All American is returning in April for its sixth season, and there is no shortage of stories to explore after the way Season 5 ended.
During the show’s panel at The Television Critics Association winter press tour, showrunner Nkecki Okoro Carroll joined the cast to discuss all things Season 6.
Season 5 left audiences with several cliffhangers, including Spencer (Daniel Ezra) and Olivia (Samantha Logan) finally reconnecting at the airport as Liv is about to leave Los Angeles to spend the summer in London. Despite a bit of bad timing, Ezra and Logan assured that their characters will have kept their promise to be waiting for each other when Liv returns. However, it won’t be easy.
The sixth season will kick off with Liv’s return, and Ezra warned “they’ve had a significant amount of time apart. That changes both of them. They’ve been on separate continents for a minute now, so what we’re going to kick off with is the two of them realizing just how much they changed.”
Ezra and his castmates were hesitant to say too much ahead of the April 1 premiere, but he called their upcoming tribulations “some really powerful stuff.”
Spencer and Olivia spent the entirety of Season 5 apart, after a rocky journey to dating the first time. Viewers might not be able to breathe the sigh of relief they’d hoped for now that the two are back together, but Logan teases that there is still light at the end of the tunnel — however long it may be.
“The season’s been really fun, because we’ve been wanting to see Spencer and Olivia together for a really long time. It seemed that there’s always something getting in the way,” she said. “We’ll just see them this season coming together as new versions of themselves. There’s going to be some stuff in between, but I think ultimately we are going to see the relationship really transformed to something really beautiful.”
Spelivia isn’t the only love story Season 6 will focus on. There’s also a wedding to plan, since Jordan (Michael Evans Behling) proposed to Layla (Greta Onieogou) in the Season 5 finale. This marks Jordan’s second marriage all before the age of 20, considering he was previously married to Simone (Geffri Maya), though the pair annulled their marriage in Season 3. Probably for the best, considering they were still in high school.
This time around, however, Carroll says that Jordan is in a much more mature place in his life, and his relationship with Layla represents something much deeper.
“Jordan is a hopeless romantic. When he falls, he falls hard. To him, it’s zero to 1000. With his father passing and having something so monumental like that happen in his life and the way Layla showed up for him, there was already so much love there, but going through what they went through… it’s like what else am I gonna throw at them that they can’t handle together?” she explained. “So getting married, the real-life stakes of that, along with the fact that…his sister is leaving town. The family unit is shifting, and Layla is becoming that new family unit. To Jordan, it’s the thing that made the most sense.”
That’s not to say it will be easy for them, either. Would it even be All American if it were? Behling teased that Jordan will experience some “jealousy, anxiousness, [and] nervousness about the relationship” this season, though he’s going to handle it much differently than he did in previous seasons, given that he’s matured.
Oneiogou said Season 5 was all about seeing Jordan and Layla come together and build their relationship, but as they move into the next phase of that, “there are things naturally that arise that you have to work through.”
For Layla, that not only includes learning how to show up for her partner as a fiancé (and eventually, a wife) but also running a business — and grappling with Patience’s stabbing.
“With Layla specifically, Patience’s stabbing has a really profound effect on her and that’s also something she’s dealing with simultaneously with trying to be a good partner,” she said.
Speaking of Patience, no one is likely to be impacted more by that than Coop (Bre-Z), who had been on her way to the Baker house to tell Patience that she still had romantic feelings for her that she’d like to explore. When asked how Patience getting stabbed will affect Coop this season, Ezra interrupted with an “oof.” (A.k.a, it’s not looking good).
“I think just like anyone else that Coop love and cares about deeply, she is very effected and will continue to be until she can make it make sense in her mind,” Bre-Z said. “I think we know from the beginning of the series up until now how passionate Coop has been about everyone that she cares about and Patience is no different. So through the fire we go.”
There’s also plenty of other stories to explore with the Vortex, including the introduction of Asher and Jaymee’s baby. Onieogou said having the babies on set brought a “youthful energy.” Ezra teased that, at some point this season, Spencer will have to babysit. His tone suggested this might present a bit of a learning curve for Spencer, while also joking that the baby was “very professional.”
In more broad strokes, the cast also discussed the dynamics of the friend group, with Ezra saying that, as always, he appreciates the nuanced depictions of male friendship that will be on display in Season 6 — just as they have been since day one.
“What I love is that our writers are giving real nuance to the male relationships, because that’s something I feel we don’t see on TV. A lot more relationships can be depicted very black and white,” he said. “Especially in this season, Nkechi has given the attention to detail…[with] relationships, highs and lows and jealousy, competitiveness, all that stuff.”
As the draft approaches, and as the players begin to interact with the world of NIL deals, Spencer and Jordan will always remain brothers, “but it’s not easy.”
Since the series revolves around football, it’s natural that it might at times shift its focus heavily to the men, but Onieogou assures plenty of “beautiful” moments of female friendship as well.
“There’s so many strong relationships with all girls,” she said.
Usually, All American is followed directly on the broadcast schedule by its spinoff All American: Homecoming. But this year, they’ll be separated as Homecoming heads into its third season, which Schwartz said is likely to debut in the summer, right after All American ends.
This begs the question of whether there will be any crossovers this season, on either show. While Carroll joked that the shift have her “a lot of sleepless nights,” she also assured the stories will still very much intersect, though it might look a little different than past seasons.
“The All American universe, what’s so beautiful about it is the characters exist in both worlds. There’s so much love and crossover and everything within the family that, while we may not have as much as we have in previous seasons, the characters are still very much alive in each circle and sharing storylines,” she said.
While neither All American nor Homecoming hasn’t been renewed for another season quite yet, The CW‘s President of Entertainment Brad Schwartz said earlier Thursday that “as long as they keep rating, there’s no reason why we can’t keep them.”
With that in mind, Carroll joked to reporters that she’s ready to write All American: Grandparents, if given the opportunity. That is to say that she has plenty of ideas to keep the show going for as long as possible. That includes seeing Spencer, Jordan and some of the others off to the NFL. Carroll said she and the creative team are “constantly” having conversations about how that transition would go, including securing the licensing necessary to make it happen.
“I live for taking the ride with them from high school into adulthood, into parenthood, all that stuff,” she said. “I love them all so much. They’re so incredibly talented. Every season they bring something new and amazing to the show…. I’m kind of like the mafia. I told them that. They’re stuck with me for life.”
For now, Carroll also said she enjoys “the real time of it,” but that doesn’t mean there won’t be a time jump sometime in the future, if it services the story.
“There’s only so much of high school you can show. There’s only so much college we show before it feels like, ‘Okay what could possibly be different for them this year than any other year?’” she said.