During a recent roundtable interview session, DeKnight shared insight into the show's upcoming third season, which stars Liam McIntyre in the title role, Lucy Lawless, Manu Bennett, Peter Mensah, Nick Tarabay, Craig Parker and Viva Bianca and is scheduled to premiere on Starz January 27th at 10/9c.
Spartacus, the award winning swords and sandals series, is returning to STARZ later this month. Series Creator, head writer and executive producer Steven DeKnight ( Smallville, Buffy the Vampire Slayer) recently spoke about the focus and titling of the upcoming third season 'Vengeance':
"This was always planned to be the season where [Spartacus] goes from a man really searching for his personal redemption in the death of his wife and his feelings of responsibility for that, that's why he wants to exact the vengeance, and transitioning him into a true leader. And it's a very, very bumpy ride for him to go from someone that we see in Season 1 who he's a good man, but he is much more concerned about himself and his wife.
"Everybody else is secondary. And this is where he starts to move into caring more about the group and putting their needs above his own eventually. And everybody else, of course, I love to take to people on journeys. Crixus goes - definitely goes on a journey. You know, even characters like Agron, which was one of the two brothers in Season 1 that we didn't get to know that well, has a major story. Everybody grows up in this season."
The casting of Liam McIntyre as the show's title character has been bittersweet. Original Spartacus actor Andy Whitfield did not return for the show's third season due to cancer diagnosis; an illness that unexpectedly took his life late last year. While fans of the series as well it's crew are still coping with the loss, they hold promise of McIntyre's portrayal of the popular character:
"What drew us to Liam is that we didn't want to try to duplicate [Andy]. I mean, that will never happen. He was such a singular, amazing talent. But we wanted to find somebody that had the same base qualities of compassion. And I told all the actors when they auditioned that even though Spartacus may fly into a rage now and then, he never comes from a place of anger, it's always from a place of a wounded heart. And we really felt like Liam captured that essence."
Even though the third season has yet to air, DeKnight is already making plans to continue the franchise and revealed he is currently writing the next season. Not only that, but he and his creative team are still considering the possibility of extending the property into film territory:
"Rob Tapert, Josh Donen, Sam Raimi, and I have always whispered in the hallways about maybe one day to do some kind of spinoff movie. You know, really I think it depends on where we take the show on television and everybody's schedules. But, you know, we'd certainly be interested in one day doing something like that."
