Pilot

Season One, Episode One

"*We didn't kill Heather Chandler, we simply offered her a new and exciting post-life experience.*"
―JD
**Pilot** is the series premiere and first episode of the first season of *Heathers*. The episode was written by Jason Micallef and directed by Leslye Headland. It aired October 25, 2018 on the Paramount Network.

*Veronica Sawyer, a seemingly normal teenager braving the politics of high school, struggles to make sense of her path in life and her connection to her "best friends", the Heathers.*

## Summary

Heather Chandler rules Westerburg High School with her entourage of Heather Duke and Heather McNamara and keeps "order" with a controlled chaos of social media posts and in person confrontations. Veronica Sawyer is caught between their world and her own private angst as she befriends outcast rebel JD and begins the decent into poor decisions and life altering choices. They decide to kill Heather Chandler and use social media to make it look like a suicide. But is it really that simple? Meanwhile at Heather Chandler's in school "memorial", Betty Finn, Veronica's childhood bestie and resident nerdy unpopular girl, pulls the unimaginable - a power move to take Heather Chandler's crown. All while JD and Veronica try to keep a low profile.

## Plot

**SPOILERS AHEAD**
The episode opens with a flashback to 2010. After setting the table for dinner, JD's mom douses the house with gasoline and lights it on fire. JD and his dad arrive home to a burning house; while his dad runs to the house to investigate, JD watches his mom in an upstairs window wave goodbye to him before shooting herself in the head with a gun.

Cut to 2018, Veronica arrives at Westerburg High School and starts her day at school. After speaking with Ms. Fleming for guidance on her personal essay for college submissions, in addition to the previous day's 'Who are you?' lunchtime poll, she comes to the conclusion that she is "literally nothing". At lunchtime she meets up with her so called friends the Heathers in the cafeteria and witnesses leader Heather Chandler, backed up by Heather Duke and Heather McNamara, threatening to ruin Ram's reputation by posting a shameful picture of him to social media in another of their attempts to maintain social control over the rest of the student body. Veronica, much to Chandler's annoyance, visibly objects to publicly humiliating Ram and bails on hanging out with the Heathers. Instead, she finds herself talking to the new boy, JD, whose rebellious outcast style intrigues her.

While getting slushies that night, Veronica and Duke discover McNamara kissing their teacher Mr. Waters in the backseat of a car - despite McNamara claiming to be a lesbian. Later that evening, Chandler takes Veronica to an art exhibition party; while Chandler attempts to network with people at the party, Veronica fantasises about what it would be like to get rid of her. Upon discovering that Chandler did in fact post about Ram online Veronica confronts her with everyone at the party watching before accidentally knocking over an oversized bottle of Hull Clean that was on exhibition, spilling blue drain cleaner all over her in the process, and regretfully calling Chandler a 'fatty'.

Veronica reflects on the events of that night while writing in her diary but is interrupted by JD, who sneaks through her window into her bedroom. He takes her back to the Snappy Snap Shack for a slushy and the two get to know each other better. On their way home, JD takes them to Chandler's house and shares with Veronica his plans to give Chandler a taste of her own medicine. He proposes they put a Nazi hat on Chandler while she's asleep and take a picture and post it to social media from her account to see how she likes being on the receiving end of the hatred she inflicts on others. JD also suggests giving Chandler 'schattenselbst pills', which he claims will induce vomiting, by slipping them into a bag of corn nuts. JD is able to convince Veronica into going along with the plan, however, Chandler wakes up and catches them. Before removing the Nazi hat, she plays up to the camera and mockingly confesses some insecurities as JD films her. She then demands her phone back to delete the video but JD refuses, emotionally manipulating her into eating the spiked packet of corn nuts before she could get her phone. Chandler ends up choking on the corn nuts and falls through a glass coffee table, where she lay on the floor lifeless. JD then realises he had used the wrong pills and that he had given her suicide pills instead. Veronica subsequently freaks out but JD comes up with the idea of posting an edited version of the video they just filmed and staging it as a suicide video.

The next day Westerburg holds a memorial service, which prompts conflict between Duke and McNamara regarding who delivers the eulogy and consequently who takes over from Chandler as the most popular and powerful person at school. Ultimately, Betty Finn ends up delivering the eulogy and taking the reigns from Chandler. Veronica struggles to deal with her involvement in Chandlers death and after school gains some insight into the dysfunctional relationship between JD and his dad.

Unknown to everyone, Chandler survived the attack as due to choking on corn nuts she didn't ingest the suicide pills. Upon regaining consciousness she discovers her 'suicide video' online has gone viral and is gleeful to find she has become famous.

## Guest Cast

* Jamie Kaler as Big Bud Dean
* Rebecca Wisocky as Mrs. Chandler
* Shannen Doherty as JD's mom
* Nikki SooHoo as Betty Finn
* Wallace Langham as Mr. Sawyer
* Mandy June Turpin as Mrs. Sawyer
* Joel Spence as Mr. Chandler
* Drew Droege as Mr. Dennis
* Deanna Cheng as Ms. Fleming
* Matthew Rocheleau as Mr. Waters
* Cayden Boyd as Ram
* Jeremy Culhane as Dylen Lutz
* Jesse Leigh as Peter Dawson
* Romel De Silva as Kyle
* Adwin Brown as Seth
* Annalisa Cochrane as Shelby Dunnstock
* Maverick Thompson as Young JD
* Christina Burdette as Jesus Julie
* Evan Crooks as Jacob
* Salma Khan as Amita

## Multimedia

### Soundtrack

 "Que Sera Sera" – Pink Martini

 "Nobody Speak" – DJ Shadows

### Images

* Stills
* Gifs
* Behind the Scenes

### Videos

Hellscape with Heather Duke 1 (Heathers Episode 1 Recap) Paramount Network
## Trivia

* The episode opens with the song Que Sera Sera ('Whatever will be, will be'), as did the film.
* The opening shot of JD's house prominently features a croquet set, referencing the game of croquet played by the Heathers and Veronica in the opening scene of the film.
* Mrs. Dean, played by Shannen Doherty, takes the only green-ended match stick out of a box of pink-ended match sticks in the opening scene; this alludes to green being the signature color of Heather Duke, who Doherty previously played in the original film.
	+ Mrs. Dean wears a green blazer for this same reason.
	+ The brand of matches she used were called 'Hot Probs', which is also the name of the sixth episode of the season.
* Mrs. Dean wears a red scrunchie.
	+ In the film, Doherty's Heather Duke starts wearing a red scrunchie following Heather Chandler's death as symbol of power.
* Westerburg's marquee board quotes media icon Khloe Kardashian towards the beginning of the episode.
* The four metal detectors at the front of the school are the four signature colours of the Heathers and Veronica (yellow for McNamara, red for Chandler, blue for Veronica and green for Duke).
* In both this episode and the film, the Heathers conduct lunchtime polls in the cafeteria.
* Veronica says "f\*ck me gently with a chainsaw", Heather Chandler originally said this phrase in the film.
* The red streak Heather Chandler has in her hair in this episode is a reference to the red hair scrunchie that Heather Chandler wore in the film to symbolise her power.
	+ Before Westerburg's memorial for Heather Chandler's apparent suicide begins, Heather Duke takes a piece of red fabric and wears it as a scarf, symbolising her claiming of Heather Chandler's social power and status. Following Heather Chandler's 'suicide' in the film, Heather Duke also assumes power as the lead 'Heather' by wearing Heather Chandler's red hair scrunchie.
	+ To a similar effect, Betty changes from wearing her hair down to having it tied up, held in place by pencils rather than a scrunchie, to signify her taking of Heather Chandler's power at the end of the episode.
* Ms. Fleming tells Veronica that, "it's not the '80s," which is a reference to the decade the film premiered and was set in.
* During the art exhibition, some pieces of art on display include a giant bottle of 'Hull Clean' and a large poster of Sylvia Plath's novel 'The Bell Jar', both of which are a reference to the film.
	+ In the film, JD poisons Heather Chandler using 'Hull Clean' brand drain cleaner. JD then gets the idea to stage Heather's murder as a suicide after seeing a copy of 'The Bell Jar' in Heather's room.
* Veronica accidentally knocks over the Hull Clean art piece, spilling its contents over Heather Chandler's new dress. This leads to an argument between the two, during which Veronica invites Heather to 'lick it up,' Veronica originally says this in the film after she throws up on Heather Chandler's shoes at a party.

### Continuity

* Mrs. Dean wore her red scunchie, as she does in all of her appearances. (Reindeer Games, Are We Going to Prom or Hell?)
* Mrs. Dean used a brand of matches called Hot Probs, Heather Duke also used this brand of matches. (I'm a No-Rust-Build-up Man Myself)
* Veronica mentioned one of the Heathers' lunchtime polls, the Heathers would continue to conduct many more lunchtime polls. (Are We Going to Prom or Hell?)

### Continuity errors

* During the cafeteria scene where Heather Chandler calls out Ram for wearing an offensive top, the positions of where at the table Shelby, Jesus and Betty are sitting change multiple times.
	+ Shelby's outfit also changes several times, with different camera shots alternating between her wearing or not wearing her red jacket.
	+ This is most likely because the scene was re-shot after the initial filming of the pilot, when production for the rest of the season began, as other scenes in this episode have different costumes, hair styling and/or lines of dialogue to the footage of the same scenes used in the trailer for the show.

## Distribution

* The episode was originally set to premiere March 7, 2018 on the Paramount Network.
	+ On February 19, 2018, the episode was made available to download for free from iTunes, Amazon and Google Play in the US and Canada ahead of its TV premiere on the Paramount Network.
	+ On February 21, 2018, the full episode was made available to stream on the Paramount Network website and app.
	+ On February 28, 2018 (a week before the premiere date), Paramount Network decided to delay the premiere until later in 2018 out of respect for the victims, their families and loved ones of the Florida shootings.
	+ On May 1, 2018, it was announced that the new premiere date would be July 10, 2018, moving from Wednesdays to Tuesdays
	+ On May 26, 2018, the episode was once again made available online ahead of its official network premiere along with several scene clips from the episode on the Paramount Network official website, however these were all taken down shortly after.
	+ On October 4, 2018, it was announced that the entire series (apart from the last episode, which was deemed too controversial for American audiences) would air as a five night binge event starting October 25, 2018 on the Paramount Network.
* On October 22, 2018, the episode was once again made available online - along with the entire season - ahead of its network premiere on October 25th, 2018, on the Paramount Network.

### International premieres

* July 11, 2018 (Eastern Europe)
* July 11, 2018 (Nordic region)
* July 11, 2018 (Spain)
* July 12, 2018 (Iceland)
* July 15, 2018 (Greece)
* July 20, 2018 (Cyprus)
* July 20, 2018 (Turkey)
* September 28, 2018 (Australia)
* April 12, 2019 (UK)

## References

1. ↑ Paramount Network to Delay Premiere of “Heathers” – Statement
2. ↑ .Heathers on Twitter