Warning: This article contains spoilers for the season finale of Genndy Tartakovsky’s Primal.
Last week, fans of Genndy Tartakovsky‘s primal, were treated to an unexpected season finale. The finale brought on the bookend the prehistoric star of the show, Spear, as he made the ultimate sacrifice for those he loved. As the final wowed fans, Tartakovsky sat down with Weekly entertainment to set a few things straight, and talk about what it all could mean for the future of the series.
For anyone who needs a recap, the final “Echoes of Eternity” begins with a flashback. Spear dreams of a time when his tribe was attacked by a pack of saber-toothed cats. After seeing his father fall, young Speer snaps and takes revenge, resulting in him being crowned the new leader. Mira wakes Spear when their boat reaches her homeland. While Mira is reunited with her tribe, Spear feels lost. The next day, the Chieftain who has followed them arrives in the village. Spear looks straight at him, but with devastating results. His body was burned beyond repair. As the final act for him, Mira lies with the dying Spear as the camera pans to his paintings on the wall. We cut years later, Fang’s cubs are fully grown, and Mira is with them, as is the daughter that emerged from that night. Fang is with them too, as Tartakovsky joked with Entertainment Weekly.
“I think if I killed Fang, I would be hunted.”
Some viewers have indicated online that what led to Spear’s demise was not that satisfying. After all, in the first season, the caveman outsmarted zombie dinosaurs, a witch’s coven, vampire bat monsters, and even a giant spider. But Tartakovsky argues that it was the finale of his previous show, Samurai Jack, that influenced the ending of Spear’s story.
“After Samurai Jack and the way we ended last season, I got a lot of bullshit because I didn’t give Jack a happy ending. In my mind, he’s a samurai, that’s his lot in life. We can’t all just be happy. Before this, when I got into it, I had an idea of where I wanted it. The whole scope of the series is about [Spear’s] evolution. He’s a bit like the last caveman, the last Neanderthal. So his evolution, in a sense, continues his family.He faces this villain who is supernatural. It’s not just any creature. It is something beyond man. I had a feeling if they hit them, it wasn’t right. So why not step out in a blaze of glory? He’s doing everything he can to protect his family, as usual, but it’s too much. You want it to be realistic, even if this is the most unrealistic show ever made. You want it to be believable in character. Moving on with his daughter felt like the right thing.”
Go out like a caveman
Tartakovsky later stated that the cave painting scene in the finale played an important role in Spear’s closing. For the team, it was a way of showing that Spear was reflecting on his existence and wondering where his place is in this world beyond him. It also helps bring the audience back to that first episode where he initially lost his family. Tartakovsky also stated that his own daughter, Lilah Tartakovsky, uttered the last battle cry of Spear and Mira’s daughter. Entertainment Weekly asked if this means future episodes of Primal would focus on her, but Tartakovsky says he has other ideas.
“I see it ending. [laughs] I don’t want to continue this story. I feel like we’ve done everything this season, in a way. I want it to be almost an anthology show, where season 3 would still be called primal, but with a different subtitle. Little dialogue, a lot of emotion, survival, rawness, visual storytelling: all those things, but with different characters. There are more things I want to do primal, not necessarily Speer and Fang. Perhaps, if there is a huge outcry, we will continue the story with his daughter and Mira and the dinosaurs. I should really think about it.”
Tartakovsky experimented a bit with Primal as an anthology with the episode “The Primal Theory”, which features a completely independent story from Spear, Fang and Mira. Tartakovsky confirmed that the episode is “Definitely not in the future” and that the episode’s theme is “definitely connected” with Spear and Fang. As the dust settles for Primal, Tartakovsky is working hard on his next project, Unicorn: Eternal Warriorsand then an acclaimed R animated comedy called Created for New Line Cinemas. After that, he says he will start developing season three of primal.
“I have an idea that I’m really excited about, an idea that’s rising to the top. After five seasons of Samurai Jack, two seasons of Primal and all the Clone Wars we’ve done, I’ve got so many battles and action. If I could do it again what would I do? How can I make it interesting for me and the audience so that it’s not just a repeat of what I’ve done? That’s why I was so excited about Primal. I’ve never fought in the style of a caveman. He has no skills, it’s just rawness. It was really fun choreographing fights like that. Pushing it into a season 3 of Primal, if it gets there, what’s different? What can I do that I can’t done?”
The first two seasons of primal is available to watch in full on HBO Max.