Netflix Users Are Obsessed With A Hereditary Star's New Psychological Thriller Series

It's a good day to be a Toni Collette fan: she stars in a new miniseries, "Wayward," which was released on Netflix Wednesday. The series stars Mae Martin as Alex Dempsey, a young police officer investigating some mysterious happenings in a small town. It also stars Collette as Evelyn, the women who is almost certainly causing all those mysterious happenings. In the trailer alone Collette is already unsettling, but you'll have to watch the show to understand how strange she gets.

The series currently has a 73% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, about the same as Netflix's breakout miniseries "Sirens" from earlier this year. It's been praised by fans for Collette's intense performance, and for its multiple LGBTQ+ cast members and characters. Alex Dempsey, the series' main character, is a trans man written with all the depth and focus you'd expect of a cis male lead. It's a fresh choice for any TV show, but it's especially nice to see from Netflix, a streaming platform that hasn't always done right by the trans community over the years.

"Wayward on netflix was so good [I] binged the whole thing lol," wrote one X user the day after the series dropped. Over on Bluesky, author Anna Kirtlan had a lot of love for the show's 2003 setting: "Came for Toni Collette being creepy AF, staying for the nostalgia." Film critic David Opie posted on X, "As someone who'd happily join a cult led by Toni Collette, I really enjoyed #Wayward." He noted the show was "a little uneven," but praised its "great twists," "weirdo vibe," and its "very strong cast."

Paste Magazine's Lacy Baugher Milas describes Collette's character as a "mesmerizing cult leader" in her review, writing:

"You likely won't be surprised to learn that it's a role that seems tailor-made for Collette's immense talents, nor that the character she's playing is something more than she initially seems. Yet, much like the show itself, the seemingly villainous Evelyn is strangely fascinating, compelling in a way that's difficult to look away from and hard to pin down."

The accolades from critics are reminiscent of the praise for Collette's "Hereditary" character Annie, a mother wracked with grief and not handling it in the healthiest of ways. "Wayward" is not getting quite the same amount of buzz as "Hereditary," a movie that was praised as a masterpiece from the moment it premiered at Sundance, but it's still been commended for giving Collette another opportunity to show off her talents. 

Collette herself found her "Wayward" role to be "intimidating," but not in a bad way. As she explained in a recent interview: "I kind of gravitate towards things that I find intimidating, and it ended up just being the best experience ... The scripts were so good. I look for ... originality and a healthy challenge, and this just gave that in spades. And I think it's a robust, timely story about fighting for your right to be you."