{alltv} 'Chuck' co-creator Chris Fedak: 'We kind of know our ending'

Tuesday, August 2, 2011

{alltv} 'Chuck' co-creator Chris Fedak: 'We kind of know our ending'

"Chuck" has already come back from the presumed-dead more than once in its four seasons on NBC -- and in each of the past two years, it's had an initial 13-episode order extended. Still, co-creator Chris Fedak can only deal with what's in front of him now, which means that as far as he's concerned, episode 13 of Season 5 will be the series finale of "Chuck."

And, he tells Zap2it, "we kind of know our ending."

Fedak says he and co-creator Josh Schwartz pitched an outline for Season 5 to NBC chairman Bob Greenblatt (who, by the way, isn't wavering on his statements that this is the last season) earlier this year to help secure a pickup.

"So we have a big arc and shape of where we want to go, and we kind of know our ending," Fedak says. "But right now we're making it real and [working on] those week-to-week adventures."

"Chuck" has aired, by our count, five episodes that could have served as series finales: the second-, third- and fourth-season enders, plus the 13th episodes in Seasons 3 and 4, which would have been the endpoint without the extensions. That's a lot of practice, but also maybe a challenge for the show's writers.

"This one better be better than all of them," Fedak says with a smile. "But it's great for us."

Knowing this will be the final season, he says, "is freeing from a storytelling perspective. You really do know that you're writing an endpoint, you know you're getting 13 episodes, you know you're getting a finale, and that's great. However, we've always built seasons that way."

Fedak of course wouldn't say where "Chuck" will end, but he does say he has an ending in mind, and it's different than what he's conceived in the past. "It's different in tone," he says. "It's just very different."

"Chuck" is set to premiere at 8 p.m. ET Friday, Oct. 21 on NBC.