Note: The following post contains major spoilers for Big Sky’s premiere.
Ally McBeal creator David E. Kelley returned to network television last night after a sojourn on cable and streaming platforms—Amazon’s Goliath, HBO’s Big Little Lies, the Audience Network’s Mr. Mercedes—with ABC’s Big Sky, a mystery with a marketing blitz that teased some kind of big shock, one presumably best enjoyed unspoiled. (Read more about it in our review of the premiere.)
Unfortunately, anyone who caught Tuesday morning’s edition of Good Morning America live did not get that pleasure. During a chat with leads Ryan Phillippe, Katheryn Winnick, and Kylie Bunbury, the latter just went ahead and spoiled the premiere’s big twist: that ostensible protagonist Phillippe bites the big one by episode’s end.
After her co-stars dutifully and carefully danced around the “shocking” nature of the premiere, Bunbury just cuts loose. “[I’m] really excited that ABC is taking a chance like this, to kill off a star like Ryan,” she blurted, oblivious to the look of flat annoyance forming on her co-star’s face. Winnick, offering a panicked laugh, yells “spoiler!” before trying to pivot the conversation, but Bunbury forges ahead. “I can’t believe I just spoiled that,” she says. Phillippe’s pained, thin-lipped smile says it all.
The spoiler was edited out of online clips of the segment, but you can watch the slip-up here (so long as it doesn’t get scrubbed by ABC). It’s worth watching, if only to marvel at how casually she says it. Was she on her phone when Mr. ABC said, “Have fun and remember: Don’t say that Ryan dies”?
Now that the cat’s out of the bag, Phillippe is excited to discuss his untimely death. “It’s a very bold thing to have one of the lead actors, who’s heavily featured in the marketing, go out in the first episode,” he told USA Today. “It sets the bar for the danger that lurks within the show and the fact that no one is safe. That’s going to create even more tension and commitment from the audience to lean in and really focus on what’s happening.”
If no one’s safe, is Bunbury next? Payback for the slip-up? Nah, but, if you’re interested, you can watch Phillippe meet his maker in the below clip, which was posted last night to the show’s socials.
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