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It sounds like a lot, and it is. But there’s a confidence to the convolution. “It’s all very organic,” says Batmanglij. “The irony is there’s a ton of wild storytelling out there. How do you explain everything that happens in Captain Marvel in one sentence? Marvel’s storytelling is much wilder than The OA’s, but no one talks about that.”

“We had to develop our own process,” Marling adds, describing writing the season as forming “the bone structure of a house.” “We were telling a long-format narrative, incorporating the twists and turns of mind-bending. On the best days, the story tells you what it wants, you just have to be a good listener.”

Photo by Nicola Goode/Netflix

For a little help, the pair put together a small writers’ room, relaying the entire store orally to the team, “almost like a play. You can’t pass off the cookie cutter without the dough,” Marling says. “We really believe in the collectivism of filmmaking. I never understood auteurism. We’re more interested in what a group of people can do together.”

Still, it’s Batmanglij andMarling’s union that’s at the heart of the project. “We’re fortunate because we have each other. It’s hard to make what is essentially an independent film in the span of two years. The only way we could do it is because we’re sharing a brain,” Marling says, the smile evident in her voice.

Batmanglij adds, “When people know each other as well as we do, we give each other a lot of confidence. We’re not waiting for someone else to tell us you can do this or can’t do that. … It’s very much mom and pop. We’re the writers and filmmakers, we can sketch out a whole scene, from the writing to exactly what the shot will look like and how it’ll move.”