‘FBI: Most Wanted’ Star Shantel VanSanten on Exploring Nina’s ‘Painful’ Relationship With Her Father (Exclusive)

Tonight’s (Oct. 29) new FBI: Most Wanted dug more into Nina’s family dynamic that included a confrontation with her father, and Shantel VanSanten spoke to PopCulture.com about the aftermath. In “White Buffalo,” Nina’s father and sister came to town, but she doesn’t have the best relationship with her father. Played by John Finn, Jackson Chase doesn’t like the path that Nina chose, including her job, where she lives, her relationship with Scola, and much more.

With a lot of unresolved hurt and anger between them, VanSanten said, “It was painful,” exploring the relationship between Nina and Jackson. “When I first kind of developed who Nina was when I did my episodes on FBI, I had a history and a background and a foundation that I laid out for Nina. And I’m so fortunate that Rick [Eid], who was the showrunner there at the time, and David Hudgins, who’s our showrunner, have both been open to hearing the story that I build Nina off of. Because she was just this temporary insert into the story, and now she’s been woven into the fabric of these shows.”

“And the place I built her from had a foundation and had a history and had a childhood because it informs who we are and how we react as adults,” VanSanten continued. “And so, really, they’ve taken it and built upon it beautifully, but it meant that I finally have had to face it, which was a bit scary. And we have John Finn, who’s incredible. He’s just, like, a monster of an amazing actor playing my dad, and so going toe to toe with him in these scenes and really diving in just naturally what comes up when you think about parental relationships that are complicated and beautiful, and there’s love, but there’s hurt and anger and wrestling with acceptance of who your parents were and what your childhood was. It’s difficult. I was both excited to do this and nervous.”

Meanwhile, at the end of the episode, the Chase family went out to eat, which is when Nina finally confronted her father about everything that he had been criticizing her for. He ended up leaving in a rage, but Nina revealed she was fine if it didn’t blow over after her sister apologized for their dad. However, it was clear how much the situation affected Nina, and VanSanten shared that fans will see the family dynamic “really play out this season.”

“It’s kind of the central focus of Nina’s story, which, again, I feel really grateful for because we’ve seen who Nina is on her own, and then we saw her defined by the Scola and Nina relationship,” she continued. “And that’s been really wonderful. But to now get to really dive in deeper, we’re filming some things currently that are diving deeper into that storyline and seeing more of who she is and that familial foundation that I just think is important for the audience to know and understand Nina a little bit more, and it’s even surprised me with the things that I’m learning about her. “

Additionally, Most Wanted will also continue to explore Nina and Scola’s relationship and everything in between. “I always like to oscillate between seeing them beyond, like, in normal life, like, to go through the ups and the downs,” Shantel VanSanten shared. “Right now, they’re solid. They’re able to navigate the difficult family challenges, raising a kid, me being on the Task, well, of course, but that isn’t always going to be this perfect homeostasis and balance of things and to be able to go through some difficulties again at where they’re at in their relationship and see a challenge when it’s more solid is always interesting. It’s like you feel as though you have an understanding of who this couple is or who one another is in the relationship, and then there’s something that rocks the foundation.”

“Navigating through hardships is how you build trust in any partnership, whether it be Nina with her partners on the show or in her actual real-life partnership with Scola,” she continued. “And so I think wanna see them navigate some harder life stuff that gets thrown at them now that they’re in a different place than they were when we met them. And does it put us on rocky ground, or does it make us dig in further? I always love it. Like, I mean, I don’t just want, like, the rose colored glasses of the difficulties of balancing parenthood, a relationship, family, the types of cases that we’re doing. Some of them affect me personally just watching us go through them. So I just think, how could that not affect our everyday life?”

It sounds like this could be the start of an emotional storyline for Nina, and it’s going to be one that fans won’t want to miss. New episodes of FBI: Most Wanted air on Tuesdays at 10 p.m. ET on CBS.