[Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for The Equalizer series finale “Decisions.”]
Well, at least The Equalizer ends on a happy note.
The CBS drama wraps up its fifth and final season with Robyn (Queen Latifah) and Dante (Tory Kittles) taking a romantic getaway, only for Salazar (Juan Javier Cardenas) to track them down. Dante is shot, which means it takes until after his surgery for Robyn to answer his proposal. She, of course, says yes! Meanwhile, Harry (Adam Goldberg) starts a conversation with Mel (Liza Lapira) about them stopping equalizing; they decide to stick with it for now. Meanwhile, Delilah’s (Laya DeLeon Hayes) still thinking about college (with an in at Howard, thanks to her favorite author), and Vi (Lorraine Toussaint) decides to move in with Curtis (Christopher B. Duncan), in a new place.
Below, showrunner Joe Wilson unpacks that finale, shares his thoughts on what Season 6 could have been, and more. (This interview was conducted before the series was canceled.)
This finale feels like it could serve as both a season and series ender. Was it purposefully designed that way?
Joe Wilson: It was definitely on purpose. We didn’t want to end with a cliffhanger. Shows get a little older. We are going into our sixth season budget, and money becomes an issue. We weren’t sure what was going to happen, and if we did end up on that wrong side, we did not want the fans to feel incomplete or cheated in any way. So we designed it in a way that can feel like an ending, but there’s so much more to unpack.
Yeah, it could be like the end of one chapter.
Yeah, exactly. And I’m very ready to do the next chapter.
Michael Greenberg / CBS
When did you know you wanted to end the season with Robyn and Dante’s romantic getaway being interrupted, Dante getting shot, and then Mel and Harry at least talking about stopping equalizing?
We knew that at the beginning of the season. When we introduced the Salazar character, I knew I wanted to book in with him and then we had to keep him alive in the middle of the season, so everybody remembered who he was. He’s a fantastic actor and villain. But I knew I wanted to do the proposal like that. I’ve been wanting to do that for years, but we had to get them through certain markers on their relationship before we can do it. So once we knew and we opened up the season, there is no team, that whole thing and Dante — that was the plan from the beginning.
Why was this season the right time to put Robyn and Dante together and to establish that they’re definitely in it for the long haul?
I think if you look at the trajectory from that first time they met, when we dropped that nugget about first time we met you said Tracy something, Tracy Sloan, you saw the heat there, and over five seasons we’ve played the steamy, flirtatious nature of it and the fans calling them McCante. And so we played the push-pull as long as we could. We wanted to give the fans what they were calling for. They felt teased every time they get close and then you separate, and then you look at when we sent Dante away to the FTF and those phone calls, you just felt her loneliness and their loneliness and them wanting to get together. So when he came back, it was time to put it in overdrive and let’s close this out, let’s get them together and let’s see what that show looks like, them busting crime. Like she says in this episode, we’ll still do it. It’s going to be a family business. Now what does that show? Where do they stay? Do they live in McCall’s house or do they move to Dante’s brownstone? All of those things. It just opens up new avenues for the show.
What led to Mel and Harry ultimately deciding to continue equalizing, especially because it feels like at this point it would be hard to imagine just one of them being out of it, especially after we saw Mel do that earlier this season?
We wanted to play that to be realistic. Harry says, we’ve been lucky up to this point. And how many times can you tempt fate? And the episode before, Mel was almost blown up. How many times can you do that and come away unscathed? We didn’t call back to it, but there was a scene where McCall was talking to Aunt Vi earlier in the seasons — it might’ve been Season 3 — when Vi says, why does it have to be you? And she says, because I can. It’s that whole, with great power comes great responsibility and who else is going to protect the people who need help? And they have the power, so they decide we’re going to keep doing this. It is our duty. So yes, it’s dangerous. Yes, we can put our lives on the line, but somebody has to do it.
Harry comes up with some vague ideas, but what would it look like when they do stop?
Yeah, we had an episode where Harry was talking about his bucket list, and is it the traveling? Is it to do all the things that they’ve never done? Is it take a chance to breathe? I think they’ll get bored, and they’ll miss the juice. If you remember how we met Mel, she was kind of an action junkie in the beginning. So I think that would be a lot of fun to see them ticking off that bucket list. If that was a spinoff, it would be them ticking off the bucket list, but getting in adventures along the way.
Michael Greenberg / CBS
Oh, yeah. I could see every place they would go. They would see someone that —
Yeah, something that comes up. We’re pitching the spinoff now, so let’s go. Everywhere they go, there’s a problem. It’s the comedy version of Kung Fu. They roam the earth and get into adventures everywhere they go.
Talk about what you wanted to do when it came to exploring Mel’s PTS this season and showing that it’s not a linear path of healing, that they are steps forward and back because that was done so well.
Thank you. Thank you. It was important to us and we feel like it’s such an under-covered subject and it’s complicated. I was in the military, we’ve talked to a lot of people in the military, and we’ve seen it and it’s something you have to work on every day. Some days are good, some days are bad, but you got to keep going. And we were just saying we get a lot of thanks for articulating what a lot of people are feeling and they just don’t have the voice for it. We wanted to put that out there. There is light at the end of that tunnel. It does not have to be a negative thing, but it is something, you have the strength, and if you seek the support, you can get through it and you can have a normal life.
What made Vi ready to move forward with Curtis?
I think Aunt Vi is one of the strongest characters we have. And again, she had to face her fears. She came to the house to help raise Delilah. Well, Delilah is ready to go off to college now. It’s easy to get comfortable, and you lean into your job. But now change is scary. And I think it’s just who she is as a person, who we’ve portrayed her to be. Once she faced that fear and put words to where it was, she’s able to [say], ‘Okay, this is something I really want.’ Captain Curtis is amazing. He’s an amazing actor, too. And I think she found the right person and the right love to help her come to that point, and she went for it. She’s always been a rebel. She’s always been somebody to buck the system, go against the grain, that rebel nature of going to Berkeley. And I think once she’s going to go for it, she owed it to herself.
I mean, that cooking? So funny.
That was fun. … But look at all that cooking that we’ve done for seasons. And so that was perfect. And for her to let down her guard, to let somebody in that domain for her is huge. It’s huge.
Talk about ending the season on that engagement party and those toasts because it feels like the end of chapter like we’ve talked about, but also it’s just so great that we get everyone together like that.
Yeah, we’ve never had them all in the house at one time, and that was a big moment. And I think Geoff Shotz did a beautiful job covering it. That push-in shot across the table of seeing them as a family and the toast. They all did a fantastic job, and just to see the love and the fun as actors that they were having, I think you see the reflection of it on screen. They really love each other like that.
What can you say about a possible Season 6?
That I hope we get it. [Laughs] I can say is if we do get it, there are wedding bells. We will see that wedding. It is going to be crazier than the proposal. It is feature worthy, what we would do with it. And just the continuing, what does their relationship look like equalizing as a family business as she says in this episode. So those are the things we’d focus on.
Would everyone be back in the same capacity? Because you had mentioned Delilah and college. Would we see her as much or would that role be reduced?
We’d have to see how it unfolds. Our plan is to set it up for the audience to not miss the family dynamic as it currently is. So they’ll be in different capacities, but with technology and travel, we don’t want to lose that core. That’s the core of the show, these three generations of black women and their relationship and the strength and support. We don’t want to lose that. So if anything, we’ll dial it in even more so we can focus on that a little bit more. Even if you don’t see it every episode, you won’t miss it.
And so would we see more of Mel and Harry figuring out what life could be next because they’ve started this conversation about stopping?
I think that’s absolutely, once Harry’s teed it up, again, bucket list, how many times can we do this? They have a responsibility, they’re not going to stop equalizing, but it’d be fun to think about it. And I would love to see more of their personal life. What does their home look like? We see the sanctum and we know what the bar looks like and we know they live in that same building, but what does their personal, their bedroom look like? What does their kitchen look like? I want to see more of that.
I want to see more of Mel’s family.
Oh, her family’s fantastic, and the relationship with the family. That scene with her father and realizing he’s dealt with the same things that she’s dealing with. It was so emotional. And her brothers are fantastic. Her mother is fantastic. That was a gem. That was a gem. So hopefully we get to explore that even more.
And I like the way you’ve mixed everyone together because I mean the Mel and Delilah scenes and then also Harry and Vi are great together, too.
Yeah, when the walls came down, we found such fertile soil. The Aunt Vi Harry stuff is hilarious, and to see them riff is fantastic. And then the bromance between Harry and Dante is great. And then this has always been there, but the sister relationship between Mel and Delilah has always been fantastic. She’s the first person she calls when she gets the acceptance letter and doesn’t know how to tell Cam, and she gives her that advice. They’ve always been there for each other and it’s a beautiful thing.
The Equalizer, Streaming Now, Paramount+
This story originally appeared on TV Insider
