With Hollywood being Hollywood the stars answered these questions with great humility and no true answer. The reason for this I will get into later, Which I learned when I had a one-on-one interview with the stars. The only real question that was answered was from Hank Steinberg who said that the series will still continue to evolve with a focus on a new beginning for the Earth and the crew of the USS Nathan James and the individuals they meet along the way. For season 3 he hopes to expand the character ' s stories more and possibly add some additional regular characters such as pilots for the helicopter that is assigned to the destroyer. Mr. Steinberg was quite honest when he said that they hadn’ t expanded the cast to include pilots because frankly they don’ t have a helicopter that they can regularly use. That might change in the future. But he was afraid that if they created a cockpit and helicopter on the sound stage with the assistance of CG it might not look real to the viewers. He wants to keep the show as real as possible.
Hank Steinberg said he hoped that the show would be around for 12 seasons, and as for all shows, it is pushed by ratings. He had asked that all fans of the show go to IMDB. com and click on“ The Last Ship”, the characters, episodes, etc. Everytime one is clicked on the studio officials will know and they do listen to the data collected from that site.
As for Dr. Stone and Tex hooking up, Rhona said maybe? For the XO Slattery to find his family, Adam said maybe and a wedding for Kara and Danny, maybe a ships wedding, they will have to see. One question that was asked of Eric Dane was what military training was he or the other cast members put through. He said about 15 minutes that it took to put on the uniform. They relied heavily on the US Navy advisers on the set.
But the bulk of the questions came from obviously military personnel, former and present. They all had great praise for the reality of the show and the attention shown to military uniforms, procedures, and protocols.
However, the one who had spoken the most to the fans was Adam Baldwin. He started off by asking for all the veterans and current military to raise their hands. He then stood up and clapped and asked everyone to clap. It was very humbling to listen to him and the praise he put towards the military and to the accuracy of the show to portray that.
With that the panel ended after about an hour and half. Those of us with the media when over to the Hilton Bayside, which was adjacent to the convention center for our press round-table and one-on-one’ s with the actors.
I was very fortunate to be able to walk part of the way to the Hilton with Adam Baldwin and I was able to carry on a chat with him. He grew up about 150 miles from where I did so we basically talked about home during that time.
When I arrived at the Hilton I was greeted by one of the representatives from TNT who was very gracious to myself and all of the media who were there. We had about 5 minutes to get some still shots of the stars prior to the start of our interviews.
I have to say that this was my first press round table and one-on-one experience with celebrities in this setting.
My first interview was with Co-Creator and Executive Producer Hank Steinberg. He spoke about where the show was going and the challenges for the crew of the USS Nathan James and its allies. The rest of the season is going to head more towards the struggles of the crew. Besides challenges from rogue nations there will also be challenges from groups who are naturally immune and who seek world domination, as
The author Tommy Anderson with Adam Baldwin. well as religious fanatic groups. There will also be challenges with the crew and with good people being effected by their emotions or where does anything go if the ultimate
end is good. The overall theme is that Captain Chandler has become, in essence, Noah and the USS Nathan James is the ark. They will be looking at the struggles of reestablishing the United States in all this chaos. But again the overall aim is to stay positive with the military in the story. In fact, the Navy and federal government is so much behind the series that the Secretary of the Navy, Ray Mabus, had a cameo role on the previous episode in which he had sent out a message to any remaining units to work on the cure and distribution. My final question to Mr. Steinberg was based on my own military experience. I told him that with my 23 years in the military I, like so many others, have become fans because of his attention to detail on the show. I then thanked him for the way he represented us. But I did ask him why in the last episode Captain Chandler had sent out the remaining Navy aircraft from Norfolk to spread the vaccine? From a military aspect I saw that and looked at the logistics of it. To me I said it would seem that as the series moves on will the USS Nathan James pick up additional naval and military units along the path? Will there be a follow up on these missions that were sent out? From personal knowledge I know they will need refueling and other assets in doing this. He looked at me and smiled and said part of the future story will be rebuilding and reestablishing the United States Government. Though he hadn’ t directly answered my question he did leave me with the impression that there is a lot more to come and the USS Nathan James may not be truly the last ship.
37