The Creators of Primeval discuss Series 3
After the end of Primeval Series Two many of you have been asking questions about what’s going to happen next. Douglashenshall.com, along with some other Primeval fansites, were invited down to the ITV head offices in London for a chat about the show with the Primeval creators, Adrian Hodges and Tim Haines, and to hear some spoilers for the upcoming series.
At first it should be cleared up that James Murray’s character, Stephen, is definitely dead and will not be coming back. “It was definitely the right thing to do,” Adrian, who writes the show, explained. “With all the danger that’s going on at some point someone was going to have problems. It made sense.” He admitted that it was always in his mind that from the point Stephen had an affair with Helen something was going to happen to him.
However, the absence of one team member means there’s now room for someone else. That’s why the pair are bringing in a new character for the third series, Captain Becker played by Ben Mansfield. Tim, the producer, said, “He’s going to be a new military guy who comes onto the team to watch their backs so that none of them get eaten.” He was keen to emphasise that Becker won’t just be a one-dimensional gun-shooting army man but will have a full character. Adrian confessed that he thought the second series needed more from the military point of view. “We got that balance wrong in series two,” he said. “There were military men in it but its worth characterising their concerns so Becker is going to articulate that. But, the other thing is, we don’t want lots of helicopters and tanks, it’s not that kind of show. We’re just finding the balance.”
As well as a new character there’s also promise of some exciting new creatures. Tim said, “One of the new creatures is called the Priste Champas (Pristichampus), which is horrible. It has a crocodile’s head but stands on two legs and has a tendency to eat lots of people.” There’s also a chance for viewers to design their own creature that will feature in one of the episodes. (For more on that and how to enter, see below.*)
About Claudia, the two creators alluded to some future development in that side of the plot, but all Adrian would say is that “bringing her back her is not in our plans at the moment but the issue with Claudia is not tied over.” However, they did also say that any more twists such as Claudia’s reincarnation are not likely. “We have to be respectful of the timeline,” he said. “We wanted to show people the consequences of mucking about but obviously not all disruptions would be that serious.”
On the love side of things, Adrian spoke of some more fun and drama between Abby and Connor as their relationship grows, “They will go through hard times in the next series but be assured it will end well.”
Viewers should make the most of Abby and Connors blossoming friendship as Adrian assures that “lovey-dovey” stuff is not on the cards for Helen and Nick. “She effectively divorced herself from Nick when she went disappeared into the anomalies,” he said. “She’ll never admit that she needs him. If you’ve read James Lovelock’s attitude to the world you’ll understand that she has a similar view of life – she’s seen how the world evolves and doesn’t care about what happens to the humans. There’s a tonne of passion about Nick and Helen’s relationship. It’s not the kind where there’s a lot of lovey emotion, they’re more the sort of couple who throw plates at each other. Nick is the only one who can get into her skin. There is a lot of passion there but there won’t be any lovey dovey stuff.”
Tim also said, “There’s very interesting stuff coming up for Nick to do with how much they know. He’s going to latch onto something. Cutter will be making a substantial discovery.”
On reflection of Primeval Series Two, the creators were pleased with their success with their work so far. Tim said, “We always felt confident about making the programme from the beginning and we began discussing series two half way through series one. The CGI guys were really into it and were chipping in with ideas and the actors were also happy. They were worried about looking like idiots, but have seen what they look like and have seen that it’s good, and that gave them confidence to come back for the second series. We try and make the programme as well as possible. The second series is better than the first and that’s because you do have to keep heightening the bar to keep it as exciting as possible.”
Adrian added, “We certainly have storylines going long into the future. Series Three will have 10 episodes and we’ve got ideas for series Four.”
*Find out how your own monster could be on Primeval by entering the Create A Creature competition at www.itv.com/primeval . Please note this competiton has now closed and the winner has been announced (see Primeval news May 22nd 2008)
Susanne Martin - www.douglashenshall.com 26th March 2008