With Sons of Anarchy spin-off Mayans M.C. bringing us a fifth and final season, fans are no doubt curious to see if there’s anything next for the franchise.
The original – which followed a close-knit outlaw motorcycle club led by ’s Jackson ‘Jax’ Teller – came to an end in 2014 after seven successful series. But as fans dried their tears, creator Kurt Sutter was busy working on something else and released a two years later, this time following the Mayans Motorcycle Club, the group’s rivals-turned-allies. However, this will also soon draw to a close, with the series renewed for a fifth and final season in July last year.
Naturally, many of us are now wondering what to expect for the last instalment and beyond, with various rumours focusing on the hope that may, at some point, return. A few months back, he actually responded to these claims, confirming that he may come back – but not necessarily in the way you might assume.
Charlie Hunnam as Jax in Sons of Anarchy. Credit: FX
Speaking at Liverpool Comic Con in May last year, he told the audience: “There’s something in that universe that doesn’t involve Jax Teller, but does involve me that we’re sort of cooking up. “But right now, it’s like we’re at the stage where the ingredients are just being measured out, they’re not even being mixed out in the bowl yet, and they’re definitely not in the oven.” Hunnam also teased his potential return in October, hinting he could ‘possibly’ appear in a follow-up series. While speaking to Access Hollywood, the actor said he could be slipping on the Sons’ biker jacket sometime soon.
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He told the outlet: “I have an idea that I’m exploring in its infancy where that could be a possibility. It would be something that I would be incredibly excited about, so we’re sort of, like I said, in the infancy of exploring the viability of the idea.” mHe said he would be 'excited' to return to the franchise. Credit: FX
After Hunnam's time as Jax ended, he found the thought of having to play a different character pretty difficult - so much so, in fact, that he ended up 'a lot'. He told Glamour in 2017: "It was actually quite emotional for me, living and loving that guy for eight years, to have to finally put him to bed. "I found myself going back to set a lot. I knew the security guards and for a couple of days said, ‘Oh, I forgot something’, so they’d let me onto the set, and I’d just walk around at night because I wanted to be in that environment and go through a personal process of saying goodbye.
"After a couple of nights I didn’t really need the alibi to get in, and then after a while I just said, ‘OK, enough, this is done’."
has teased his return to the universe. The actor has hinted he could ‘possibly’ appear in a followup series and fans have been going wild over the suggestion. While speaking to Access Hollywood, the , who is most well known for playing Jax Teller in the popular , said he could be potentially slipping on the Sons’ biker jacket sometime soon.
He told the outlet: “I have an idea that I’m exploring in its infancy where that could be a possibility. "It would be something that I would be incredibly excited about, so we’re sort of, like I said, in the infancy of exploring the viability of the idea.” Following the show's last episode, FX released a spin-off series called Mayans M.C. It takes place two and a half years after the events of Sons of Anarchy and follows a Latino biker club. The follow-up series has also proved to be hugely popular, receiving commercial and critical praise, and was renewed for a fifth season back in July.
However, despite its success, production has also been met with its fair share of turbulence. The show’s creator, who also wrote Sons of Anarchy, Kurt Sutter, was fired after the cast and crew made numerous complaints about his ‘unprofessional behaviour’. In October 2019, Deadline reported that Sutter revealed in an email to cast and crew that FX decided to let him go from his executive producer role and subsequently handed the series over to co-creator Elgin James. According to the outlet, Sutter’s firing followed an investigation into complaints collected by human resources from writers, producers, cast and crew who alleged the showrunner created a hostile work environment.
However, Sutter also noted that he felt intense ‘creative scrutiny’ under Disney and FX, who were trying to undermine his work.
“Notes on scripts and cuts have been heavy handed. Demanding a level of dumbing-down story and inane PC restraints like I’ve never experienced before,” he wrote in a letter obtained by Deadline.
“I genuinely feared for the creative future of the storytelling. So I pushed back. Hard.”
He added that chairman of Disney Television Studios Dana Walden and ABC Entertainment and chairman of FX Networks and FX Productions John Landgraf were responsible for terminating his contract.
He wrote: “The truth is, the suits wanted me gone. I stepped on toes and bruised egos. And in this Disney regime, I’m dangerous to the wholesome brand. And clearly not worth the trouble.
“So 18 years of friendship, loyalty and producing quality television, was flushed down the drain. They threw me under the f**king bus.”
And while Charlie Hunnam’s return to the universe will be in Sutter’s absence, we can’t wait until he graces the silver screen again.
That is if his idea is able to come to fruition. Only time will tell.
Charlie Hunnam admits he found it so difficult to say goodbye to his Sons of Anarchy character Jax he kept making up excuses to return to the set.
The British actor famous played Jax Teller, who fully embraced the motorcyclist lifestyle.
For those unaware, the premise for the show follows Teller, who struggles to balance being a father and being involved in an outlaw motorcycle club - , aka SAMCRO.
By played the role for such a long time, seven seasons in fact, the thought of having to play a different character was something he found pretty difficult.
Two months after finishing the final season of Sons Of Anarchy, said he felt 'emotional'.
In 2017, he told Glamour: "It was actually quite emotional for me, living and loving that guy for eight years, to have to finally put him to bed.
"I found myself going back to set a lot.
"I knew the security guards and for a couple of days said, ‘Oh, I forgot something’, so they’d let me onto the set, and I’d just walk around at night because I wanted to be in that environment and go through a personal process of saying goodbye.
"After a couple of nights I didn’t really need the alibi to get in, and then after a while I just said, ‘OK, enough, this is done’."
Credit: Cinematic Collection / Alamy Stock Photo
The actor has undergone a successful career ever since, and in his new series Shantaram, Hunnam plays an Australian fugitive named Lin Ford who lives in 1980s Bombay.
Speaking candidly about having to change accent for the role, Hunnam told 7 News Australia: "I had a wonderful dialect coach and a lot of Australian friends who helped me, but honestly I think I probably got about 75 percent of the way there.
"I have a strange accent myself, it’s half English, half American, and everybody, my entire life, has thought I was Australian.
"I have a lot of family in Melbourne.
"I came to Melbourne the first time when I was two years old and spent six weeks there, so I’ve been coming to Australia all my life."
In his new series Shantaram, Hunnam plays an Australian fugitive named Lin Ford who lives in 1980s Bombay. Credit: Apple TV+
The synopsis for Shantaram reads: "Escaped convict Lin Ford flees to the teeming streets of 1980s Bombay, looking to disappear.
"Working as a medic for the city's poor and neglected, Lin finds unexpected love, connection, and courage on the long road to redemption."
Shantaram is available to stream on Apple TV+ now
Sons of Anarchy came to an end all the way back in 2014, but fans of the show have been keeping it alive ever since, and the success of spin-off series Mayans M.C. hasn't hurt either.
Even though the show may have ended years ago, that hasn't stopped speculation that it might make some sort of comeback, and .
You might be wondering how that's possible considering Jax, y'know, during the grand finale of , but the actor said he was working on 'something in that universe' which involves him but not his character.
For the majority of Sons of Anarchy the heart of the drama centred on the Hamlet-esque relationship between Jax and stepfather Clay Morrow () as they started off close but eventually ended up in conflict with each other.
The part of Clay is one of Perlman's most recognisable roles, but the actor has been open and honest about the fact that he wasn't actually first choice for the part.
Ron Perlman starred as Clay Morrow in Sons of Anarchy, but someone else had the role before he did. Credit: Maximum Film / Alamy Stock Photo
Shortly after the end of Sons of Anarchy, the actor revealed that when he auditioned for the role of Clay they had already filmed a pilot episode with someone else in the role.
That pilot hadn't received the green light from the network, who Perlman says 'loved the series' but wanted some changes to the cast before they gave approval to go on with the show.
The actor didn't say who was first cast as Clay Morrow, only revealing that they were a 'brilliant actor' who he really liked, but explained to NPR in 2015 that the show was looking for someone to give a 'way more dynamic' performance.
He said: "The original actor is a brilliant actor, I won’t mention his name, but he’s – I’m a huge fan of his. "But he’s a very subtle guy. And he has a very kind of a quiet, understated presence about him, which, in terms of this particular guy, Clay Morrow, they were looking for way more dynamic.
"They were looking for higher highs and lower lows and a lot of very, very kind of…resonance, yeah.
"So I understood going into it that, you know – that they were looking for a more operatic version of this guy.
"And it just so happened – you know, I happened to be free that week."
Though Perlman didn't name the original Clay Morrow actor, we now know who originally had the part.
Scott Glenn played Clay Morrow in the pilot for Sons of Anarchy. Credit: Cinematic Collection / Alamy Stock Photo
Sons of Anarchy creator Kurt Sutter revealed in 2020 that Scott Glenn had been Clay in the pilot episode, calling the actor a 'powerhouse' but saying the first pilot episode 'took itself too seriously' and needed changes.
Perlman's character Clay met a grisly end near the end of the sixth season of Sons of Anarchy, as the biker gang leader had betrayed pretty much everyone around him and ended up in prison.
He was released by his former friends, only to realise that he was going to be executed by them for his past actions.
Saying goodbye to the show must have been difficult, with Perlman adding that he felt 'truly isolated' due to his character's fate in the sixth season as he was on different sets and shooting different scenes from the actors he'd been working with for years.
Perlman wasn't the only one who found it difficult to say goodbye to the show, as to the point that after a while security just let him back in without any pretence.
Cillian Murphy has appeared in five Christopher Nolan films during his lengthy career, with an upcoming sixth called Oppenheimer that is yet to drop.
It's safe to say that the chemistry between them produces magic as The Dark Knight trilogy, Dunkirk and Inception are phenomenal films.
We could see plenty more of the Irish actor in the legendary director's films if the latter has his way.
When asked if Nolan had become sick of working with Murphy after all these years, he gave a pretty wholesome answer.
"If I could cast Cillian in every film I ever do, and just lean on him for the rest of my career, I'd be a happy man."
Well, that is certainly one definitive answer.
Despite working on six films together, it was their latest that brought Nolan so much joy when it came to the casting process.
Murphy plays theoretical physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer, who was the head of the Los Alamos Laboratory-based Manhattan Project during World War II.
Oppenheimer is largely credited with creating the first atomic bomb and the film dives into the journey of its manufacture.
While Murphy has played pivotal roles in Nolan's previous films, he gets to be the lead in this one.
Nolan told Entertainment Weekly: "To be able to pick up the phone, and call you, and be like, 'This is the one where you carry the movie and really get to show what you can do', it's honestly one of my favorite moments in the movie business, when I had that conversation with you."
Murphy added: "It was one of the best days of my life, I'll tell you that, when you called me.
"I'll always turn up for Chris, no matter what the part is, but, secretly, it's a dream to play a lead part.
"The thing was, I had no idea.
"There was no preamble or anything, I just got the call. So it was incredibly exciting, and daunting, and terrifying, all at the same time."
Cillian hadn't even read the script for Oppenheimer at this point but he was just thrilled to be part of the project.
However, once he did feast his eyes on the content, he was blown away. Murphy said it is the best script he's ever read and that is certainly a big statement. We can't wait to see him in action as the controversial scientist when the movie drops on July 20.
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