CBS’ hit dramatic series Scorpion left fans wondering what was going on with Happy, who her mystery husband could possibly be, and what did this unknown husband mean for the Happy Quinn/Toby Curtis relationship (or as fans refer to it, ‘Quintis’). So, what’s in store for season three? Writer/executive producer Nicholas Wootton provided a sneak peek into the upcoming season during our roundtable interview at the 2016 San Diego Comic Con. During our interview Wootton said viewers will be learning more about each member of #TeamScorpion, Happy’s hidden marrriage, and if we’ll ever see the musical episode fans have been asking for.
Scorpion season three will premiere on October 3, 2016.
Nicholas Wootton Interview:
How are you going to top season 2?
Nicholas Wootton: (Laughing) “Just wait. Well, you have to find out who she’s married to, for one. What we did at the beginning of this season when we first got there we broke out, I would say, twice the amount of personal story stuff for every character than we ever did before. I think the things that we learned from season one and season two were our best episodes are our most personal episodes, and also technologically what we’re able to do in terms of visual effects we’ve learned a lot. So, we’re actually able to make bigger, more active episodes because we know what we can pull off. But, there’s going to be big character twists like what you saw at the end of last season which we normally don’t do. We have more of those coming up because they’re really fun and I think that it was so great for us at the end of the season.
We’ve learned so much over the last seasons about the depth that we can take these characters and these actors. You know, we gave little bits to Jadyn (Wong) in terms of emotional stuff because it just wasn’t her character. We really had to find those things, but now it’s going to be a huge part of the first 10 episodes is really her emotional story in so many ways with the marriage and other complications…other things that are going to reverberate out. There’s going to be so much more of that than I think we’ve ever done before. We’re all very, very excited about it.”
At what point in the process did you decide having Happy be already married was going to be the twist?
Nicholas Wootton: “Last season, about two-thirds of the way through the season we thought it would be a really, really fun final sentence of the season. For that revelation to come at the end, it was like, ‘Oh my…’ If you’re a fan, if you’re devoted to the show, you have to come back. It has to come back. You have to know who it is. It was great because we pitched it out to the network executives like, ‘Who is it?!’ And we’re like, ‘We’re not telling you.’ No, we told them and they told us, ‘That’s crazy!’
There’s a lot of sort of big emotional twists in there that we normally don’t do. I think that we can do them because you’ve seen these characters evolve and you’ve seen what they are great at and what we can get out of what we can do with them which is great emotional stuff, especially for the Happy character. We saw the stuff with her father and she was so deep and so wonderful. So, a lot more of that coming up.”
Do you have conversations with the actors so they know what’s happening or are they surprised when they get the script?
Nicholas Wootton: (Laughing) “They are surprised when they get the script. Honestly, they knew…we have a dinner every year at Robert Patrick’s house at Christmas. We all go – myself, Nick Santora, and the cast – and it’s usually around Christmas that we know where the season’s going to go and we kind of know where the beginning of the next season’s going to be. We told them generally what’s happening and that the reveal was going to be Happy was going to be married. So, they know that. They didn’t know who she was married to. She didn’t know who she was married to – no, we actually did tell her but literally about three days before she got the script. We’re like, ‘We probably should tell her who she’s married to.’ Number one, they’re used to it. But, they’re also hugely trusting of us. They love where the stuff is going and they just sort of go along, like, ‘Great. Fabulous.’ And I think that this season has proved that out more than any other how these arcs are going to be so rich for them to play. But, yeah, they’re like, ‘I didn’t know Happy was married!’ A lot of surprises for TeamScorpion behind the scenes.”
She’s not going to have a baby that we don’t know about?
Nicholas Wootton: “Maybe! I don’t know. We’ve got a lot more to break out. We’ve got 20-something episodes to do. She could have two babies by the time we’re done.”
How do you find the topics for each episodes? Is there a lot of research that goes into the different challenges the team faces?
Nicholas Wootton: “Well, at the beginning of the season what we had our writers do is come up with…submit stuff over hiatus. They find it from everywhere. Scientific America, blogs, journals, everywhere. You look online. Anybody that they know who’s in sort of a field, you mine technological sources or medical sources or so many different sources. The beauty of the show is you can draw from really any sort of intellectual community to take dilemmas or new technology that could go wrong or adventures.”
So when is the musical episode?
Nicholas Wootton: “Everybody’s asking about the musical episode! The answer I’ve given to this, and my partner would kill me, but I think there’s a great episode where they play a song and they have a band. I don’t think it can be like West Side Story. I don’t think you want them to start busting into song. I don’t think you can do that. But, obviously Kat (McPhee) is brilliant. Ari (Stidham) is a musician. Elyes (Gabel) is in a band. And, mathematics and music are very closely linked. Musical people tend to be, can be, very mathematically inclined. So, there is a way to do it but I don’t know. There is a way – we haven’t quite cracked it yet. I think one of these days it may happen because it’s really fun. It’s a fun idea.”
Watch the full Nicholas Wootton interview:
