The OA Part 2 Gets Trailer, Premiere Date
Get ready to jump into another dimension with The OA.
Netflix dropped a trailer for Part II of its mind-bending sci-fi/fantasy series this morning on its official YouTube Channel. The spot also served as an announcement for the release date of the next batch of episodes: March 22.
Released in 2016, The OA was created by star Brit Marling and collaborator Zal Batmanglij, who had teamed up in the past for the feature films Sound of My Voice (2011), Another Earth (2011), and The East (2013). The series focuses on a woman named Prairie Johnson (Marling), who returns to her adoptive parents after going missing for seven years. She's not quite the same, however; blind before her disappearance, she can now see, and also sports mysterious scars on her back and refuses to go by her name, insisting that she is now called "The OA." Through flashbacks, we learn that she was born in Russia under the name Nina Azarov, and was blinded in an accident during which she had a near-death experience. After the death of her father, she was adopted by Americans Nancy and Abel Johnson, but was plagued by dreams indicating that her father may still be alive. Running away to attempt to find him on her 21st birthday, she instead encountered a mysterious scientist named "Hap," who held her captive — along with four others who had also had NDE's — in the belief that the five of them may be the key to traveling to an alternate dimension.
After her escape and return home, she assembles another group of five (including herself) who have had near-death experiences, teaching them techniques she had learned while in captivity that she believes will allow them to "jump" into another reality, so that she can rescue her former fellow captives.
Whether or not her "jump" was successful was left ambiguous at the end of the first season, but in the new spot, it's shown that it was — and OA finds herself in a strange new world in which she is living a life far different from her previous one. There's also a new interested party in this alternate dimension: a private investigator who may be friend or foe. OA starts to piece together connections between events of her previous life and her new one, but even as the puzzle pieces begin to fall into place, nefarious forces may be working against her, as the spot concludes with OA once again captive, and taking part against her will in some kind of experiment which may hold the key to Hap's master plan.
While the first season of The OA wasn't exactly a breakout hit for Netflix, it was an engaging and challenging watch, and Part II looks like more of the same in the best possible way. The series has earned comparisons — both favorable and otherwise — to Stranger Things, which was a breakout hit and debuted the same year; it could be argued quite effectively, though, that The OA sports a decidedly more inventive premise while trafficking in a similar otherworldly, dimension-hopping vibe.
Marling implied as much in an Instagram post last year, in response to fan queries about what the heck was taking so long for the new batch of episodes to be completed. "TV shows are created on a yearly cycle primarily because they function off a pattern narrative," she explained. "The show creator acts as a master tailor — she crafts the pattern for the original garment (pilot). Then other great tailors come in and create new garments out of this same pattern. This allows for creation with great speed and also familiarity, which is one of the things we all love about great TV."
"The OA is vastly different, however," she continued. "Our chapters vary in length, scope, and even genre. There is no pattern. As a result, at every step along the way nothing can be imitated, it has to be invented."
This seems a somewhat roundabout way of saying that really awesome things take time, and Part II of The OA certainly looks like it will expand on the promise shown by its first season. Here's the official synopsis (via Collider): "The 'mind-bending' story returns with The OA Part II, which follows OA as she navigates a new dimension, one in which she had a completely different life as a Russian heiress, and one in which she once again finds herself as Hap's captive. Part II introduces Karim Washington, a private detective tasked with finding a missing teen, Michelle Vu. His path crosses with OA, as they try to solve the mystery of Michelle's whereabouts and a house on Nob Hill connected to the disappearance of several teenagers. Meanwhile, back in the first dimension, BBA, Angie and the boys find themselves on a journey to understand the truth behind OA's story and the incredible realities she described."
If you're a fan, get pumped; if not, now might be a good time to catch up on the first season. Check out the new trailer above, and the official poster for Part II below.
