And lo, another season of Orphan Black has come to an end with Thursday’s fourth-year finale “From Dancing Mice to Psychopaths,” a climax bolstered by the recent announcement of Season 5's renewal and conclusion. Looking ahead to the final season, co-creator Graeme Manson reveals both reasoning behind the abrupt end, as well the potential story continuation in spinoffs and movies.

You’re warned of full spoilers through Thursday’s Orphan Black Season 4 finale, but in spite of one of the most sci-fi seasons to date, adding maggot-bots and seemingly-immortal Neolution leaders into the mix, “From Dancing Mice to Psychopaths” definitely seemed to consolidate storylines toward the final season. As to why Manson felt Season 5 would prove a natural endpoint, the co-creator tells The Hollywood Reporter:

Four seasons on Orphan Black, we chew up a lot of story every season. We chew up a couple seasons worth of story every season; it’s a fast-paced show. I think we’ve done a good job of keeping the show sharp and relevant with packing all that much stuff in and our biggest fear is repeating ourselves. We just didn’t want the show to become watered down. We really think it’s cooler to cancel yourself. (Laughs.) To go out on your own terms telling the story that we want to tell.

That’s the way we presented it to our networks and they were good enough to agree with us and to not want to drag it out and get other showrunners involved or anything. [Co-creator John Fawcett] and I made a pact that we would stay with the show until the end, and for a long time, we’ve had a pretty good idea that season five would be the furthest that we could take the ball down the field.

It certainly sounds as if Manson and Fawcett (as well Tatiana Maslany) have reached a point of wanting some distance from Orphan Black, but might some extension of the franchise exist down the line? Might BBC-A want a spinoff, perhaps under new creative talent?

Yes, there has been some loose talk of [spinoffs], but I can’t say where it’s at right now. We’re completely consumed with this. We’ve always jokingly said we ‘d love to do a movie, but those aren’t things that, at this point, that we know are going to be happening at all. I think we’re looking forward to a rest. (Laughs.)

We’ll hear more on Orphan Black’s fifth and final season in the weeks to come, but is the #CloneClub best left on ice after wrapping up the series in 2017? Check out the finale clips below.

 

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