PRODIGAL SON Finale Post-Mortem: The EPs Break Down the ‘Game-Changing’ Twist

[Warning: This post contains spoilers for the PRODIGAL SON finale.]

The PRODIGAL SON season 2 finale ended with one heck of a twist, as Bright (Tom Payne)—who spent the hour with Martin (Michael Sheen), in the aftermath of the latter’s escape from Claremont and then Vivian’s (Catherine Zeta-Jones) kidnapping—fought with his father…and stabbed him in the gut.

Unfortunately, what comes next may not be seen by fans: Fox canceled the show, and the studio is still trying to see if they can find a new home for the delightful drama.

But what might come next? Showrunners Chris Fedak and Sam Sklaver share their season 3 hopes…

After the final moments, what state is Martin in? Is he for-sure dead?
Chris Fedak: Well, I’ll try to answer that question by talking about Sam and myself for a moment, which is weird. After we were done with cutting the show, we actually came up with a pitch for season 3 that we are very excited by, and [so was] Fox, in truth, it was a wonderful pitch; and it was a great vision they were enthusiastic for. And in no version of that pitch was Michael Sheen not a part of the show. In regard to like the hope of seeing him again, and the hope of where we want to go, I would say that. We were really excited to kind of take him in new directions. If you read in-between the lines, I think there’s an answer to the question.
Sam Sklaver: Also, I do think, historically, when we stab someone—if you look at Nicolas Endicott, that guy was dead. Martin, I’m not so sure about.

Malcolm is someone who has also struggled with reality, so he could be the best one to have taken him out—Martin might never leave him.
Fedak: I like how you climb into our minds; you know us well. Which is [to say] that there is a subconscious version of Martin that lives inside Bright’s mind.
Sklaver: No one would give Martin more joy [for having done it]; I think a lot of people would enjoy killing Martin. I think if you were interviewing Bellamy Young as Jessica Whitly, I think she would love to. And I think Gil Arroyo would have a lot of fun, as well. But I definitely know that the one person Martin wants to kill him is probably his son. Or maybe his daughter. The narcissist in him.

Malcolm has deeply struggled with his mental health in the past, and even if this is just a wound, it seems like this might mess him up more. What can you share about the plans for him getting past this trauma?
Fedak: Painfully, slowly, and over the course of season 3. Sam has said it: This was a game-changing moment for the show. It is a huge change for Bright, in the sense of actually drawing that blood. And bringing down his father and—maybe—killing him. I think that that was something that we were really excited to explore in a season 3. In keeping with the vibe of our show, we wouldn’t do it in a just solely dark perspective. There’s a version of reality where, I know Martin and Bright have been on the run for the entirety of that episode, and when he makes that 911 call, he’s pretty much listing: “I saved the girl, I captured the serial killer, and, oh, by the way, I’ve got another serial killer, as well.” So there’s kind of a heroic element to this that I know we don’t explore here in the end of season 2, but it is a pretty amazing thing he’s managed to do.

There’s also the lingering secret that Jessica didn’t report that Martin called for help. How would that betrayal play out, especially since it led to such tragic consequences?
Fedak: We always like that the show is a family show. And so that there can be secrets and lies, and there can be estrangement, but in the end, that these people have survived by also staying together. And I think that’s one of the hopeful aspects of the show: it isn’t about bad people; it’s about good people struggling with what happens when bad people happen to them. All that complexity and Ainsley’s perspective and Jessica’s perspective, that’s the heart of our family show. That’s the soap opera side of the show, the family drama, that we love to do, along with our procedurals and our mysteries. So, it is something that we would definitely would have explored. And we would have had to deal with that estrangement and that anxiety and that tension between them.
Sklaver: What’s fun about the characters of our show—by which I really mean the actors who portray them—is that they bring such depth and complexity to the roles that when I look at Bright, he could be very mad at Jessica for not reporting the phone call, for not trying to save the father. But from Jessica’s point of view, Bright stabbed him in the gut after spending a weekend up in Vermont with him. So, like Chris is saying, no one is really the good guy or the bad guy. And at the end of the day, the only thing they really are is family, and our family has found a way to stick together through the most messed up of circumstances. And I’m not saying it won’t be juicy and dramatic. But I would be excited to see how it plays out.

Ainsley (Halston Sage) has had a connection with her father that occasionally baffled the rest of her family. How might she respond to this?
Fedak: I think that it’s one of the most interesting reactions. As we left her in episode 11, she realized that her father had actually kind of left her an Easter egg behind that was an invitation for her to run with him. And as a young woman, who’s never really had the relationship that her brother had with her father, and maybe has had a bit of like weird inverted jealousy in regard to it, there was almost a promise of something more between the two of them. She’s a complicated person; she may have elements where she may not be as empathetic as her brother, but she would be conflicted. And I think that the fallout from those last few seconds would be something that will cause a rift between the two of them, as well. And especially with someone like Ainsley, a rift can lead to really intriguing and interesting places.

One of the unresolved issues of the season was Dani (Aurora Perrineau) and Malcolm’s kiss. Where did you see them going?
Fedak: Well first off, if you ever find yourself having your first big romantic kiss with somebody in a storage unit, it’s maybe not the best idea, but…

For us, we were building to this moment of these two people who understand each other in a way, because they both have dealt with their own traumas in the past. And that Dani understands Bright a little bit more. And there’s also a relationship between the two of them. I think that what’s neat is that the question really is, can there be a relationship between two people with such traumatic pasts and who are connected in a way about that trauma? But also can they be connected emotionally and romantically? And I think that that was something that we really want to explore that. How do you do that? How do you improve yourself? How do you deal and cope with the things that have traumatized you, but also connected you to this person? It was something that they would have to get into it. And from a ‘shipper perspective, because Sam and I are all about the romance, that was how we built our pitch around season 3. That, in some ways, is the spine of the story.

And how about Jessica and Gil (Lou Diamond Phillips)?
Sklaver: I think that Jessica is really hinting at it in that last scene. Edrisa says so clearly, “It’s getting a little steamy in here.” I think that Jessica, for the first time, is hopeful. Gil has always felt hopeful, to me, that he could have a relationship with Jessica. And Jessica has always been afraid. Is she too damaged? Will she bring Gil down? When I watched that last scene with Catherine Zeta-Jones sitting in interrogation and the two of them looking at each other, I’m very hopeful for their future. I know nothing in our show is ever easy, which is why our show is so much fun, but it’s an exciting road to go down for sure.

Do you anticipate bringing Catherine Zeta-Jones back if season 3 happens?
Fedak: One thousand percent we would want to try to have a Catherine return to the show. We had a way to bring her back in, and we were excited to do more with Dr. Vivian Capshaw, the very dangerous, unstable, fascinating doctor. We would be criminally negligent as producers to not try figure out how to bring Catherine back. Along with Alan Cumming.

I don’t know how much this might be a spoiler, but if the show returns, do you anticipate Claremont being a fixture going forward? Or would you move to a new third, non-NYPD and non-Whitly home, hub?
Sklaver: That’s a great question. I do have to say, towards the end of this season, seeing Martin in a big house and a beautiful suit, and then seeing him out in Vermont, in his flannel layers, we’ve really started to enjoy how much more this character was even blossoming. And kind of realizing that for the first two seasons, he was always on one set.

Claremont got a little bit bigger, and he was in the infirmary, but Michael brings so much to the character. So it was just crazy to see how much more Martin could flourish once we took him out of Claremont. And it’s definitely something we’ve been discussing a lot: other roles that we could see Martin in, other worlds. That gets us very excited. We love Claremont. But seeing Martin out in a new place is awesome and very exciting.

PRODIGAL SON, Tuesdays, 9/8c, Fox

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