By now, you're likely emotionally preparing yourself for what I am calling "the Super Bawl" — a.k.a., the post-game This Is Us episode in which Milo Ventimiglia's Jack Pearson tragically meets his demise. We've known this day would come ever since season 1, when it was revealed that Jack was not among the living in the present day timeline. Somehow, though, Jack's impending doom never got any easier to digest. One silver lining? According to creator Dan Fogelman's interview with Entertainment Weekly, This Is Us promises to keep one character alive all season long.
Yes, Jack will die in the Super Bowl episode, but despite fan theories suggesting otherwise, Randall Pearson (Sterling K. Brown), will live to see season 3.
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Fans grew a little concerned with the fate of the father after the episode "That'll Be The Day," which showed Randall confronting his own mortality. Alas, there's nothing to worry about here: Randall's crisis wasn't foreshadowing anything terribly tragic.
"I can assure everybody that we’re not killing Randall this season, so everybody can relax," he told EW. "I think [fans] would burn my house down."
Umm, maybe we shouldn't joke about houses burning down, Fogelman, considering that a slow cooker-related house fire is what will ultimately kill the original Pearson patriarch.
While Fogelman's promise may seem encouraging, don't think for a second that This Is Us isn't going to continue on its emotionally-draining quest even after we learn everything there is to know about Jack's death. In a previous interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Fogelman assured fans that there is a lot more Pearson drama heading our way.
"[This Is Us is] going to new places where people don't even know quite yet exactly where the show is going and what it's about and that's going to start revealing itself as we move forward."
Could that include more death? Possibly. Ventimiglia told Refinery29 that This Is Us has important lessons to teach about the cycle of life.
"I think once people discover how and when and why [Jack] died, hopefully they can move on from it. It’s like death that happens in our own lives: you have to accept that it happens," the actor told Refinery29. "And you have to accept that it’s coming and there’s nothing you can do about it. None of us can escape it."
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That all may be true, but if the show kills off Randall in season 3, I'm turning my TV off for good.
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