Animal Kingdom series finale: Shawn Hatosy reflects on Pope
How do we describe this character and his overall journey? It’s painful and tragic and so much more, and it speaks to the depth of human emotion. There are plenty of people who will argue that Pope was never a villain, even if he was a murderer and a criminal. He was always doomed to fail from the beginning with a mother like Smurf, one who brainwashed him to be a tool of her own making. In a completely different world, we like to think that he would have been a totally different person.
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Pope’s greatest regret, as seen in the series finale, was not being there for his late sister Julia and allowing Smurf’s control to overwhelm him to the point of fear. Not killing J was his redemption, or at least that’s how he may have seen it. Pope died amidst the wreckage of his former home — someone like him would have always lived in danger and darkness. We’ll try to think about the goodness that lied within him, and we saw that here and there at the skate park he created.
If you want to see what Shawn Hatosy himself had to say about playing this role, just check out his post below on Instagram. While this show never received the support it deserved, we feel confidently that this was an Emmy-worthy performance from him throughout the final character. Pope is such a nuanced, difficult man to play — in lesser hands, you may not have felt the same array of emotion over time.
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What do you think the legacy is for Pope following the Animal Kingdom series finale?
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