Lockwood & Co. is a British supernatural detective thriller television series developed by Joe Cornish for Netflix based on the book series by Jonathan Stroud. Consisting of eight episodes, it premiered on 27 January 2023. It follows the plots of the first two books, The Screaming Staircase and The Whispering Skull. In May 2023, the series was cancelled after one season.
Contents
Premise
In an alternate version of present-day Britain, ghosts, known as visitors, have been rising from their graves for the past 50 years. Because of this phenomenon, known as "The Problem", technological advances have stopped; for example, there is no internet and people still use cassette recorders.
Most adults (over the age of 20) do not possess the ability to see or sense ghosts, unlike children. So youths have been organised into licensed ghost-hunting agencies to detect and dispose of threats. Lucy Carlyle, a psychically gifted teenager, runs away from home and comes to London, in the hope of catching on at an agency. Running out of options, she applies for a job at a tiny outfit run by two boys in an old townhouse: Lockwood & Co.
Cast and characters
Main
Ruby Stokes as Lucy Carlyle, a highly talented "Listener"—someone who can hear supernatural sounds and voices. She is also gifted with "touch". Pressed into ghost-hunting by her mother, she was unjustly made the scapegoat by her former supervisor in her former agency, Jacobs & Co., for a tragedy that killed four colleagues and left her best friend "ghost locked".
Cameron Chapman as Anthony Lockwood, proprietor of Lockwood & Co., London's newest psychic investigations agency and the only one with no adult supervisors. Orphaned at a young age, he is the owner of 35 Portland Row, the Lockwood family residence, which serves as the agency’s office and home to its three members.
Ali Hadji-Heshmati as George Karim, Lockwood's friend and the agency's head of research. Shy, but highly intelligent, he was fired from the prestigious Fittes agency for asking too many questions about "the Problem". In the book, the character was named George Cubbins. An excellent cook, he also serves as unofficial head chef at Portland Row.
Recurring
Ivanno Jeremiah as Inspector Montagu Barnes, an official at the Department for Psychical Research and Control (DEPRAC), which regulates agency work and responds to paranormal incidents
Jack Bandeira as Quill Kipps, the top agent at Fittes, charged with solving its most dangerous cases. He is a longtime rival of Lockwood's
Rhianna Dorris as Kat Godwin, a member of Kipps's elite team and effectively his second-in-command
Paddy Holland as Bobby Vernon, a young researcher on Kipps's team whose grasp of the Problem is almost as good as George's
Rico Vina as Ned Shaw, the fourth member of Kipps's team
Bronwyn James as Sergeant Wade, Barnes's hardline deputy
Louise Brealey as Pamela Joplin, a driven researcher at Sweet Dreams Excavations whose job is to identify potentially haunted gravesites. This character in the book series was named Albert Joplin and reportedly looked very similar to George
Guest
Lily Newmark as Norrie White, Lucy's best friend and colleague at her first agency, who is "ghost-locked" (which is something similar to being trapped in a coma) after the tragedy
Andrew Woodall as Jacobs, the alcoholic proprietor of Jacobs & Co., Lucy's first agency
Sandra Huggett as Mrs. Carlyle, Lucy's uncaring mother
Ishtar Currie-Wilson as Annabel "Annie" Ward, a British actress who disappeared in the 1980s
Sharon Morgan as Mrs. Hope, the owner of the estate Lucy and Lockwood accidentally set fire to during a case
Saverio Buono as Hugo Blake, an actor suspected of Annabel's murder
Nigel Planer as Sir John Fairfax, an industrialist who has made millions from the global demand for iron as a means of repelling ghosts. He is later found out to be the murderer of Annie Ward
Lily Nichol as Ellie, Fairfax's assistant, a former agent
Morven Christie as Penelope Fittes, enigmatic head of the Fittes agency and the public face of Britain's ghost-hunting effort
Jeff Rawle as Sebastian Saunders, Joplin's business partner at Sweet Dreams Excavations
Saskia Axten as Genevieve, a Sensitive employed by Sweet Dreams
Michael Clarke as the Skull, a ghost contained in a secure jar George stole from the Fittes agency, now kept at Portland Row
Amanda Abbington as Marissa Fittes, Penelope's mother; the late founder of the Fittes agency and Britain's most famous ghost hunter. (In the book, it is later revealed that she and Penelope are one and the same)
Production
Development
In 2017 it was announced that Nira Park and Rachael Prior had optioned the rights to Jonathan Stroud's Lockwood & Co. book series while at Big Talk Productions. In 2019 they left Big Talk to set up Complete Fiction Pictures and produced the TV series under their new banner. On 19 May 2020 it was announced that Complete Fiction was working with Netflix to develop the series, and Joe Cornish was set to helm and executive produce the series. In December 2020, Netflix officially gave an eight-episode series order to Lockwood & Co. Cornish served as lead writer and director. Park, Prior, and Cornish served as executive producers. William McGregor was also involved in directing several episodes. Ed Hime, Kara Smith, and Joy Wilkinson were the writers.
Casting
The cast was confirmed in March 2022 with Ruby Stokes, Cameron Chapman and Ali Hadji-Heshmati set to star alongside Ivanno Jeremiah, Luke Treadaway and Morven Christie. Also joining the cast were Jack Bandeira, Ben Crompton, Hayley Konadu, Rhianna Dorris and Paddy Holland.
Filming
Filming began on 5 July 2021 in London. A house on Claremont Square in Islington was chosen for the exterior shots of 35 Portland Row, with the interiors of the house constructed as sets at Ealing Studios. Filming occurred at the Kensal Green Cemetery in late October 2021. Scenes at haunted "Combe Carey Hall" for episode 3 were shot at Mentmore Towers in Buckinghamshire and the part of the series set in Lucy's unidentified hometown was filmed in Chipping Campden in Gloucestershire. The series wrapped on 15 March 2022.
Music
Cornish chose to include in the series songs relying on early goth rock from the repertoire of Bauhaus, the Cure, Siouxsie and the Banshees and This Mortal Coil. Journalist Matthew Mahler noted: "The score seems [...] to create a truly supernatural aural palette."
Of the music, Cornish said: "We went back to a lot of post-punk, [...] music like Siouxsie and the Banshees and The Cure and Bauhaus that have this kind of romantic, doom-laden spookiness to them, and they feel very analog [...] They feel alive, they feel haunted, and they have a terrific, beautiful melancholy to them. We had a playlist very early on of those tracks of Bauhaus and Siouxsie and The Cure". Many of the bands are referenced in posters in characters' rooms.
Reception
Critical reception
The review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes reported a 100% approval rating based on 14 critic reviews and an average rating of 8.00/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "A paranormal procedural steered by writer-producer Joe Cornish's usual deft hand, Lockwood & Co. is a fun-filled adventure carried off with sprightly charm." Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned a score of 76 out of 100 based on 8 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".
Leila Latif of The Guardian wrote: "Lockwood and Co is a delight, with a level of intelligence and respect for its source material, its characters and its audience." Writing in Empire, Boyd Hilton said: "Forget the YA label; this is an addictive, sophisticated supernatural thriller which will keep cynical old duffers entertained throughout." Naming it one of Variety's Best Netflix Shows of 2023, Kate Arthur wrote: "Well-acted, atmospheric, inventive and creepy, 'Lockwood & Co.' effectively set up a world ripe for more seasons."
Audience viewership
Lockwood & Co. featured in the Netflix global top 10s for 3 weeks between 22 January and 12 February, picking up 79.91 million hours. It reached Netflix's Global Top #1 Show spot in its second week on the platform, holding the number one spot in 18 countries. Over the first half of 2023, the show ranked fourth among Netflix UK's original shows, with 113 million hours viewed, and 80th globally among all Netflix titles.
Cancellation
On May 12, 2023, Stroud and Complete Fiction Picture announced that the series had been cancelled. Variety added that the "viewing numbers didn't meet the threshold to greenlight a second season". Fans expressed their disappointment on social media, and some publications criticized Netflix's habit of prematurely cancelling series, especially young adult-related and fantasy-related ones.