Locke & Key Creators Tease “Darker” Season 2

At long last, Locke & Key has finally returned to Netflix. The second season of the beloved IDW adaptation returns viewers to Keyhouse for more adventures with Tyler, Kinsey, and Bode Locke, but this installment of the series may seem a little different than the first. This new season not only takes the story to bigger places, it also gets a lot darker. ComicBook.com recently sat down with creators Carlton Cuse and Meredith Averill to discuss what fans can expect and how the creative team approached a second season.

“I think just how do we beat Season 1. How to we keep turning it up,” Averill told us. “I think that our characters are all maturing and I think our show matured with them. Season 2 feels kind of richer, and a bit darker. That’s not to say that there isn’t Savini Squad fun to be had, and the kids having fun with the keys and discovering new keys and the wish fulfillment of them. But it’s also a lot darker because we’ve raised the stakes in every way and everything is just so much more heightened.”

One of the ways in which the show gets more mature, potentially even darker this time around is in its exploration of getting older. We learned in Season 1 that adults don’t remember the magic of the keys or the experiences they had with them, essentially losing out on many of their fondest memories. Tyler is now on the verge of being an adult, and it’s starting to weigh on him that he won’t share the same bond with his siblings for very long.

“That’s one of our big thematics, this whole issue of what does it mean to grow up and what are the consequences of growing up,” said Cuse. “And that’s something that very much plays out for our characters this year, particularly for Kinsey and Tyler.”

Season 1 of Locke & Key showed fans that the Netflix series will incorporate major pieces of Joe Hill and Gabriel Rodriguez’s comic series, but that it is also very much its own show with its own story. We see that solo identity even more in Season 2, but it was still important for the creative team to keep everything rooted in the books.

“I think it’s just kind of an intuitive process that Meredith and I oversee with the other writers. There are certain elements and certain story points that we love in the comics and we want to get to, but our story is its own thing,” Cuse explained. “And as Joe Hill said, a literal adaptation would be incredibly boring. Joe and Gabriel have been very wonderful collaborators and support the idea that this series is its own thing. It’s based on their work but it has its own evolution and its own organic journey. We listen to the show and follow the show and included in that are elements from the comics, but for us it’s its own creation.”

Speaking of creation, Season 2 of Locke & Key is going to take a pretty significant dive into the origins of the keys, explaining who was behind them and how they came to be.

“This season we are delving into the origin of the keys, how the keys were made, who made the first key, what was the first key, why was it made,” Averill said. “We’re going to tell all those stories, which are really exciting.”

Season 2 of Locke & Key is now streaming on Netflix.