Two years after Season 1, the second season of Twisted Metal, Peacock and Sony Pictures’ streaming series adapted from Sony’s Twisted Metal video game series, debuts this week. A lot happened in Season 1, and the main characters John Doe (Anthony Mackie) and Quiet (Stephanie Beatriz) are facing new challenges in Season 2. It puts a lot of focus on a vehicular-combat tournament–which will be known to people who played the games–organized by Anthony Carrigan’s Calypso

GameSpot visited the Twisted Metal Season 2 set in Toronto and caught up with Mackie, Beatriz, and other members of the cast and crew to find out everything we could about what’s on tap. Plenty of details remain under wraps for Season 2, but Mackie and Beatriz outlined some of what to expect. This story contains spoilers for Twisted Metal.

In Season 2, John successfully delivers the package from Raven (Neve Campbell), which earns him citizenship in New San Francisco. No longer is John getting his hands dirty and running dangerous missions–he’s now in the safe and sterile confines of the city.

“He’s hanging out with the regular guys, and he’s wearing polos, and he has a shower. So life is different. So over the course of the season, we get to see how that affects him and how that’s made him different,” Mackie said.

John was a “man child” in Season 1, Mackie said, but now his new reality is life within the “structure complex” of New San Francisco. Based on the teaser images and videos so far, John is no doubt growing restless and eager to get back in the mix.

“It’s almost like when you left college for the holidays, you would come back home and lose your fucking mind your freshman and sophomore year,” Mackie said. “That’s kind of become John’s life right now. He’s moved into this structured world, but he still yearns for the fun of being the milkman, the wide-open space. So it’s just, you know, learning the ways of existing and conforming to the new, while craving the old.”

Mackie said he sees some of himself in John, in that they both don’t take themselves too seriously.

“I’m a ‘glass-half-full’ kind of guy. You know what I mean? If you take yourself too seriously, fuck you, stay away from me,” Mackie said. “And John’s one of those people. It’s like, every day is a new day. Every day is a blessing. There’s only one way to not get old, right?”

As for Beatriz, her character Quiet went through a lot in Season 1. Her brother was murdered right in front of her, and her quest in Season 1 was to avenge that death. But things changed for her, and she became a Robin Hood-like figure who seeks to do good and help the masses overthrow the oppressive powers that be.

You can expect to see more of that in Season 2, with Beatriz saying Quiet “has her eyes set on” doing good and helping others, or at least as much as a person can in an apocalypse. She’s also going to spend more time behind the wheel in Season 2, driving Roadkill, her beloved car.

“So she’s done a lot of growth as a person and as a driver, and I think particularly in driving, her skills have evolved incredibly, which I think you’re gonna see played out in the show,” she said.

Quiet was a huge part of John’s life and transformation in Season 1, but they went their separate ways at the end. But are they really going to stay apart? We don’t think so. All signs point to John and Quiet having an epic reunion.

Mackie went on to say that fans can look forward to more practical stunts in Season 2, aided by the help of stunt coordinator Logan Holladay. He was Ryan Gosling’s stuntman for the movie Fall Guy–which itself was a movie all about stunts.

“We use CGI as little as possible,” he said. “So a lot of the stuff we’re doing practically, and because of that, I feel like it gives it a really cool, interesting look. It gives it a feel that you normally wouldn’t get in something like this, because they would just make it look weird with CGI.”

Another fan-favorite Twisted Metal character is Sweet Tooth, who is voiced by comedian and actor Will Arnett and physically performed by wrestler, actor, and GameSpot-hater Samoa Joe. Showrunner MJ Smith said fans can expect even more Sweet Tooth in Season 2, and Samoa Joe said Sweet Tooth is the “ultimate agent of chaos” this season.

“He’s somebody that, you know, consistently wants to do what he wants, when he wants to. And you know, you’re gonna find, as the show goes on, there are certain new nemeses that have sprung up in his life, and he is desperately anxious to murder them as soon as possible–and he can’t,” Samoa Joe said.

Sweet Tooth cannot just kill people outright like he did in Season 1, due to the rules of Calypso’s tournament, and this is “maddening” for the character.

“It’s the kid who desperately wants that cookie in that jar,” Samoa Joe said.

Of his relationship with Samoa Joe, Mackie said he remains “deathly afraid of Joe,” in part because Sweet Tooth is usually oiled up–and this leads to some sticky situations.

“I know we’re friends. We hang out, but I don’t think he likes me. The shit he does to me in real life … So this is the hard part: He’s always oiled up,” Mackie said, adding that when he tussles with Samoa Joe, he’s left with what he called “Sweet Tooth nipple” imprinted on him from the oil. “I always end up with smudges of baby oil on me.”

“It’s a disaster. But what you’re gonna do, hit him?” Mackie said. “No, you’re gonna run, right? So it’s just that Pinky and the Brain relationship, yeah, but I’m not sure which one I am.”

Twisted Metal Season 2 premieres July 31 on Peacock.

Sony Pictures Television paid for GameSpot’s flight and accommodation to Toronto to see the Twisted Metal Season 2 set and speak with the cast and crew.

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