Maximum Pleasure Guaranteed Boss Breaks Down That 'Heart-Pounding' Finale Twist And Teases Season 2 Possibilities — Plus, Grade It!

Warning: This post contains spoilers for Wednesday's "Maximum Pleasure Guaranteed" finale.

Paula Sanders can finally relax and take a breath — well, maybe not.

For most of this week's "Maximum Pleasure Guaranteed" season finale, it looked like everything was working out for our favorite soccer mom: She strong-armed Cecilia and the shadowy Souter Group into getting off her back — they whacked a still-breathing Dennis and killer-for-hire Jen to cover their tracks — and she won custody of her daughter Hazel after an emotional courtroom showdown with Karl. (She even shared a smooch with Steve!) It seemed like we'd get a happy ending... until Paula got a call from a mystery number, along with a video that shows a contentious argument between Paula and Caleb in Portland before she hit him with her car. "You're going to do us a favor," the mystery caller texted her. Here we go again...

Our minds are still spinning from the implications of what we just saw in that finale, so we had to reach out to showrunner David J. Rosen and hit him with our biggest burning questions. Who's after Paula now? Was there more to her relationship with Caleb? Plus, we quiz him on Rudy, Geri, Sofia... and whether we should be getting our hopes up for a Season 2. (Apple TV hasn't officially renewed the series yet, for the record.)

TVLINE | Let's start at the end. So we think Paula is in the clear, but then she gets this threatening message from an unknown caller, along with a video of what really happened between her and Caleb in Portland. Have we already met who's behind these messages, or is this a new adversary?
You know, I don't know that I want to say the answer to that one. I haven't calibrated that. But I think what we do know is that someone somehow is aware, and we don't know how they're aware, of what Paula has done in Portland, which certainly seems worse than what she's told everyone. So the fact is that she's not in the clear, and whether it is a person or an entity that we've met or a new one remains unclear.

TVLINE | What's Paula's state of mind after all this? She was ready to move on and get back to a normal life. But is there a part of her that wants to get to the bottom of this anyway?
I think Paula has, over the course of this season... I don't know that she's realized it yet, but I think we've seen that she thrives a little bit in the chaos. So this is certainly not something that she wants or expected in any way, shape, or form. But I think I myself wonder if this isn't what she might need. So as heart-pounding as it is for her in the moment, let's see where it goes.

TVLINE | Like you said, there's clearly more to the Caleb story than we've been told thus far. Can you say: Did he and Paula have some kind of relationship?
I think we can say they had some kind of relationship. I don't think we can say yet what kind of relationship. They certainly knew each other, and it seems like more than just as the person who lived next door. So there's something going on between him and her that's more than what's going on between Karl and him. Let's put it that way. But I don't want to really give away anything. Unless we don't get a second season, and then I'll tell everyone everything. [Laughs]

TVLINE | Yeah, I'll get back to you in that case, and then you can spill everything. I have to say I was a little disappointed to see the romantic potential between Rudy and Geri fizzle out like that. With Geri pulling her Paula story out of the trash, what kind of repercussions could that have for those three as friends?
I think it's very possible it could have enormous [repercussions], or maybe none. I think that what Geri is realizing is that she has to be her own advocate, which is something that I think we've seen from Paula all season. And in terms of Rudy and Geri: You know, they're young. Who knows what's gonna happen with those two crazy kids? Sometimes timing is everything.

TVLINE | Will we ever get to meet the mythical Vi?
It's a great question. I don't know. We'll see what happens with Vi. There were versions of the first season where we met Vi, and then there were versions where we didn't. We ended up where we didn't, but I'm certainly curious about her.

TVLINE | If Rudy does become a paralegal and isn't a fact-checker anymore, is there a way to keep him worked into the story if they're not all working in the same office?
I think where there's a will, there's a way. And you know, I don't think he has the job yet. I think Rudy is someone who talks a lot about things that may or may not happen. He did actually take the LSAT, but we've also heard of other things in his past that he's talked about but didn't do, so we'll see if he actually gets the job and takes it. I could definitely see him flubbing an interview.

TVLINE | I love Sofia and her dogged determination to get to the truth. As she continues to pursue who shot Baxter, will that keep her in Paula's orbit? Please say yes.
She's not going anywhere. I love her, and I just think she always comes at things in a slightly different manner than most people. So how she stays involved, I think, will be really interesting to chew on and to dream up.

TVLINE | This show is such a unique balance of comedy and thriller. Do you see it more as a comedy with thrills, or a thriller with jokes?
I like to use the word "comed-iller," but I don't really think it is that. I guess you could call it a "thromedy." It is probably more of a "thromedy," though. I think comic-slash-anything is always very fraught, because if you make it too funny, if it's a horror, if it's a thriller, you just take all the stakes out. So in making this show, we — the producers and the writers, and then the rest of the crew and the actors — we all were like: This is a thriller that happens to be populated with people who are funny. So we never really wrote scenes that were jokes, per se. It always comes out of the character, how they react to the situation, the comedy. So that, I think, was our sort of north star in terms of making sure the stakes stayed high, and I think we're going for the naturalism and the believability that this is scary and people are actually dying.

TVLINE | I want to talk a little bit about Tatiana Maslany. I loved her on "Orphan Black," and she was playing a bunch of clones on there, but here, she's bringing so many different shades to this one person. Where did she come in as far as the casting process goes? How much of Paula did you already have in place when you cast her? And then what did she add to it after she was cast?
Well, we had a lot of Paula in place. We had about two episodes written when she was cast. But what happens, especially with an actor of her caliber, is they put on the clothes of this character that were just words on a page, and they make it into a real [person]. Tatiana made Paula into Paula. I can't see her any other way, and she owns the character now. So it's sort of like we wrote it, we had it, she knew what she was going to be doing, and then she took it even further. And then, after she was cast, we had only written really the first two episodes, and I then was like, "Well, it's Tatiana Maslany. We can do this. We can do that. Let's have her do this." Because you just know that she's so capable of anything. I can't say how lucky we are to have her, and how amazing it is to watch her work.

TVLINE | So what has Apple communicated to you as far as the possibility of a Season 2? Do you have a timetable for a decision?
Not really. I think, generally, they like to see everything and do their process. There's a lot of ones and zeros and algorithms and advanced level math that I would have never gotten into the class for that have to happen. But no, they've been so supportive of the show, and I think we're all really happy with how it's been out there in the public. I don't know, in terms of anything more than that, but you know, fingers crossed.

TVLINE | Can you tease a little bit about what directions Paula's story might take if it does come back? Do you already have that in mind?
We definitely have thoughts, and the only thing I can tease, I guess, is that it's not getting easier. We have an arc for her. We have plans. But we definitely are going to keep her on our toes.

Alright, it's your turn: Give the "Maximum Pleasure Guaranteed" finale — and Season 1 as a whole — a grade in our polls, and then hit the comments to share your post-finale thoughts.