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‘The Magicians’ Season 2: Five things to know about the whimsical Showcase drama

Jason Ralph stars as Quentin in 'The Magicians' Season 2. Showcase

For fans of magic and fantasy, as well as sex, swearing and mischief, The Magicians is coming back to Showcase for Season 2, and boy, there are some real doozies this time around.

In Season 2 of the densely packed and eccentric show, Quentin (Jason Ralph) and his friends have been thrust into even more dangerous and unfamiliar territory, and must draw upon their novice magic abilities to defeat a threat that could destroy the entire magical world. Driven by power, revenge and survival, they realize that those who entered the hauntingly beautiful world of Fillory will never be the same as those who leave.

READ MORE: Stella Maeve, The Magicians star, on mixing magic with real life in Season 1

Global News caught up with series stars Ralph, Stella Maeve (Julia) and Olivia Taylor Dudley (Alice) at the winter session of the Television Critics Association, where the trio laughingly tried to reveal what’s coming up in Season 2 without spoiling anything for the show’s die-hard fans. Here are five things we’re able to share with The Magicians faithful.

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There are talking animals this season

Yes, you read that right. Talking animals are going to join the menagerie this year, though the cast won’t tell us what kind of animal or what part they play in the bigger story. The good news for Magicians fans is that there’s yet another wonderful, magical aspect to the proceedings. While Ralph wasn’t particularly jazzed by the concept of the talking animals (he’s a fan of realism, he asserts), both Maeve and Dudley could hardly contain their excitement.

“[The talking animals] are my favourite thing!” exclaimed Dudley. “Whenever people ask me what magical power I want, I always say that I want to talk to animals. Obviously they aren’t real talking animals, but when I found out they were going to be a part of this season, I was so excited!”

Maeve echoed that exact sentiment, taking it a bit further for her character.

“My dream for Julia is for her to live in Fillory and become the talker to the animals,” she said, laughing. “To live in a weird fantasy woodland cabin like Stevie Nicks, just talkin’ to bunnies and hangin’ out with the squirrels.”

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You’ll get to know Fillory quite well

A bit of a mystery throughout Season 1, the land of Fillory comes sharply into focus in Season 2. The show will hop back and forth between the established “universe” of Brakebills and the new expanse of Fillory, but don’t fret: both worlds are integral to the show’s plot and storylines, so neither one is going anywhere.

“Quentin’s journey is so complicated and convoluted, it’s hard to take apart,” said Ralph. “Overall, if Season 1 was about giving glimpses into these three separate worlds, this season is about opening all those worlds up, to understand more thoroughly how magic runs through them — how the three worlds influence and depend on each other for survival.”

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“What’s frustrating to him about the real world is it’s fraught with complication,” he continued. “What he fell in love with about the Fillory books was this made-up world, there’s good and evil, black and white, heroes and villains. He finds out magic is real, and he thinks he can eradicate poverty or not be depressed anymore. All he finds out is that the quick answers and “easy ways” out come with consequences. The world suffers from too many magicians and not enough villains. People just cause more problems for themselves.”

Shot in and around Vancouver, the scenery remains astounding

Like many sci-fi or fantasy TV shows, Vancouver seems to be the place to shoot them. There’s something about the rainy, lush environment that lends itself to fantastic worlds, and The Magicians corners the market on those.

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“Vancouver is gorgeous, I’ve never been to any place like it,” said Ralph. “It’s like a city surrounded by water that’s surrounded by mountains that shoot up. It really is magical in a lot of ways: that drive up to Whistler, past the glacier lakes (which are emerald-coloured at certain times of the year), with those islands that … if they started moving and a turtle head poked up, I wouldn’t be surprised.”

“There’s a scene of Julia in Fillory this season, and it was still nice, just beautiful, out in the forest. That was my favourite thing to shoot all year,” said Maeve. “If I could do that in that climate all year long, sign me up.”

Get ready for many journeys of self-discovery

All three actors attest that the show isn’t exactly about magic per se, but rather about human identity and finding oneself. Focusing on magic allows the character learning it to discover more about themselves, and provides a convenient mechanism for TV: Who is this person? What do they do with the magical powers? Most importantly, who can be trusted?

“This season feels like an investigation for me, as an actor. It was an investigation into the different stages of grief and sacrifice,” said Ralph. “In Season 1, Quentin was trying to add things to his personality to make him feel more complete. Now, he’s realizing that he’s surrounded himself with things that are vile, that are hurting him and weighing him down. Season 2 is about him shedding, about him becoming not a better person necessarily, but a true-to-character person. Who is he and what does he care about?”

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“S**t gets way crazier. It even gets confusing for me sometimes,” agreed Dudley, who was mum on her character’s arc this season. “For Alice, it’s hard to reveal what’s happening with her — it would be a huge spoiler. This season, we get to see… many different sides of her. That’s all I can give you.”

Maeve is also cryptic about Julia’s path in Season 2.

“You get to see a lot more of Julia in Fillory,” she said. “You get to see her interact with a lot of other characters who we haven’t seen before, like Eliot. You get to see Julia play with Margo in Fillory, which is fun.”

The show’s density and intensity aren’t going anywhere

Known for its heavy storylines, lexicon and terminology, The Magicians isn’t deviating from that in the new season. Originally taken from the book trilogy by Lev Grossman, the source material is dense on its own, so it only makes sense that the resulting TV show would have the same complicated feel to it.

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“The show is very dense,” said Dudley. “There are so many different things to relate to in the show, even if you’re not a fan. I’m very into magic, so that was the draw for me, but once I started on Magicians, I realized I was more attracted to the human-nature aspect of the show, the relationships between everyone. I can’t believe how many things we jam-pack into this show; and it works. Episode 1 is really packed with stuff. We see different groups, they split up and then go on different journeys. It’s really interesting how things split apart and then come back together.”

WATCH BELOW: Stella Maeve drew on real-life experience to play Julia in The Magicians

Click to play video: '‘The Magician’ star Stella Maeve brings real life experience to new role'
‘The Magician’ star Stella Maeve brings real life experience to new role

Dudley thinks that Harry Potter fans must’ve loved the first season, and for this second season, she thinks it’s heading in a partial Game of Thrones direction, “except with less killing and a lot more humour.”

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“The writers are brave and smart. They want to tap into subjects that are normally a little taboo: the rape scene, the pedophilia, that kind of stuff. It should be talked about and out in the world; this is how the characters deal with this sort of thing, and there can be real-life consequences to these issues. They deal with real relationship problems, real family problems, all while practicing magic. That’s the magic of this show,” concluded Dudley.

‘The Magicians’ Season 2 premieres on Thurs., Jan. 26 at 10 p.m. ET/PT on Showcase.

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