Why Jenna Ortega Isn’t In You Season 5 & Her Scrapped Storyline Addressed By Showrunners -

Warning: The following article contains spoilers for You season 5.

Penn Badgley’s Joe Goldberg may be back for You’s season 5, but Jenna Ortega’s Ellie missed out on returning for the hit show’s final season. Originally joining the cast for 2019’s season 2, Ortega played Ellie Alves, an aspiring filmmaker and Joe’s teenage neighbor, whose proximity to Badgley’s character ultimately saw her caught up in the trail of death and destruction that follows him wherever he goes. When Ellie’s elder sister, Delilah (Carmela Zumbado), was slain by Love Quinn (Victoria Pedretti), Joe sent her away from Los Angeles to protect her.

Speaking with Business Insider, You season 5 showrunners Michael Foley and Justin W. Lo revealed that while they originally wanted Ortega to return as Ellie for the show’s final season, her commitments to Wednesday season 2 made it impossible. Check out Foley’s initial comments below:

That was complicated by the fact that she’s doing ‘Wednesday’ in Ireland and it just seemed like a non-starter. We just couldn’t figure out a way to make it work.

Foley also went on to explain that had Ortega been able to return, the plan would have been to have her character serve as a benefactor to season 5’s internet vigilantes Dominique (Natasha Behnam) and Phoenix (b). Check out his final comments below:

That was a thought [that Ortega’s Ellie would serve as a benefactor to Dominique and Phoenix] that I’m sure when we were putting things together, we felt like maybe we could make this work, and we just simply couldn’t.

Meanwhile, Lo also suggested that while Ellie’s past with Joe may have indicated that she would be on his side, he believed that her character would have likely figured out that he would have been involved in her sister’s death. As such, she would likely have turned against him as well. Check out his comments below:

You could make an argument for pro-Joe because he was there for her during a very difficult time in her life. But you could also say, I think Ellie’s very smart and she probably knows that he had something to do with her sister’s death, even though it was Love. So she could have turned against him as well.

Joe Would Have Been Deeply Hurt By Ellie’s Betrayal

Despite only directly appearing You season 2, Ortega’s character would continue to be referenced in seasons 2 and 3, with Joe revealed to still be supporting her financially. With the You season 4 finale revealing that Joe was intending to return to the United States after his time in England, many viewers questioned whether Ortega might be swayed to return for the show’s final season. While Joe may not have been the one to kill Ellie’s sister, her death was still very much a result of his actions, and her presence would have been a fascinating addition to the show’s finale.

Every Character Who Dies In You Season 5

You season 5 marked the end of Joe Goldberg’s story, but he had plenty of time to add a handful of new names to his long list of tragic victims.

Much as Lo suggests, it would not have taken Ellie much to deduce the nature of Joe’s involvement in Delilah’s death, and it would have made sense for her to fund the characters responsible for the start of his You season 5 downfall. Moreover, given Joe’s own protective feelings for Ellie, in his own warped worldview, it is likely that he would have considered this a major betrayal, and it would have been an act that wounded him deeply.

Our Take On Ellie Missing Out On You’s Final Season

There Is Still No Shortage Of Familiar Faces

Given Ortega’s meteoric rise and increasingly busy schedule, it is probably unsurprising that Foley and Lo were unable to secure her return for You season 5. However, with a long line of other characters who have also been hurt due to Joe’s past actions, the show’s final season is not short on other familiar faces returning to see justice being delivered. Nonetheless, it would have been interesting to see how the show’s final season would have worked had Ortega been available to reprise her season 2 role.

Source: Business Insider

You

7/10

Release Date: 2018 – 2024
Showrunner: Sera Gamble, Greg Berlanti
Directors: Marcos Siega, Lee Toland Krieger, Cherie Nowlan, DeMane Davis, Kellie Cyrus, Marta Cunningham, Martha Mitchell, Victoria Mahoney, Erin Feeley
Writers: Justin W. Lo