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The first season of Channel Zero comes to an end in the US on November 15 but producer/writer Nick Antosca has just completed filming on the second season in Canada. As he prepared to fly back to the US, he set the scene for the finale and discussed the show’s reception with Paul Simpson…

NB: There are major spoilers here for the first three episodes of Candle Cove; spoilers for unaired episodes in the UK are indicated.

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How is the second season looking?

Great. There should be a teaser airing after the finale tomorrow. We’ve had a great cast, a great director – I’m really excited about it. It’s super cool, it feels very different from the first season but has some of the same style of horror in terms of suspense.

What do you feel you learned from the first season that you’ve applied to the second year, particularly in terms of the response you’ve had from the audience?

Fortunately I think people responded to the kind of horror that we’re trying to do, which is very psychological and suspenseful, and that was really good to see in terms of our approach when we go back into the editing room for season 2. Certainly the aesthetic we were going for all along was one we wanted to preserve and take it further.

In every episode of season 1 there have been real shocks as we’ve gone along; no character has been safe; no situation has been unquestionable – is that how you hoped the audience would treat the show?

Yeah. We only have six episodes so it’s important that they all feel important from a character perspective and a story perspective. There has to be something pivotal in every one. You have to finish each episode feeling like, “whoa, everything is different now, I’ve learned something or seen something that changes the story fundamentally”.

When you rewatch episode 1 now you’re surprised that we got to where we are at the end of episode 5 from there… and yet the path has felt organic.

Great. I’m glad to hear you say that. It’s a challenge in the sense that you want to make promises to the audience and fulfil them and at the same time surprise them. In a genre story the audience has expectations of what they’re going to see, and you want to subvert their expectations while still telling a satisfying story.

Are there any twists you wish you’d done earlier or later, particularly in terms of the reveals about the characters?

No, I don’t think there’s anything I would have changed.

It’s interesting you ask that because obviously that was an ongoing conversation in the writers’ room and even in editing where certain things would be revealed. Early on in the story when I pitched the outline of the season, there was some questions from the studio and the network, who were very supportive all the way through. They initially wanted me to hold back the reveal that Mike had killed his brother until the end of the season, so a reveal in the fifth or sixth episodes that it was Mike who killed Eddie. That’s maybe how you could do this, but given that we were trying to be very psychological in our exploration of character, it wouldn’t give us much opportunities to play with the character’s psychology. It was a reveal that was much more surprising in episode 2 than it would be in episode 5 or 6.

Another thing that changed was that originally we didn’t reveal that Mrs Booth was the villainess until the end of episode 3 – there was no explicit reveal that, “oh shit, something is up with this woman”, until she cut Daphne’s throat, so that was a big shock. Then in editing we put in the scene where she’s feeding the Tooth Child at the end of episode 2 so you knew by that point she was up to no good. When Daphne goes into her house at the end of episode 3 you know now that something bad is going to happen. I felt it made that scene stronger to do a Hitchcockian version where you know this woman is dangerous rather than, “oh my God!” when she cuts her throat.

[SPOILER FOR EPISODE 5] Was the intention always that Mike had got to go into Candle Cove?

Yes. This is just personal preference but I don’t like big twists in the final episode. To me once you’re in the last episode of your season or your show you should know how the table is set so you can spend the time exploring character, or resolving character stories and not have to worry about pulling the rug out from under your audience. You should be doing character or psychological work in the final episode. That’s why we revealed in episode 5 that Eddie was the source of Candle Cove so that going into episode 6, we’ve set the table for the final confrontation.

[SPOILER END] And is the story, as far as it can be, resolved, or are there elements left so that we could go back to whichever of these characters survive?

I think that there’s a resolution. It’s a story that’s structured to be told as a self contained story; there isn’t a cliff-hanger at the end where we have to return to this. I want the season to feel like we’ve told a complete story and it’s satisfying.

You might want to go back because you like the characters and the world, and it’s not impossible that we could tell another story in the world with these characters, but each season should feel like a complete story.

Are there any links apart from the Channel Zero branding between seasons 1 and 2?

No, just the sensibility behind them, and the fact that they’re all based on creepypastas. There are no character threads that continue from season to season.

Was there a temptation during Season 2 to have a Stephen King-esque shout out to the events of Season 1?

Yes! And there are some Easter eggs from season to season, but they’re completely inessential to the story. They’re just fun.

What’s been the most surprising reaction you’ve had from viewers or critics to the story?

I didn’t expect the overwhelmingly positive response; I thought most people would think this is a very strange and difficult to get into show. We weren’t going for mass appeal and I’m really pleased that most people that have watched it mostly seem to have really liked it.

The most surprising thing is the constant comparisons to Stranger Things which is a show that I like, but other than the fact that it involves kids and part of it is that we have flashbacks to the 1980s, I don’t really feel a lot of parallels. Nostalgia is the word that comes up in reviews comparing the two: I don’t think Candle Cove is very nostalgic: it presents a fairly nihilistic view of childhood and it’s pretty grim. I understand where the comparisons come from but I did not expect those.

With both shows, they feel that they have their roots in the same area that King mined in It.

Yes.

There’s something about that book that continues to resonate now as much as it did when it came out – that going back into your childhood and having to face the reality of it as opposed to what we’ve tried to draw a veil over. Candle Cove doesn’t let you; neither does It; neither does Stranger Things…

Yeah, I think the comparisons between It and Candle Cove are very legitimate. I think that Stephen King thread that runs from Candle Cove to It to Stranger Things is a real thing and actually is speaking to the fact that Stephen King has had a huge influence ion our culture and a whole generation of readers and writers.

A friend of mine used to say, “if you have a good idea, write it right now because otherwise sooner or later Stephen King is going to write it”. I think it’s true: when I sat down to break this season and write the arc of it, it didn’t occur to me that it was similar to It. It was only once we were a little bit down the road, I realised it was the same basic concept of people who go back to confront a childhood evil.

What’s next for you now that season 2 has wrapped filming – straight into postproduction?

Yes, what’s next is editing, go back to the States, take a week or so off then Steven Piet, who’s the director of season 2 and I are going to spend a couple of months in the editing room and get it where it needs to be.

When’s it expected on air?

2017 – I don’t have the dates yet, but the latest would be in October. We’ll figure out the exact date in the couple of months.

Channel Zero: Candle Cove concludes on Syfy US on November 15; the series continues with episode 4 (of 6) on 5Star in the UK on November 21. Thanks to Michelle Marron for her help in organising this interview.