The actor takes us behind the scenes of Sean’s explosive response in episode 5 of season 2.
Warning: This article contains spoilers about season 2, episode 5 ofShrinking,“Honesty Era.”
Since Sean (Luke Tennie) started therapy onShrinking,he’s been pretty beat down by life.
Christa Miller and Luke Tennie on ‘Shrinking’.Beth Dubber/Apple
That is, until he decided to take the notion of being beaten down to a literal extreme.
“Save the bulls— for someone else,” his dad tells him before storming off.
Still, Tennie thinks this is what Sean craved all along.
Luke Tennie on ‘Shrinking’.apple tv+
“I don’t know that he’s ever actually wanted to beat someone up.
He’s a big guy.
He trained in military basic training, and he’s got combat experience.
So if he were to ever pick a fight, he’s not really trying to beat someone up.
He was always hoping to get beat up.”
LUKE TENNIE:If Sean had been primed, he might’ve initially said no.
But if he had been primed rather than surprised, he might’ve been into it.
He might’ve tried to accept something that would be a challenge, knowing it would make him better.
He doesn’t quite know or understand how both things can be true.
He’s trying to reconcile this anger, this disappointment he feels, but also this sense of gratitude.
He knows his father provided him what looks, on the surface, to be a great life.
A life so many people would be blessed and fortunate to have.
That’s the true source of his issue.
And as soon as he can reconcile that dissonance, he’ll begin to make forward motion.
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A lot of that anger is obviously rooted in his PTSD.
How much is the PTSD something he needs to focus on with Paul (Harrison Ford)?
What do you think is a bigger obstacle right now, that PTSD or his relationship with his dad?
They’re both connected, and it’s hard to separate that.
Because the PTSD alone isn’t really what his anger stems from.
It’s a totally different issue.
Then you start talking about amputation.
It’s the injury plus the infection; it’s the PTSD plus the neglect that he’s facing.
They’re both connected.
So, I’m not really sure which one is a greater issue.
I just know both of them together is pretty tough to conquer.
We know why he picks a fight.
We’re seeing Sean’s extreme version of self-harm.
That’s what he’s been running from this trauma that he’s been trying to hide from.
It all goes back to him running from that trauma.
How concerned about Sean should we be?
It looks like a pretty brutal beating from what we see.
I mean, you saw one of them dudes, that guy’s like 6'6".
Look, I’ve actually trained a lot in jiu-jitsu and Muay Thai now.
I wanted to train the way he trained.
One thing you learn is it doesn’t matter how big you are.
I’m a big guy myself.
You throw more than one person in the mix, and it’s over.
That sort of anime thing where it’s one versus 40, that does not exist.
People who are not proficient will clean your clock.
So, we should be very worried about Sean.
Presuming that he is able to recover, what does the future of the food truck look like?
Might he want to bring Liz back in?
Is he going to be able to keep it going with his dad?
As to what happens, y’all got to stay tuned to find out.
He is working on a lot of stuff in his life right now.
There was that weird moment with Alice (Lukita Maxwell) in season 1.
We see him run from the people he’s close to because he’s afraid to hurt them.
His fear is also connected to getting close with somebody romantically.
I think that for him, a relationship requires so much more growth than where he’s at now.
He needs to break that fear of hurting others.
He does switch to Paul as his therapist instead of Jimmy (Jason Segel).
How helpful is that to him?
Paul and Jimmy both have very different approaches.
Paul has the very traditional approach, and we’ve seen how that goes.
In season 1, we saw Sean make significant progress in one department, but then backtrack in another.
It’s one of those two steps forwards, three steps back situations.
With Paul, he’s facing these things, but then he’s engaging in severe self-harm.
Drop my pants and make my ass clap?"
That was not in the script.
We gave Harrison a couple of alts."
He dropped that one and the camera was on him.
I can’t breathe.
But this man just looked straight into our eyes, fully committed and connected.
How am I supposed to keep it together?
I got Indiana Jones in front of me cussing very creatively.
Bill Lawrencereally talks about how the arc of season 2 is this theme of forgiveness.
What does that mean for Sean?
He’s somebody who keeps everything behind a locked door or in a vault.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
