The Diplomat is heading into its fourth season with unfinished business stretching back to its very first episode. Plot details confirm that the fallout from the British carrier ship attack, a storyline that began in season one, will continue to drive conflict between characters and countries when the show returns.
The Hollywood Reporter spoke with series creator Debora Cahn and star Allison Janney about what is coming. Cahn described the carrier attack as something she always planned to let breathe across multiple seasons. "There was always a very long plan for what the carrier meant to the relationship between these two countries," she said. "The consequences reverberate through the third season and will continue through the fourth. It's satisfying for me to be able to make one geopolitical error resonate over a number of seasons. Look at the relationships between countries. We are still dealing with things that happened decades, sometimes centuries ago. Certainly with the U.K., the origin story [of the U.S.] will always be hanging over the way that we interact now."
Season three ended with UK Prime Minister Nicol Trowbridge publicly blaming the late President Bill Rayburn for ordering the carrier attack. The accusation complicates matters because Rayburn is dead and cannot defend himself, and only a small group of characters knows what actually happened. Among those who do know is Grace Penn, the character Janney plays, who was involved in the attack and has since risen to occupy the Oval Office.
Janney gave a brief but pointed description of where Grace stands heading into season four. "Grace is not afraid to make bold decisions and to suffer the consequences, whatever they are, and she'll stand behind what decision she makes. Not everyone agrees with her," she said.
Also central to season four will be the whereabouts of the Poseidon weapon. Hal, played by Rufus Sewell, betrayed protagonist Kate in order to secure the weapon for the United States. That betrayal has fractured the trust at the center of the show, and Cahn suggests that personal damage will mirror the larger damage between nations.
Cahn also pushed back against any sense that the show is winding down. She said the relatively low episode count per season compared to traditional broadcast television makes it feel earlier in the story than the season number suggests. "I grew up in broadcast television, where one season was 22, sometimes 25, episodes, so it feels like we're just getting started. It doesn't feel to me like we're in season four. It feels like we're in the juicy middle," she said.
Season four of The Diplomat is currently in development at Netflix.
