‘Sheriff Country’ Boss Teases Sparks Flying Between Mickey & Travis Because of Skye Trouble

[Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for Sheriff Country Season 1 Episode 2 “Firewall.”]

It’s impossible for Mickey (Morena Baccarin) to not make it personal when it’s her daughter, Skye (Amanda Arcuri), mixed up in the middle of a murder investigation on Sheriff Country.

The premiere ended with Skye telling her mom and grandfather, Wes (W. Earl Brown), that she found her boyfriend, Brandon, dead. Brandon’s mother and brothers zero in on Skye being brought in. She’s a witness, Wes stresses. But it can’t be Mickey leading this investigation, so it falls on Boone (Matt Lauria), who had just given his two-weeks notice after losing out on being sheriff to Mickey. But Skye does have her parents, Mickey and Travis (Christopher Gorham), in her corner, even if they struggle to agree on things such as bringing in a lawyer recommended by his sister (Mickey ultimately agrees when the murder weapon is reported to be missing), as well as her aunt, Sharon (Fire Country‘s Diane Farr, crossing over).

Below, showrunner Matt Lopez breaks down the episode, teases the reveal of Mickey’s romance, and more.

When Mickey, Wes, and Skye get home, Mickey sees that car parked down the street.

Matt Lopez: One of the things we love about Sheriff Country — and Fire Country for that matter — is, unlike so many other shows on television, it’s set in this small town, a town where everyone knows everyone, so everyone knows Skye, but everyone knew Brandon, too. And we will lean into that idea that there are members of the town who very much feel like justice needs to be done for Brandon, and is the sheriff compromised? Is she up to the job? Does she have a blind spot when it comes to her own daughter? And so all of that delicious kind of suspense and danger comes into play really in Episode 3; that really sort of moves from the back burner to the front burner.

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Speaking of that, because things aren’t looking great when it comes to the case, but Travis did call in that lawyer after Mickey agreed to let him. What is next with the case, and how are both Travis and Mickey handling that?

Yeah, it’s a great storyline. Travis and Mickey grew up together. In subsequent episodes, we’ll find out, they have a very long history that precedes their marriage. They essentially were from the same town, and Travis is from a very well-to-do family, and Mickey is from a very different kind of family. And so one of the things we’ll play around with and explore is, they divorced several years ago, but now suddenly Skye, their only child, is, as you say, at least a person of interest, she’s implicated in her boyfriend’s murder. And that will throw Travis and Mickey back to each other’s orbits in a way that they have not been since they were married. And when that happens, sparks can fly. And by the way, all kinds of sparks like, “Oh, I just remembered why I hate you and why I left,” but also maybe, “Oh, this is what was so great about you,” and we have a lot of fun playing that.

And then this is complicated by the addition of Cassidy (Michele Weaver) because we know what that relationship is now, but then it’s like what Cassidy and Mickey mean to each other and the way they’re going about figuring out this whole new dynamic with the three of them.

Very much so. The Cassidy and Mickey relationship is a very special one. As we’re told in the pilot, Cassidy’s entire origin story as a sheriff’s deputy is very tied up with Mickey, and we will explore that in subsequent episodes. And so you’re absolutely right, Mickey — and at the end of Episode 1, Mickey and Cassidy are kind of like, “OK, we are going to do this. We’re going to be adults about it. And you’re in a relationship with my ex-husband, and I can’t stop you, but we’re going to be adults about it.” And as we know, there’s one thing to say it, there’s another thing to… the proof is in the pudding, as they say. And so that’ll be an ongoing source of drama for sure.

I love the way that Sharon makes her entrance, but was it wrong of Wes to call Sharon as she’s dealing with her own pain, her grief? Or was it what everyone involved, including Sharon, needed?

I think very much the latter. And in fact, Sharon’s got that great moment where she tells Mickey, “Honestly, it’s kind of been nice not to deal with my own mess right now.” And what we’ll unpack in subsequent episodes in both shows really is that the Wes and Sharon relationship is a very special one. Mickey’s father married Sharon’s mother, but Mickey and Sharon were teenagers when that happened. They don’t share any blood. It was a second marriage for both of their parents. And in a way that I think often happens in step-families is that Sharon is able to give Wes a bit of grace — and we saw this in Fire Country in the third season — that Mickey cannot yet give him. She’s got a real soft spot for Wes, and Diane and Earl Brown, their onscreen chemistry is fantastic.

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The Mickey and Sharon scenes were great, and we see how much the sisters need each other right now and how far they’ve come from when we first met Mickey on Fire Country. But how are you going to be maintaining that relationship for Mickey when we don’t see Diane on screen? Because I feel like Mickey’s really going to need her sister with everything going on.

She will, she will. There are all kinds of ways that have not been announced yet, and I’m not at liberty to discuss about how these worlds, that we are trying to create a seamless Edgewater Country Universe, as it were. And sometimes it’ll be core members of the Leone and Fox families, and sometimes it’ll be other characters who cross over. But you’ll continue to feel the presence. As you see in the pilot, like Bode, he stands up for Skye, and he helps Skye out of a bit of a jam. And so I feel very confident that you’ll feel this family, for good and ill, they are a family. When we first meet Mickey in Fire Country Season 2, Sharon and Mickey have been estranged for a while, and there’s a real coming together, and we’ve seen it only increase in closeness since then. Without giving anything away, that’s not to say that it will always be smooth sailing between these sisters, so viewers will, I think, tune in to see some great drama with that.

The trailer revealed a romance for Mickey with the shower scene. When I spoke with Tony Phelan and Joan Rater, they teased that it will become more serious as the season progresses, and the audience will be surprised by who it is. What can you say about who it is and that relationship?

It is coming up very shortly, as in Episode 3, and there is a fantastic twist, and it is a relationship that very much presents as one thing and starts out as being one thing and takes some delicious turns along the way. What we’ll find out is that Mickey, since her divorce from Travis, her relationships have been sort of brief and fleeting, and the relationship with the mystery shower guy from the trailer will be the first one that stands a chance at being something more than that if Mickey will let it. Mickey, as you saw in Episode 2, she puts up this firewall, she’s got some armor on her because of the lumps that she’s taken, and it’ll be a question of can she and when will she be ready to let someone in?

I’m intrigued by the Wes and Gina (Caroline Rhea) dynamic. We know that they have a history. Could they have a future?

I think it’s definitely possible. Caroline and Earl also have a great sort of onscreen chemistry, and those two actors have actually known each other for a long time, so you feel it. And yes, in that great sort of small-town way, their paths will cross again, and over the course of the season, we will take them on a fun and emotional journey together.

How long is it going to be before we see one of the main characters’ lives in serious danger, like episode-ending cliffhanger way?

To not be too vague, not long. One of the things we love about the show is there is obviously a lot of spiritual and I’ll call it genetic overlap between the kind of show Fire Country is and the kind of show Sheriff Country is. Small town. There’s a sense of hopefulness, there’s a sense of community. Sheriff Country affords us, however, the ability to play in some more treacherous waters. The truth about small towns is there’s a great side to them, and as anyone who grew up in a small town will tell you, there is also frequently a dark side to them. And so Sheriff Countryis going to take us to some corners of Edgewater where we’ve never taken viewers before. So that aspect of physical jeopardy, danger, suspense, and so on is a flavor that Sheriff Country will live in. I think in the best kind of way, it taps into what is so great about Fire Country but carves out its new identity. And part of that is exactly what you’re talking about, the element of danger and crime.

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'Sheriff Country' Boss Unpacks Mickey's Conflict With Skye in Middle of Murder Case

There’s a two-part crossover coming up with Fire Country. What can you tease?

I think it’s going to be fantastic. As you may know, we shoot these shows in two different cities, which is a challenge. It’s a little bit from a production standpoint like solving a Rubik’s cube while playing three-dimensional chess. But it’s going to be fantastic because it’s not just a question like — we’ve sent a character over here, they’ll send a character over there. This is a true merging of the two shows and a merging of the two storylines. So it will be a storyline that launches in Sheriff Country at 8 o’clock, and then we pass the baton to Fire Country. My background is as a feature writer, it almost plays like a Fire Country Sheriff Country feature, which is really exciting.

People can expect an episode filled with all kinds of danger and unexpected pairings. That’s one of the things we’ve loved is like, look, we kind of expect Sharon and Mickey to spend time together or Wes and Sharon to spend time together, but what about Wes and a character from Fire Country that we wouldn’t expect to see together? And what kind of sparks fly in those instances? What about Boone and a character from Fire Country? So it’s nice because in the early episodes where we dip into the common universe, it’s very much focused on the Leone and Fox families, and the crossover event is an opportunity to really broaden it out.

Sheriff Country, Fridays, 8/7c, CBS