‘The Day of the Jackal’ Bosses Talk About Flipping That Ending & Potential Season 2 Plans

Marcell Piti / Carnival Film & Television

If Nuria had decided to turn on the Jackal during their in-person conversation, and it didn’t go the way it did, would he have killed her? 

Marchant: It’s interesting. It’s a good question. And I think we wanted at points at the beginning to [wonder], is she a good cover for him or does he really love her, and for an audience to ask that question. And I think as we go through the series, we realize actually he really does love her and he needs that family and wants to be part of it. So whether he could pull the trigger right at the very end, who knows? 

Did he know that he was gonna kill Trevor and Liz? It seemed like he really struggled with that. 

Naeme: No, and that’s why he breaks down because he says at one point, “You remind me of my parents,” and that’s somewhere we might go with the second season, perhaps. The idea we don’t really know much. We know kind of the way he started in the military. We know a little bit about his backstory of how he got into the army, and he fabricated his background and where he came from. But I think he related to them. He knew they were two innocent people. He had no intention of killing them at all. And when, unfortunately, events lead to that, that is why I think you see him at his lowest ebb of all. He could even kill Rasmus in cold [blood]. He didn’t want to do it. There’s that lovely moment where he stops and thinks, “Oh, don’t. Don’t come running after me. I know you’re gonna have to die if this happens.” And he doesn’t want it to happen.

But it’s even more so with Trevor and Liz, and he breaks down because I think he realizes he’s a meticulous person that plans and prepares everything, so it doesn’t fit for him to work in this way, but also he’s no better than the other men that he was in the military with, who carried out that war crime. And he wouldn’t tolerate that. It lowers him to their level and that, he hates. 

What was the straw that broke the camel’s back with Nuria? Was it finding out what happened with the fisherman in the papers or finding out that she wasn’t safe? 

Marchant: I would go with she wasn’t safe. Obviously, as we go through the show, she finds out more and more of the lies and peels at the different skins of the onion to get to the truth. But I think it’s that moment where he had always promised her she would be safe, that they would never be found, at that moment where she knows he is lying, and he needs to go away on holiday to hide that she fears for her own child’s safety. And I think that’s when she knows she’s gotta get away. 

Marcell PIti / Carnival Film & Television

You already said that Bianca didn’t suspect that she was in danger from her employers, but did Jackal have any idea that Winthrop would come after him? 

Naeme: I think it doesn’t surprise him when the chips are down, I think that ultimately doesn’t. He knows the world that he lives in. He was expecting to carry out the mission and get paid because that’s usually what’s happened. And he’s also been pretty effective at bumping off anyone who doesn’t settle their debts. We see that right at the beginning. But I think it’s all part and parcel of it, the situation getting out of control.

I wanted to talk about just that shot of Bianca and him through the two-way mirror. Can you talk about just forming that shot? It was really cool. 

Marchant: That was our director who came up with that on the last block, Anu [Menon]. We’ve been waiting for this moment for nine or 10 hours, of them to come face to face, and it was such a brilliant way of doing it. That’s kind of two sides of the same coin, isn’t it? 

The ending leaves a bit of an open ending. Do you have hopes for what we’ll see in Season 2?

Well, yeah, there’s various hooks there. We’ve been tracking how the show’s run and what people enjoy, and I think the premise of the assassin, how he works, who he works for, who employs his services, how he carries out his missions, people seem to be very drawn to that, and I guess we’ll continue in that vein. But yeah, we’ve set various hairs running, as Nigel says, for a second season.

One of those openings is he wants to go see someone before he settles his debts. I’m sure you can’t tell me who he wants to see, but my guess would be Nuria. Does he really believe that he deserves a normal happy family life? 

Naeme: I think that’s another very good question. I think at the beginning of the series, he does. He’s clearly, we discover, somebody who’s suffered, probably quite profoundly from combat stress disorder, and that’s affected a lot of these decisions. And I think he is one of those people who, as people who have that kind of mental injury like that, is able to compartmentalize his life. Some people can do that. 

I mean, another way of looking at it would be say for somebody who was a bigamist who had two marriages running at the same time in different cities or something, he’s completely able to compartmentalize himself. And because he’s so taciturn and transactional and cool and all of these things, he thinks it works. He’s like a man who works on the oil rigs. He’s away for half the year, and when he comes back home, he has six weeks of normality. But the armorer tells him that he learned a long time ago, that’s not a lifestyle that we can have in this business. And I think this is dawning on him as the story progresses. So the whole thing is really, can he — I would imagine, let’s see where we go [in Season 2] — can he get her back? Can he build a normal life? But at the same time, can he let go of this addiction he has? So all of those things are quite fascinating. 

It’s a job that none of us have. I think when we watch this thing, that’s what’s quite intriguing about it, that it’s a kind of dynamic of your life that, thank heavens, practically no one has ever set up and so therefore, it’s a kind of unique character that intrigues us. 

The Day of the Jackal, Streaming Now, Peacock