“We wanted to start the season with Will working on himself,” Thomsen explains. “He’s got a lot to explore with his new relationship to his family, and whether or not he is going to be able to find a living relative to talk to, so I think that put him in a place where he wasn’t as codependent as normal.” And when it comes to Angie, Heldens believes that “people are ready to follow her and her own stories,” independent from Will.
Season 2 picked up six months after Detective Polaski suffered a brutal beatdown at the hands of serial killer James Ulster. Ever since then, she’s been itching to return to the grind. “She’s a workaholic,” Thomsen acknowledges. “Her job means so much to her, and when it’s gone, she truly feels like she’s teetering on the edge,” and struggling to find purpose in her sobriety. “That’s why [in Episode 2] she’s thrown herself into being a sponsor.”
What Angie isn’t necessarily prepared for is the return of Crystal (Chapel Oaks), the teenager who in Season 1 was preyed upon by Angie’s former abuser, Lenny Broussard. After Crystal killed Lenny, Angie took the fall and claimed self-defense against the pedophile.
“I think it was a really good, emotional story,” Thomsen says. “It’s also a story about unintended consequences. They tried to handle things on their own, outside the system, and look where it got them.” Crystal has since been abandoned by her mother, Lenny’s ex, and in Episode 2 wound up in GBI custody.
“The intention of bringing Crystal back is to show the fallout, and not just pretend like that story never happened,” the EP explains. “Now that Angie has some more time on her hands, Crystal comes back into her life,” and subsequent episodes will explore “what that looks like. How can she take care of this girl?”