Netflix’s 2022 hit show Wednesday soared to the highest heights, and left fans desperately wanting more. The eponymous character herself, Wednesday Addams, has been heralded as a queer icon, and has long stood as the symbol of uniqueness and self-love in a world that strives for conformity and sameness. The Netflix series took this one step even further with her introduction to Nevermore, the school for misfit and outcast children.
There is a range of cool abilities found in the children at Nevermore, from Siren songs that can control people’s actions, to Gorgons that turn people to stone, from a pack of werewolves to a boy whose artwork comes to life out of the page. And Wednesday herself possesses visions that warn her of dangerous events on the horizon, which become increasingly more intense and unpredictable as the series goes on. But no one knows about her visions at first, which begs the question, how did she end up at Nevermore?
The academy is very strict on the admittance of both its students, and staff, a point which is made very clear by the presence of Miss Thornhill, the botanist teacher who is later revealed to be the villain Laurel Gates. Christina Ricci rejoins the Addams Family in Wednesday to play the botanist teacher, who is pointedly made to seem significant because she is the first 'normie' teacher in the Academy's history. Yet, with no apparent powers at the time, Wednesday was still allowed into this school for the gifted.
It is explained in the first episode of the show that she has made her way through several ‘typical’ secondary schools, all of which she has been expelled from, and subsequently, Nevermore is her last hope. Her parents hope that the academy will finally be somewhere that she fits in and finds like-minded peers, despite the fact that they all have growing powers to contend with, whilst Wednesday, according to everyone else at the time, has nothing of the sort.
It is possible that she could have been admitted into the school on the presumptuous basis that she would eventually develop powers, and that she was just perhaps a late bloomer. Her mother, Morticia, has powerful visions, and attended Nevermore herself at Wednesday’s age. As well as Morticia and Thing, her father, Gomez, has displayed no powers thus far in the Netflix rendition of the show, but is canonically known to be able to walk up walls and ceilings, and have a high pain threshold as he sleeps on a bed of nails in the original Addams Family universe.
The fact that he too attended Nevermore suggests that he must be a member of the supernatural in some form or another, and therefore it would be easy to assume that Wednesday would also be. The same is true for her colorful and bubbly room-mate Enid, who is able to produce claws, but is unable to fully transition into werewolf form until she does so in the season 1 finally, in order to protect Wednesday from the Hyde that is trying to kill her.
Wednesday may have been admitted to the school purely based on the impressiveness of her family lineage. Whether she has powers or not, the Addams family is notorious among the supernatural community, and therefore would likely have both the political and the monetary sway to be able to buy her a way in, even if she is seemingly a ‘normie’. Coming from a family of powerful influence like that, it is likely that there are many doors open to Wednesday that some of her classmates would never have the opportunity to go through.
And of course, it helps that Morticia and Principal Weems, the headmaster of the school, have a close personal history as well, though whether this is one formed of friendly rivalry or out-and-out jealousy is hard to say. When Wednesday challenges authority, breaks Nevermore rules, sets the town statue of Joseph Cragstone on fire, and nearly gets two of her closest friends killed, she is given more chances than most, namely because of her mother’s friendship with Weems (played by Gwendolyn Christie, who hints at a Season 2 return for her character).
Luckily for Wednesday, her visions are in fact present throughout the duration of the show, and guide her to several very dangerous but very important discoveries, including her psychic connection with her ancestor Goody Addams, and the revelation of who the monster is (which of course turns out to be Tyler Galpin, the one boy she decided to trust.) It’s clear that Wednesday belongs there, especially when she saves Nevermore Academy and all of its students from destruction at the hands of the reincarnated supernatural hater Cragstone himself, and with a Season 2 officially renewed by Netflix, it is clear that she has more adventures ahead.