Search Party’s creators explain 2022’s first bonkers TV twist

polygon.com:

Each season of HBO Max’s Search Party is full of unexpected turns — the season 1 finale is an all-time great twist, but season 3’s pivot to legal drama and season 4’s Misery-esque plotline were impossible to predict, given the show’s relatively simple premise. Somehow, the straightforward comedy-thriller about Dory Sief (Alia Shawkat) and her friends’ search for their missing college friend Chantal (Clare McNulty) has become a vehicle for all kinds of TV.

In its fifth and final season, all 10 episodes of which hit the streaming service in January, Search Party goes out with a hell of a bang — one that’s hard to believe until you see it for yourself.

[Ed. note: Major spoilers for the final season of Search Party follow.]

Most of Search Party season 5 is about a cult. Dory Sief, having died for 37 seconds in the previous season finale, has come to believe that she’s discovered true enlightenment. As she shares her insights on social media, she gains a passionate following and recruits other influencers to her cause. Eventually, with the help of tech mogul Tunnel Quinn, Dory sets a goal for her cult: creating a pill that will give everyone who takes it the same enlightenment she has. Unfortunately, that pill is what kicks off the honest-to-God zombie apocalypse.

There’s no walking it back, either: The world as we know it in Search Party really does end, albeit comedically. And the show’s final moments are of its cast going about life in post-apocalyptic Brooklyn. So naturally, we wanted to talk to showrunners Sarah-Violet Bliss and Charles Rogers about how Search Party ended the world.

So let’s get to it right away: When did you know you were doing a zombie apocalypse?

Sarah-Violet Bliss: In season 4, when we were