The minds behind Fox's Last Man on Earth will say time and time again that the network has been uniquely supportive of their efforts to make a distinct and expectation-shattering television show. But that doesn't mean they weren't a little nervous about the episode that kicked off the second half of the show's sophomore season on Sunday night. Why? Because not once did the show's star and creator Will Forte appear in it. In fact, none of the show's series regulars did.
Instead, the half hour -- easily one of the gutsiest episodes of TV you'll see this year -- focused on exploring the story of Mike Miller, the astronaut character played by guest star Jason Sudeikis, who found himself back on Earth for the first time in years.
"Of course it made everybody nervous and of course there were a lot of discussions about it, but ultimately [Fox has] been so supportive of us and letting us make this show, which is the weirdest and craziest and most surprising show that I could possibly imagine being on network TV right now," executive producer Chris Miller told Mashable last week after a screening of the episode for press.
"They have basically embraced how crazy this show is," executive producer Phil Lord added. "I don't know if Will just ground everyone down, but eventually we've all just thrown up our hands and said this is a unique show with a unique creator and we have to support his vision."
The episode was a vision Forte admits he "fought for," largely because he felt this was an opportunity to get to know Mike Miller in a uniquely personal way -- much like how fans got to know Phil back in Season 1.
"It just felt like an exciting way to tell this story and kind of risky -- 'Let's see if we can do this,'" said Forte.
They did -- with help from guest stars like Jacob Tremblay and Mark Boone Junior. The latter played a grizzled -- and "somewhat disturbing," Miller jokes -- man who'd fled for the seas after the virus outbreak.
Tremblay, meanwhile, played a young, foul-mouthed Phil Miller, who visited his brother in visions. In addition to providing adorable one-liners, the character, Forte says, was their way of having a touch of Phil in the episode without actually featuring the Phil we see every week.
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"I had seen Room and he's just amazing in it, so I just knew we would be so lucky to get Jacob to do this and he came and was just a delight," says Forte. "I felt kind of guilty with some of the stuff we made him do; I wanted to make sure with his parents that he was comfortable with it. I felt lucky because they watch the show so it was a really fun situation and they were very game for everything."
Next week's episode somewhat gets back to business as usual, with the core gang dealing with their loss and Phil/Tandy continuing his search for deeper connections in the world.
"This whole season has really been about family and Tandy's search for family," Miller says. "He's really trying and not succeeding, and so the idea of bringing some of his real family into that and having it not go as one would expect is part of the fun."
Yes, as you've probably assumed, we haven't seen the last of Mike Miller, who was last seen waking up in a white body bag and heading for Tucson after seeing one of the "Alive in Tucson" billboards.
Well, at least we think we haven't seen the last of him.
"It would be so annoying -- but so this show -- to actually not have him come back ever again," Lord added, laughing.
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