Spoiler alert: Do not read until you’ve watched all of Season 1 of Prime Video’s Off Campus.
The first season of Prime Video’s spicy hockey romance Off Campus put aspiring songwriter Hannah Wells (Ella Bright) and collegiate hockey star Garrett Graham (Belmont Cameli) through the literal wringer. By the end, though, the Briar U lovebirds came out on the other side stronger than ever — even if their path to love was anything but smooth.
As established in Elle Kennedy’s bestselling Off Campus novels, it was revealed midway through the season that Hannah’s intimacy issues are the result of being date-raped in high school by the mayor’s son, who was also a hockey player. Meanwhile, Garrett’s icy relationship with his abusive father (played by Steve Howey) — a former hockey great with lofty expectations for his son — only compounded his fears that he’d grow up to be a monster, too.
All of those heated emotions reached a boiling point during an explosive hockey match between Briar U and their rival school, which was captained by Hannah’s high school rapist. The game ended in an on-ice brawl that got Garrett suspended and temporarily severed his romance with Hannah. But they eventually reconnected after working out their own issues. Hannah findds her voice again and writes a song personal to her journey, as Garrett realizes that he does love hockey after all.
With the couple reunited, the focus shifted toward the Briar U hockey team. A technicality forced the crew to forfeit their wins, leaving them scrambling to find replacements for the new starting line as they adjusted to their status as underdogs, planting seeds for Season 2 and beyond.
Speaking with Gold Derby, Off Campus creator-showrunner Louisa Levy and the starsbreak down the first season’s biggest moments and where the series may go next.
Balancing sex and drama wasn’t easy
“It’s quite a line to toe,” Levy says about handling Hannah and Garrett’s traumatic backstories with care while also nurturing their red-hot romance. “It was very important to us to make sure to handle these topics responsibly. We spoke to experts, we talked a lot about it, and we thought very carefully. The most important distinction for me is that the show just like the books, is not about the trauma — it’s about surviving the trauma.”
“We never actually show any abuse for either Hannah or Garrett, we only show the aftermath of it, which is itself traumatic,” she adds. “But we wanted to show the ripples after the events and how those affect you even further down the line, and also that these two characters can heal themselves and still find love.”
A key moment that Levy lifted straight from the book is Hannah and Garrett’s self-pleasuring scene in Episode 4, which happens after she discloses her high school rape to him for the first time. Hannah then boldly requests that Garrett give her an orgasm, so she can be sure that she’ll be able to be intimate with her crush.
“That’s a really iconic moment in the book and we wanted to do it justice, but also honor Hannah’s character arc,” Levy notes. “She is someone who believes that she’s broken and it’s such a crucial moment in the book when Garrett tells her she’s not broken. That threads through all the way to the finale when she finds her voice again and is able to write music and fully embodies that spirit of someone who is not broken. That was important to us.”
From fake love to real love
“A big moment for Hannah is when she decides to trust Garrett watching her drink in the karaoke scene in Episode 3,” Bright says. “Then the bomb really drops in Episode 4 [during] Drunk Shakespeare when she’s talking with Justin [Kohl, her rockstar crush played by Josh Heuston], who she’s having these conflicting feelings about.
“The whole reason that she’s in Garrett’s life is that they’re having this fake relationship for her benefit,” the actress continues. “She realizes that they’re not having this depth of conversation that she’s been having with Garrett since the beginning of the season. That’s a really special, fun moment to play out. That’s where it all falls together in a really beautiful way.”
For his part, Cameli believes that Garrett was ready to make the romance legit first — and made that choice quite early. “When Garrett sees the video of Hannah singing in high school in the pilot, that’s when his antenna goes up,” he says, referring to Bright’s performance of “Bad Romance.”
“I don’t think he’s in love with her at that point, certainly, but karaoke is a big moment for him,” the actor continues. “Music is also a huge part of Garrett’s life because of his mother, so seeing that musical side of her immediately endears him to Hannah. When he’s standing in the crowd with everybody else, and she’s singing that song to f–k with him. But she’s also pretty and powerful and [her] voice sounds amazing. That’s a big moment for Garrett; that’s his first ‘Oh s–t’’ moment!”
Bright got emotional while filming Hannah’s phone call
Bright calls Hannah’s emotional phone call with her mother in the season’s penultimate episode her favorite scene of the series. During the conversation, she tearfully apologizes to her mother for ruining their lives and being the reason for why they spent all their savings on therapy, court cases, and lawyers to bring her rapist down.
“It was really an emotional scene,” the actress says. “I was listening to ‘Call Your Mom’ by Noah Khan in a dark corner of UBC campus with my headphones on. Chelah [Horsdal] played my mom, and she actually came onto set that day so we could just have a conversation. It was so special that she was willing to do that, and it felt so much more genuine.
That was also Bright’s final dialogue scene of the series, which added to the intensity. “That was my last scene with lines and that will always be a scene that I will always remember,” she recalls.
Dean and Allie could be the next Off Campus leads
While Levy wouldn’t commit to whether Dean and Allie — played by Stephen Kalyn and Mika Abdalla — will be the couple taking center ice in Off Campus’ already-announced Season 2, all signs point to that being the case. If that happens, it would mean that the series is leaping ahead to adapt the third book, The Score.
“The fun thing about Elle’s books is that every romance is centered around a different fantasy,” says Levy. “Hannah and Garrett are the ‘fake dating-becomes-real relationship’ fantasy. Allie and Dean are the ‘bad boy-who-falls-for-you’ fantasy. We get to do a little bit of that in Season 1, but there’s still room to play with the two of them.
To hear Kalyn and Abdalla tell it, Dean and Allie’s love story — which started off as secret hook-ups but quickly became more — is only just beginning.
“I love that Allie and Dean’s relationship is fun and sexy and a little bit easier emotionally [to digest],” Abdalla says. “I’m glad that we got to dive into it a little bit in Season 1. I’m excited for the future, getting to do what Ella and Belmont did this year.”
“It was fun to see the fun side of Dean quite a bit in the show, and there’s still a lot more to learn as we move forward,” Kalyn agrees. “Working with Mika was incredible. She’s such a talented actor, and she made the job a lot easier. I’m just excited to keep going forward and for everyone’s season, to be honest. I love rollercoasters.”
The Original Ending Was Completely Different
According to Abdalla, the first season of Off Campus almost had a completely different ending. The version that viewers saw features a massive hockey team brawl after Dean finds out that Allie slept with another rival, Hunter Davenport (Charlie Evans).
“A very different ending was originally planned for this season,” Abdalla reveals. “Watching the boys film that fight was crazy. It was really fun and also horrifying!”
Asked why the original ending was swapped out, Levy plays coy. “That would be a spoiler because we might get to it at another time,” she hints.
Ultimately, the thrill of introducing Hunter Davenport — who becomes the future male lead in Book 5 — was too enticing to pass up. His arrival as the newest addition to the Briar U hockey team also presents challenges and obstacles for Dean and Allie, as well as the hockey squad, to overcome. “It was a really fun discovery to allow a new character to drop into our show and cause some splashes and create some waves,” she notes.
