In Sweet Tooth, Gus (Christian Convery) spends the first 10 years of his life in one place: his Yellowstone home. But as circumstances force him to grow up, he ventures out into the world, and the show sees him constantly on the move as he travels the country, searching for Birdie (Amy Seimetz).
A number of other characters are also on journeys of their own. Some are intertwined with Gus’ journey, like those of Jepperd (Nonso Anozie), Bear (Stefania LaVie Owen) and Dr. Singh (Adeel Akhtar). Others, like Birdie, trek practically to the ends of the earth to find answers about the Sick. But whether the story is set in Colorado or Alaska, the majority of scenes are actually filmed at various New Zealand locations.
Executive producer Amanda Burrell describes New Zealand as “a treasure trove of beauty.” She adds, “Wherever you put the camera, it just makes it instantly cinematic.” We’ll point you directly to some of the screensaver-worthy locations where Sweet Tooth was filmed.
Season 2’s chilly opening scene shows Birdie venturing through arctic weather and doing a little spelunking. Showrunner Jim Mickle talked to Tudum about the challenging process of filming in such harsh conditions.
“We shot that on a glacier in the South Island in New Zealand, and that was a big thing. We went through so many different avenues of, ‘How are we going to do this?’ and then finally it was like, ‘I think we just have to do it.’
“So we ended up going for one day right before Christmas. We flew helicopters into this amazing glacier and shot. The scale was the thing that blew you away because when you’re out with that much white, you just can’t tell how big anything is. It was very difficult to shoot, but we learned a ton from it. I love that we were able to actually get to a real place like that to open the season and really put you in that environment.”
The cabin where we first meet Gus and Pubba (Will Forte), and where Gus later takes his new hybrid friends, was built for the show’s pilot, then disassembled — and then rebuilt from scratch in exactly the same spot when the full first season was filmed.
An old Maori boys’ school called St. Stephen’s School stands in for the exterior of the Essex County Zoo, formerly the hybrids’ sanctuary and now the prison where the Last Men hold them hostage.
The Last Men snatch Gus as he sits in front of the old Cessna, which was filmed on a hill in the Auckland suburb of Penrose.
Jepperd and Aimee arrive by boat to Factory Town, where they share a drink and open up about their individual experiences. The area’s aesthetic was inspired by the Sweet Tooth comic books, and integrates repurposed pieces of Season 1’s set, including train cars from Season 1, Episode 6.
Mickle had high praise for the set. “The art department did an amazing job and built all these different huts and that great windmill from scratch.” Dania Ramirez, who plays Aimee, said that the place, an old quarry and industrial ruins, stood out as a personal favorite filming location. “It was beautiful. When you walked away, you had this beautiful, cool historical site behind you.”
Becky meets a group of travelers during her quest to locate Big Man and Gus; the fateful encounter takes place on Rountree Road, which connects the towns of Ngatea and Mangatarata.
Kids and grown-ups alike will enjoy visiting the location that serves as the headquarters of the Air Lords: MOTAT, aka New Zealand’s Museum of Transport and Technology, is a family-friendly collection of more than 300,000 items that highlight the history of Kiwi transportation.
The place where Dr. Gillian Washington’s research begins is also where Dr. Singh takes Gus in an attempt to learn more about Project Midnight Sun. In real life, it’s a community center built for the residents of the Te Tauoma housing development in Auckland.
The now closed mental institution Kingseat Hospital stands in for Essex City High School, where Becky trains with her fellow Last Men recruits. The old hospital is rumored to be haunted, and the grounds are now the home of Spookers Haunted Attraction Theme Park.
Standing in for the fictional Essex City is the central business district (CBD) of Auckland, where you can go if you want to see the streets our heroes Jepp, Aimee and Becky navigate as they attempt to rescue the hybrids from the Last Men.
