Knowing that this was quite possibly the final Prison Break story ever told, what were your goals in how to bring the series in for a landing?
Mostly, the goal was to tell a rip-roaring and close-ended tale with a ton of action, a ton of emotion, and a ton of twists, filled with some brain-bending strategy. Like any great feature film — like an Indiana Jones or something — the movie itself is self-contained, but if there's going to be a sequel, that can be its own self-contained thing afterwards. The intention for this season was to just really kill it for nine episodes, walk away, and then should conversations ever develop again about doing another season, we would consider that, and then in turn create another self-standing season. In other words, the idea of getting Michael to smile in the end and walk away with him happy… that wasn't necessarily the endgame.
The fact that we're even joking about season six… you entered this year of Prison Break with a mind toward a closed-ended story. The season resonated with longtime fans of the series. Can you seriously imagine a sixth season?
There's a zero percent chance of the show coming back if we don't have a top-notch story. Right now, we don't have that story. That's not to say we can't find it. But we're not going to make the show in perpetuity because we want to. We want it to be of very high value and high quality. Right now, the creative powers that be don't have that answer. So it may never come back. I'm not being coy. I hold the quality standard very high. If we can't get something that doesn't in some way feel new and different, then we're not doing it. That's difficult when you have a very singular conceit like Prison Break. You have to get out of prison! So what prison is it now? So, it's tough. I would be open to it, but only if we can find a story that's going to knock your socks off.
Mostly, the goal was to tell a rip-roaring and close-ended tale with a ton of action, a ton of emotion, and a ton of twists, filled with some brain-bending strategy. Like any great feature film — like an Indiana Jones or something — the movie itself is self-contained, but if there's going to be a sequel, that can be its own self-contained thing afterwards. The intention for this season was to just really kill it for nine episodes, walk away, and then should conversations ever develop again about doing another season, we would consider that, and then in turn create another self-standing season. In other words, the idea of getting Michael to smile in the end and walk away with him happy… that wasn't necessarily the endgame.
The fact that we're even joking about season six… you entered this year of Prison Break with a mind toward a closed-ended story. The season resonated with longtime fans of the series. Can you seriously imagine a sixth season?
There's a zero percent chance of the show coming back if we don't have a top-notch story. Right now, we don't have that story. That's not to say we can't find it. But we're not going to make the show in perpetuity because we want to. We want it to be of very high value and high quality. Right now, the creative powers that be don't have that answer. So it may never come back. I'm not being coy. I hold the quality standard very high. If we can't get something that doesn't in some way feel new and different, then we're not doing it. That's difficult when you have a very singular conceit like Prison Break. You have to get out of prison! So what prison is it now? So, it's tough. I would be open to it, but only if we can find a story that's going to knock your socks off.
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What was that alternate ending?
The idea was Michael comes back and he’s apparently got a normal life, but with that comes a creeping paranoia that things can’t stay good like this. Unfortunately, that’s not on screen, but the idea that he’s always going to be looking over his shoulder. There was a scripted page where they said, “Michael, you can stop looking over your shoulder now, you’re free,” but then he looks over his shoulder and you can see the whole world out there and all the people in the park and everything, and any one of them might be a threat and you realize that a man like this could never go back to a normal life, but again that didn’t end up happening exactly how we wanted it so this is what we got on film. I think it still emotionally lands them in a good spot, and hopefully the audience gets the subtext that life will never be normal for Michael Scofield.
Is there anything you wish you had gotten to do this season?
That’s a good question. No, this was all outlined pretty copiously before the season started, so we shot exactly what we intended. Obviously you always want bigger action sequences and more time to film and that sort of stuff, but I feel like given the very tiny window we had to make this, I think we’ve got to do what we want to do, so I feel pretty good about that. One thing that’s funny is, I will say that a lot of fans are really clamoring for Sucre because they haven’t seen him since episode 1. I love Sucre, I wish he could’ve been in the season more, but again, all characters had to be organically within the series and he didn’t really have a role other than being the sidekick running around in Yemen, which he really didn’t have a skill set for. So I guess I wish there could’ve been more Sucre, but that would have been creatively disingenuous to include him more than that, but if there’s another season maybe there’s way more Sucre.
The idea was Michael comes back and he’s apparently got a normal life, but with that comes a creeping paranoia that things can’t stay good like this. Unfortunately, that’s not on screen, but the idea that he’s always going to be looking over his shoulder. There was a scripted page where they said, “Michael, you can stop looking over your shoulder now, you’re free,” but then he looks over his shoulder and you can see the whole world out there and all the people in the park and everything, and any one of them might be a threat and you realize that a man like this could never go back to a normal life, but again that didn’t end up happening exactly how we wanted it so this is what we got on film. I think it still emotionally lands them in a good spot, and hopefully the audience gets the subtext that life will never be normal for Michael Scofield.
Is there anything you wish you had gotten to do this season?
That’s a good question. No, this was all outlined pretty copiously before the season started, so we shot exactly what we intended. Obviously you always want bigger action sequences and more time to film and that sort of stuff, but I feel like given the very tiny window we had to make this, I think we’ve got to do what we want to do, so I feel pretty good about that. One thing that’s funny is, I will say that a lot of fans are really clamoring for Sucre because they haven’t seen him since episode 1. I love Sucre, I wish he could’ve been in the season more, but again, all characters had to be organically within the series and he didn’t really have a role other than being the sidekick running around in Yemen, which he really didn’t have a skill set for. So I guess I wish there could’ve been more Sucre, but that would have been creatively disingenuous to include him more than that, but if there’s another season maybe there’s way more Sucre.
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