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The Magicians bosses explain dramatic series finale and reveal season 6 hopes

Photo credit: SyFy
Photo credit: SyFy

From Digital Spy

The Magicians spoilers follow.

The Magicians aired its series finale in the US last night (April 1), and the Syfy series made sure that it went out in truly dramatic fashion.

Over the course of the episode, the Brakebills gang blew up the planet of Fillory to defeat the risen dead and then used the World Seed to create a brand new world for the refugees, with four members of the gang disappearing during the process.

As Eliot and Kady were left behind on Earth, they began taking steps forward to adapt to life without Josh, Margo, Fen and Alice, who were in turn adjusting to life on Fillory 2.0 across the multiverse.

As the episode ended, the newly-crowned high king Margo was preparing to free all of the Fillorians from the ark, ending the series on a hopeful and positive note.

Photo credit: SyFy
Photo credit: SyFy

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Sspeaking to Entertainment Weekly about the episode's dramatic events, showrunners Sera Gamble and John McNamara explained that they always knew they were going to destroy Fillory at the end of this season.

"We knew pretty early on that would be the difficult cost of saving the universe, they would have to do that," Sera explained.

"We didn't know at that point [of breaking season 5] whether we would have a season 6 or not. We have a philosophy in the room every season that if there's a story we're burning to do, we're not going to save it for later, we're going to do it now," she continued.

"There was an overwhelming feeling that we should do this very moving piece from The Magician's Land; the World Seed story is that story. We all set our minds to plotting a good story that ended with them backed into a corner [and] having to let go of this thing they love.

"It ended up making a lot of sense for us in a season that's so much about each character contending with many different flavours of grief and learning how to let go of things, and bring new things into their lives in smaller ways. The big one is, we also have to blow up an entire planet."

Photo credit: SyFy
Photo credit: SyFy

Related: How Syfy's The Magicians is reinventing fantasy TV

With the show's bosses only finding out later in the season's run that it wouldn't be returning for a sixth season, they were left with the task of writing a season finale that could also serve as a fitting series finale, and John added that it's a line that he thinks Sera and co-writer Henry Alonso Myers balanced really well.

"To walk that tight rope was really difficult, and they made it look really easy," he said. "I love the fact that it ends on this — for us — unusually optimistic note.

"I think that should be the first clue that this is the end of the series. If we're being optimistic in the last episode, we're shutting the lights off, locking the door, and going out to a bar."

As for their plans for a sixth season, John McNamara revealed that they had already started to map out where the series could have gone next.

"I'll let you in the vault," he joked. "We have a document that may someday be available on eBay that is the arc of season 6. I mean, you have to be just optimistic enough to be ready in case someone writes you a big check to produce a season on television.

"I know Henry, Sera, [executive producer] David Reed, and I were really starting to get excited as we mapped out the broad strokes of what a season 6 should be. It was interesting."

The Magicians airs on Syfy in the US and on 5STAR in the UK.


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