Note: This story contains spoilers from “Tell Me Lies” Season 2 finale.
“Tell Me Lies” has come full circle, with its Season 2 finale seeing Lucy (Grace Van Patten) and Stephen (Jackson White) back together, and definitely not better than ever.
After Stephen declared his love for Lucy at the end of Episode 7, the finale picks up after the exes hooked up, leaving Lucy in a place so low all she can think to do is reach back out to Leo (Thomas Doherty) and make a plea for them to reconcile. Leo takes her back — and simultaneously Stephen breaks up with Diana (Alicia Crowder) — but their reconnection ends abruptly when Stephen throws his and Lucy’s hookup just hours before in Leo’s face, which arouses out an anger in Leo to beat Stephen bloody.
Left at a standstill, Lucy is pushed back into Stephen’s orbit when, after Drew’s sudden death in the finale, Stephen takes the blame for the letter (that Lucy wrote in Season 1 asking the Dean to look into Drew involvement in Macy’s death) in what showrunner Meaghan Oppenheimer calls a “crazy moment for him.”
“When Stephen decides he wants something … he’ll do anything to get it, and I think in that moment, he decides that it’s more important for him to have Lucy than to have the love and respect of Wrigley,” Oppenheimer told TheWrap. “He takes that risk and and it works. Wrigley forgives him, but he knows that he can’t get in any legal trouble for the letter … his sights are set on Lucy at that moment, so he’s going to do anything.”
Lucy sees Stephen taking the blame as an “incredibly selfless act” that “reframes the way that she sees him,” according to Oppenheimer. “She really believes that she’s not worth anyone else, but also that no one else, if they knew the real her, would love her,” Oppenheimer said, adding that Stephen accepts her worst moments.
Below, Oppenheimer unpacks the Season 2 finale’s implications for Diana, Pippa, Bree and Wrigley, shares her hopes for Season 3 and reveals whether Tom Ellis and Thomas Doherty could be involved in future installments.
TheWrap: In the 2015 storyline, things seem to be fine between Lucy and Stephen after they sleep together, but then Stephen reveals to Bree right before the wedding that Lucy and Evan slept together. Why would he do that?
Oppenheimer: He always knew he was not going to let Evan and Lucy get away with this. He considers it a betrayal, and he does not forgive betrayal … he’s decided he’s gotten everything he needs from his relationship with Evan at this point, and so he’s ready to just hit him where it hurts most.
It’s also a betrayal to Lucy. By 2015, does Stephen consider Lucy a viable partner for the future or is he still playing games?
He will always be fascinated by Lucy and certainly attracted to her, but I don’t think that he’s in a place where he’s considering a stable future between them. Even the sex that they have in the finale, it’s hate sex. They’ve both been pretending like they’ve matured, and then them coming together and having sex in that moment is both of them saying, “you’re still exactly the same.” They both think they’ve won in that moment, they both feel like they’ve unveiled the other person. But then, of course, Stephen actually wins, because he’s just hard to beat.
Lucy’s relationship with Leo has paused, but can we expect to see Leo (Thomas Doherty) in future seasons?
I really don’t know. I never want to say anything about that definitively, because once you get into the room, sometimes you just realize what you have room for or what you don’t have room for. It was definitely, initially expected to be a one season character, but you never know. I think Thomas was fantastic, so we would just have to see.
There’s been speculation among fans about the matching rose tattoo behind Stephen and Leo’s ears with many people thinking they’re brothers or related. What do you think about that theory?
It’s just the actors having tattoos unfortunately. Those guys, they just are all tatted up. I didn’t even realize. I guess I now thinking about, I’m like, “Oh yeah, they do have the same tattoos.” That’s very funny. No, maybe we’ll use it, but it wasn’t intentional at this point.
Bree is absolutely repulsed by Oliver and Marianne’s arrangement. Knowing what we know now about her feelings towards Oliver, is it likely that they stay in each others lives? What can you tease about who is on the phone with her during her wedding?
I can’t say who she’s on the phone with, but what I would say is, if Oliver was still in the story, I don’t think it would be in a romantic way with Bree. I think it would be something that has to be a little bit more explosive. Realistically, he’s a person who has definitely has done this before, and I think it’s hard to keep those secrets on a small college campus, so I think his life could maybe blow up in a more public way.
Have you talked to Tom about staying on for next season?
It’s always possible. We’re just seeing what happens. We have a little baby now, so our main thing is we’re going to be geographically in the same place, regardless of what we’re working on. So it certainly could happen, though, I would need to make sure it was the best story for the show. Obviously I love working with Tom [and] it’s certainly become more of a possibility to me only because so many people have been asking — people that have seen the whole season have been asking about the future of that character and wanting wrap up questions. I was not anticipating people wanting so much more closure than what they have. It’s a possibility. You never know.
Fans have loved seeing Pippa and Diana’s relationship grow across the season. Why did you want to pursue this storyline you wanted to pursue and what’s next for them?
That was not something I planned in Season 1, but in the hiatus between Season 1 and then starting the Season 2 storyline. I did decide that was something I wanted to do, mostly because I was like, “Where is Diana in 2015?” She’s the only character we haven’t established, so she could be anywhere. I think they both make sense with each other, and knowing what I was going to put both of them through, separately, it made sense that they would be two characters who need each other, who meet at rock bottom.
What I liked about how we did it this season was that it they didn’t get to the finish line. With Diana, I don’t think she comes from a family that is going to be very open to her dating women, so I think Pippa is much closer to realizing and understanding her own sexuality, because she’s already experimented with girls before this. Diana is so much further back in that evolution — she has a lot more growing to do. What was important to me was that their relationship really stemmed from a true friendship, so I think we need to see more of their friendship, and then, yes, ultimately, see what the romantic beginnings are. But I don’t think they get together romantically, at least not in a serious way, in college.
Wrigley is already so low and then his brother dies. How’s this tragedy going to affect him moving forward? How might it affect Pippa as well?
One of the tragedies of this relationship is that it does stunt Pippa’s own personal growth. She feels so responsible for him and his feelings … When she sleeps with him and she has the orgasm, she knows that she connects physically, but she knows that there’s something else there. She knows that she’s more into Diana, and she has to put those feelings aside in order to take care of Wrigley, who has become her best friend. I definitely think that will stunt her growth a little bit, at least temporarily, not forever. With Wrigley, when we see him in 2015 he’s such a wreck, so I knew we needed to put him through the ringer to justify that.
Diana gets the biggest laugh of all. Why did you want her to come out on top?
It’s very interesting when people have to manipulate their way out of relationships out of a place of fear and just exploring. What would fear look like for Diana? She has never known truly how dark Stephen is until this moment. I wanted to show the difference between how she would react to that and how Lucy would react. Lucy knows that he was in the car — she doesn’t know that he was driving — but she still stays with him. And Diana is not like Lucy. Diana is a survivor. Diana is always going to put herself first, even if she’s in love with someone, and I think she is in love with Stephen, so as soon as she realizes that he’s a true danger, she’s like, “I’m out.” She knows that he would never let her leave him. She’s tried to do that before — she left him earlier in their relationship, and he got her back. She knows that she has to make herself undesirable in his eyes in order to get away. I thought someone needed to have a win, because this season, a lot of people get hurt by the end. It was nice to have one person come out on top, and she deserves it. She’s had to deal with so much from him.
This season tackled sexual assault on campus. Why is this something you wanted to tackle this season and how does the time period change how you were writing it?
I was honestly surprised that it didn’t come up Season 1, because it is just so unbelievably prevalent on on college campuses, especially in 2008. The conversations around consent, sex and sexual assault have changed so dramatically since 2008 — I was in college in 2008 — and it’s been interesting discussing sex scenes with the cast, who are all you know about 10 years younger than me … In 2008 if you get drunk and you don’t remember [having sex], a lot of people would say you weren’t assaulted — a lot of people would just say you got drunk and you regret it now — so I think it was realistic to have Pippa not even knowing for sure whether she had the right to blame Chris and whether she should be blaming herself. It certainly impacted the way that she confronts it, or doesn’t confront it, and the way the Chris just acts like he’s not done anything wrong.
I know there hasn’t been an official Season 3 greenlight but what’s the timeline for a potential Season 3? What do you want to focus on next season?
I have no idea in terms of when things would happen — It depends on so many things, so many different people’s schedules. I would definitely like to see more of 2015. I know what happens to Lucy and Stephen’s relationship — I know what their final breakup in college is, and how that very permanently damages her and sets her up to be the person we meet in 2015 and I have some ideas for what would happen, but … once we get into the room, ideas change and morph and grow. I do think it would be interesting to see a lot more of 2015 now, especially with what happens at the end of Season 2.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
“Tell Me Lies” Seasons 1 and 2 are now streaming on Hulu.
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