Note: This story contains spoilers for “Shrinking” Season 3, Episode 1: “My Bad.”
Jason Segel opened up about that heart-to-heart between Jimmy and Louis in the Season 3 premiere of “Shrinking,” sharing that the pair’s conversation is a nod to the season’s overarching theme.
“We all have agency, and maybe happiness is not this impossible thing… You just have to choose it,” Jimmy tells Louis (Brett Goldstein) as they sit on a park bench — a recurring staple in the Emmy-nominated Apple TV comedy. He passes off Jimmy’s inspirational words as the therapist’s repeated attempts to boost joy in his life. And after a couple of sips from their “hate crime”-worthy coffee, Jimmy asks Louis if he’s genuinely “happy,” particularly as he’s left behind a career in graphic design to work as a barista.
“At some point you’re going to have to restart your life,” Jimmy tells him, to which Louis agrees and says that his holdup is in part due to him finally starting to feel “OK where I am.”
It’s been a little over a year since Louis drove drunkenly into Jimmy’s wife Tia (Lilan Bowden), unintentionally killing her in the car crash. Over the past two seasons, Jimmy and his daughter Alice (Lukita Maxwell) have done the work to forgive Louis. But Segel tells TheWrap that the lovable Brit, played by the series’ third co-creator with Segel and Bill Lawrence, is the last remaining piece of the father and daughter’s healing process.
“Louis is sort of this last physical remnant of this terrible tragedy they all went through, and it’s time to let everybody move on,” Segel explains to TheWrap. “This season is about moving forward; it’s the theme of the season.”
This time around, the show brings on two new faces to expand Jimmy and Paul’s (Harrison Ford) storylines, longtime actors Michael J. Fox and Jeff Daniels. Segel said the two had long been a part of the creative team’s casting wish list.
“The cool thing about the show catching on is that we get to work with people we really admire, and we have this wish list of people,” Segel explained. “You ask them to do the show, and they know what you’re talking about when you say ‘Shrinking,’ and they want to do it, so it’s really cool. You get to be a fan when each of these people come in and you get to watch masters at work. So shoot, I feel like a lucky guy.”
“Shrinking” Season 3 releases new episodes Wednesdays on Apple TV.
