Doris Schwartz Time and Again Season 2 Ep 12 Commentary

As "Scattered Pieces" Part two concludes Season 2 many of the pieces put in place in this season come together. It was inevitable that with the different time lines merging throughout the season, that at some point characters from different times would meet, start interacting and realise that something was very wrong. The different hospital settings from the original series gave a perfect way to do this.

As with the end of season 1 I knew how I wanted season 2 to end with a group 0f main characters looking at Doris accusingly. I also had the end of season 3 in mind. At the last minute I decided to incorporate the end of season 3 as well with the hooded figure suffocating the Doris in the hospital bed. I just wrote that scene from a different angle so we didn't know who the hooded figure was. It seemed like the best way to have the series as a whole have some connection. I included this aspect of the story to add to the drama so that season 1 and 2 didn't end in a similar way and with the reader just thinking that Doris would disappear and reappear somewhere else so the story would continue.

Also as Doris was suffocating at the end this was to explain where the idea came from to use that to kill Nicole although when she tried doing it her body was experiencing what we now see at the end of this episode and so that was my way of getting out of having her kill Nicole. Although that in itself doesn't stop her and she then thinks up something else where she gets the syringe and drug bottle. At the time of writing I was thinking this might become significant in a future episode where Doris would find it in her pocket. However as things progressed I never really needed to use it but write until the end of season 4 I had it at the top of my notes as a possibility of a future plot line.

As things had been very heavy in recent episodes I wanted things to be a lot lighter so had Mrs Berg reveal that she was once an actress, something we don't discover until season 6 of the original series. Also in the conversations between the characters at the end I added little light touches of humour like Danny not graduating and Coco wondering if she was a start in the future.

It became a little complicated writing characters from different timelines meeting and having remember what each character would actually know and who they would actually know in their particular timelines and it took quite awhile to construct that part but I was pretty pleased with the results.

I also knew what a key player that Leroy would be next season and had planted lots of scenes with him meeting Doris throughout this season. I thought it was important for him not to take part in the conversation with the others at then end until he points out that Doris is watching them. Most of the characters had previously experienced strange things happening and wanted Leroy to voice how people try to forget about strange things happening. I felt this was important to explain to the reader how although people experienced strange things they didn't always talk about then for fear of people thinking they were going mad or something.

So we end on the cliff hanger of Doris watching herself being suffocated and being confronted by her friends as to what is happening.

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