‘Dead Boy Detectives’ Showrunners on the Shocks and Romance of the Season

[Editor’s note: The following contains major spoilers for Dead Boy Detectives.]

The Big Picture

• The Netflix series ‘Dead Boy Detectives’ is a spooky supernatural mystery series set in ‘The Sandman’ universe.
• The showrunners aimed for a psychedelic yet comforting story, focusing on character relationships.
• The cast chemistry was crucial, with Kirby Howell-Baptiste playing a key role, hinting at more possible crossovers in the future.

From co-showrunners Steve Yockey (The Flight Attendant) and Beth Schwartz (Arrow) and set within The Sandman universe, Netflix‘s eight-episode comic book series Dead Boy Detectives follows Edwin Payne (George Rexstrew) and Charles Rowland (Jayden Revri), ghosts who became best friends in death and have teamed up to solve mysteries that will help ghosts in limbo to be on their way. While avoiding Hell and Death (Kirby Howell-Baptiste), and getting some help from clairvoyant Crystal Palace (Kassius Nelson) and new friend Niko (Yuyu Kitamura), they must overcome their own metaphorical and actual demons in order for this duo-turned-foursome to continue to do good.

During this interview with Collider, Yockey and Schwartz talked about telling a story that feels both psychedelic and comforting, falling in love with these characters, why they chose to do a case of the week with each episode, which aspect of the comics they weren’t sure they were going to do but ultimately worked into the season, getting to bring over Death from The Sandman series, being inspired by The Hardy Boys, putting this cast together, playing with all the relationship dynamics, the importance of that declaration of love, and that final scene.

The Case-of-the-Week Format for ‘Dead Boy Detectives’ Helped Build the World Within ‘The Sandman’ Universe

Collider: What was it about this that made you guys want to have a hand in bringing this world to a TV series? When you have a world this big, is it the whole world that you just want to dive into, or do you connect with a specific character the most?

STEVE YOCKEY: The initial impetus was that I discovered these comic books at a point in my life when I was going through a personal loss and I found them to be psychedelic but comforting. When I had the opportunity at Warner Bros., coming off The Flight Attendant pilot, I was like, “If you will give me this, I promise that I will take good care of it.” Eventually, the request got to Jim Lee and Neil Gaiman and they said yes, which was a huge boon. That was my impetus. I fell in love with Charles and Edwin. I fell in love with their relationship. I fell in love with their glasses half-full look at the world, even though they’re dead. For me, it was more the attitude that I fell in love with, and then we built the rest.

BETH SCHWARTZ: Just in terms of the world building, you can’t do it all at once, or it’s overwhelming. You also have to follow the characters and what they’re doing and build the world around them, instead of just being like, “Welcome to this new, huge world.” Otherwise, it can be overwhelming.

YOCKEY: Doing a case of the week is something that Beth and I have done before on separate shows. By doing case of the week, you can use the client and the case to open up different pockets of the world, as you move through the season, a lot easier than if it was just us following Charles and Edwin and they weren’t detectives. So, that also helped.

SCHWARTZ: And we specifically wanted each case to be something completely different. That also helped, in terms of the world-building and showing what types of things are out there.

Was there anything that you knew you absolutely had to carry over from the comics, or anything that you knew you couldn’t carry over from the comics, or did you try to stay open to either of those things along the way?

YOCKEY: I think we stayed open. The thing that I thought was gonna even be totally too far for our show was Crystal’s parents. But for those people that read the comic books, we stayed creatively true to Crystal’s parents, the performance artists. We got that in.

This is set in the world of The Sandman, and you have Kirby Howell-Baptiste as Death in this. What was it like to get her to play that character? Would you want to find ways to keep bridging the two series in future episodes if you continue doing this?

SCHWARTZ: Yeah. It was amazing getting to use Kirby. Obviously, the whole show is centered around our two leads running from her. She’s their main antagonist, even though she’s so lovely. So, it was a dream for us to be able to use her in the pilot to just set the stakes for them. And yes, we would love to continue to use other characters, as long as it feels organic to our show. That’s how we come up with where a crossover could be, if it fits right into our episodes.

YOCKEY: And if Neil and Allan [Heinberg] wanted to use our characters on The Sandman, we would love that. And Kirby is fantastic. Just as an actor and as a person, it was wonderful having her on our set.

This series reminded me a little bit of the British version of Being Human because of the supernatural characters who were roommates and the mix of genres. Was that something that you thought about at all? Did you pull from any inspirations from outside of the comics?

YOCKEY: I should say yes because the American version of Being Human was Jeremy Carver, who’s a producer on our show and he’s also from Supernatural like me. And so, I’m aware of it, but we didn’t pull from it. It is tonally similar, in terms of genre. For us, the biggest reference outside of Neil Gaiman’s work was The Hardy Boys because what we essentially made is The Hardy Boys on acid. That was what we started off trying to make, and I feel like we’ve achieved that.

‘Dead Boy Detectives’ Co-Stars George Rexstrew and Jayden Revri Are Best Friends On-Screen and Off-Screen

One of the keys to the success of a series like this is the relationship dynamics and the cast chemistry. What was it like to put this cast together and see how that played out?

YOCKEY: Warner Bros. provided us with resources. It was our David [Rapaport], our casting director in L.A., but he was working with a casting director in Vancouver, one in New York, two in the UK, and one in Australia, so they cast a very wide net. We saw a lot of people. But I actually wasn’t even worried about whether it would work or not. Once we saw Jayden [Revri] and George [Rexstrew] together, I was like, “This is it.” And then, we threw Kassius [Nelson] into the mix, and we found Yuyu [Kitamura] in Hong Kong. Thank God that we cast such a wide net because the four that we ended up with because they sell it on a daily basis.

SCHWARTZ: The chemistry, specifically between the boys, what you see on screen is what is happening off-screen.

YOCKEY: They’re attached at the hip.

SCHWARTZ: They’re together all the time and they’ve become best friends. Our entire cast is just a joy to be around. They’re such hard workers and they have fun together. They’re having the time of their lives.

What was your favorite otherworldly thing that you got to create for this series?

YOCKEY: For me, it was the dandelion sprites.

SCHWARTZ: I love the Cat King and everything about him. He’s amazing.

This series has everything from talking snarky cats, to heads exploding and regenerating, to a sausage curtain in a meat shop. What was your favorite weird little detail that you could have only done on this show?

YOCKEY: Beth’s favorite detail was all the people throwing up in the gluttony scene.

SCHWARTZ: That was gross.

YOCKEY: I don’t wanna say the sprites again, but I don’t know how that lives on any other show. We wanted to make characters that were like Waldorf and Statler from The Muppet Show, like two old men in the opera box, criticizing everything on the show. Instead, we have foul-mouthed sprites in a jar. I’m thrilled with Max [Jenkins] and Caitlin [Reilly].

SCHWARTZ: Just in episode two, how they came out of her and their whole entrance into the show is amazing.

I didn’t expect to end the season liking those characters as much as I did. They’re so fun.

SCHWARTZ: Also, the animated sequences were hard to do and make it feel so natural to the show.

YOCKEY: I have to say that Warner Bros. Animation really knocked that out of the park because we asked them to do very different styles and we were working on a budget, and they really came through in the most beautiful way. Both the animated sequences in the season are pretty gorgeous.

One of my unexpectedly favorite aspects of the season is Jenny and her butcher shop. How much fun was she to weave in, making comments, chopping up meat, and having a date that goes horribly wrong? What was that like to work into everything?

YOCKEY: When I was developing the idea, the studio actually said, “You know what this show needs? It needs that adult character who brings in a different perspective.” And I was like, “You want an adult character? Okay, great.” And I created Jenny. I worked with [Briana Cuoco] on The Flight Attendant. She had a small role, but she just killed it. She was so deadpan funny. When I was writing the role of Jenny the Butcher, I was like, “I really want Bree to play this.” And then, she came in and knocked it out of the park. She just is so good at that dark deadpan thing, and Jenny is so much fun because she has no belief or hope in humanity at all. That’s a really fun adult character to have with a bunch of dead kids who actually have more hope than she does. It’s a good mix.

SCHWARTZ: And also, she obviously has a soft spot for these girls that she’s taken in but won’t admit it. It’s fun because she doesn’t want to get involved in the drama, but then she does get involved. She also grows throughout the season, letting people in slightly until it blows up in her face.

There’s so much to love about these characters and the relationships and the feelings that they have for each other. We get to see Charles and Crystal, we get fun moments between Edwin and the Cat King, and Edwin and Monte, and Edwin telling Charles that he’s in love with him. There are all these great little moments, and the only complaint that I would have about any of that is that I would love more of all of it. How did you decide how much of that to give us? And if you continue with a second season, will we get more of that relationship stuff?

YOCKEY: If we get to continue, yes, we will do more. The great thing about the love rhombus that we’ve created, or about the relationships, is that none of those relationships can possibly work in the long term, and yet they’re still trying anyway.

SCHWARTZ: And that is relatable to a lot of us, whether we’re teenagers or older. But yeah, we would love to continue with these characters. If we’re so lucky to get a Season 2, we set up the finale where the whole group has shifted again, so they’d have to re-figure out who the agency is back in London.

That Declaration of Love Between ‘Dead Boy Detectives’ Edwin and Charles Was Always Planned That Way

It was such a particularly beautiful moment between Edwin and Charles, with Edwin telling Charles that he’s in love with him, and Charles’ reaction. Was there an evolution of that moment? Did that moment change at all? Did you guys always know what you wanted that to be?

YOCKEY: My intent was always that. We were always heading towards that, in that moment. It was always gonna be in episode seven, it was always gonna be in Hell, and it was always gonna have that Orpheus and Eurydice joke in it. I’m really happy with the performance aspects of it because in my mind, it was such a little gem of a moment. Charles gives the answer that every gay man hopes his best friend would give him, but you never know how it’s gonna be realized. I think Richard Speight did a beautiful job directing that moment and I think the boys both delivered in spades.

What can you say about the final scene and what’s going on it that igloo?

SCHWARTZ: Well, Niko is somewhere and the sprites are with her. If we get to do more episodes, she will have a long journey if she’s gonna try to get back to the boys.

YOCKEY: Yuyu did a beautiful job bringing Niko to life.

SCHWARTZ: And her comedic timing is fantastic.

YOCKEY: The way she delivers a line is hysterical. Her timing is just A+.

Dead Boy Detectives is available to stream on Netflix. Check out the trailer:

Watch on Netflix