Yahoo Lifestyle Sweet Magnolias EP Defends Killing [Spoiler] in Season 4: ‘Tomorrow Is Not Promised to Any of Us’
Death comes to Serenity (by way of Texas) in Sweet Magnolias’ fourth season, now streaming on Netflix.
Following an unexpectedly joyous Halloween, which includes Maddie and Cal’s surprise wedding, Episode 2 ends with a visit from Bill’s mother, who drops a heck of a bombshell — Bill is dead! That’s right, folks. After three seasons of lying, cheating and secretly populating half of Serenity, we’ve officially seen the last of Chris Klein as Dr. Bill Townsend.
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“First of all, I just want to say how much we all love and miss Chris,” showrunner Sheryl J. Anderson tells TVLine. “But the writers were looking for a way to shake Maddie, and therefore everybody’s, path in a new direction. Because we had allowed Bill to achieve redemption in the eyes of everybody who loved him in Serenity before he and Cathy went off to Texas [at the end of Season 3], we didn’t feel like we were ending his time on the show — or the planet — before he had reached the goal he had set for himself.”
Anderson says Klein was “gracious and understanding” when she broke the news of Bill’s death, adding that she looks forward to working with him again someday. “I love everybody on the show,” she says. “I don’t want anybody to ever leave, but sometimes story requires that you do something big and bold, and that was what the Season 4 writers’ room decided to do.”
On the plus side, Bill’s shocking death inspires various members of his inner circle — including ex-wife Maddie, baby mama Noreen and secret son Isaac — to reevaluate their priorities and make some important changes in their lives.
“When anyone dies too young, it shakes you up,” Anderson says. “But at their age, for them to lose the first person in their circle when they’ve all known each other since they were kids, we thought that was a deeply emotional way to get everybody to look at where they are and ask themselves, ‘If that happens to me tomorrow, am I where I should be? Am I doing what I want to do? Am I with who I should be with?’ Those existential questions that arise when you realize tomorrow is not promised to any of us were the drivers behind a lot of what happens in Season 4.”
OK, let’s talk: Were you stunned by the news of Bill’s sudden passing, or are you secretly glad that he can’t stir up any more trouble in Serenity? Drop a comment with your reaction to his death below.
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