ALEXI HAWLEY: Well, I guess it depends on when you start that conversation. I didn’t go out of Season 5 with necessarily a plan other than how I was going to resolve the cliffhanger. Then obviously, as we went through the strike we started to hear rumors about what the episode count was. By the time we started this season, we understood that 10 episodes was not a lot for a season, and ultimately ended up telling a more serialized version of the show than we normally do. Which I actually really liked.I’ve said it before, but I feel like every season our show feels slightly different. And part of that is circumstances, whether it’s the pandemic, or a strike or a hard conversation about policing that’s necessary after George Floyd was killed. Each season has been defined in some certain ways. So we’re kind of used to having to adjust our storytelling. So yes, coming into Season 6, it was a bit of, “OK, with 10 episodes, what’s the best version of the show?” And it just felt like ultimately, let’s lean into the serialized a little bit more.

Had you had your eyes on Monica as a potential villain for a while?

Bridget is just such a joy to watch. And we’ve done really well with villains on our show, dating back to Harold Perrineau in Season 2, which was heartbreaking because he was also a great friend to Nolan and a good guy until he wasn’t. Matthew, who plays Oscar, has always been a joy, but also dangerous. Obviously, he stabbed Wesley and almost killed him in a previous season. When you have great actors, you just want to write for them. So yes, as we came into the season, it felt like finding a story for Bridget, a bigger story, and then ultimately, when Blair was created, Dr. London was created, it felt like it was a great way that we can hide the villain behind the villain and that ended up being a pairing of those two.

Over these last few episodes, we’ve sort of seen these far-reaching tendrils and connections Monica has, but last we see her at the end of this season, she’s on the run. How dangerous is she now?

That’s TBD. I do think her whole world got blown up. There’s warrants for her all over the place. So there’s no universe in which she’s sort of returning to life as it was. She might need to go hide somewhere and lick her wounds for a little while, and then we’ll see. But we’re early in the planning of Season 7, so I don’t necessarily have a specific answer for you there. But I do think that it’ll be a minute before we see her again, probably.

We’ve got obviously some pretty high stakes introduced in the finale for Nolan and Bailey with the return of her ex-husband Jason — just as they are trying to potentially introduce a child into their home. Was it just that you always want to throw the worst obstacle at the worst time? Why was it the right time to bring back the horror husband?

Not exclusively that, but I do think that as we were sort of breaking our story toward the end of the season, we did start to think of who — because we have had such great villains over the years. And, in theory and in reality, the prison system is a finite thing and people would end up with other people. So that became a sort of lightbulb. Monica goes to Oscar, who can he get to help? Then Jason just seemed like the most delicious idea, to bring him back out into the world.