Sweet Tooth Season 3 Review – An uneven but bittersweet ending

Episode Guide

Episode 1 -| Review Score – 3/5
Episode 2 -| Review Score – 3.5/5
Episode 3 -| Review Score – 3.5/5
Episode 4 -| Review Score – 3.5/5
Episode 5 -| Review Score – 3.5/5
Episode 6 -| Review Score – 3.5/5
Episode 7 -| Review Score – 3.5/5
Episode 8 -| Review Score – 3.5/5

When Sweet Tooth dropped on Netflix back in 2021, it carved itself a lovely little slice of post-apocalyptic pie. Chock full of deliciously crafted worldbuilding, lovable characters and a good deal of depth, the show took a simple premise and absolutely run with it. On paper, the idea of moving a person from A to B across a wasteland is not new, and it’s certainly a bold choice to take that same premise that made stories like The Last Of Us so endearing and tweaking slightly to include more hybrids and different human factions.

One of the more menacing came from The Last Men, led by the General. An instantly iconic man lusting for war, this Dr Robotnik looking foe made a big impression, which carried across to season 2, which continued our characters’ journey until a climactic final that set everything up for the third and final instalment in this show.

For those unaware, season 2 ends with The General dead and a new antagonist picking up the reigns. Ms. Zhang and her cronies are hot on Gus’ trail, while our little Sweet Tooth is dead-set on fixing the world and reuniting with his mother, Birdie, who’s still alive and up in Alaska working on a cure.

Season 3 tries to rekindle that same plot that made season 1 so endearing, adding in a road trip, while blending in some ideas of season 2. In the process, it simplifies everything to a pretty disappointing degree. Don’t get me wrong, the show has a decent conclusion but the final 8 episodes here certainly leave a lot to be desired.

We’ll try to be as spoiler-free here as possible but here are some glaring character issues that absolutely need to be addressed. The most interesting part of Zhang’s entourage stem from her daughters, Ginger and Rosie. Ginger is pregnant and expecting a child, which Zhang is worried will be a hybrid child.

Rosie however, is the outsider. She already has children and has begrudgingly returned to the colony for security. However, there are clear tensions between both characters. This builds to fever pitch… and then it’s never explored. You’re constantly expecting Rosie or Zhang to pull the trigger but instead, we get a built arc that doesn’t really have a good pay-off.

The plot also over-simplifies the conclusion to involve a cave and Gus as the “keys to save the world” and it kinda undermines a lot of the themes that made this show so endearing to begin with. There’s not much nuance or grey areas like we’ve seen in the past, and there’s a “twist” by one character that you’ll see coming a mile off too, and it’s not particularly well disguised either.

The other characters in the show do well with the material they’re given, but again a lot of what’s here is so very simple and lacks the bigger character development we’ve seen in previous seasons. We get several stops along the way that almost feel like bottle episodes in themselves and although they’re nice journeys, they almost feel like padding at times.

Take the first stop in episode 1 for example. Our group meet a bunch of old people living in a casino and they have a ton of resources. Our group need supplies and outnumber the “Bingo Bandits” so they play a game with them for the resources and then leave. It’s an unsatisfying bit that does little beyond gaining some information when a more interesting question to be explored could be “Should we steal supplies and prevent these guys from hoarding?”

Perhaps we’re reading too much into this but there are numerous examples like this throughout the season that are left untapped.

Will all that being said, the third season is a fun watch. It’s not bad but it’s certainly a steep downward turn in quality compared to what we’ve seen before. The tension is lacking, perhaps partly due to Zhang’s diminished threat, and the issues here just feel so simplified and underdeveloped. There’s no morally ambiguous drama we’ve come to expect and the characters don’t have a whole lot to work with. Thankfully, the emotionally stirring conclusion does help but Sweet Tooth could have been so much sweeter.

You Can Check Out More Of Our TV Show Reviews Here!