Jake Johnson on What Led to That Surprising Determination in ‘Minx’ Season 2 Finale

[This story contains spoilers from the season two finale of Minx, “Woman of the Hour.”]

In Minx‘s season two finale, the Backside Greenback gang reunites to hit again at Constance Papadopoulos’ takeover, which has not solely reshaped the journal (titled “Minx”) however slowly revealed itself as extra hostile than (virtually) anybody realized.

Whereas a lot of the group catches on within the finale, Doug (Jake Johnson) was the primary to see Constance’s (Elizabeth Perkins) strikes for what they have been, bringing the proof to Tina (Idara Victor) within the season’s penultimate episode whereas she was on a cabin-in-the-woods retreat with Joyce (Ophelia Lovibond) discovering new girls to hitch the Minx employees.

However the journal’s worldwide operations — promised to Doug by Joyce — have been handed to Tina by Constance. Earlier within the season, Tina additionally turned down Doug’s marriage proposal after they each attended her household dinner, the place Doug found she by no means instructed her household they have been courting. Because of this, Doug attempting to tip Tina off grew to become a full-blown confrontation that noticed Tina reveal she’s by no means felt like an equal associate.

The second threatens a partnership that star and EP Johnson describes as Doug’s surest relationship on the present.

“He’s at all times seen Joyce as ‘different.’ Joyce is the little brainiac that’s obtained massive concepts. Doug likes Richie [Oscar Montoya], however Richie was simply one among his staff who he stated: Begin taking images. And Bambi [Jessica Lowe] has been like the child who’s a ache within the ass. You at all times deal with her. She’s a part of our group,” he instructed The Hollywood Reporter in an interview carried out forward of the SAG-AFTRA strike. “However Tina was half of Doug in Doug’s eyes.”

That may make Doug’s finale-ending resolution to sleep with Constance — revealed on the finish of the finale — much more confounding. However the Doug of season one has seen a lot of his energy usurped, and for the primary time in a very long time, his concepts and selections have been on the whims of different individuals.

After his newest thought for {a magazine} is killed and Joyce turns down his put h for a Chippendale-esque present, probably the most steady and dependable factor in Doug’s life is seemingly Tina. However by season two, she’s ascended the company ladder whereas he’s remained stagnant. In the meantime, Tina has had the possibility to think about her life past Backside Greenback — and past Doug.

When talking to THR, Johnson described Doug’s finale resolution as one not pushed by jealousy, however as a substitute harm. “He doesn’t need her success,” he stated. “I don’t see Doug that manner essentially in any respect. He felt like the whole lot was going nice. They have been successful.”

“When that scene occurs within the cabin, when he asks her, and she or he says no, I felt very unhappy for them. As a result of he’s glad for her,” he continued. “I feel that the error Doug made with Tina was that he actually believed they have been one factor, and that they have been at all times a workforce and there was by no means Doug with out Tina. They got here up promoting these magazines out of the trunk of his automobile.”

And as Minx has discovered success, Johnson says Doug has envisioned it with Tina — which is why he chooses to suggest when he does. “Why now? Is just because they’ve obtained some cash, they might construct one thing, this dream that Doug thought that they had,” he defined. “For Doug, it was at all times: we. We’re successful. So why are you impulsively saying for the primary time, no, you’re successful? I feel for Doug, that essentially bent his mind backwards.”

The transfer will doubtless not go over properly with followers of the couple, however Johnson says they will’t write to that.

“If the present is actual life, and the characters need to play the whole lot actually and the writers have to put in writing these issues, they’re not allowed to simply say, ‘Oh properly, the viewers beloved this, let’s return,” Johnson stated. “That scene within the cabin doesn’t simply get made when Doug goes with a rose and says, ‘I’m so sorry, I used to be insensitive,’ after which we transfer on to a different will-they, gained’t-they. It is a 20-year relationship and that was a, ‘They essentially noticed their relationship in another way’ second.”

Whereas some followers might have picked sides on this battle after a number of episodes of the duo drifting (Johnson notes that Victor has shared that feminine viewers usually inform her: “Love the present. You’re manner too good for Doug,” and showrunner Ellen Rapoport is fairly strongly workforce Tina), he doesn’t see both of them because the “dangerous man.”

“This was only a shock to him,” he stated. “There was quite a bit on this season that shocked me. She doesn’t inform her household about Doug. The truth that Doug didn’t even understand her household doesn’t know they’re collectively. I’m like, ‘Oh, maintain on?’ Like, we go to her household, they usually don’t even learn about him.”

It’s been a sensitive string of occasions for followers of the couple, together with Johnson and it’s unclear if there’s a manner out.

“The Doug-Tina story issues to me. It was within the pilot after I learn the factor. I stated to Ellen, ‘I really feel such as you’re constructing one thing right here.’ She stated, ‘We’re,’ and I stated, ‘Nice, as a result of there may very well be a pleasant factor inbuilt there,” Johnson stated. “Doug was served quite a lot of drugs this season, and in the long run, he reacted to it.”

All of Minx season two is now streaming on Starz.