Poised to capture the world’s attention, the series is a refreshing, honest look at Inuit and Northern culture—for the community first and a global audience second.
Alethea Arnaquq-Baril, Stacey Aglok MacDonald and Anna Lambe are in their stocking feet, grinning mischievously. While the three Inuit women cheerily welcome me into the tiny windowless room in the CBC building in Toronto, ON, where they’ve been doing interviews for the past eight hours, they explain that because they knew I was Inuk, they decided to get Inuit-cozy. My heart and toes expand as I slide off my boots and curl up to chat with them about their show, North of North. Their authentic approach to promotion is a reflection of their series: good for everyone, but with a warm hug and special wink for Inuit.
The show, co-created and produced by Arnaquq-Baril and Aglok MacDonald of Red Marrow Media, follows young Inuk mother Siaja, played by Lambe, who dreams of reinventing herself after a spontaneous, very public exit from her marriage. She does this while crashing on her mother’s couch, with her feisty young daughter in tow, in her tiny fictional Arctic community of Ice Cove, where everybody knows your business. This forces Siaja to navigate the unpredictable, often hilarious, highs and lows that come with finding your way.
Still of Anna Lambe and Keira Belle Cooper as Bun in episode four of North of North (2025) COURTESY APTN, CBC AND NETFLIX PHOTO JASPER SAVAGE
Having three broadcasters attached to the project—APTN, CBC and Netflix—is a double-edged sword: lots of support for a universal audience and lots of potential for many voices that aren’t Inuit or Northern to chime in. Indigenous storytelling onscreen has come a long way since the days of...always, when Indigenous roles were occupied by white actors and entire Indigenous stories were co-opted and told without Indigenous involvement. It’s 2025, and things have changed for the better. But some negotiating still needs to happen.
“That almost got cut,” Arnaquq-Baril practically sings when I ask the team about a joke in the second episode about Siaja’s all-important earring collection, which she ranks with her wallet and keys as essential. After all, what earring-loving Inuk girl among us wouldn’t panic at the thought of leaving her collection at her ex’s house? But a non-Indigenous person might not understand the stakes involved. “We argued that one,” she reveals. As my own Mathew Nuqingaqs swing from my lobes, I feel seen. Aglok MacDonald elaborates: “There were definitely a lot of things like that. They’re [Our networks are] not from the North; they’re not of the culture; they’re excellent collaborators, but there is so much cultural specificity in the show that sometimes, especially CBC or Netflix, they don’t necessarily know these things, but then as soon as we’re like, ‘It means this, this and this,’ they’re like, ‘Oooh, okay, okay, okay, cool’ and they’ll back off. But there were definitely a few things we had to fight for.”
From left to right: Maika Harper, Anna Lambe and Hope Akeeagok filming episode one of North of North (2025) COURTESY APTN, CBC AND NETFLIX PHOTO JASPER SAVAGE
The series’ creators had a tall order: make a comedic show that appeals to a universal audience, with teeth and heart that assures Inuit that it is also specifically for us. “Of course, there were times where it’s like, this is just for the Inuit. It’s okay if you don’t get it,” Aglok MacDonald confirms. The creators relied on cues from their own community to know when they were on the right track.
“Colin’s twenty bucks,” Aglok MacDonald continues mirthfully, referencing another joke in the pilot episode, “was another one they were asking to be cut. They didn’t get it. And we’re like, ‘It’s a Native joke!’” The three women giggle conspiratorially. “You ask for a favour, twenty bucks.” The show’s creators were proven right when they heard everyone laughing in the audience during the community screening.
Authentically capturing life in the North proved to be a logistical challenge. The team encountered some production barriers when shooting, such as having to fake “dangerous stunts” like ski-dooing on flat sea ice simply because insurance rules have been developed for a completely different (southern) terrain. But not all cultural specificities presented obstacles. Some held advantages. For example, the show’s drool-worthy fur fashions and depictions of traditional hunting, which notoriously receive undue scrutiny from non-Indigenous people, were easily accepted. “Because Netflix is a global streamer,” Arnaquq-Baril explains, “they actually were not concerned about us using fur and wild meat, because vegans are actually a very, very tiny percent of the population across the world. And there are many cultures around the world that eat different foods and hunt and farm and are much closer to their food production.”
While decolonizing our television screens through authenticity and targeted audience service is great, the series goes one step further to decolonize feminism in its story. North of North shows Siaja’s path of self-actualization as grand yet unglamorous and community oriented. She aspires to become an assistant at the community centre so she can make a difference in the lives of those around her. The show had me at three generations of gender-norm-defying women while the heroine trades in her fuckboy-Ken husband (played by the rakish Kelly William) for an exacting female boss.
Co-showrunners and executive producers Stacey Aglok MacDonald (left) and Alethea Arnaquq-Baril during production of North of North (2025) COURTESY APTN, CBC AND NETFLIX PHOTO JASPER SAVAGE
Siaja knows her community inside and out and the issues affecting it—accessibility, housing, climate change, a void of cultural programming throughout the year—and is pissed off enough to want to address those issues. While she wants what any suddenly single mom might want, something that is “just hers” so she can build an identity for herself outside of “wife and mother,” her pursuit of personal freedom and autonomy is not the only part of her journey, as is the case in so many white feminist stories. Siaja’s empowerment also lies in her serving her people—an ethos that will especially resonate with Inuit. It is this passion and drive that turned out to be the most immediate way for actor Anna Lambe, who has her own record of advocacy work in her community, to connect with her character. While other aspects of the character scared Lambe, like playing a mother, she wisely relied, again, on the inspiration of her community: “[Siaja] is somebody that I feel like I’ve seen so many times amongst my own cousins, my mom, my grandma, and their stories and their lives. All the girls who I thought were really cool and interesting and doing really important things in community were all really kind of important in building Siaja.”
Credit to the writers and Lambe’s performance that they don’t allow this character to fall into the trope of a plucky heroine with a heart of gold who you simply must love. She messes up plenty and can be pretty obnoxious along the way. However Lambe hitches the audience firmly along for the ride by capturing the heart of Siaja and making her sometimes imprudent choices sympathetic. By episode three, Siaja commits several egregious social faux pas in her extremely small-town community, causing my inner twenty-something self to recoil as though under a harsh spotlight, and I feel uncomfortably seen.
Of course, the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, and Siaja must also contend with her mother, Neevee, played by Maika Harper, another fierce single mom who also has some messes in her closet. Siaja may crash land on Neevee’s couch in her time of need, but Toto, we are not in Stars Hollow anymore. This relationship is loving but fraught. The show resists the easy route to mine this new living situation for odd-couple roommate laughs, or even a sweet “it takes a village” spirit when it comes to parenting. Instead, it is made immediately clear that Siaja is not welcome to stay very long and that she and Neevee have some deep-rooted issues to work out, due in no small part to Neevee’s past struggles with alcoholism. Of course alcoholism is not a uniquely Indigenous experience, but it is a particularly painful one. Thankfully the show is not afraid to represent it despite enduring stigma, because we are treated to layered Inuit female characters worthy of redemption and laughs (and it doesn’t hurt that Harper brings scorching humour and depth to Neevee).
Still of Maika Harper as Neevee in episode four of North of North (2025) COURTESY APTN, CBC AND NETFLIX PHOTO JASPER SAVAGE
Depicting layered, complex characters turns out to be a pretty instinctual choice for the creators. When asked why it was important to them to depict Inuit women onscreen like this, Aglok MacDonald offers, “I think there’s a certain level of it that comes from ‘write what you know,’ and as Inuit women ourselves, it just felt like the most natural perspective to write from.” “It would never even occur to me to write a show with a male lead,” Arnaquq-Baril confesses, returning the room to laughter. “It just felt really organic and natural to us, and felt like something that we could write for and from, from a very honest place,” Aglok MacDonald continues. “We’re also Inuit women who have complicated Inuk mothers, so that also felt really easy and natural to write,” shares Arnaquq-Baril.
Ultimately, the team aims to decolonize the television industry by picking their battles. “I think the way we approach it is to just work in the way we think makes sense and do our best. And like from project to project, try to do better the next time, like the audition process,” Arnaquq-Baril says. Aglok MacDonald quickly agrees: “Notice the gaps. Understand why we think that the gaps are happening. Because sometimes I don’t think we fully understand it when we’re in the middle of it.” For example, networks are used to considering actors who have auditioned hundreds of times for projects, and most Inuit haven’t had the opportunity to do that, requiring the team to do some convincing when it comes to casting. The pair are considering holding training sessions on how to audition and hope that more Inuit men will audition for season two (should we be so lucky to get it), since a scant few auditioned for season one.
Near the end of our interview, when talking about the characters being a mishmash of people the producers know from their communities, I blurt out that I related to Kuuk, played charmingly by Braeden Clarke, the southern Inuk “Little Prince” who clumsily straddles the insider-outsider line in the world of the show. I joking-but-not-joking ask if he was based on me. They blessedly laugh this off. “We wanted Inuit to feel represented in the show, whether they are born and raised in the North, or if they’re born in the North and moved away and are trying to reintegrate into community,” Arnaquq-Baril reassures me. I feel seen.
Natives, wherever you are in the world, consider this your invitation to kick off your boots, head north of North and get Inuit-cozy.
Bronwyn Szabo is a filmmaker, writer and professional actor. She made her directorial debut with horror film Mardöll (2020) and co-directed the third season of Anaana’s Tent (2021). In 2023 she won the Jeff Barnaby Grant for Indigenous horror filmmakers to produce her web series called It Doesn't Show, based on the Qallupilluit. It will premiere on APTN Lumi in the fall of 2025.