It's taken a while but many viewers are finally realizing that Christina Ricci played the role of Wednesday Addams before Jenna Ortega.
The latest series is a fresh take on the macabre Addams Family. Directed by gothic fantasy enthusiast Tim Burton, it centers on Wednesday's life as a student at a boarding school for misfits - attended by various students who are werewolves, vampires, and even sirens.
Throughout the series, Wednesday - played by 20-year-old Ortega - begins to learn how to harness her newfound psychic powers, and slowly unearths a years-long cover-up involving a murder scandal that deeply affected her parents Morticia and Gomez.
Ricci, 42, portrays Ms Thornhill on the show - but certain viewers didn't seem to realize until later that she had played the original Wednesday in 1991's The Addams Family and its subsequent sequel in 1993.
One person took to Twitter to write: "i just found out that the redhead teacher in wednesday is literally played by christina ricci aka HER????!?"
Though, not everyone was so shocked to see Ricci in Wednesday, with many viewers taking to social media to announce that they'd already recognized her. "The fact that you're watching #wednesdaynetflix and not immediately fangirling over the fact that Christina Ricci is in it, shows me that you need to press pause, step away and go watch the literal reason why a show like Wednesday actually was made #addamsfamily," one person wrote.
Another continued: "I don't understand. She's in the credits and she looks like Christina Ricci. How could y'all not realize?"
"Seeing people post 'Just found out the redhead teacher in Wednesday played Wednesday when she was a kid!' and I'm like HER NAME IS QUEEN CHRISTINA RICCI AND SHE WAS AND STILL IS GOTH GIRL GOALS," another added.
Any actor playing Wednesday would be rightfully intimidated by having Ricci on set, especially given her well-known deadpan portrayal of the eldest Addams child in the 90s. However, Ortega has maintained in numerous interviews that she wanted to create an entirely unique and different characterization of Wednesday, adding that she and Ricci didn't even say the name "Wednesday" once to each other.
Check out the trailer for Netflix's new series, Wednesday:"I think when she was on set, neither one of us said Wednesday once to each other. I think because she knew not to say anything to me... I don't think she wanted to get in the way of my performance and feel like she was overbearing. And I felt like I didn't want to pull up something that she did 30 years ago," Ortega told MTV News.
"For one, the sake of my own benefit, but two, yeah, I didn't want to rip her off, and I didn't want to be too much like her. I think our show has superpowers, and outcasts, and evil ghost pilgrims. They're two very different people, our Wednesdays, I think," she added.
Wednesday is available to watch now on Netflix.
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