Timeless interview: Goran Visnjic teases Garcia Flynn’s mission in Salem, season 2 arc
With this story in mind, who better to discuss this story than Goran Visnjic himself? In our interview with Visnjic, the man behind Flynn gives us a good sense of his story, Flynn’s motives, and what he really enjoys about getting to play both the good and bad sides to this character.
CarterMatt – Flynn spent the first few episodes this season behind bars waiting to find a way out. Were you excited to get back out into the field?
Goran Visnjic – Yeah. Their interests align this season because they realize that they are after the same people. So, for Flynn it’s relatively easy to work with them and he sees them as his allies. He’s going to try and maintain that relationship.
Is he going to be a smartass about it? Of course he will! Is he going to do things his own way and sort of live life on the edge? Yes, but you have to keep this explosive mixture in the team. You never know what’s going to happen with him.
What are some of the circumstances that lead to Flynn joining them back in time on Sunday?
He has so much intel from the previous missions and he knows a lot. He’s been doing this longer than they were and he’s done so many missions that they probably aren’t even aware of. He’s just experienced.
There’s a scene you are going to see in a future episode where Lucy and Flynn are talking and they call each other geniuses or something like that (laughs). He worked himself up to being knowledgeable about history and about eras. He’s a good person to have around, you know?
Is there a sense of vindication in his mind that much of what he said about Rittenhouse is true and he and Lucy are now working together?
He does for sure, but there is still that big problem that his motivation was trying to get his family back and no matter what he tried last season it didn’t happen. If you remember the Benedict Arnold episode last season he literally went back an hour before the Time Team got there — he tried to change the history again and it didn’t work out.
He’s trying to take a different approach this year. He’s taking an approach of ‘I’m going to work with these people to try to get rid of Rittenhouse completely, and as a consequence one day I’m going to walk out of the time machine and my family is going to be there.’ Their interests are finally aligned and he is kind of poking them a little bit, being like ‘see guys, I’m not that bad. You guys are doing the same thing that I used to do.’ There are going to be a lot of funny situations over the next few episodes with Flynn.
How much of an awareness does he really have about the idea that history could change at random? Obviously we know everything with Lucy and her sister, but then there’s also everything with Wyatt that is happening. Does he think often about his family just magically appearing now?
Yeah, that’s what I’m saying — because of the bad guys having a time machine, they need to try and counter them every time. So, instead of going after Flynn they’re going after Rittenhouse.
Now, are they thinking about if they hurt a random person in the past, is that going to effect the future not knowingly? It’s very difficult to think in those terms. Let’s just say that Flynn is being much more gentle with history than he used to be (laughs).
Just for you as an actor, is it nice to be able to play that sort of Big Bad in season 1 and then get to do something very different this time and show a different side?
That’s my favorite game. I don’t know if you had a chance to see Red Widow — it was a show I did a couple of years ago and it unfortunately only lasted one season. It was kind of a similar character in that he was a bad guy, but he does a lot of good things and he kind of protects the lead. It’s always fun to play people like that. You always approach each script with great energy and ferocity that you’re going to get something completely unexpected.
When I had my first conversations with [creators Shawn Ryan and Eric Kripke] before the pilot, when I asked what to expect from the character that’s exactly what they said. We’re going to need some time to tell his story and some people are going to feel like ‘well, he did these bad things.’ But now, you can see that the vindication is there and you feel better about him.
Is there anything especially notable to you about going back to the Salem Witch Trials and getting Flynn in that era?
Not necessarily with him, but we have a situation where Wyatt needs to do something on his own, and Agent Christopher is kind of trying to figure out what to do. Flynn, being very knowledgeable about Salem, they send him on the mission. Wyatt is not available at the moment and they’re practically saying ‘look, we trust him so far so what else can he do? Don’t give him any guns and see how he’s going to behave.’ He wants to prove to that he’s a good person to have around.
Is this going to be just Lucy and Rufus constantly looking over their shoulder, seeing if they can trust him?
That’s the thing! The whole episode is very much about that. Rufus is nervous. Lucy is not. She knows him and she believes him more and more. She knows that he had a chance to kill her so many times and he never wanted to do that. She can feel some sort of infatuation on Flynn’s part with her. She’s a girl and she knows those things. She can say that Flynn is looking at her nicely and in a good way — I don’t want to say fatherly or like a lover, but there is something going on there. She doesn’t want to accept that or show that, but there is something between them where she doesn’t feel so much in danger of Flynn.
But Rufus, on the other hand, he really doesn’t like this idea of Flynn going with them (laughs). He’s really against it and doesn’t want to hear about it.
If Rittenhouse is ever gone and Flynn does get his family, would that just be his endgame? Is he so addicted to the game at this point that he would never really be able to stop?
There was a point in the last episode of last year when he says ‘Lucy, if I get my family back I don’t want to see this damn machine ever again.’ He’s basically promising that he’s going to return the time machine and he’s going to stop doing what he’s doing.
If they would offer him a job and his family is safe, he would go for it. Rittenhouse isn’t there anymore, but we could probably come up with an enemy or an exploration team to find out some things that could happen. God knows and that’s probably seasons in the future. It would be interesting to see what would happen there! All of the evil he was doing, he was doing to get his family back. So if you fix that equation and his family is back … This guy was an NSA operative for years! He was a trusted agent for years. The moment that he lost his family [though], he went berserk and he changed his ways.
I could see him back in a government business and seeing him doing what he did all of his life.
So is there anything else that you want to say about what’s coming up?
This is my favorite episode this season, at least so far, because you’re getting to see Flynn go back and be with the team. We’ll let the story lead to wherever the story is going to go.
Related – See more information on “The Salem Witch Hunt”
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A very special thanks to Goran Visnjic for speaking to us about Timeless and what is coming up for his character.
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