PERSON OF INTEREST Season 3 Finale Post-Mortem: Greg Plageman and Jonathan Nolan Tease What Comes Next

[This post contains spoilers for the third season finale of PERSON OF INTEREST. If you haven’t seen it, please go watch that before you read this interview.]

PERSON OF INTEREST concluded its third season this week with a major shakeup: after Samaritan went live, Reese, Finch, Root, and Shaw were in danger, so Root was able to implement a program into Samaritan’s serves that would allow them to disappear and live “ordinary” lives.

Like much of the rest of POI’s crazy-good third season (including the still-stunning death of Carter), this latest twist brings up the question of where the heck the showrunners are going to take us next. Thankfully, PERSON OF INTEREST bosses Greg Plageman and Jonathan Nolan were willing to give a few teases about what season 4 will have in store for fans…

What can you say about where the show will pick up next season? Will there be a time jump?
Jonathan Nolan: [Pause] We’re still talking about it. But we imagine, at this point, we will find our heroes after they’ve settled, a little bit, into the life that Root has set up for them.

We spent three seasons with our superheroes being these fabulous shadowy figures in the background. They get to do the superhero bit. But they’ve never been [burdened] with the banality of being a normal person. Finch has dabbled with it, but they’ve never really been saddled with normalcy. But we just thought it was too much fun to pass up: to explore the idea of John Reese and Sam Shaw and Root and Harold Finch all having to be the one normal person. And sneak off and be superheroes in their own spare time. We’re looking forward to finding our heroes and what’s become of them in the new world order.
Greg Plageman: We can’t decide which one of them is going to get a job at Hot Dog on a Stick. [Laughs]

Um, all of them should do that, because how could you pass up the visual of those actors in that uniform? As they’re on the run, what’s Fusco going to be up to?
GP: I think Fusco is going to be dealing with a potentially volatile new member of the precinct across the desk from him. That will remain a secret into the premiere.

Someone new, or someone we’ve seen before?
JN: You’re going to have to stay tuned. No comment!

You’ve been upfront about not intending to do 200 episode of the show. As you look to arc season 4, are you going into this as, say, the start of chapter four out of a five chapter book? Or are you a little less sure about how long the show will last for?
JN: What do you think, Greg? How much more of this can we do?
GP: [Joking] I’ll probably be dead by the end of next season.
JN: Greg and I went into this knowing what the last episode would be, knowing what the last song would be, and knowing what that last moment would be. And the fun of television is when you’re having fun and working with great actors and great writers and an amazing crew — as we are — we get to chase down different paths and different ideas. And we’ve had these ideas of different waypoints, or chapters, as you said, and sometimes we adjust to this.

We definitely had a conversation about whether Samaritan would come online this season or the end of next season. As we moved through the season, we thought, let’s get there. Let’s go for it.

I mean, look, I’d love to keep doing this as long as we have a compelling story to tell, and as long as we’re having fun. But in order for it to remain a compelling story, it needs to have a beginning, a middle, and an end. I don’t think the end is that close in sight, yet, and I hope the audience agrees, and we can continue to play in this universe. But yes, we craft [things] with an ending in mind. But I think we have more than five seasons of story to tell.

Personally, I would agree, but I’m also not the one who has to craft the show. Is Samaritan going to be the main arc/focus of next season, or is that just the jumping off point?
GP: Well, it’s certainly where we’re launching off for next year. I’m certain the story will open up to a larger story and understanding. What do we do now? What is Harold Finch going to do now that he’s expressed his ambivalence on the stand in terms of his creation. And has told Mr. Reese that this is where I get off [a few episodes back]. How does Harold reconcile his life now, now that not only his Machine is out there, and Samaritan — Samaritan perhaps being even more predatory. How does he go about his life? And I think that’s the interesting thing Jonah and I are exploring now.

One of the fascinating things, when they captured Osama bin Laden, one of the reasons they realized something strange was going on in the house was because they couldn’t get any telephone signals, they couldn’t get any wifi signals, they couldn’t get any internet access. The thing that made it anomalous was that there was this compound that was off the grid. And that let them know he was in that residence.

I think that’s a cool understanding we have now is the way to become more noticeable to an entity like Samaritan is if you’re trying to take yourself off the grid. The real challenge will be what can our guys do, and what has Root installed in those servers in Samaritan that allows them to exist on this planet, and how will our heroes conduct themselves going forward?

There was that cool graphic in the finale as Samaritan became fully functional that showed its impact outside of New York. Is this going to be when you take the show on the road a bit?
JN: I think every season our storyline has grown outward in reach and ambition. But New York remains a natural home for us. Honestly, if you were hiding from an all-seeing eye, New York is probably the best place to hide. It’s that jumble of humanity in which, ironically, it remains the most surveilled place in the world, but also the best place to dodge surveillance.

So I think we’ll continue this balance of a story that goes more and more international in its scope, but still focused in on New York as the forum or the arena its playing in.

When we last spoke, you mentioned you wanted to bring Carter back in flashbacks. Now that Taraji P. Henson (Carter) is busy with her new show, EMPIRE, is that something you’ll have to push a bit?
JN: We’ve always managed to duck and weave with actor availability. We would still love to revisit Carter’s character. And it’s always a pleasure to work with the incredible Taraji P. Henson. She could be busy, no question, but we’d love to make it possible.
GP: I think we brought back Annie Parisse (Stanton) after they killed her on THE FOLLOWING. [Laughs]
JN: [Laughs] Hopefully they won’t be killing off Taraji in the first season of EMPIRE!
GP: [Joking] I hope they kill off Camryn Manheim on EXTANT, because we’d love to have her back [as Control on PERSON OF INTEREST].

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What did you think of the PERSON OF INTEREST season finale?
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