‘The Hunting Party’ Stars Talk Lazarus Reveal, Morales’ Secret, and Bex & Shane’s Feelings

When The Hunting Party returns for its second season on January 8, there’s a lot it needs to address, including whether Oliver (Nick Wechsler) will survive and how the team — ex-FBI profiler Bex (Melissa Roxburgh), CIA’s Hassani (Patrick Sabongui), Pit prison guard Shane (Josh McKenzie), and intel officer Morales (Sara Garcia) — will get back to work after being disbanded. (Get scoop on that as well as Season 2 guest stars, including Eric McCormack, Niecy Nash Betts, and Kelsey Grammer in our TV Guide Magazine cover story here.)

But there’s also the matter of other threads that need to be addressed, like Shane’s birth mother, whom he’s been searching for, being Colonel Lazarus (Kari Matchett), not only embroiled in the program the Pit — the prison where the worst serial killers, who are said to be dead, were kept until an explosion led to their escapes — but also someone who “graduated” from it. So far, he has no idea who she is.

“It’s a tricky one. I genuinely don’t know how Shane would respond to that. It’s such a huge thing, but I do know that it’s going to create conflict, especially within the central unit. There’s a lot of withholding information, not looking at anyone in particular,” McKenzie tells TV Insider on the set of the command center, looking to Garcia next to him, and they both laugh. “It’s going to cause some fractures, which of course, this is The Hunting Party, so the fractures will be healed, I hope.”

He adds, “He’s got so many questions about himself, his identity, his past, his life, the choices he’s made, that it’s going to be really confronting. It’s going to force him to really reconcile a few things and work out what actually makes him happy and how he defines himself from here on in. So that’s going to be exciting because there’s going to be a lot of people trying to interfere with that.”

Ralph Bavaro/NBC

We’ll also see how the rest of the team reacts to that reveal. “Once we all know, we get to explore the reality of what that means,” says Roxburgh. Adds Sabongui, “That’s one of my favorite dimensions to this, is it gets back to who you can trust in the hierarchy of the institution. And she’s so deeply ingrained in that it’s inevitable that we’re going to have to confront that somehow.”

While Hassani does have issues of trust, as we saw in the first season, especially with Oliver, such is not true for Bex, to the same degree. “I think we’ve established trust with Shane, but I think the fact that he doesn’t know is our most concerning aspect,” Roxburgh explains.

Speaking of what people do and do not know: In the Season 1 finale, it was revealed that Hassani’s wife is dead. That detail was something Sabongui found out halfway through filming Season 1.

“It crushed me,” he admits. “There was definitely an adjustment period for me and replaying all of my choices in previous episodes before I knew that, and it just made it more heartbreaking.”

Hassani doesn’t know that’s no longer a secret, and as Roxburgh points out, “Bex is a good secret keeper, and she’s got her own secrets. The whole purpose of Bex is understanding people. And I think when she sees Hassani and she sees how hard he’s fought to keep this under wraps and how hard he’s fought to keep himself together on these missions, she’s made the decision to let it play out how it needs to play out and not to confront him necessarily. That moment will come.”

According to Sabongui, his character isn’t one to share, and so in a way, it is better for him that it’s out there without him having to open up — just yet. “I’m pretty sure Hassani hasn’t really dealt with it and covers it up with work. I think he uses his workaholic-ness to cover up and keep his mind occupied, and so he won’t even really admit it to himself on a day-to-day basis,” he says.

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Something else other characters don’t know? That Morales has been keeping secrets! “We explore how her allegiances shift in Season 2,” exec producer JJ Bailey previews.

“I was joking that her bun is thick with secrets,” laughs Garcia. “She sort of finds herself in the middle, and I think being in the middle can be really difficult. Her job and her loyalties are to the US military and to the US government first and foremost. But she’s developed these really wonderful, trusting relationships with her team, and she really feels honored to be a part of the team, and she doesn’t want to let anyone down and she doesn’t want to be deceiving them.”

She continues, “There is a breaking point where the secrets become too much and she decides to tell people, but strategically, which is why I say her bun is full with secrets because she becomes the center of this conflict that ends up with Shane knowing, finding out the truth and feeling a bit betrayed. She doesn’t like it. She’s a very honest and loyal person, and any chance that the writers have given her to stand up for another character, she does. So it’s a bit uncomfortable place for her to be in, but sometimes we have to do uncomfortable things.”

While she does mainly stay in the command center, “the field’s going to come to Morales” this season, teases McKenzie. Garcia adds, “There are a couple episodes where the command center gets very exciting, very dynamic. The command center crisis kind of strikes, and I think people are going to enjoy seeing that. It’s kind of a double whammy because in one of these episodes, crisis strikes here and outside at the same time.”

Season 1 began establishing a potential love triangle with Bex, Oliver, and Shane. When we first met these characters, Oliver was “such a push and pull for Bex,” Roxburgh tells TV Insider. “As the season goes on, we realize very quickly that he is on our side despite what he’s done in the past.”

She continues, “What I think was great about Season 1 is that we got to see a woman doing her job without any real distractions other than just her own personal mind. And now going into Season 2, I think what is cool to play with is that she has all these walls up and she’s this tough cookie, so to speak. But maybe just maybe someone helps her, maybe someone softens her. Maybe she has someone that she can relax around. And whether that forms into just a really strong friendship or whether it allows her to open her heart back up after the relationship ended with Oliver, TBD.”

Ralph Bavaro/NBC

On Shane’s part, “He’s never really had a relationship before with someone, so he doesn’t really know how to interpret certain feelings. I think partly one of the reasons why he was so gutted when they shut down was because he wasn’t going to see her every day,” McKenzie shares. “I think it’s one of those things where you go to work and there’s this one person that — it’s fun to see everyone else — you kind of lock eyes with them every day at work, and you’re like, ‘Oh, this person sees me. And I kind of see them as well.’ And I think that he has that with Bex. I just don’t think he knows the difference between romantic and platonic, and he’s still working that out.”

What are you hoping to see in The Hunting Party Season 2? Let us know in the comments section below.

The Hunting Party, Season 2 Premiere, Thursday, January 8, 10/9c, NBC