‘Paradise’ Episode 1 Ending Explained: Big Premiere Twist Revealed

Spoiler alert: This article contains spoilers from the series premiere of Hulu’s “Paradise,” now streaming on Hulu and Disney+.

Fooling us, shame on Dan Fogelman. Fool us twice, shame on us.

After the now-famous twist at the end of the 2016 pilot episode of NBC’s family drama “This Is Us,” it’s hard to remember a time when the world didn’t know the show wasn’t about separate people in different circumstances. Modern Day, but a time-jumping show about one family over the span of decades. Now the ‘This Is Us’ creator has debuted his new series, Hulu’s ‘Paradise,’ catching everyone off guard again with an even bigger surprise: A show that’s initially a political conspiracy drama is actually a thriller set in a giant bunker in a seemingly post-apocalyptic world.

“He gets you, because in a script that’s 52 pages, the first 49 pages, is like, ‘Oh yeah, I feel the story. This is really cool. I love it,'” ‘Paradise’ star Sterling K . Brown says of the beginning of Fogelman’s ‘This Is Us’, on which he starred for six seasons as Randall Pearson ‘And then you get to my man smoking a cigarette in it hospital,” Brown says, which was the audience’s big clue that’s happening in the ’80s and the timeline.

Now onto “Paradise,” which follows Brown’s Xavier Collins, a Secret Service agent charged with protecting former President Cal Bradford (James Marsden) who is killed at the top of the premiere and, due to his tumultuous relationship with Xavier, before his death, leaves Xavier as the top suspect in Cal’s murder. As the episode ends with Xavier Running, the audience’s attention takes away from the mystery as we notice that the ducks in the town’s pond are fake, the residents pay for everything with the same exact wristbands, and the entire community is enclosed in a giant dome in a cave.

“In the original version of the script, there were these sprinklers, like you see Xavier going through in the beginning,” Brown says, during an interview for a Variety cover story. “There are sprinklers on, etc., and then you fast forward to the end and you get up close, and the sprinklers release dye, because you have to color the grass. The ducks are a part that is maintained from start to finish. And then you realize, like, ‘Oh, this is the goddamn ‘Truman Show’? Like, are you kidding me? These people are in a bunker? ‘ Your mind just goes, ‘Boom! You got me again! ‘ And you don’t expect it, do you?

“Next time I’ll read something now. I know I’m just going to wait for the twist. But it was great, and it just made me lean back. ‘

If all that wasn’t shocking enough, Fogelman & Co. taking things a step further by dropping the premiere episode of “Paradise” two days early on Hulu and Disney+ ahead of the planned debut of the first three episodes on Hulu on Hulu in January. 28.

Here, “paradise” creator Fogelman joins the conversation Variety about that big twist, and where things go throughout the rest of the eight-episode first season.

“This Is Us” was filled with questions, some of which weren’t answered until the end of the show. How long will we wait to find out the story behind Cal’s murder and what brought everyone into this bunker?

What I can say about this show – which is exciting to me that I’m six years into “this is us” – is every question about a mystery or something that begs a question is answered over the course of the first season of the television show . So in terms of Xavier’s feelings toward Cal at the beginning of this pilot, there are two mysteries in the show: There’s the mystery of what exactly happened to Cal, who killed him, and why? A murder mystery, right? But then there are the deeper questions in the show about, what is the conspiracy? What’s happening in the world? Does it have anything to do with what the murder was? And both are answered.

In terms of Sterling’s reaction to Cal’s body, and generally calming down in the pilot, it all ties back to that larger mystery. I’ve seen all of people from the pilot saying, “He’s mad at Cal because Cal killed his wife!” And things like that. And you would have different theories and I’m wondering, I don’t know that people will get it at all, but it will definitely be answered over the course of the season.

By the end of episode 7 you will have answers to all the questions about the world’s big picture mystery. I don’t think there are any more looming questions after that. But you’ll have a lot of questions about the murder, about Xavier’s wife – and those answers will all come in the eighth episode.

There are many ways you could have revealed the true nature of the town of Paradise. How did you decide on this lineup for the end of the premiere?

I’ve done things with twists before, so your first step is for me to screen ad -nisseam for people, and while I do care about what people think and want feedback, that’s for later showings. My first set of screenings, when I have the rare smart people who have fresh eyes and they’re just television viewers, is: where are you confused and following the twist? It starts with a schematic and rendering and drawing, and I display that in front of people and go, “Are you following?” And they all go, “Oh my God, what happened?” That’s the confusion I want. It’s, do you understand the story I’m planning to tell?

So then you take it to the next level, you start saying, “What does that look like? And That looks like? ” And then now I even withdraw one from every 10 people, is a reaction to the shape of the sun. That’s the process.

One of the key moments that points to Xavier as a suspect in Cal’s death in the premiere is their final private conversation in a flashback, specifically the line, “I’ll forgive you when I can sleep again, and I’ll sleep again When you’re dead.” Why go so hard with its potential guilt right off the bat?

That was a big controversial line. I shot several alts of it just in case it was too much. And we all really liked it. Sterling, when we shot that line, he said, “Oh, that one hits different, doesn’t it?” Yah, it does! We had one that was like, “Will I ever forgive you for what you did? No, but I will never forgive myself either. ” So it was softer, softer.

You’ve said you have a three-season plan for “Paradise.” The show hasn’t been renewed yet, so where are you in terms of planning for a second season?

We’ve broken almost the entire season and now almost written it. The fundamental problem with streaming is these shows get people hooked and then go off the air for two and a half years. And so my goal is to have this thing back on television at least within a year.

This interview has been edited and condensed.