THE SECRET CIRCLE: Andrew Miller Teases Blackwell’s Impact, Ethan’s Secrets, Major Deaths and More

What will the return of THE SECRET CIRCLE bring tonight? “Lots of fun surprises and not fun surprises,” co-creator Andew Miller cryptically teased.

Hmph.

But you want a bit more than that about our return to Chance Harbor, don’t you? Don’t worry, I’ve got you covered.

Miller and I spoke yesterday about what Blackwell will be up to now, how that will impact the characters around him, Faye and Diana’s new romances, deaths (!), why he’s planning a (satisfying) cliffhanger finale and more…
What can you say about tonight’s return?
Andrew Miller: Well, [tonight]’s episode starts with Cassie confronting this guy who says he’s her father and says he’s a reformed devil and trying to understand if this is someone she can trust, if this is someone she can reach out to. And this is from a girl who desperately needs someone to reach out to. Who basically has no family right now, and wants someone to call “Dad.” But he’s a guy who comes with a lot of baggage. But despite who he claims to be and despite what he claims his intentions are, he brings with a lot of stuff that eventually puts Cassie in a lot more danger than if he had never shown up at all. We’re going to confront that right away in the next episode.

We ended Cassie and Adam in this pretty decent place, where after 14 episodes, Adam was finally in the position to step up and make a romantic gesture. And i think Cassie, despite having to battle six dead ghosts, was receptive to it and likes the idea of being with Adam and definitely wants to explore what written in the stars means, and this seems like their best shot at it. But Blackwell — Cassie’s trust for Blackwell and Adam’s mistrust for Blackwell — becomes a severe stumbling block in their relationship right now.

And then, over on the other side of Chance Harbor, young, sweet Faye has just broken through with this voodoo guy, Lee, and stood up to him and said she didn’t believe him and he really…it feels like he made a decision and said, “I want you to trust me, I’m ready for this.” In the last episode he broke the voodoo totem that he had. [Laughs] And what he’s about to discover, is we all have to deal with exes showing up in our lives once in a while, it’s really a pain in the ass to deal with an ex showing up from the dead and back in your life. And that’s going to start — there’s a love triangle there between Faye, Lee, and his former girlfriend in a coma that is a lot of fun tomorrow night.

Wow, a lot going on. Going quickly back to Blackwell, you mentioned a couple of times that he’s claiming to be this person. Should fans be doubting whether this man truly is the real Blackwell?
AM: No. I think fans should be suspicious of him, just as Cassie’s suspicious of him. I think it’s fairly safe to say that he is John Blackwell, but what side of Blackwell and what that means is definitely up for grabs.

There was also the tease in the last episode that he and Jake will team up to protect Cassie. Is that going to be off-screen or will we see that explored further?
AM: No, that’s explored further [tonight]…The only person more hungry for a father figure in their life than Cassie is Jake. He lost his father at a young age — he saw his father killed at a very young age — and he’s been searching. In some degree, I think the relationship he has/had with Isaac was about that. But that hasn’t been going well lately. I think this Blackwell presence is another opportunity for Jake to believe in someone. I think he’s going to become firmly Team Blackwell early on, which just makes things harder for Adam, who so desperately doesn’t trust Blackwell.

Will Blackwell’s other child be brought up by the end of the season?
AM: Oh yeah. Brought up, brought out.

So we’ll know who it is?
AM: For sure. [Laughs] It’s really exciting. And it’s only one of many surprises along those lines. It’s a very fun reveal and it’s more than just the surprise factor of the reveal, it’s very interesting how that plays into the mythology of John Blackwell and what was happening 16 years ago and what’s continuing to happen now.

Does that mean we’ll get the adults back into the mix more?
AM: Yeah, one of the fun aspects of the Blackwell character has been not only playing with Cassie’s expectations, but you’ve got these three grownups in town who have had 16 years to stew with their feelings for John Blackwell. Cassie has only been hearing about him in truth for the past few weeks, but these guys have spent a long time imagining what it would be like to see him again or hoping that he was really dead or suspecting that he isn’t. And we get to explore all of those emotions in the next few episodes as he starts to touch the lives of the adults in ways that they like — some of them — and really, really don’t like.

In [tonight’s] episode, we’ll deal with Ethan a lot. We saw him react to Blackwell in the last episode, and it only gets worse in this one. As Charles hinted a couple episodes ago, there may be stuff in Ethan’s past that he shouldn’t be so proud of. We’re going to find those things out and how that [impacts] his specific relationship with Blackwell and then ultimately, how it [impacts] his own relationship with his son whose own expectations of his father will be turned on its head because of what we reveal.

Does that mean we’ll get the return of Drunk Ethan?
AM: [Laughs] Ethan’s being trying really hard lately! I don’t want to knock his progress. He’s been trying to clean his act up, to be the dad that he’s always wanted to be for Adam. He’s just made a mess of things.

Many fans do love their Drunk Ethan…
AM: Who doesn’t love Drunk Ethan? First of all, you could go for a swim in the blueness of Drunk Ethan’s eyes. Number two, he is just so tortured that how much he loves Adam is amazing, how much he loves Cassie’s mom is amazing. It’s just that we’re going to find out more about Drunk Ethan that may surprise people.

And Diana will be dating a “normal” guy, right? How difficult will that be for her?
AM: Dating a normal guy is hard under any circumstance when you’re a 16-year-old girl. Dating a normal guy when you’re being chased by demons, ghosts and witch hunters is really hard. Diana is the last person who should be dating a “normal” guy because she’s been so circle-centric and she’s the responsible one and she’s the one who brought them together and she’s, in some respects, leading them. But if you’re attracted to a hot guy from Australia with a yacht, it’s hard to deny it. And she’s going to be struggling with that starting this episode and hopefully continuing for a while.

Melissa knows more than anybody how hard it is to date when you’re in the secret circle. Diana’s going to realize just how hard that is, too.

Very interesting. Should we be expecting any more major deaths by the end of the season?
AM: Fans can expect major deaths [tonight], let alone by the end of the season! This is a show…we started this show with Kevin [Williamson] and following VAMPIRE DIARIES — and as a huge fan of VAMPIRE DIARIES — there is nothing that makes the stakes feel more real for me than when real characters suffer from the mistakes they make and that other people make. It’s one of my favorite things about VAMPIRE DIARIES and one of my favorite things about our show. We’ll definitely be putting kids in jeopardy or risky situations they can’t get out of.

Does that mean we should expect a cliffhanger finale?
AM: Yeah. I think we can expect a cliffhanger, but as a fan, there’s nothing more frustrating than an unsatisfying cliffhanger, so we’re going to answer the mythology of the show — at least this first season — and there will still be a cliffhanger, but the mythology of what happened 16 years ago and how it’s affecting them today is so fun that we can’t wait for a second season to get into that.

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Give us your best theories! And don’t forget THE SECRET CIRCLE airs Thursdays at 9 PM on The CW.

Related:

THE SECRET CIRCLE: Chris Zylka Talks the Return of John Blackwell, the Adam-Cassie-Jake-Faye Quad, and More

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