Below on Netflix: Cast, Ending Explained, Reviews and Season 2
Below is the creature feature that took over Netflix in October. A fishing town on a remote Newfoundland island starts losing boats to something in the water, and the man who has to hold the place together is Calvin Penney, a stubborn fisherman who has been afraid of the sea since it took his father.
It went straight to No. 1 on Netflix's English TV chart, ahead of East of Eden, and it's a good month for Josh Hartnett, who is also in cinemas in Verity. Here's who's in it, what it's really about, and what that ending means.
What is Below about?
Calvin Penney (Josh Hartnett) fishes the waters off Snooks Arm, a small, tight-knit town on a Newfoundland island. When boats start going missing and an unidentified sea creature begins attacking the town, Calvin ends up working with Fonda (Mackenzie Davis), a visiting marine researcher, to work out what it is and why it has come. For Calvin it's personal: his father was dragged under when Calvin was a boy, and he has never shaken it.
The monster is only half the story. Snooks Arm is also under pressure to leave: a wealthy family business is offering the islanders resettlement, and the series slowly reveals why the land under their homes is worth so much. Creator Jesse McKeown said he wanted something that taps into "the terrifying ruggedness and isolation" of Newfoundland, and the show mixes its scares with local myth, dark humour and a lot of family arguments.
Below cast and characters
Josh Hartnett leads as Calvin, and he's also an executive producer. Mackenzie Davis (Halt and Catch Fire, Station Eleven) plays Fonda, the marine researcher who arrives to study the creature, and Charlie Heaton (Stranger Things) is Wade. Rohan Campbell and Ruby Stokes play Jay and Mary of the Penney family, and Joshua Close is the local police officer, Jaxon Noseworthy. Natasha Henstridge, Willow Kean, Kaleb Horn and Mary Walsh round out the cast.
Below reviews
“A captivating ride blending horror and suspense while centering our very real climate crisis.”
Critics have mostly been won over. The most common praise is for Hartnett, with one review calling Calvin perhaps the most mature leading-man performance of his career, and for the way the show folds the climate crisis into its monster story. Decider praised his "charmingly ragged performance, and a solid group around him". The complaints are consistent too: the second half drags, some of the Newfoundland accents wobble, and The Age felt the monster story had been "Frankensteined together".
Viewers are cooler on it than critics, with an audience score around 60%. Our guess is that part of that is expectation: anyone who came for a non-stop monster movie got a slow-burning small-town drama with a monster in it.
Below ending explained
⚠ How Below ends (full spoilers)Show spoilers
The creature turns out to be a giant squid, and she isn't attacking out of malice. Warming water has driven her south from the Arctic, and she's guarding her eggs, which are lodged in an iceberg that has drifted into the waters off Snooks Arm. Her presence near the town is a symptom, not the disease.
The real villains are human. The family behind the resettlement offers wants the islanders gone because of the cobalt and copper under the town, and the creature has given them the perfect excuse. With the military preparing an air strike that would destroy the squid, the eggs and much of the harbour, Calvin makes a different choice: instead of killing her, he and his family, with Wade's help, net the section of iceberg holding the eggs and tow it out into deeper water. The squid follows, and the strike is called off.
It isn't a clean happy ending. Fonda warns that the water may already be too warm for the eggs to survive, and the series leaves their fate open. For Calvin, though, it settles something: the people who did the most damage to Snooks Arm were never in the water. "There was never a curse," as Hartnett has put it.
The town gets back to normal, the resettlement vote is thrown out, and the fishing picks up. Then comes the final shot: Calvin and Wade looking out at the horizon as more icebergs appear. It means exactly what it looks like. The squid was the first sign of a bigger change, not the last. "Things are going to get worse," McKeown said of the ending.
Will there be a Below season 2?
Not for now. Netflix released Below as a limited series and hasn't announced a second season. Jesse McKeown has said he wrote it as a complete six-episode story, and that the final shot is meant as a question about the future rather than a cliffhanger: "If there's another story to tell with these characters, great. But that's not my intention."
That said, the ending leaves the door open, and a No. 1 debut won't hurt its chances. We'll update this page if a second season is announced.
Quick answers
How many episodes does Below have?
Six. All of them were released on Netflix worldwide on 8 October 2026.
Where can I watch Below?
Only on Netflix. It's a Netflix original, available in every country where Netflix operates.
Who plays Calvin in Below?
Josh Hartnett, who also executive produces. Mackenzie Davis plays Fonda and Charlie Heaton plays Wade.
What is the creature in Below?
A giant squid, protecting her eggs in an iceberg that drifted into the town's waters. The series uses her to tell a story about climate change and the people trying to empty the town.
Where was Below filmed?
In Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada, where the story is also set.
Will there be a Below season 2?
Nothing has been announced. Netflix released it as a limited series, and creator Jesse McKeown has said a second season isn't his intention, though the final scene leaves room for one.
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