TV show’s dark turn: ‘Oh, no, we’re burying a body’

FIRST tagged as a Gen Y version of Nancy Drew, this darkly funny series has taken a much, much darker turn.

IF THERE’S one advantage to having seen Search Party’s first season months after the US is that Aussies didn’t have to wait as long for season two.

Streaming now on SBS On Demand and airing on Monday nights on SBS Viceland, the clever mystery series about a group of twenty-somethings looking for a missing girl has taken a dark turn in its return after the shocking twist in the closing moments of season one.

You only have to look at the series’ promotional posters to see the difference. The first instalment was marketed as a millennial (an Americanism to be sure, but one we can no longer fight) Nancy Drew-esque mystery. Season two’s posters are clearly an homage to Alfred Hitchcock movies, signalling the series’ new tone.

SBS has even classified the series as “drama” — don’t worry, it’s still awkwardly hilarious.

Spot the difference — from season one to two.

The darkly funny series picks up seconds from where it left off with Dory and her friends trying to hide a dead body. The show has morphed from a sometimes-light “aren’t young people ridiculous” satire to something with a sharper, more macabre edge.

“I like it even more than season one and I can’t believe I’m saying that,” Meredith Hagner told news.com.au. Hagner is the actor behind Portia, the pampered friend whose self-centred narcissism makes her the perfect symbol of millennial entitlement that older generations groan about.

“It’s shifted from when mistakes go from ‘oh, no, my job is difficult’ to ‘oh, no, we’re burying a body’,” she said. “I definitely felt a little more pressure [going into season two] and I think that is a good thing.

“I don’t know if it was pressure as much as excitement because the tone shifted so we were all like, ‘OK, I hope we can pull this off’. We had to trust the writing. After we shot the first two episodes, it felt really good, really fun.”

Hagner, who’s in a relationship with Wyatt Russell, son of Kurt and Goldie, has spent the last year or so appearing in several projects tagged with a millennial slant — Ingrid Goes West, Strangers, Younger — to the point that US media has labelled her the millennial “"It" girl”. At 30, the former soap actor isn’t too worried about the typecasting as long as she gets to work with great directors, though, ‘If I’m still doing the same thing in 10 years, then I probably would be”.

Hagner with co-stars Alia Shawkat and John Early.

One of Hagner’s challenges is to humanise Portia, a character that could so easily descend into caricature. That she manages to imbue humanity and complexity into Portia is a testament to both Hagner and Search Party’s writers.

“People who are terrible, like someone you overhear at brunch, aren’t generally a terrible person,” Hagner said as a way of explaining how she views her most recognisable role. “They have terrible behaviours or they are a product of a time that has not brought out the best in them — a product of entitlement, image and technology-obsessed and all the things we associate with millennials.

“But actually, is that really that person? That’s how I feel about Portia. I have so much empathy for her as a person. I never want to make fun of her.

“It’s very important for me to bring out what makes her human and separate her from all the qualities that, at times, make her reprehensible. There’s such a presentational aspect to her — you see her perform socially but then she’s a different person when she’s talking to her mother or when you see grapple with what she’s done and who she is.”

Search Party season two is streaming on SBS On Demand and airs on SBS Viceland on Monday nights at 10.30pm.

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