Jenna Ortega Will Quit 'Wednesday,' Hollywood Analyst Predicts

Jenna Ortega's days as Wednesday Addams could be coming to an end. Hollywood analyst Matthew Belloni is predicting that the 21-year-old actress, who plays the beloved Charles Addams character on Netflix's Wednesday, will quit the hit series. Belloni has voiced his speculation about Ortega's future in the role several times as of late, first on the Dec. 28 episode of his podcast The Town.

"I do not believe that Jenna Ortega will be on the show beyond the second season," he said while discussing Ortega's complaints about Wednesday Season 1. "There's a reason they (Netflix) are developing spinoffs like the Uncle Fester show and some others they have in the works, and I just feel like this may be 'two and done' for her."

Belloni doubled down on his doubts in a Jan. 5 article for Puck, in which he listed 24 of his Hollywood predictions for 2024. He plainly predicted that "Jenna Ortega Will Leave Wednesday," citing her rising fame and her displeasure with Season 1's writing.

"Staying with Netflix, Season 2 of its biggest series doesn't shoot until summer, but I'd be surprised if its 21-year-old star sticks around after that. It's not just that she trashed the writing of the first season, or that she claimed to have saved the show from creators Alfred Gough and Miles Millar," Belloni wrote. "Ortega is red-hot on casting lists, has already quit the Scream franchise, has Beetlejuice 2 in September, and is said to want to follow the path of her fellow Disney Channel alums Zendaya and Austin Butler, which means prestige films. Hopefully, Netflix will have its planned Fester spinoff ready to step in when she bails."

Much of Belloni's reasoning stems around the Miller's Girl star's March 2023 remarks on Dax Shepard's podcast Armchair Expert. Ortega was rather blunt with her displeasure for the Tim-Burton-helmed teen comedy material, claiming she had to step in and make changes to the writing staff's work.

"I don't think I've ever had to put my foot down on a set in a way that I had to on Wednesday," Ortega said, per Seventeen. "Everything that [Wednesday] does, everything that I had to play, did not make sense for her character at all. Her being in a love triangle? Made no sense. There was a line about this dress she has to wear for a school dance and she said, 'Oh my god, I love it. Ugh, I can't believe I said that. I literally hate myself.' And I had to go, 'No. There's no way.'"

"There were times on that set where I even became almost unprofessional in the sense where I just started changing lines. The script supervisor thought that I was going with something and then I would have to sit down with the writers and they would be like, 'Wait, what happened to this scene?' And I would have to go through and explain why I couldn't do certain things. I grew very, very protective of her."

While Belloni is a news-breaker, having broken the story of Top Gun 3's development just this week, we have to stress that he is not reporting that Ortega is leaving the show. This is just his opinion. However, you'd be hard to find a more informed Hollywood media reporter than Belloni, so his prediction carries some weight.

It's also worth noting that, if Ortega does depart Wednesday after Season 2, that doesn't necessarily mean Netflix will cancel the series. The streamer recently recast A-list lead Henry Cavill in The Witcher ahead of the fantasy show's next season.

All eight episodes of Wednesday Season 1 are currently streaming on Netflix. The streaming service also hosts some of Ortega's previous projects like The Babysitter: Killer Queen, You Season 2, Yes Day and Jurassic World Camp Cretaceous.