The Equalizer Stars Break Down Season 3 Finale's Biggest Twists And What They Already Know For Season 4: 'There's A Ticking Clock'
Season 3 of The Equalizer ended on huge twists, and stars broke down what happened and how Season 4 starts.
Warning: spoilers ahead for the Season 3 finale of The Equalizer, called "Eye for an Eye."
The third season of The Equalizer has come to an end on CBS with a finale that put the whole cast of characters in varying degrees of danger from almost the very beginning. While some of them were safe by the end of the hour, "Eye for an Eye" wrapped with no fewer than three regulars in immediate danger of burning to death, with McCall seemingly helpless to save them. While fans will have to wait through summer hiatus to find out what happens next for all the characters, two stars spoke with CinemaBlend about what went down... and dropped some clues about how Season 4 will pick up.
Read on for how Laya DeLeon Hayes and Tory Kittles broke down the "Eye for an Eye" finale of The Equalizer after they'd hyped the high stakes and "imminent jeopardy" of the episode!
Delilah Dealt With A Hostage Situation
Delilah and Aunt Vi seemed like the safest characters of the episode with their plans to go out to a movie, but their plan to load up with snacks at a bodega instead of paying movie theater prices for candy backfired. They ended up in a hostage situation with the armed and desperate Drake waving a gun around. Fortunately, Aunt Vi was able to get through to him with her particular kind of wisdom with some help from Delilah, and Dee managed to save the man's life with a well-timed dropkick. She used what she learned from both Vi and her mom in this situation, and Laya DeLeon Hayes weighed in on what her character went through:
Delilah put her own life at risk at the end of the hostage situation when the police stormed the bodega. After noticing an instant before that Drake's revolver wasn't actually loaded, she dropkicked him so that that cops wouldn't have a clean shot, then shouted that his gun was empty while she more or less served as his human shield. It was a brave moment that could have gone sideways if somebody had shot anyway, and all came down to Dee noticing that the gun wasn't loaded in a very Robyn McCall-type move. Laya DeLeon Hayes elaborated on the situation:
Interestingly, the episode with McCall and Delilah in the cafe (available streaming via Paramount+ subscription) was the same one that showcased Lorraine Toussaint as Aunt Vi did everything she could to help a friend stuck in a cycle of domestic abuse. Dee obviously absorbed a lot of what her mom tried to teach her about situational awareness, and was proved right (albeit too late to escape) in her deduction that Drake was about to rob the store. The actress went on to share what it means to Delilah to be taken seriously, with Hayes saying:
Luckily, Delilah is one of a couple important characters actually guaranteed to have a future after the events of "Eye for an Eye," since neither she nor Vi was captured by Michelle Chambers in her revenge plot against McCall. Hayes continued:
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The little family unit of McCall, Delilah, and Aunt Vi (which Lorraine Toussaint has said she's very "proud" of) is at the heart of The Equalizer, and according to Hayes, the two older women acknowledging Dee's maturity and growth has been a special part of Season 3. A lot has changed since just earlier this year, when McCall didn't want her daughter trained at all!
Dante Has A Fiery Cliffhanger (And Accidental Confession)
Unfortunately for Dante, his dangerous situation was not neatly wrapped up by the end of the hour like Delilah's was. Not only was his life in danger in the final minutes of the finale, but he was injected with a deadly truth serum earlier in the hour and actually had his heart stopped before Harry's Hail Mary move with a defibrillator. Oddly enough, though, Dante being stabbed in the neck with the syringe of serum led to some comedy with Harry... and Dante confessing his feelings for McCall. Actor Tory Kittles weighed in on whether his character would have ever said any of what he said without the effects of truth serum, saying:
The truth may have been bound to come out at some point or other, but spilling the truth to Harry with McCall and Mel on speakerphone was not the way that Dante would have gone if given the choice! He's certainly one of the more serious characters on the show, which made this a fun episode for Tory Kittles, as he explained:
As much as the episode was fun for Tory Kittles to play, the same cannot be said for his character! As if Dante wasn't already having a bad day when he went from trying to drink his suspension woes away to getting in a brawl with a bad guy to stabbed with a truth serum to his heart literally stopping, he was revived just in time to be captured, tied to a chair in a room full of accelerant, and unable to fight back when the room was set on fire... and the credits rolled without a resolution. The actor shared his thoughts on the cliffhanger:
How much time it will take for The Equalizer to tell remains to be seen, particularly in light of the WGA writers strike, but Dante, Mel, and Harry are going to need some help ASAP, which McCall seemingly can't provide unless something big changes. "Eye for an Eye" ended with McCall's three allies tied to chairs and on the verge of burning alive, and Tory Kittles opened up about filming that climactic moment:
Hopefully most people will never been in the same circumstances as Dante when it comes to being tied to chairs with what appears to be the seemingly impossible objective of escaping! According to Kittles, the fire wasn't all a result of special effects, either. The actor shared:
The writers ended Season 3 with a big and complicated cliffhanger to resolve, and fans can only speculate about the payoff for the time being. As to whether or not everybody will survive... well, we can always cross our fingers until The Equalizer is back!
Season 4 Started Filming Early
While CBS has not yet announced precisely when The Equalizer is expected to return to primetime for Season 4, the show did take the extra step of making sure to film the resolution sooner rather than later. The actors confirmed that the fourth season premiere has already been filmed. When asked if she gets any clues about what comes next or is kept in the dark as much as fans, Laya DeLeon Hayes shared:
This certainly isn't the first time that The Equalizer wasted no time in filming the payoff of a cliffhanger, as the show did something similar with Mel's story at the end of the fall finale and beginning of the winter premiere, according to Liza Lapira. Of course, the stakes are considerably higher following this season finale than it was back with the fall finale. For Tory Kittles, getting right into the premiere was "great," as he explained:
Fans will have to wait to see the continuation of this Season 3 finale, but it's a good sign when actors are already speaking highly of an episode that is still months away from airing. For summer hiatus, viewers can always revisit past episodes of The Equalizer streaming on Paramount+, which has all three seasons so far available. For some new viewing options to pass the warmer months, check out our 2023 TV premiere schedule.
Laura turned a lifelong love of television into a valid reason to write and think about TV on a daily basis. She's not a doctor, lawyer, or detective, but watches a lot of them in primetime. CinemaBlend's resident expert and interviewer for One Chicago, the galaxy far, far away, and a variety of other primetime television. Will not time travel and can cite multiple TV shows to explain why. She does, however, want to believe that she can sneak references to The X-Files into daily conversation (and author bios).