‘FBI’ Star Jeremy Sisto Breaks Down Fall Finale and Jubal’s Mindset During ‘Horrific Nightmare’ (Exclusive)

FBI’s fall finale on Monday night kept many on the edge of their seats for the entire two hours, and Jeremy Sisto broke it down with PopCulture.com.

In the back-to-back episodes, “Lone Wolf” and “Wolf Pack,” a seemingly straightforward murder during the holidays takes a shocking turn and puts the entire city of New York at risk.

The case eventually turns personal for Jubal when his son, Tyler, is caught in an explosion at the end of the first episode, and he was pretty hungry for revenge, so much so that he defied orders from Isobel. There was never any telling what direction the episodes would go in. Between the murders of the sex workers, taking out the city’s fiber optics network and cutting out all communication, putting the city into a panic and sending out an alert to evacuate, and letting cyanide gas loose in a tunnel, each minute was intense. And Sisto weighed in on just about everything below. (Interview has been edited for length and clarity.)

PopCulture: Throughout the first episode, the team discovered that this lone wolf attack that started as a murder turns out to be much bigger than anyone had figured, as they’re targeting different areas in the city. And at one point, Tyler even sees something happening before getting on the train and calls Jubal about it. How worried do you believe Jubal was when he got that call, knowing just how close his son was, as everyone was piecing together more information about it?

Jeremy Sisto: I mean, it ended up being helpful, but it’s the last place, last person, last way you wanna get a usable tip that’s through your children’s eyewitness accounts. So it’s something that, as we see towards the end that he regrets how he dealt with it. He regrets that he didn’t make it clearer that his son needed to get out, but in truth, I think he did what he felt was right in the moment.

He was supportive of his son. He wanted to give him props, but the way he said it and how it came about, and then he had to convince his team to be like, “Oh, this is the threat that my son brought up, but it really is. I know it sounds like maybe we shouldn’t be taking this too seriously, but I heard his voice.” And, it ends up being really useful, but yeah, not ideal.

PC: Eventually, the extremists take out the fiber optic network in the city, cutting off communication virtually everywhere in New York. And Tyler, unfortunately, wasn’t able to get out in time. There is this really heartbreaking scene at the end of the first episode where Jubal is searching through all the rubble and calling out his name, and eventually finds him unconscious. What do you think was going through his mind when he first saw what had happened at 26 Fed, seeing the explosion, and he wasn’t able to get through to Tyler?

Sisto: Awful. I mean, he is surrounded by its own horrific nightmare that is people running away from an explosion, echoing sort of some horrible times of a worldly kind of horrors. And he can’t really focus on that or helping anyone because of this thing. And then, when something that level of unbelievable circumstance or something you love, it’s almost like you feel like you create it in your head because he’s looking for his son, and then he finds him exactly in his worst fear. So part of the damage that can come from that is this feeling that you almost created it with your own fear. There’s a lot of psychological trickery that your mind can do to sort of keep you from just dealing with the reality in the right way.

PC: We do eventually find out at the end of the second episode that Tyler ends up being okay. But with this being a two-parter, were you aware of the outcome while filming part one?

Sisto: It was pretty soon that we got the second script. I think we got it before we had started the first one, which was nice. I never really thought that the writers were gonna go that way. I mean, I think Jubal has been through a lot. I don’t know if the audience would want to see that. It’s a character that they’re close to, and it would’ve been tough. But you never know. It is the fall finale, so you can expect anything. But fortunately, he’s gonna be just fine. We’ll see. We’ll see where he goes. I mean, if he becomes an agent, then boy, that would be something you have to deal with quite a bit. Right?

PC: Throughout the second episode, Jubal is obviously very distraught and has a million things running through his mind, including revenge. Is it difficult at all to tap into those kinds of emotions? It definitely felt real at times, especially when Jubal was blaming himself for what happened.

Sisto: It was a weird thing, too, because he’s kind of motivated by a need to channel this fear, this sadness, and this pain into getting these bad guys. So he definitely allows himself to lean into that feeling of revenge, which I think is a very human element that, unfortunately, is a similar impulse within people that can cause some people to do some really bad things, too. And he does do some bad things. He’s gonna be really hard on himself. What he did to that shooter, that he has in that room. It’s not something he’s proud of.

It’s not something that in real life an agent would ever be allowed to get away with. But this was also a specific circumstance where the city was really in danger of some huge casualties. And so, I think that goes into the thinking of what the consequences should be. So playing that was kind of a more level of, “Alright, how can we define a line that it still feels like our character that we know and love?”

Because he’s a pretty conscious guy. I mean, obviously, he was an alcoholic. So there were times when he was acting outside of his mind for sure. But, I mean, I think the worst person we know and the person he is most of the time is somebody who’s fairly conscious. And it’s a different thing when your family’s involved. Sam is not somebody who operates like that. So I think hearing her encouragement of leaning into those sort of maybe not great emotions is kinda part of the cause.

PC: What will the second half of the season look like after everything that happened? Will there be anything that will be impacting the season in the New Year?

Sisto: As far as I can tell, no. As it seems like the thinking behind that is this was a big win for the agency. They stopped a horrible threat. I think Jubal will definitely get off. He’s not going to be receiving any punishment or having to deal with consequences beyond his own personal handling of the fallout.

FBI returns on Monday, Feb. 23 at 9 p.m. ET on CBS, streaming the next day on Paramount+.