Mythic Quest is Taking Big Risks in Season 2 | ATX Television Festival

Mythic Quest really raised the bar on Season 2 by pairing different characters together, exploring new interoffice dynamics. It’s been one of the highlights of the season.

Mixing up the pairings was one of the topics of conversation during a pre-recorded panel with the Mythic Quest cast and creatives presented by ATX Television Festival Season 10.

The panel featured Rob McElhenney (Ian/co-creator), Megan Ganz (co-creator), David Hornsby (David/Executive producer), Ashly Burch (Rachel/writer), Charlotte Nicdao (Poppy), F. Murray Abraham (C.W.), Danny Pudi (Brad), Imani Hakim (Dana), and Jessie Ennis (Jo).

According to Hornsby, mixing things up “comes with the second season of a show where you really want to keep it interesting for yourselves, you want to discover more about the characters, you want to give the audience something new.”

Ganz stated that they realized all the potential for pairings they had in Season 1.

“We had short scenes of Charlotte and Imani together when they go to the convention, and they were just funny. We just sort of had that delightful discovery season one that there didn’t seem to be a way to mix up the characters that wasn’t fun to watch. We had scenes with C.W. and Rachel together. We would put David down with Sue and that was funny.”

“And so season two it really was just a thing of who haven’t we seen together a lot. We realized like Jo and the testers hadn’t had that many scenes together, and we thought that was a fun dynamic to explore,” Ganz continued. “Honestly, it was like shuffle the deck, and it came up funny every time.”

Season 2 does find the testers outside of their testing box a lot more, which Burch and Hakim both enjoyed.

Burch noted that “it felt nice to feel more a part of the ensemble. I got to have scenes with Rob, and Imani got all those awesome scenes with Charlotte. I feel like it makes the cast and the season more cohesive, and there’s a lot of fun nuances to our relationship that our characters get to explore.”

Burch shared an aspect of her real-life relationship with McElhenney that she sees represented in Rachel and Ian’s dynamic. She recalled when McElhenney had approached her about either being a showrunner or directing an episode, and Burch wasn’t too sure she was right for the job.

“He was getting angry at me for not believing in myself. And so I feel like that dynamic is also a bit in Rachel and Ian, although Ian just genuinely is annoyed by Rachel. I also think that dynamic is funny because Rob and I have that dynamic sometimes where I’m like ‘I don’t know if I can do this,’ and he’s like ‘shut the fuck up! You can do it,'” Burch said.

Hakim shared her thoughts on the new pairings and what she wants to see more of in the future. “I feel like this just the beginning of all the fun we can have with all the new pairings. Honestly, I would love to see more of a Dana and David pairing in the future. I think that would be really fun. There’s so much we can play with.”

The standout duo of Season 2, in my opinion, is definitely Brad and Jo. Pudi and Ennis shared their thoughts on their scenes together, both raving about the experience.

“Last season we had a glimpse of what might come when there was a conversation that Jo and Brad had about predator-prey videos and how much they both appreciated them, and we’ve taken that to the next level in Season 2. And it’s fun to have this sort of predator off the whole season, watching us walk and talk, disrupt everyone. It’s a workplace comedy, but it’s like we’re on Succession. We’re just trying to be the biggest predators,” Pudi stated.

“We had so much fun doing physical comedy in our walk and talks, matching each other’s gestures, and it was a blast. It was a fun arc to play this year,” he continued.

Ennis elaborated on their physical comedy, sharing aspects that she and Pudi came up with that not everyone may have caught the first time around.

“The two of us spent a lot of time preparing for these scenes and figuring out fun little things that I don’t know if an audience will ever pick up on but like matching our props or the way that Jo’s hair evolves as she learns more and more from Brad; the way that they start dressing alike. We figured out ways for me to be like stacked behind him when we were doing walk and talks in the beginning, and then as she starts to learn more, she starts to walk in line with him.”

The panel ended with a discussion of what the Season 2 ending means for the future of the show. If you don’t want a slight spoiler for the finale, I’d stop reading this article now.

Immediately after this question, Hornsby and McElhenney turned off their cameras, earning a lot of laughs and leaving Ganz to answer.

When asked if the ending was written in case there wasn’t a Season 3, Ganz responded, “that is less of a thing of us wanting to give ourselves an out to possibly ending the show and more we just like to take big risks with the show.”

“And so it was exciting to us to end the season in a way where we really didn’t know what the next year was going to look like for the characters. They were venturing into a new place, and we thought that was really exciting to set ourselves up for that. We just like the fact that this show feels like this show can do anything that it wants to, and that felt like exciting to us,” Ganz stated.

Hornsby chimed in with, “Not to me. Megan and Rob, they wanted to take big risks. I said ‘don’t do it. What are we doing guys? This is nuts.'”

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Have you been enjoying all the new pairings and dynamics on Mythic Quest Season 2? Share your thoughts in the comments below.

Be sure to check out all of our coverage of the ATX Television Festival’s virtual event right here. There is still more to come!

Mythic Quest is currently streaming on Apple TV+ with new episodes of Season 2 premiering on Fridays. 

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