On the 7/11/13, a Thursday, Nowhere Boys first premiered.
I remember the trailer for the first episode. The show looked interesting. Boys go missing in a forest then get home to find that no one knows them and reality is altered? You’ve got my attention. I’ll check it out for sure. I also remember the individual Bremin 4 trailers. I only got to see Felix’s and Jake’s and that annoyed me. I wanted to see all of them. I wanted to know the characters.
I immediately deemed Felix as my favourite even before the show started because I was heavily into Pewdiepie at the time. That quickly changed during the show. No hate on Felix, I just preferred Jake after a few episodes.
I watched the first episode and I enjoyed it greatly, as well as the rest of the season. The ending of the first episode when Oscar stood up was stunning. Trying to figure out if the boys were in another world or had manipulated their own, what and who the fifth element was, why had this predicament happened in the first place was fun. This show was so exciting. I became a full-on fangirl quickly.
It was also relatable for me. As an Australian teenager the show was so homely in this weird way. Hearing magpies squawk in the background and the bogan-ness of the characters were nice because most of the shows that interested me like this weren’t Australian. It was 2013 and I was in 10th grade like the characters which was pretty cool too, but 2013 was the beginning of the rough patch of my life. I won’t get too deep into it because this post isn’t about that but I will briefly go over it. I started getting sick, massive stomach cramps almost every day, and all sectors of life started to falter because of them.
Before the season final, three of the Nowhere Boys, Joel (Andy), Matt (Jake), and Dougie (Felix), were doing a live Q and A. It was hectic. Once you posted your question you wouldn’t see it for another ten minutes. Some replies I could only see once the Q and A was over. I asked two questions and got two replies. I felt like the luckiest person in the world that I didn’t just get one but two replies.
For the below question I asked Matt what he was afraid of.
Then Season 1 was left on a cliffhanger. They had powers, of course, that made sense. And Alice was back and ready to cause trouble. I couldn’t wait to see what could happen.
I remember thinking that Nowhere Boys wouldn’t get a second season. I knew it was successful, it won a Logie and an AACTA, but I just didn’t think that it would. So I was very excited when we did get a second season confirmed, especially as it was a very bad day I had. We were going to get answers to every question we had from those last few minutes of Season 1.
I remember the sneak preview of Season 2. It was Halloween and I had to tape it because I was over my friend’s, NN (only using initials in case she doesn’t want to be named), for Halloween like usual. I remember thinking that Andy couldn’t be missing for the whole season. He’s one of the Bremin Four. He’s got to be fine in about three episodes, right? Yeah, no, okay…
Season 2 felt a lot more serious to me in general too, stakes felt higher. Other than Andy going missing and for the first half of the season we had no clue where he was we had a death technically with Saskia, we had a proper villain with Alice, someone we could see and fear, we had real life consequences for the Nowhere Boys with the police investigation, etc. I really liked season 2.
Then the most horrid year of my life happened, 2015. Again, I won’t go into deep detail as this post isn’t about that, but every month something horrible happened. People died, pets died, my school life died and I felt like I was dying as I was in pain every day.
I fell into a deep depression and really didn’t want to live. One of the only things that kept me going, kept me motivated, was Nowhere Boys. I became obsessed with it. Every waking second I thought about the show. It was what I needed. I needed something to take over and give me some kind of structure to live with. I needed a positive outlet to fill my day as there was hardly anything positive for me.
I was researching elements and other things involved with Nowhere Boys, I was making art (that no one will see because most are pretty terrible), I was writing fanfic (again, that no one will ever see, not right now anyway), I was coming up with insane theories, I even made this blog so I could post theories (which I didn’t really do for some reason). Everything revolved around the show, and I wouldn’t say this type of obsession is healthy, but at the time it was. It anchored me to life.
I invited NN around to watch the final of Season 2. She missed about five episodes so I rewatched them with her and we got them done in time before the new episode aired. However, something happened. About an hour before the episode was going to air, my entire suburb had a power outage. I was livid. I can’t miss this episode. This could be the last episode ever and I’m going to miss it.
I knew that I would be able to watch it eventually, ABC iView is a thing and so are repeats, but I really wanted to watch it when it premiered. A first world problem I know, but my obsession was that serious. It was also about 30 degrees Celsius so we were sweating a lot. After the episode aired and was uploaded to iView we watched it and Andy finally came back.
Season 2 ended and again I thought that was it, no more Nowhere Boys. I even made another ‘ode’ post because I thought that was the end. It made me sad to think about the end. The show had ended on another cliff hanger, and I thought we’d never find out the truth of it (which we technically didn’t).
I wanted to make a bucket list of things that I wanted to do, as mortality became a thing I thought about a lot at the time, and at the top of the list was meeting someone who had worked on Nowhere Boys. An actor, a writer, a camera operator, an extra... it didn’t matter. I just wanted to meet someone who had worked on this show that helped me live and thank them for it. I didn’t think that would happen but I hoped. Maybe somehow with some weird coincidence it would happen, weird things can happen.
I have very weird dreams and during this time they mainly resolved around meeting the Nowhere Boys, but they were never coherent. There’d always be some weird scenario like I was at my local shops and some of the Nowhere Boys were there somehow, or I had powers and I was helping them defeat some monster. There were probably whackier ones but I cannot remember them.
Then on 14/5/15, Nowhere Boys: Book of Shadows was announced and it was amazing. I remember thinking that there would be a premiere for it like with the first four episodes of Season 1 and 2, and that maybe there’d be a competition. That’d be cool. Maybe I could win. Maybe not, again weird things can happen.
I remember the cinema locations and being disappointed there weren’t any near me. I knew it wouldn’t be possible to travel an hour to see a movie in some dingy theatre. There’s no way I could have convinced my mum to take me that far to see a movie, and with it premiering on ABC3 early the next year, what would the point be? I understood that I’d have to wait, even if I didn’t want to. Everyone else had to and I was like everyone else, again it’s a first world problem. A competition would change things though. My mum would take it seriously if I won a competition and it wouldn’t just be to see the movie. It’d be more important.
2015 wasn’t a good year, until one thing happened.
On the 7/12/15, I woke up with this gut feeling that something had happened with Nowhere Boys. I turned my phone on and went on the ABC3 FB page, and there it was: A competition to win tickets to the world premiere of Nowhere Boys: Book of Shadows and to meet the cast. I freaked out. This is exactly what I said would happen. I need to win this. I’m going to win this.
I messaged NN and I told her to enter. I would take her and she would take me if either of us won. She agreed and I then immediately got to crafting the most perfect response I could make. The rule to enter was ‘write who your favourite character is and why in 25 words or less.’ At first I was unsure which character to use. I was tossing up whether to use my actual favourite character, Jake, or the most popular character, Felix. I wanted the best chance to win. Should I go with my heart or cater to the people choosing the winners? After a little deliberating I went with my heart. If I was going to lose this competition I would lose it by doing what felt right. I perfected a sentence that I felt wasn’t too over the top but seemed like it had some amount of effort put into it, and I commented it and waited.
It’s three days later when I got a notification from the ABC3 FB page. All it said was that they had replied to my comment. My heart started beating faster, and in my gut I knew what it would say, but I tried to be level headed. Maybe they’re informing me that I lost, but would they go through every losing comment and say sorry? No they wouldn’t. I click on the notification, and there it is. “Hi (my name) You’ve won!”
I cried. I was so happy I just cried. My dream was about to come true. I left my room and entered the front room freaking out my mum. The last time she had seen me leave my room in tears I told her somebody I knew died. I managed to tell her that I won the competition. At first she’s confused, then shocked, then concerned. She’s terrified of being on planes and we’d have to go on one.
Oh yeah, we had to go on a plane. The premiere was in Melbourne, Victoria, and I lived an hour from Sydney, New South Wales. I needed to be in Melbourne in two days. I needed plane tickets and a place nearby the cinema to stay in in two days. I had been saving money for years in case there was a circumstance like this or an emergency. I guess it paid off, literally.
My mum called my great aunt, her aunt, and asked her for a very big favour. Would she accompany me, my nan, and NN to Melbourne? Luckily, she said yes. I hastily messaged NN as my family and I drove to the nearest travel agency. We’d never travelled anywhere like this, we’d never gone on holiday so not only was it very stressful to get everything in time we had no clue what we were doing. Luckily everything turned out alright. The agent we went to and spoke to was very kind and helped us out.
Two days later I was in Melbourne. The hotel we stayed in was nice. It wasn’t a five star hotel or anything, we got one of the cheaper ones because it didn’t matter, but it was so fancy to me. We had two suites but they were conjoined, so NN and I stayed in one, and my nan and her sister stayed in the other.
We had a nice view of the petrol station which mind sound sarcastic as it wasn’t very scenic, but I did think it was a nice view. The drawers in the kitchen were weird though. You pushed them in and then they’d open. I almost hit NN in the head with one.
NN and I went to bed watching Lord of the Rings, which was really good. I’d never watched it before. Don’t judge. Then the next day came by so quickly.
We got into our outfits, not too over the top but still something nice, this was a movie premiere after all. Then an hour and a half before the premiere, 2:30pm, we hopped in the taxi and went to Lido Cinema.
It was situated in this long hallway of shops. In the centre were the stairs up to the cinema and Book of Shadows.
There were a few people there but the place started buzzing about 30 minutes later. Most people probably don’t remember but there was a host of ABC3 named Tim and he turned up with a cameraman to showcase the event for the channel. NN and I freaked because this was someone from TV, which might sound a bit sad but seeing people from TV isn’t a thing that happens.
It got really awkward though because we somehow got wedged between the ensuing interview Tim was conducting and the nearby wall. We couldn’t move and the interview was a metre away. The interview wasn’t very good as the people he interviewed had no idea who the characters of the show were which confused me. Why are you here if the show doesn’t matter that much to you?
After the incident which was the weird interview, the first actors of the show started turning up. The first person from Nowhere Boys to arrive was Daniel Di Giovanni (Vince, Sam’s brother). Then we saw Joel. That was exciting. There’s a Nowhere Boy right there about 30 metres away from us. Then everyone started to pile into this corridor in what felt like the next five minutes.
It was like a school hallway but with a little more breathing room, somehow. Us fans all slowly shuffled to the cast in a surprisingly, orderly fashion, even if it did look chaotic. Then NN and I got to the front of the crowd. I let NN go first as my anxiety started to play up, but then it was my turn and they looked to me. I wanted to meet all of them but at that moment my eyes were only for Matt. I asked him for a hug and he obliged. I got my photos with Matt, Joel and Rahart (Sam), and then we moved to the next group which was Dougie and Sean (Oscar).
It was a lot less crowded for the onscreen brothers which surprised me as I always thought, and still believe, that Felix was the most popular. Because there wasn’t anyone around, NN talked to Dougie about fashion and I talked to Sean about ‘Kath and Kim’ and it was very surreal for both of us. We then got our items signed (NN’s DVD and my book) and moved on back to the previous three as Dougie and Sean moved on too.
We chatted a little bit, Rahart especially as he seemed the most calm and collected. I know he’s doing, and has done, pretty well for himself so meeting fans must be second nature to him now. I told them about my 2015 and thanked them for just being them, inadvertently helping me in the process. I gave Rahart the letter I had written and he said he would read it, but I don’t believe he got to it which I completely understand. The day was hectic for me so I can’t imagine what it was like for him and the others.
Then it was time to go upstairs and watch the movie. I tripped up the stairs twice but luckily didn’t fall flat on my face. It would have been memorable but not for a good reason. I had trouble finding two seats next to each other in the theatre but I managed to find one eventually. Before the movie aired the creators and the cast spoke for a bit, and they were so funny and nice.
Then we watched the movie. It was heartbreaking, funny, interesting, and all these emotions. It was goodbye to the original Nowhere Boys and so the happiness of what was happening around me mixed with sadness that it was goodbye.
After the movie we wandered around a bit, still soaking in the atmosphere but knowing this moment was about to end. We then got to meet Darci (Ellen) and she was very nice, and she was shorter than me. Somehow I met someone shorter than me. That was surprising.
We also got an interview after Michala Banas (Phoebe) which in hindsight was horrible. I spoke in clichés because I had no idea what to say and now I wish I would have said something a tiny bit insightful. It turned out that I didn’t have to worry though, as all those interviews are nowhere, no pun intended. I’ve searched for the cast interviews but I can’t find them, but I’m not too mad about that.
We said goodbye to the boys, congratulated them on the movie, and got hugs one last time. I was very worried that I pestered them. I genuinely tried not to. Of course this would have been incredibly overwhelming for them so I tried to keep that in mind. Side note though, Joel gave the best hug. He almost cracked my bones.
There was almost an awkward moment with Matt. He asked if we would see the movie in cinemas with our friends, and I was going to reply with ‘no, because the cinemas are too far away’, right after we told him we were from Sydney. Luckily NN had a plausible and legitimate answer to his question and a fangirl disaster was avoided. Thanks NN for swooping in.
As soon as we left the corridor and walked back into the street and reality, I fell from the high I was just on. I plummeted back to reality and became very home sick. I was fine when I got home. I was still sad it was over but mostly happy that I got this once in a lifetime experience. I still think about it almost every day and get teary because it truly was the best day of my life and I will never forget it.
I was left with one thought after all of this: Where does Nowhere Boys go from here? The Nowhere Boys had lost their powers and given up magic… but there’s a season three and a heavy implication at the end of Book of Shadows that others would have powers… so a new cast. This wasn’t confirmed yet but of course there would be a new cast. I knew people would be apprehensive about a new cast. The originals were and still are amazing. They were what we fans knew, and change usually isn’t welcome. I had hope though. I wouldn’t judge anything until I saw it.
The new cast was announced a few months later, and of course there were unhappy comments, but I had faith in them. I knew the show would not just shut out the past three years. There would be a legacy of some kind. I knew the creators would not let this show waste away by writing a rubbish story or hiring the wrong actors. It could work, people just needed faith.
Fast forward a few months to 11/11/16, a Friday. The new cast debuted and they were great. The episode and the ensuing storyline were intriguing and it just felt like Nowhere Boys. I knew there were different faces but it felt right. It didn’t feel like anything different, and I really appreciated the mentions of previous events and the cast throughout the series.
Luckily though, by the time Season 3 rolled around I had gotten a lot better physically and mentally. I still watched the show religiously but my obsession had calmed down, not a lot but a bit. I didn’t dedicate my life to the show anymore. It was more like a hobby, a branch of my life instead of the whole tree.
I did create more art like a talisman and some other designs. Some that even got noticed by the creators of the show which was awesome.
I had also been writing some more fanfiction at this time. I was intrigued with what happened between Season 2 and Book of Shadows, and there were little things I saw in the show that didn’t make sense. If I was going to write something then I wanted it to be accurate, but what if I couldn’t find the answers anywhere to the questions I had? Well, you ask the person who has the answers.
I went to Twitter and looked at Tony Ayres’ (creator) account. He replied to some fans of his shows and I knew that maybe I could get a reply too. I had a lot of questions but picked out the one I wanted answered the most.
I spent most of the day pacing around my house, my finger fumbling over the tweet button. Should I tweet him? I knew he was a busy man working on about 5 different shows so maybe he couldn’t reply to me right then, but I thought maybe he would. Weirder things have happened, so I tweeted him.
Then I get a notification a few hours later, he replied. I first asked him if I could ask him about Nowhere Boys and he said yes. I replied back with my question and he answered it. I was very grateful, but his answer led me to question more things, so I tweeted him again.
He didn’t reply to me after this though, and I don’t know why. Maybe he was busy and forgot, maybe he didn’t want to, maybe he got annoyed by me, maybe I had just rumbled a plothole that he couldn’t explain. I don’t know, but I don’t really care. I got two replies and that was cool. He isn’t owed to message me back and I certainly am not mad about it. I didn’t get to meet him at the Book of Shadows premiere so this made me happy.
As I have done before, I worried that the show had ended, but this time I believed I had reason to worry. Nowhere Boys should have been announced/aired at a certain time, like the rest of the seasons, but it hadn’t. It was about to be November 2017 and if we were getting a fourth season then it should have been airing this month… but it wasn’t.
Then it was confirmed in the middle of November that we were getting a Season 4, but it wasn’t all good news. The article I read was conflicting but was the first outlet to mention that Season 4 would be the last. I saw it coming, of course I did. I was waiting for this since Season 1 ended, but it didn’t make me feel better. Most times it feels good to be right, but not this time.
In January 2018, we got more news about Season 4 including confirmation that filming had begun. There was some added exciting news that came with this though. We were getting an original Nowhere Boy back. Some of my old habits came back too. I cried a little bit and then immediately went into investigation mode. I follow the cast on Insta and noticed that two were confirmed to be in Melbourne the time of filming of Season 4; Matt and Rahart. Who were we most likely to get back, what circumstances could I think of that would help me figure out which character could return? I was reading the comments on Insta and someone said Matt was the only original Nowhere Boy following the official account, but then Rahart started posting old photos of Nowhere Boys so… I just had to wait and see.
I also started editing the Nowhere Boys Wiki, but not too much. I saw that a lot of the characters’ biographies were, and still are, incomplete and thought that I could fill them in. I messed it up a little bit, but Mia’s is now almost complete, and I majorly messed up Nicco’s. I managed to somehow have gaps in all my writing and I panicked I’d ruined everything. Luckily I fixed it up the next day. There are still things that need to be changed but for the moment it’s good.
Not too long after the Wiki incident, we got our first trailer for Season 4. It was short and sweet and intriguing, but one part had people talking, a part I didn’t even take in. A man we didn’t see in the trailer spoke and only a few people figured who it was; Jake Riles. At first I didn’t believe it, but then I played the sound bite over and over. That was Jake Riles. Oh my God, it’s Jake. Jake is back! I even made my mum listen to the clip compared with another clip of Jake so she could confirm it. Then a week later we got the full trailer, and who did we see in it? Jake Riles. This was the best news. The trailer made him out to be a villain, however. It must be some trickery for us viewers. He can’t be a bad guy. No, I don’t believe it.
With this newest trailer we got the premiere date of Season 4, 3/12/18. I mapped out that Season 4 would end in February. I would have plenty of time to come to terms with the episodes, make a few theories, and accept the end of this show, but then I couldn’t. I read an article informing me that episodes would air consecutively every day, the day before the premiere. I wouldn’t be saying goodbye in two months but two weeks. I was happy that I would be able to watch an episode a day but I knew those two weeks were going to go by so fast.
It’s still very strange though, even when I’m writing this, the show ending and me. The show returned when I thought it wouldn’t and now it’s confirmed as the final season I can’t believe it. That’s really dumb of me.
I’ve enjoyed Season 4 but I don’t know if I’ve enjoyed it to the full extent. I haven’t had a whole week to mull over each episode, everything felt like it’s happening so quickly, this was the last season and I’ll never experience first viewing jitters again.
There were many things we did get that I enjoyed. We got to see Hicco/Neath become a real couple, Ben redeem himself from the previous season, we got a cool new character with Zeb, we had more LGBT+ inclusion (even if we didn’t get the Darius/Jesse kiss. Not going to lie, disappointed we didn’t see it), Ellen still being a badass and with Mr Bates as the only characters/actors to have done every single Nowhere Boys chapter, and we got Jake back (I know it wasn’t the real universe Jake who we watched for years, but he was virtually the same.)
So today is the 15/12/18, a Saturday, and the last episode of Nowhere Boys just aired. It’s over. That episode was epic. Seeing all the worlds come back, the guardian being activated, the first spell of the show being it’s last... there was a lot to smile about. I do have a lot of questions however, but this isn’t the place to ask them. I’m incredibly sad but I’m okay.
Well, it’s not completely over I guess. I can still watch the reruns, there are plenty of Wiki pages to be edited, there are plenty of gifs to be made and posted on here, more art can be made… It’s just the show that’s finished…
This show is the best. It’s got great storylines, great characters, cool visual effects (I know they’re not Hollywood standard but of course they wouldn’t be). It’s diverse with race, sexuality, gender, disabilities. It’s not afraid to talk about things that are serious like bad injuries or someone coming out and telling the world who they are. It’s not afraid to show the realism of bullying in school, or the effect of a troubled home life on a child. It’s won countless awards for different aspects of the show (music score, directing, etc). It even had a tie-in video game for the first season which does answer some unanswered questions from the show (the Roland conundrum).
I would like to write every name of every single person who has contributed to this show but I know I would miss people out so I’m not going to do that, but I still want to thank them.
Thank you to the creators of the show, to the cast, to camera crew, the producers and the directors. Thank you to the designers, the makeup and hair artists, the music composers, editors, and the VFX crew. Thank you to the accountants, camera operators/grips, electricians, safety supervisors and stunt coordinators. Thank you to the nurses, the tutors that made sure the young cast got an education, the sound crew, the location crew and the people who allowed the show to be filmed on their property including the traditional owners of the land. Thank you to the art department and costume department, the casting officials, the drama coaches, the catering crew, and everyone involved with legal. Thank you to the companies that helped produce and develop the show, companies who helped fund the show, and the companies that distributed the show all over the world. Thank you to the people who helped in the most minor way and who weren’t credited. Thank you to every other fan who watched the show and helped it stay on air for over five years. Thank you to everyone else I’ve forgotten.
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