Anthony Lemke and Jodelle Ferland Talk Dark Matter Season 2 

[Warning: General spoilers ahead.]

Two episodes into the second season of Dark Matter, we’ve dipped a toe into the new dynamic of the team. When we visited the set in February, we chatted with the cast and creator Joseph Mallozzi about what to expect this year. Tonight’s episode has some strong moments for Three (Anthony Lemke) and Five (Jodelle Ferland). Here’s what they had to say about their characters and Season 2.

Lemke says he grieved as both his character and the actor after learning Six was the traitor. “At first, [it] was kind of like sorrow and joy that it wasn’t me. You never know what that means for season 2. I love this show, and the character, and if I had been the traitor that would have taken my character in a different direction,” he explains.

“I felt like Roger [Cross] and I as characters had developed a cool ‘brother-brother’ thing and had this weird, grudging respect for each other as the two ‘guys’ guys’ on the ship. When I found out it was him I was sad as an actor as I was going to lose a friend. It’s a real feeling inside of you. All of those great scenes.”

“My character wouldn’t trust him anymore. I didn’t know if he would be there, and how much, in the second season, and I really enjoyed my scenes with Roger in the first season. So my first reaction was sorrow and loss in a way. Three has to learn to trust again and that arc will play out over Season 2.”

While the first season painted Three as a “survival-of-the-fittest kind of guy,” we’ll see him evolve beyond that this year. “[He has] a very simple moral code. It’s almost amoral…’if I survive at the end of the day, then I have won.’ That’s what is joyful about Three in a way…whenever [he’s faced with a difficult] question, my filter is ‘What do I gain out of it?’ You can probably formulate what kind of person would develop that moral code and in Season 2 you might start seeing reasons why he is the way he is,” he says.

“One of the beautiful things of the show [is that] it allows you to explore the other side of people that they sometimes keep hidden. Five wears that on her sleeve but the rest of us keep it fairly hidden.”

“Three…frequently plays the loudmouth know-it-all but he has this other side to him and whenever I get to dip into that, it’s always rewarding as an actor. Discovering…his past and why he is the way he is and getting to play through those moments was a real treat.”

As for fan reaction that initially pegged Three as a bad guy, Lemke embraced it. “I l love when folks get involved—whether it’s good or bad. In some level it’s fantastic. The worst that could happen is if people were indifferent and went and watched something else. You are supposed to hate him and feel ambivalent towards him and it was all a set up for the episode with Sarah,” he explains.

“You see Sarah come in and now it’s like. ‘What, do I have to like him or something?’ The cool thing is, it wasn’t like all of a sudden he was this likable character, he still is the same jerk, but you never know when he’s going to surprise you and not be a jerk and I think it’s fairly consistent. I love playing the asshole role as there is nothing more fun than inspiring ire.”

Lemke refers to the analogy of the least-favored son who always comes through. “He is the guy that says he is always going to let you down and in the end, he doesn’t. When the chips are really down he sees himself as the person that the second son declares himself to be,” he points out.

“In the end he does the right thing and that’s the [irony]. He thinks they have him all wrong, ‘I’m not the guy who stays, I’m the second son, the one who leaves.’ Then [Sarah] collapses in front of him and he can’t leave because he isn’t that person.”

Lemke’s favorite prop on the show, by far, is Three’s trusty behemoth gun, Bubba. “Bubba becomes a character. As an actor it’s just us dancing, the rest is on the computer. We don’t hear anything, they don’t even click. Bubba is the object I hold in my hands and pretend is a weapon and is the most fun,” he says.

“It doesn’t just shoot, it bounces people off walls, the battery runs out. It’s this whole other thing that’s fun to interact with as with others, people just die, Bubba’s not that simple. It’s super heavy [so] you can’t hold it up, you have to manipulate it. You are running with it, it’s a big lug and a difficult thing to work with but definitely my favorite.”

Working with Ferland’s character, Five, allows us to see a different side of Three. “Five makes Three a better person and I don’t think that’s unique to Three, I think she’s the one who reminds us that we are a family,” says Lemke. “I think she’s the one that keeps the odd band of miscreants together. I like the paternal/fraternal aspect.”

“Because of her age, it’s somewhere between fatherly or brotherly or older uncle. For me it’s fun to play as an actor, as it’s not how Three is with anybody else. Everyone proves [to] Three [that] he is wrong, but that doesn’t mean he has learned anything. There are very few characters that he has learned anything from, and she is one of them.”

Five is often underestimated because of her age and her size, and Ferland has enjoyed Five getting to exploit that. “Nobody would expect her to be capable of what she’s capable of. People definitely underestimate her, which is not a good idea. Five is very smart and capable of a lot more than people think she is,” she shares. “I think that will work to her advantage.”

After the betrayal by Six, Five tries to bring everyone back together as a family, plus she gets to kick a little ass again in Season 2. “She doesn’t come from a traditional family background. We don’t know a whole lot about her, but you can see from the little parts of her past she hasn’t had the best family life,” Ferland shares. “I think this is her makeshift family and it’s all she has so if she can’t keep them together, what is she going to do?”

“I have been lucky I haven’t had that many stunt crushes. Last year, I had sword fighting and that was a new skill to learn. This year it’s been stuff I have done before, so I haven’t been so bad but I really enjoyed it and I’m excited for you all to see!”

Dark Matter airs Fridays at 10/9c on Syfy.