Killjoys Seasons Guide: Five Seasons Explained, Plus Where to Begin

Killjoys seasons, every season explained

Killjoys is a Canadian space adventure drama created by Michelle Lovretta. It aired on Space in Canada, now CTV Sci-Fi Channel, and was co-produced with Syfy, which aired it in the United States. The series ran from June 19, 2015, to September 20, 2019. It follows three bounty hunters who work for the Reclamation Apprehension Coalition, known as the RAC, in the Quad, a system of four planets and moons. RAC teams pick up contracts for wanted felons throughout the Quad, and the three leads are one such team.

How many Killjoys seasons are there? Five, with 10 episodes in each, for a total of 50. That regularity makes the show easy to plan around. Every season premiered on a Friday in summer, between mid-June and late July, and ended in late August or September: season 1 ran from June 19 to August 21, 2015, season 2 from July 1 to September 2, 2016, season 3 from June 30 to September 1, 2017, season 4 from July 20 to September 21, 2018, and season 5 from July 19 to September 20, 2019. The counts and dates in this guide follow the episode list on Wikipedia.

The cast is small, which keeps the show easy to follow. Hannah John-Kamen plays Yalena Yardeen, known as Dutch, a level five RAC agent with a secret history. Aaron Ashmore plays John Jaqobis, called Johnny, her partner and best friend. Luke Macfarlane plays D'avin Jaqobis, Johnny's older brother, a former soldier who joins them as a bounty hunter. The three leads carry the series from the pilot to the finale.

The setting does a lot of the work. According to Syfy's season 1 recap, Qresh is the planet for the rich, Leith holds people who could not afford Qresh, Westerley is home to the poor and working class, and Arkyn is the smallest moon, thought to be uninhabited. The RAC, nicknamed the Rack, is an independent company that issues warrants, and the recap adds the Company, a powerful organization that controls much of the Quad, and the Nine, the wealthy families that own Qresh. Dutch's past with her mentor Khlyen runs through the early seasons, and the hunt for a dangerous group called the Hullen becomes the long arc of the series.

Production changed once. Syfy renewed the show for season 2 in September 2015, and renewed it for seasons 4 and 5 in September 2017, each with 10 episodes. Adam Barken became showrunner from season 4, with Lovretta staying on as an executive producer and writer. Season 5 was the final season. SF Crowsnest's review of the complete series describes the tone as a blend of action, humor and emotionally driven relationships between the characters. Outside North America, the show reached the United Kingdom on January 25, 2016, and Australia on January 30, 2016, a few months after its Canadian premiere.

Watch order is broadcast order. The plot is serialized, so broadcast order matters. A viewer can start with the pilot, "Bangarang," directed by Chris Grismer, and see within one episode whether the show lands. The episode titles are a signature in their own right: "The Warrior Princess Bride," "Johnny Dangerously," "Three Killjoys and a Lady," "Don't Stop Beweaving" and "Terraformance Anxiety" all riff on other titles, and a title list alone gives a sense of the show's tone.

Ten-episode seasons make this a short commitment. A viewer can finish the Killjoys seasons at one season a week and be done in five weeks, and the guide below takes them one at a time.

The season-by-season guide

Each section below covers one season in order: when it aired, how long it is, who directed it and what kind of story it tells. None of them reveals how a season ends. Readers who want the quick version can use the table above, and what follows is the longer version of the Killjoys seasons guide. Anyone asking how many seasons there are can stop at five and use the sections to decide where to begin.

The directing credits are concentrated. Stefan Pleszczynski directed the most episodes, with Paolo Barzman a clear second, and the two between them directed more than a third of the series. Pleszczynski directed the season 4 premiere and finale and both of the final two episodes of the entire run, so the look of the closing stretch is consistent.

Overall numbering is regular, which helps when a streaming menu lists the episodes in one long run. Season 1 covers overall episodes 1 to 10, season 2 covers 11 to 20, season 3 covers 21 to 30, season 4 covers 31 to 40 and season 5 covers 41 to 50. The season boundaries therefore fall on every tenth episode, and anyone sampling the Killjoys seasons can use the overall number to find a given episode quickly.

Two small details separate the first season from the rest. The opening theme for season 1 is "Westerley Theme" by Finny and Katie McConnell, and seasons 2 to 5 use "Happy Damage" by Jacuzzi Boys. The show also drew a handful of award nominations, according to Wikipedia: two Canadian Screen Award nominations, three Prix Aurora Award nominations and a 2015 nomination from IGN for best TV sci-fi series.