Sometimes, being “happily” married is relative.
The new trailer for BEEF Season 2 finds its two central couples — millennials Josh (Oscar Isaac) and Lindsay (Carey Mulligan) and Gen Zers Ashley (Cailee Spaeny) and Austin (Charles Melton) — meditating on one of the biggest choices a person can make: picking the “right” life partner. These seemingly personal decisions can lead to explosive ramifications around the world, as evidenced in the video above.
From A24 and BEEF creator and showrunner Lee Sung Jin, the critically acclaimed, award-winning anthology series returns for its second go-round on April 16. Kicking off within the gilded cage of Ojai, California, Season 2 explores the trials of love across life stages and the mounting pressures marriage can create.
“Each generation starts off thinking that they’ll never become what they see in the older generation,” says Lee. “But with the passage of time and the pressures of capitalism, each generation soon discovers why the older generations are the way they are.”
In the trailer for BEEF Season 2, we see low-level country club staffers Austin and Ashley, young and, perhaps naively, in love. Melton considers the newly engaged couple to be in the “honeymoon phase of a relationship” as they work together at Monte Vista Point. Adds Lee, “They think all they need is each other.”
But when Austin and Ashley happen to witness an alarming fight between their boss, Josh, and his wife, Lindsay, the young lovers’ foundation is tested for the first time. Seeing an older couple whose romance has turned sour is like seeing “the Ghosts of Christmas Future,” says Spaeny.
Isaac recalls that he and Mulligan spent a long time considering their characters’ history. “What were they like when they were Austin and Ashley, in that phase of their life [in which] the possibilities were endless?”
Considering the shocking inciting incident then, it’s surprising to find Ashley and Lindsay sharing a poignant moment confiding in one another in the trailer. But unexpected alliances arise quickly in the back-stabbing world of BEEF.
Sitting curbside in the dead of night, Ashley asks Lindsay if she is happy in her marriage. Ashley is attempting to parse through what life with her fiancé could look like, while Lindsay has the clarity that can only come with hindsight. Lindsay tells Ashley that she carries an “immense pain” knowing she picked the wrong person as her life partner decades earlier. “How did I not realize this sooner?” Lindsay despondently asks Ashley — and, perhaps, the memory of her younger self too.
“The essence of [Josh and Lindsay’s] young love is faintly in the background, and they keep trying to grasp for it,” says Mulligan. “But their relationship has grown pretty contentious.”
The two couples aren’t the only characters involved in this season’s BEEF though. In the trailer, we get a closer look at Monte Vista Point’s new owner, Chairwoman Park (Youn Yuh-jung), a Silent Generation billionaire who’s navigating the struggles of her own marriage to her boomer second husband, Doctor Kim (Song Kang-ho).
Both of the central couples vie for the Chairwoman’s approval throughout the season. They also interact with folks across the Monte Vista Point ecosystem, from employees like tennis trainer Woosh (Matthew Kim, aka musician BM of KARD, in his acting debut) and the Chairwoman’s interpreter, Eunice (Seoyeon Jang), to wealthy club members, like boomer Troy (William Fichtner) and his millennial wife, Ava (Mikaela Hoover).
By the end of the trailer, we’re left to wonder along with Ashley: Are you actually supposed to be looking for the right wrong person to spend your life with? Can there ever really be a right person? And just how much can you lose if you don’t answer these questions correctly?
Decide for yourself when BEEF Season 2 premieres April 16, only on Netflix.
Watch the BEEF Season 2 Teaser Trailer
