Tom Ellis Says Colin Will be Even More "Unpredictable" in 'CIA' Season 2

The finale of CIA season one pushed protagonist Colin Glass to his psychological limit. On top of discovering that his great love, Toni (Angela Sarafyan), was alive and working for the enemy, he found himself on the verge of having to kill her. But as if things couldn’t get any worse, the protagonist had to accept the agency’s decision to keep Toni as an asset — something that will continue to reverberate throughout the show’s second season.

For Ellis, the CIA’s decision to recruit Toni back doesn’t come as a surprise to Colin, but rather as confirmation of something he already knew. "I think that, unfortunately for Colin, it just confirms everything he already knew about the agency, which is that they don’t care about any of the things we care about in everyday life. They care about what works for them and what would be useful to them," the actor explained in an exclusive interview with Omelete.

The actor described the character’s bond with the CIA as something ambiguous, almost contradictory. "I think he has a love-hate relationship with the CIA because of that. It’s an agency that kind of drew him in, and it fits the kind of person he is," Ellis said, suggesting that Colin may never have allowed himself to question whether that was really the right place for someone like him.

According to the actor, Colin is able to live with that contradiction most of the time, but the first season finale exposes the limits of that arrangement. "When it really mattered, and when he really cared about something, of course they do exactly what they always do, which is act in their own self-interest, and he just has to swallow that," he said.

It’s this buildup of swallowed frustration that Ellis promises to explore in season two, which he himself dubbed the process of "putting the pieces of broken Glass back together." Asked whether that will make the character more cautious or more unpredictable, the actor didn’t hesitate. "I think the second option," he replied.

Speaking to the press, Ellis was blunt in describing why Colin isn’t the kind of person who processes trauma in a healthy way. "He can recognize that he has them and all, but he doesn’t know what to do with them, and he’s certainly not someone who goes to therapy," he said, adding that the character has a capacity to repress and compartmentalize that he himself believes is healthy, but from the outside, "it’s not a healthy process at all."

The actor’s outlook on what comes next is direct and somewhat bleak. "At some point, you keep pushing it down, keep pushing it down, and eventually it’s going to explode again," he said, making it clear that Colin only deals with his own broken pieces "very superficially" and that season two of CIA should make him pay the price for that.

The full first season of CIA is now available on Universal+.