Entertainment Weekly: What really excites you about the series, particularly now that its done and you have a sense of the full scope of the story youre telling?
Jonathan Nolan: We wanted to go flat out, full scope, sleeves-rolled-up plunge into the next chapter of the human story, in which we stop being the protagonists, and our creations start taking over that role. We were fascinated by the tectonic plates that seem to be shifting into place right now the argument over the creation of AI and what form it will take; VR finally coming online and our consciousness going broadband, allowing us to lose ourselves in an acid bath of experience that will be indistinguishable from reality (and only because reality will be the most boring level); and that, despite all of that, we remain, as a species, frustratingly broken, seemingly barreling towards disaster. So, yeah thats what we wanted the show to be about.
EW: Obviously the show had a lengthy production process. What did that extra time gain you in terms of polishing the show, or shaping the story?
Lisa Joy: The show is complicated and ambitious. For the first half of the series we were writing while in production and we needed the time to catch up on scripts. Taking that time allowed us to really finesse all the storylines we set up deepening character arcs and delving further into the series larger mythological questions. By finishing all the episodes before returning to shooting, we were able to concentrate on production in the latter half of the show making sure the last few episodes were as ambitious on the screen as they were on the page.
