Season 1: "Homecoming"
| Season 1 | |
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[Season 1 Promotional Art]
"Fear has two meanings. The choice is yours."
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| Subtitle | Homecoming |
|---|---|
| Episodes | 10 |
| Premiere | March 2019 |
| Finale | May 2019 |
| Primary Antagonist | The Wendigo |
| Showrunner | Jesse Alexander |
Season 1, subtitled "Homecoming," is the first and only produced season of Tales from Nowhere. Consisting of ten episodes, the season follows Abigail Jimenez Fleming as she arrives in the mysterious town of Nowhere, West Virginia and discovers both the community's supernatural secrets and her own forgotten past.
Despite positive critical reception and a dedicated fanbase, Tales from Nowhere has been on an unexplained hiatus since Season 1. Three additional seasons were planned. See The Hiatus for more information.
Season Summary
The season opens with three YouTubers being attacked by supernatural forces while driving to Nowhere. The next morning, Abigail Fleming arrives in town to begin her new job as tech enforcement officer, hired by the enigmatic Thaddeus Beaumont.
Each episode presents a new paranormal investigation featuring a different creature from North American folklore, while building toward the season's overarching mystery: the awakening of the Wendigo, an ancient entity that feeds on fear. As Abigail investigates, she uncovers the truth about Nowhere's supernatural history and her own connection to it.
Key revelations include:
- Abigail was born in Nowhere and spirited away as an infant by Clara Sterling
- Her EMF sensitivity is actually a supernatural ability inherited from her otherworldly mother
- The Beaumont family has manipulated the town for generations in pursuit of immortality
- Nowhere sits on a nexus of supernatural energy that attracts cryptids and paranormal phenomena
The season culminates in "The Wendigo Awakens," where Abigail rallies the town to confront the fear-entity. By accepting her role as Nowhere's protector, she gains the power to subdue the Wendigo but absorbs part of its essence in the process.
Episode Guide
| # | Title | Featured Creature(s) | Fear Hook |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | "Welcome to Nowhere" | Mothman/Flatwoods Monster Hybrid | "What if the only place that felt like home was actually the most dangerous place on Earth?" |
| 2 | "The Wendigo Frequency" | Wendigo (First Appearance) | "What if the voice in your head telling you you're worthless... wasn't yours?" |
| 3 | "The Whispering Woods" | Hidebehind | "What if the thing you're most afraid of is the thing you can never see coming?" |
| 4 | "Echoes of the Past" | Pukwudgie | "What if the people who raised you weren't really your family... and your real family wasn't human at all?" |
| 5 | "Trauma Storm" | Thunderbird/Piasa Hybrid | "What if the storm inside you became a storm that everyone could see?" |
| 6 | "The Skin Walker" | Skinwalker | "What if the person you're closest to... isn't who they appear to be?" |
| 7 | "Family Reunion" | Batsquatch | "What if your family loved you... but their love was the thing destroying you?" |
| 8 | "The Hollow Men" | Hollow Men | "What if dying wasn't the worst thing that could happen to you?" |
| 9 | "Judgment Night" | Snallygaster, Jersey Devil, Multiple Cryptids | "What if judgment day came... and you weren't sure which side you'd be on?" |
| 10 | "Face Your Fear" | The Wendigo (Full Form) | "What if the only way to defeat fear... was to become it?" |
Main Characters
Season 1 features eleven main cast members:
- Abigail Jimenez Fleming - Protagonist, tech enforcement officer with EMF sensitivity
- Benjamin "Benji" Margolis - Video store owner, Abigail's ally
- Thaddeus Beaumont - Town patriarch, Abigail's employer
- Clara Sterling - Beaumont's caretaker, ageless guardian
- Satoshi Nakamura - Restaurant owner, military veteran
- Keiko Nakamura - Restaurant owner, secret kitsune
- Dr. Ian Bailey - Town doctor, obsessive mycologist
- Dr. Jennifer Bailey - Psychiatrist, emerging telepath
- Willow Bailey - Teenager with parasitic entity
- Asher Drake - Tech entrepreneur, newcomer
- Sasha "Nova" Black - Artist/musician, newcomer
Featured Cryptids
Season 1 draws from North American folklore, featuring creatures both well-known and obscure:
Themes
Creator Jesse Alexander described the season's thematic focus:
"Fear is the engine. Every character is driven by what scares them. The question is whether they let fear control them or find the courage to face it." Jesse Alexander, 2019 interview
Key themes explored in Season 1:
- Fear as Catalyst: Characters either succumb to or overcome their fears
- Community and Isolation: The tension between Nowhere's isolation and the bonds between residents
- Identity and Origin: Abigail's journey to understand who she really is
- Technology and Tradition: The clash between modern life and ancient forces
- Secrets and Truth: Nearly every character harbors hidden aspects of themselves
Reception
Season 1 received generally positive reviews from critics, with particular praise for its atmosphere, mythology, and character development. The show holds a 78% critics score on Rotten Tomatoes with an 89% audience score.
"Jesse Alexander has finally found the perfect vehicle for his particular obsessions. Where Alias buried its mythology under spy gadgetry and Heroes eventually collapsed under the weight of too many characters with too many powers, Tales from Nowhere feels focused and deliberate. Alexander has learned from his previous shows that mystery works best when grounded in emotional truth. Abigail Fleming isn't Sydney Bristow hunting for Rambaldi artifacts—she's hunting for herself, and that makes all the difference."
— Alan Sepinwall, Rolling Stone
"There's a maturity here that Alexander's work on Lost only hinted at. Gone are the endless mystery boxes that led nowhere (pun intended). Every question Tales from Nowhere poses in its pilot gets addressed by the finale. It's as if Alexander took every criticism of serialized television's worst tendencies and built a show specifically designed to prove those problems were always solvable."
— Emily Nussbaum, The New Yorker
"Fans of Hannibal will recognize the show's willingness to marinate in atmosphere and dread. But where Fuller's cannibal opera was about the seductive nature of evil, Alexander is interested in something more universal: the everyday fears that keep us awake at three in the morning. The Wendigo isn't just a monster—it's a metaphor that actually works as a monster. That's harder than it sounds."
— Todd VanDerWerff, Vox
"It's impossible to watch Tales from Nowhere without thinking about what might have been with Day One, Alexander's apocalyptic NBC series that was famously killed by a regime change after the pilot was already shot. That show promised to explore community in crisis. This one delivers on that promise, just with cryptids instead of catastrophe. One wonders if Alexander has been waiting fifteen years to tell essentially the same story about how strangers become family when the world gets strange."
— James Poniewozik, The New York Times
"The creature design is spectacular—genuinely unsettling in a way network TV rarely achieves. But Alexander isn't just trying to scare us. He's doing what he did best on Alias: building a mythology that rewards close attention. The difference is that this time, the answers are as satisfying as the questions. That's growth."
— Maureen Ryan, Variety
"Tales from Nowhere feels like what The X-Files would be if it were made today, with a dash of Twin Peaks weirdness and a healthy respect for indigenous folklore. Alexander has assembled a murderer's row of character actors and given them room to breathe. The result is the rare supernatural show where you care about the humans as much as the horror."
— Genre TV Review
"If Heroes was Alexander trying to give us a superhero story that felt grounded, Tales from Nowhere is him trying to give us a horror story that feels human. He succeeds where Heroes ultimately didn't, mostly because he's working with a smaller canvas and deeper focus. Ten episodes, one town, one woman discovering who she really is. Sometimes constraints breed creativity."
— Daniel Fienberg, The Hollywood Reporter
"The show's greatest strength is its sense of place. Nowhere feels lived-in, dangerous, and somehow cozy all at once. You understand why Abigail would stay even as every instinct screams at her to run. That's the mark of great world-building—when the audience becomes complicit in the characters' bad decisions."
— Streaming Critics
Critical Consensus
Critics praised the show's atmospheric direction, creature design, and Maria Santos's lead performance. The serialized mythology received particular attention, with many reviewers noting how Alexander's experience on Lost and Heroes seemed to have informed a more disciplined approach to long-form storytelling.
Criticism centered on pacing issues in mid-season episodes (particularly episodes 6 and 7) and some underdeveloped supporting characters. Several reviewers also noted that the show's slow-burn approach might alienate viewers expecting more conventional horror.
Trivia
- The season was filmed in rural Virginia and West Virginia locations to capture authentic Appalachian atmosphere.
- Each episode's "Fear Hook" tagline was displayed in promotional materials but not in the episodes themselves.
- The pilot was originally 90 minutes but was edited to standard length for broadcast.
- Creator Jesse Alexander visited the actual National Radio Quiet Zone in Green Bank, WV during development.
- The finale was written to work as both a season and potential series finale, due to uncertainty about renewal.