Containment: Season Two Plans Revealed for Cancelled CW Series

Containment was cancelled by The CW back in May, but the network let 13 one-hour episode drama play out. In the wake of last night’s unintentional Containment TV series finale, Executive Producer Julie Plec talks about her plans, had The CW renewed the quarantine drama for a second season.

Based on the Belgian series Cordon, Containment follows people afflicted with and affected by a mysterious epidemic that breaks out in Atlanta. The Containment TV series cast includes: David Gyasi, Christina Moses, Chris Wood, Kristen Gutoskie, Claudia Black, George Young, Hanna Mangan Lawrence, and Trevor St. John. Warning: Containment TV series finale spoilers, after the jump.

 

 

EW asked Plec what she would have done with Containment, season two:

We had so many plans, and what’s exciting to me, in the midst of my despair, is that the Belgian company has made a second series of the show, so we get to see their story continue on. Maybe if nothing else, more people will watch that now that they don’t get to watch ours.

We really wanted to spend a season dealing with the day-to-day community building of being inside a quarantine that feels like it might never end and really explore what society goes through when they are essentially left to die. And then we were planning on building a really tremendous conspiracy outside the cordon that Leo Green was going to be chasing in a great kind of All the President’s Men way as he connected the origins of the virus back to a big pharma company. We wanted to see what it was like for Lex to end up in a community where suddenly Jake was really, for all intents and purposes, the mayor, and what conflict that would create between those two friends. We wanted to see Jana as the mama bear queen of the community as we see people starting to experiment with how do we communicate, can we have radio, how do we get the message out, how do we educate our kids? What’s poor Quinton going to be like as a teenager growing up in this community? What are the other kids? Are they troublemakers? We had a lot of plans. And I’m super sad that we’re not going to be able to tell those stories.

 

Plec tells TV Line what she would have done differently, had she known Containment would only run for one season:

 

Well, if I had known that from the beginning, I would have finished the story. I would have found a way to find a cure and see a sense of hope that the quarantine would be lifted. We got pretty close to that, coincidentally, so that’s good. But I would have liked to see it go on for another chapter in order to tell the other half of the story.

 

Plec went into even more detail with TV Line, about her plans, had The CW picked up Containment season two.

 

TVLINE | What was in store for a potential Season 2?

We had the conflict at the hospital. As the entire community is waiting for the virus to die out, knowing they won’t be free until it does, Dr. Cannerts comes up with a way to keep people alive, even though they’re symptomatic. So there’s a bunch of people, diseased and able to spread the virus, that he’s keeping alive and healthy but still infectious. Suddenly, these people who just 20 days ago were outraged to be placed in a cordon find themselves having to cordon off an area within their own zone so that they can potentially avoid infection from the people at the hospital. So we had a great cuckoo’s nest kind of division: the hospital filled with sick and dying people versus a community of people trying to build and hold on and survive in functional ways by deciding what to do about communication and law and martial law and how to feed themselves and how to teach their kids and how to be intimate with each other — all the things that you need to have when you’re stuck somewhere and you’re not going anywhere anytime soon.

TVLINE | How would Lex have adjusted to being inside the cordon?

The adjustment would have been complicated for him, because he’s used to being the guy in charge. He’s the Major, and here he comes into a town with less than 10 cops, where Jake has stepped into, basically, an ad hoc mayoral role within the community [and] where normal law does not apply. And yet, Jake is such a by-the-book guy, he would have had quite a wake-up call in terms of how to navigate within this new world.

TVLINE | Jake went on such a journey in Season 1 with Katie. What love interest could you have possibly introduced for him that fans wouldn’t have revolted against?

We had a new lady friend that we were planning on, quite literally, dropping from a helicopter into the middle of the quarantine zone, but certainly knowing that it wouldn’t be easy to get romantic anytime soon. But we definitely had a new scene partner for him that we were excited to explore.

TVLINE | After the finale, I had to wonder what Katie would think of the fact that Quentin did not get out of the cordon after all.

She would still be rooting for an alternate exit route. Season 2 would have continued to be about ways to eventually get healthy people out of the cordon. Quentin’s destiny, certainly — unless we had to “Walt” him because he was growing too tall [Laughs] — was to make it out safely. I can’t see it ending any other way.

 

 

Did you enjoy the Containment TV series finale? Even though it was not planned as a single season show, do you think Containment‘s first and only season told a complete story? Sound off in the comments!