Editor’s note: The following contains major spoilers for The Terminal List Season 2.
Summary
- In Season 2 of ‘The Terminal List,’ Mo Farooq mirrors James Reece: a grief-driven, loyal warrior living in moral gray zones.
- Freddy Strain is a skilled family-man and sniper whose heartbreaking fate honors the stories of real SEALs.
- Dar Salim is open to a Mo Farooq spin-off exploring missions and his chameleon warrior life.
In Season 2 of the Prime Video series The Terminal List, based on former Navy SEAL-turned-author Jack Carr’s second novel True Believer, Navy SEAL Commander James Reece (Chris Pratt) battles conspiratorial forces that turn out to connect to his deceased CIA agent father. To clear his name, Reece teams up with Raife Hastings (Tom Hopper), Freddy Strain (Gabriel Luna) and Mo Farooq (Dar Salim) to stop a resurgent terrorist organization and uncover the truth.
Collider recently got the opportunity to chat with co-stars Luna and Salim about the second season of the hugely popular book series and the role their characters play within it. Freddy Strain is an elite sniper and dedicated family man who Reece trusts to make a shot that would otherwise seem impossible, while Mo Farooq has been wrapped up in his own conspiracy mission until it winds its way to Reece’s doorstep. During the interview, they discussed working within the gray zones, how Mo and Reece are mirrors to each other, shooting Landry’s brutal torture, Freddy’s heartbreaking fate, how The Terminal List and The Last of Us compare for Luna, and whether Salim would be game for a Mo Farooq spin-off.
Mo Farooq Is a Mirror to James Reece in ‘The Terminal List’ Season 2
“He’s lost everything, as well.”
COLLIDER: Dar, I have to say that Mo Farooq is one of my favorite characters in The Terminal List world, in large part because of how you approach the character and the choices that you make with him. He’s endlessly fascinating to watch. What have you found most creatively fulfilling and most challenging about playing this character?
DAR SALIM: Well, thank you for those words, first of all. That’s very kind of you. I think playing a character that’s basically lost everything is very interesting because how do you deal with life? How do you continue from there? He’s written in a way that his way to survive is to fight his way out of it, fight for the right thing, and dedicate his life to his brothers and the causes that he’s fighting for. It’s a mirror to James Reece’s character because he’s lost everything, as well.
For me, it was finding a meaning in all of this. I also like the gray zones. We live in a world where most people think they know the truth, think they’re the good ones, and think they have the right over what’s good and what’s wrong and what’s bad. These guys all live somewhere in between. They see the world for what it is, they see the politics for what it is, and they still choose to fight for what’s seemingly right and for the guy standing next to them. He’s extremely loyal, extremely capable, and extremely vulnerable, as well. That’s an interesting corner of humanity to play around and to be in, as an actor.
GABRIEL LUNA: And I love Mo Farooq too, as a character. I’m serious. I love watching Dar, and I got to see it firsthand, which was great. What I love about that character and James Reece is, you’re right, when you do lose everything, what do you have to fight for, at that point? It’s something that is built into these guys, into team guys, into these warfighters. They just revert back down to that baseline code of, “I have to fight. This is what I’ve been built to do.” And then, eventually, a reason will present itself to keep going. He’s a great character.
Dar, we see Landry being tortured, mentally and physically, for quite a chunk of time before Mo then takes things a step further. What was it like to shoot all of that between the two of you, having Luke Hemsworth there to play that off? That was such a fascinating scene between the two of you.
SALIM: Fascinating is a good word. That’s a good word.
LUNA: And a step further is a good description.
SALIM: I refer to it as a date between Landry and Mo Farooq that you will never forget again after you watch it, and I apologize for that. I don’t think I’m ever going to get to play a scene like that again. When I read it in the book, and they said we were going to do it this season, we were all talking about, “Is this going to be in the series or not?” And luckily, they had the courage to do it. Playing it was intense, but it was also a very good experience. We’ve become very good friends. I know his family. I’ve met his kids. I think the most impressive thing about that scene was him and his performance. The way he gave himself up to it, standing there the way he looks, being so vulnerable and having done those things that he’s done throughout the show. Somehow, he still finds some humanity in it towards the end. I enjoyed watching him do his thing, and I really enjoyed doing the scene with him.
Gabriel Luna Worked With Former Navy SEAL Jared Shaw To Authentically Build Freddy Strain in ‘The Terminal List’ Season 2
“I knew what his ultimate fate would be.”
Gabriel, Landry essentially earned his fate, but Freddy’s fate was heartbreaking because he is this good guy who’s skilled at what he does and he has a family to go home to. What was your reaction to learning about how all of that would play out and then spending so much time in the moments up to that on your stomach?
LUNA: I read the novels, so I knew what his ultimate fate would be. What’s really interesting about that whole series of events is that it’s just the tiny little pivots that they need to make during the course of that day and the decisions they have to make, which brought him to that moment, with superior skill but inferior equipment, outnumbered by the enemy. It’s just a really beautiful duel that happens. The pacing and the edit and everything having built up to that point is truly an incredible ultimate end for this really beloved character. I got a lesser form of the Moroccan flu and was not feeling 100%, so being on my stomach all day was actually really nice. I was on Romanian ibuprofen, which has codeine in it, that my wife gave me, so I was fortunate to have a pretty relaxing day, otherwise.
But that episode was written by Jared Shaw. It was a tribute to his brothers, particularly the ones that didn’t come back. It was a lot that we were dealing with together, but we had each other to lean on to deal with it. We sat there together. We drew the range cards together. He gave me that notebook. We were just in Corpus Christi screening the show for the naval base down there. He lives there in Corpus. He’s a Texas boy like me, so we have a lot of similarities. He gave me my own version of Freddy’s notebook, but he had the one from set. He was like, “I couldn’t leave the set without this,” and he showed it to me, with our little drawings of that bay in Tangiers where we shot it. During the course of that day, he rested his hand on my back because we were just in it, approaching that moment. I’ll never forget that. We’re very alike in many ways, but at that moment, we were one. That felt really great, considering so much of Jared Shaw is in the character that I tried to build for Freddy Strain.
Gabriel, both The Terminal List and The Last of Us seem to be very physically demanding. How do they compare for you? Does one feel more challenging than the other? Are they equally challenging, but in different ways?
LUNA: There are a lot of similarities. They’re both marksmen, so that helps. What’s good about that is that the bad guys are far away and you can get comfy and do your work. I’m just privileged to be able to have that skill set and to relish those opportunities and to feel the doing of it all. Most people confuse acting with thinking and saying, and really, it’s about doing. I could really go and be active. They’re very similar characters. They’re both family men and they’re both trained snipers. To be able to jump from Tommy into this, and to have these characters be so close to my heart, and just to be able to make that transition into Freddy was kismet. I’m lucky for that.
Dar Salim is Down For a Mo Farooq Spin-Off in ‘The Terminal List’ World
“I would love to do that and combine him maybe with some of the other characters.”
Dar, when I spoke to co-showrunner David DiGilio, we were talking about your character and how much he also loves Mo Farooq, and he said that he would love to do a spin-off. Is that something that you’d be interested in doing?
SALIM: Dave said that?
LUNA: Yes, he did. He said it to me, too. I was trying to pitch him Light Wolf with Freddy Strain, but he was like, “No, we’re going to do Mo Farooq.”
SALIM: Anytime, just let me know and I’ll be there. I would love to do that and combine him maybe with some of the other characters. A guy like him, you can put in any kind of situation and he would blend in. He’s a chameleon. He’s done this since he was a child. He doesn’t have a personality other than a warrior. So, I think a guy like him, you could put on missions in the Middle East, in Europe, in the U.S., in Australia. You could explore a lot of venues with a character like Mo Farooq and look at the background stories that go on with him and combine him with some of the other characters. So, if Dave gives me the call, it’s going to be a very short negotiation because it’s just going to be, “Yeah, I’m there.”
LUNA: I’m going to step in there for a second then to make sure that all the Ts are crossed and the Is are dotted, and Mo gets what he deserves.
The Terminal List is available to stream on Prime Video.
- Release Date
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June 30, 2022
- Network
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Prime Video
- Showrunner
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David DiGilio
- Directors
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Fred Toye, Sylvain White, Antoine Fuqua, Ellen Kuras, M.J. Bassett
- Writers
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Chris Pratt2, David DiGilio
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Jeanne Tripplehorn
Secretary Hartley
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