Exec producer Sally Woodward Gentle also addresses Carolyns masterplan and the future of the franchise.
Warning: This story contains plot details from the series finale ofKilling Eve, “Hello, Losers.”
But this time, the Pair That Couldn’t Be (Apart) truly and painfully parted ways.
David Emery/BBCA
Because this time, only one of them survived.
They shared a statement kiss on the road.
Afterward, on the ship’s deck, as Eve and Villanelle embraced, a bullet seared through Villanelle.
Olly Courtney/BBCA
Gunfire continued as Villanelle instinctively pushed Eve toward the water to save her before following her in.
How did it come to pass that Villanelle would die but Eve would live?
How monstrous is Carolyn?
Olly Courtney/BBCA
And how soon might there be aKilling Evespin-off?
ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: Can you walk viewers through the discussions about the end game in the writers' room?
Were there times where you considered having both live or both die?
And to remember that Villanelle works and has worked in a very high-risk job.
She loved Eve and she loved her properly.
Eve living was incredibly important for us.
That, ultimately, was the thinking behind it.
Of course, we went backwards and forwards.
We thought, “Kill both?”
“No, that’s just too f—ing tragic.”
What were Sandra’s and Jodie’s reactions when you pitched them the final fates of Villanelle and Eve?
How did the writers formulate her grand plan?
How much of her revenge mission for Kenny’s death was an excuse to gather power?
As she says, “Even loyalty is a dubious virtue, except when it’s to me.”
In the end, she’s a bit of a monster.
Yeah, she’s a monster.
She’s almost the devil.
Carolyn is always several steps ahead of everybody.
She needs somewhere to vent that energy.
She keeps her hands completely clean.
It was incredibly humiliating for her to be sent as cultural attache.
And then to have Hugo [Edward Bluemel] essentially be her boss, it was a terrible thing.
This has got her back to where she wants to be.
She needed to hold onto that so that she could give herself an excuse to stay in the game.
And to work through her grief.
She’s always been tracking the Twelve.
Now we know that it was because she was there at the very origins of the Twelve.
But it’s been a terrible sword in her side for decades.
And she wasn’t going to let that go after Kenny died.
The bullet pierces Villanelle’s shoulder as she and Eve hugged.
And if she did, does she think Eve’s dead now?
I suspect it was collateral.
If it got them both, absolutely fine.
And I think she stares out at that river long enough to go, “Right.
They’re not surfacing.
Carolyn says that even if you kill one, they’ll just be replaced with someone else.
We didn’t want to take the focus away from Eve and Villanelle.
Ultimately, this is a show about relationships and about those four people.
It’s not an espionage show.
It’s not a show that’s about the Twelve.
It’s not about who the big evil is that’s controlling the world.
I think it’s far more abstract than that.
Frank, in [season] 1, when he is asked, “Who’s done this?
What do they want?,” and he says, “They want chaos.”
Ultimately they’re like a hydra; you cut off one head and they keep on going.
It’s an entertaining show and one that’s meant to be escapist.
And it just became more and more perverted, and more and more self-serving.
Maybe there are echos of that in terms of relationships.
It feels too reductive.
And we liked the messiness of the Twelve being somewhat unknowable.
Konstantin was killed by Pam right as he wanted out of the spy life.
It’s probably two-fold.
One was probably practical, which is like, “I’m really not gonna survive this.”
[Laughs] He’s not daft.
I think he felt he wasn’t going to survive it.
But I also think that he was really exhausted.
You know, the man should’ve died many times over.
He probably wasn’t paid enough for what he had to do all the time.
He was in trouble.
He had embezzled money.
He probably was responsible for Kenny.
He’s just a man who wasknackeredand did want to disappear.
He’s found his humanity; he doesn’t want to do that.
He doesn’t want to be responsible for the brutality or the using of any of these women anymore.
And he’d said [to Pam], “We’re going to pack our bags.
Poor Konstantin is just exhausted.
What is the status of the spinoffs?
There’s reportedly one in the works focusing on Carolyn’s early days in the British Secret service.
That’s not necessarily happening.
I think somebody picked up on something and sort of ran with it.
Of course, there’s various thoughts.
There’s nothing solid yet.
When the books of TV history are written, what do you hope the legacy of the show is?
And I think we’ve shook that off with this.
Yet we still have created iconic characters who people love to see.
you’re free to fall in love with your characters.
They can take you to places you might never imagine that you’ll go to.
But you don’t have to resort to… tits.
This interview has been edited and condensed for length and clarity.
