The reappearance of a woman’s missing husband changes the game in the second season of thriller The Last Thing He Told Me
When Laura Dave wrote her thriller The Last Thing He Told Me, she didn’t realize she had created the ultimate cliffhanger. It was only after the Apple TV series, adapted from her novel by Dave and her husband Josh Singer, that fans started asking what comes next. “I started hearing from people how much excitement there was for a season two,” says Dave.
While the author had no hesitation about revisiting California artisan Hannah Hall (Jennifer Garner) and her stepdaughter Bailey Michaels (Angourie Rice), currently laying low from the people threatening the life of Hannah’s missing husband Owen (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau), the process of bringing the continuation of their journey to the screen was a far cry from the first go-round, which took the author 10 solitary years. “[This time] I sat down and wrote the first hundred pages. I shared them with [Hello Sunshine executive producer] Lauren [Neustadter], I shared them with Josh, I shared them with Jen [Garner]. And we decided that this was going to be the next chapter for Hannah,” she says.
The story picks up from where it left off, five years after Owen went on the run, leaving his wife and daughter to fend for their own safety. As we saw in the finale of the first season, Owen had a brief clandestine encounter with Hannah, but it was Bailey calling Hannah “Mom” that was the real emotional beat of the scene. This was how Dave determined where to start their next chapter. “The beating heart of this show is the relationship between Hannah and Bailey,” says Dave. “I wanted to meet them at a time in their future where they had managed to save each other. And regardless of what was going to happen with Hannah’s husband and Bailey’s father, they were a self-contained, happy unit because they managed to become the hero of their own lives.”
The true hero of the series is, of course, Hannah, who this season takes charge of the situation in ways we have come to expect from the former Alias star. “In the first season, she’s very reactive. She’s never a victim, and she always has a real purpose and mission, but I think the five-year jump allows her to really know where she is and we’re shifting into a new gear,” says Neustadter. What hasn’t changed is the way Hannah continues to be the grownup in the room. “Have you heard of this term, ‘competency porn’?” asks Garner. “Hannah does that for me. She has prepared everything for every eventuality, all to keep Bailey safe. Watching the penny drop, where Hannah realizes the kind of danger they’re in, and watching her take one step after the other and include Bailey in this grand escape is, to me, really, really gratifying.”
But no amount of preparation readies them for the impact of absentee Owen, when he finally makes his return. For Coster-Waldau, digging deeper into the motivations of his character was the true draw of the season. “In the first season, more or less everything with Owen is through the other characters’ memories, and you know how sometimes your memory, you can’t trust it,” says the Game of Thrones actor. “What was exciting for me in this season is that you see him through his eyes, if that makes any sense. And also, Laura said that she had a whole story written out about what Owen did [throughout the first season], and I’m very curious about where he went.”
The Last Thing universe expands this season, with two new characters that offer more insight into our three leads. Rita Wilson joins as Hannah’s mother Carol. “As you know from the Quinn Campano books, Hannah and her mother are estranged and Hannah goes to see Carol as a last resort,” says Singer. “They have a lot to work out, just as Hannah and Owen will have a lot to work out. So, we thought there was a real opportunity there.” Judy Greer plays Quinn Campano, the daughter of the man hunting Owen. “Quinn was quite close to Bailey’s mother, so she and Bailey wind up having this long conversation over the course of the season about who Bailey’s mother was,” says Singer. “What I loved about [casting Greer] was it was something that we hadn’t seen Judy do. She gets pigeonholed as a comic actress, but her drama chops are fantastic. There are a couple scenes that are shot in Paris with Judy and Jen that are, I think, among the best things we’ve done.”
Even as the cast grows in numbers, there is no question about which relationship fans want to see more of. The second season is an opportunity to demonstrate how Hannah and Bailey’s relationship has deepened, but also how it changes when a child becomes more of a peer. “In season one, she’s 16, and in season two, she’s 21, 22, and that changes your relationship with your parents,” says Rice. “For Bailey, a lot of season two is realizing that your parents are also just people. She has to come to terms with Owen and the decisions he made. And, also, exploring the history with her biological mother, there’s kind of a disillusionment there, but also a deeper understanding of her relationships with her mom and dad, and I loved exploring that.”
While the narrative goal is to pull Hannah and Bailey apart, one of Garner’s favourite memories from the second season is a scene that demonstrates how close they have grown. “We’re on the run, and we have this night where we are sleeping together in our car,” she says. “We shot it on a beach in Malibu, and it was really cold, and so we were actually really snuggled up, and it was just so dear to think of how far these characters had come.” In fact, it’s that unbearable threat of separation that creates the greatest tension of all. “Over five years, Hannah and Bailey have worked so hard to find stability and a routine,” says Rice. “When that’s all thrown into the air, they have to figure out how to be in a crisis together. The last time they were in a crisis together, it brought them closer, but there was a lot of tension along the way. So, the stakes are very high.”
The Last Thing He Told Me, streaming on Apple TV