School Spirits’ season 2 finale left the future of Milo Manheim’s character up in the air — and the actor is weighing in on what the show may look like moving forward.
“I think the first season was kind of like, what happened [to these ghosts]?” Manheim, 24, explained exclusively to Us Weekly while promoting his upcoming film Zombies 4. “Second season it was like, ‘OK, we know what happened, now let’s solve this thing,’ and I think season 3 we’ll just zoom out even more. We’re just going to be like, ‘What the hell is going on?’”
School Spirits premiered on Paramount+ in 2021 and follows high school student Maddie (Peyton List) as she investigates her own mysterious disappearance and alleged death from the afterlife. While on a mission for answers, she discovers a group of teen ghosts haunting the hallways. That includes Manheim’s Wally, an ’80s ghost jock slash golden retriever-type who quickly falls head over heels for Maddie.
While the season 1 finale revealed that Maddie’s human body had been taken over by another spirit, she ended season 2 back in the human realm. Wally, meanwhile, appeared to find the door to peace, although it wasn’t revealed if he walked through.
While speaking with Us, Manheim teased that season 3 will attempt to “crack the code of what’s happening in this world [of Split River]” while answering questions from the previous season.
The show’s executive producers, meanwhile, previously shared that Manheim’s future as Wally was intentionally ambiguous — leaving fans reeling over the potential loss of a fan favorite character.
“We live [for] cliffhangers and to also devastate people!” cocreator Nate Trinrud joked to Us exclusively earlier this year. He also hinted at what Wally’s next chapter might mean for the series: “There’s a lot of questions that come along with that. Like, what does it mean to really lose somebody? But also, do you ever lose anybody?”
Milo Manheim ©Paramount+ /AwesomenessTV / Courtesy Everett Collection
Trinrud added that Wally’s next steps are a “big question mark” that will be broached in season 3, noting that other characters have been able to walk the line of multiple realms. “Anything could happen,” he teased.
Manheim is certainly no stranger to playing the undead, as all three of his most recent three characters met their untimely end in one way or another. Manheim faces death by plant as Seymour in the current off Broadway production of Little Shop of Horrors, haunts the halls of his old high school as Wally on School Spirits and plays another football-loving jock, Zed — who also happens to be a zombie — in Disney’s Zombies franchise.
“I don’t know what it is, maybe it’s just because I’m so full of life that I need to be killed,” Manheim joked to Us. “This was never my plan, first of all, but maybe I’ve really tapped into a niche here that Hollywood is short on. But yeah, School Spirits and Zombies I’m a football-playing dead person with a girlfriend whose name kind of sounds like Addison. Madison is her name on [School Spirits].”
Meg Donnelly, Milo Manheim Matt Klitscher / © Disney+ / Courtesy Everett Collection
Fans will have to wait to see Manheim back as Wally for season 3 of School Spirits, but he’ll be back as Zed in Zombies 4: Dawn on the Vampires later this month. The film will pick up after Zed and Addison’s (Meg Donnelly) first year of college. When the two lovebirds head out for the road trip of a lifetime, they discover the warring words of Sunnyside and Shadyside — and two brand new groups of monsters.
The first Zombies film premiered in 2018 and has since spawned one of the most successful movie franchises for Disney to date (move over, High School Musical!). Manheim and Donnelly have reprised their role for each installment, including lending their voices for the re-animated series. Seven years in, Manheim has learned a lot about playing a leading man.
“I am equally excited now than when I was on Zombies 1, but the excitement then was just like an unreal, I can’t believe I’m here, what is my life? And I think I’ve changed because I’ve really grounded myself and really realized just the impact that we have made with these movies and this franchise,” he told Us. “I guess I’ve taken the reins a little bit. Really tried to put creative input in there and guide this franchise [in] the direction that I believe is important. So I think just stepping up to the plate is how I’ve changed the most.”
Zombies 4: Dawn on the Vampires premieres on Disney Channel Thursday, July 10, at 8 p.m. ET and will be available to stream on Disney+ the following day.