Magnum P.I.'s Boss on Those Cliffhangers, a Better Call Saul Vet Casting, and What's Coming in Season 6

[Warning: This story contains spoilers for Magnum P.I. Season 5 Episode 10, "Charlie Foxtrot." Read at your own risk!]

Magnum P.I. wrapped up the first half of its 20-episode fifth season in explosive fashion this week, putting almost all of its main characters in danger and leaving one with a long road to recovery (and a potentially life-changing injury).

The midseason finale of the NBC procedural drama begins with Thomas Magnum (Jay Hernandez) and Juliet Higgins (Perdita Weeks) relaxing at Robin's Nest together after the latter was drugged in the last episode by a rogue nurse at a psychiatric hospital. The couple's relaxing movie night is interrupted, however, when Rick (Zachary Knighton) calls the house and informs them that T.C. (Stephen Hill) has been shot and rushed to the hospital.

Within minutes, an armed team — hired by the same people who killed Captain Buck Greene and have been searching for Magnum, T.C., and Rick ever since — lays siege on Robin's estate. While Magnum and Higgins are able to fight them off, they soon realize that they were attacked on multiple fronts at the same time; not only is T.C. fighting for his life in surgery, but Rick has also been taken captive with a stun gun.

As the story goes, Greene sent the trio into a war zone to take out a high-value target named Ahmad Hadid seven years ago, and Nadine Amherst, the CIA expert on Hadid's case who ended up falling for the man, has wanted to avenge his murder ever since. Magnum and Higgins discover that Nadine and Ahmad had a son together, but that child died of MERS a year ago, prompting Nadine to act like she has nothing to lose or live for anymore. The police are able to save Rick in time, but back at the hospital, T.C. wakes up from surgery and discovers that he can't feel his legs.

Following the finale, TV Guide called up showrunner Eric Guggenheim to break down the key moments from the finale and preview what lies ahead in the second half of the season, including the Better Call Saul alum who will make their debut as a formidable new antagonist. (A premiere date for Season 5B has yet to be announced.)

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How did you break the finale in the writers' room, and why did you decide that now was the right time to put T.C. and Rick in these life-threatening situations at the same time?

Eric Guggenheim: We had committed to telling a story that had a beginning, a middle and an end, so we knew that by episode 10, we wanted to wrap everything up. We wanted to leave some threads hanging, and obviously there is a cliffhanger, but we didn't want there to be a giant cliffhanger and not answer who was after Magnum, T.C. and Rick and why. We wanted there to be some real stakes and put everyone in some real jeopardy. It felt like we were building to that all season — the guys knew that someone was after them, and we had learned that whoever was after them hadn't quite identified them yet. We knew that [ending] would eventually happen, and once it did, things would get pretty real, pretty quick.

The last scene of the finale sees Magnum and Rick visiting T.C. in his hospital room, and there are many references throughout the episode that reiterate how those three men kept each other alive during their time in the military. How would you describe the evolution of those relationships, and what have you wanted to capture about the importance of the brotherhood that exists in these high-octane situations?

Guggenheim: As we've established on the show over a number of seasons, those four guys would not have gotten through being POWs for 18 months if they didn't have each other, and they were in the fight of their lives, and it was only because they had each other's back. They were able to survive that and make it home, and now T.C. is in another big fight. He has a really tough road ahead, and Higgins says to Cade [played by Martin Martinez], "There's nothing that they can't get through [together]." So, moving forward, Magnum and Rick are gonna have T.C.'s back, but so will Higgins, Kumu (Amy Hill), and, most importantly, Shammy (Chris Thornton). We're gonna see Shammy quite a bit in the second half, and T.C.'s mom is also going to return, so he's got a pretty good support system.

Everyone is visibly and understandably shaken about what has happened to T.C. and Rick, but Cade seems to have the most difficult time processing the reality of almost losing someone he considers a real father figure in his life. What is he struggling with the most? Why doesn't he think things will turn out the way he wants them to?

Guggenheim: Obviously, this is a kid who has faced quite a bit of adversity in his young life. His mother left him, and then he discovered that his mother died, and he was homeless. This kid has been really knocked down by life, and he can't help but think he's maybe cursed in some way. Those experiences really take a toll on a person, and you can't help but be somewhat pessimistic. And maybe a little bit of that is a defense mechanism. So he's obviously struggling with this. And what I love about that scene is that Higgins is there for Cade, and Kumu is also there for Cade earlier in the episode, because he is a victim in this as well. To see everyone rally around T.C. and Cade is incredibly moving.

Rick is thankfully just fine, but what prompts him to record that final video on his phone?

Guggenheim: Given the situation — he was on the run, he was without a weapon, he was being hunted — he really thought this could be the end, and it's almost like soldiers who write death letters in case something happens to them. That's basically what he was doing with that recording. And obviously, he's gonna make it through it, but it was an opportunity for him to say everything that he felt and say goodbye. That recording was very moving, and when Magnum sees it, he's also pretty moved by it.

What is the state of Rick and Suzy's (Betsy Phillips) relationship now?

Guggenheim: Well, this is not the end of their story. What happens between Rick and Suzy will be a big part of the second half of Season 5. I don't want to give away too much, but they're co-parenting, and Rick still has very strong feelings for her, and we're gonna explore that further in Part 2.

As the first-born son of Asian immigrants, I was particularly struck by Gordon (Tim Kang) and Dennis' (Lance Lim) storyline in episode 509, in which the father-son duo were on the receiving end of a racist verbal attack. Why was that an important story for you to tell, and what did you want to accomplish with that arc?

Guggenheim: Obviously, Hawaii has a huge pan-Asian population, and Dennis is all of 17 and hasn't spent very much time off the island. I think it's a little bit different if you're on the mainland, where I suspect you're more likely to have an encounter like that. The kid doesn't live in a bubble. He knows that there's racism in the world, but we felt like he probably just realistically hadn't encountered it [in this way].

So it felt like there was a really interesting story to be told there and to show how Katsumoto, as a parent, handles a situation like that. He doesn't quite know what to say and really takes most of the episode to figure it out. You have to live your life, but if you're afraid of these things, then your world becomes very small, and that can be a tragic thing. We don't usually get to tell stories like that on this show, but here was a way to do it in a way that didn't feel forced, that didn't feel preachy. We tried to keep that story as grounded as we could.

What prompted the decision to kill off Detective Childs (Michael Rady) in the same episode? Did you ever consider having him stick around, or was the plan always for him to serve this purpose in the story?

Guggenheim: That is a very good question. Killing off Childs was always a plan from the very beginning. That said, there was definitely a moment where we considered keeping him alive for two reasons: Michael is just such a great guy, and you want to work with people like that, but I was seeing his dailies and watching him with Jay, watching him with Tim, and I really liked what he was doing with his character. So we did start to wonder: Are we making a mistake here? I'll be honest: It was a really tough decision. I think, in the end, we made the right decision for the story that we were telling. I guess maybe that tells us that it was the right decision, because it did hurt so much.

Magnum and Higgins have both acknowledged that they haven't had a conventional courtship by any means, but they've grown more comfortable with the idea of being in a romantic relationship together. How will their relationship continue to deepen in the second half?

Guggenheim: Magnum and Higgins are going to transition from the honeymoon phase to the couple stage, or the "Okay, now we're getting serious stage." Things will come up, and they're actually gonna start to wonder if they're as aligned as they thought they were. In the first half of the season, I guess there was a little bit of conflict starting in Episode 9 over how Magnum was handling the situation with the guys being hunted and some disagreement with Higgins over how he was dealing with that. But for the most part, things were pretty fun and romantic and sexy. And then in the second half of the season, things will still be fun and romantic, but there's also going to be a few bumps in the road.

What else can you preview about where the show picks up in the second half of the season?

Guggenheim: We're gonna see our recurring characters, namely [played by] Bobby Lee, Chris Thornton, Martin Martinez — they're gonna be in more episodes. So is Emily Alabi [who plays Mahina], and Judith Scott will be back as T.C.'s mom. Instead of doing one big arc like we just did with the guys, we're gonna be telling multiple stories over multiple episodes that are a little bit more character-driven. T.C. and Rick, for example, each have their own stories.

Midway through Part 2, we're actually going to introduce a new antagonist played by the incredible Patrick Fabian from Better Call Saul. I think that is the first time I've shared that! He's absolutely terrific.

We are doing a story revolving around Japanese internment in Episode 13. Sab Shimono is probably best known from — and this will tell you how old I am — [the films] Gung Ho and Presumed Innocent. He was actually interned at a camp in California as a child, and he'll be playing a man who was in a camp, so having him on the show is a real honor. I will say there's a lot more action in the second half. The set pieces are bigger and more frequent.

Perdita told me last week that she still doesn't really know much about Robin Masters' relationship with Higgins. Are we going to learn more about Higgins' backstory in the second half, or is that something that might come in future seasons?

Guggenheim: Yeah, that would certainly come if we get another season. It's interesting because there's a lot about these characters that we've known since Season 1 that we have yet to unpack. We've obviously mentioned Higgins' father, and we've been talking about bringing on Higgins' father since Season 2. And every time we start to think, "Okay, well, now's the time to tell that story," there's another story that we feel we need to prioritize or we need to service. So it's just a matter of timing.

Assuming there's going to be a Season 6, that season is gonna be Magnum-centric in the way that the first season was, because there's a lot about Magnum that we still have to unpack, so we want to do that. While we [as the writers] know the answer, we still haven't answered the question: Why does Robin Masters know Juliet Higgins? So that's a question we also want to answer, and we do want to meet her father. We thought we were gonna get to tell that story this year, but it's just gonna have to wait until next year.

Given what you guys went through last year, do you have any contingency plans in the event that the show is either renewed or canceled at the end of this season? Have you guys shot any alternate endings?

Guggenheim: We did not shoot an alternate ending. The season does have a very clear ending; we feel that Part 2 ends in a very satisfying way. There's some closure there for a lot of the characters, but there's also things left unresolved that can be picked up in Season 6.

Have you had any conversations with the network about a renewal, or will we have to wait until the end of this year to see how things turn out?

Guggenheim: The other writers and I have certainly had conversations about next season and what it would look like and some of the stories we want to tell. I think it's a little early to know. We're optimistic, but we're kind of in a holding pattern. I think it's somewhat unique because [NBC is] going to have 10 episodes just sitting on the shelf that they can air whenever they want, so I don't know that they're feeling any pressure to pull the trigger on another season just yet. But, like I said, we're pretty optimistic, and hopefully, we'll know sooner rather than later.

Magnum P.I. airs Sundays at 9/8c on NBC. Episodes stream the next day on Peacock.