Primal Creator Talks Finally Paying Off a Major Tease With Season 3 (Exclusive)

Warning! Major spoilers for Genndy Tartakovsky’s Primal Season 3 Episodes 8 and 9 to follow! Primal has reached the final weeks of Season 3 with Adult Swim, and Spear has undergone a massive transformation that fans certainly didn’t expect to see payoff. And helping in those matters is a special returning element from the first season that has come back to help payoff one of the hugest teases of the series to date. ComicBook got the chance to speak with series creator Genndy Tartakovsky all about it, and the creator was able to pay off a longstanding tease.

As fans began to see in Primal Season 3 Episode 8, the now zombified Spear suddenly found himself in a deadly cycle of fights where he was crowned king. With each victory, Spear would drink a mysterious black elixir that fans have seen in the first season, and each drink of this elixir actually brought Spear back to life. Primal’s penultimate episode of the third season has fully restored Spear’s humanity as a result of this elixir, and Tartakovsky opened up as to why he brought it back to use it in this way.

Primal Creator Explains Using Black Goo to Revive Spear

“We needed something, and I didn’t want to introduce new magic because then I feel like it’s very convenient, you know?” Tartakovsky began. So him essentially falling off the ledge, off the waterfall, and then him traveling to a lost world. That’s the home of the Black Elixir, and what was nice is that I feel like that ‘Rage of the Ape-Men’ episode in the first season was so memorable.” As the creator continued, he explained that it was a choice where he kind of “relied” on fans to remember the elixir from the episode in question.

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“And people, especially fans, know that liquid because it’s so powerful,” the creator explained while noting that it was also rewarding bringing that older first season element for a payoff with fans now, “I relied a little bit, and I usually don’t do this a lot, but I relied on people…why not? This is the third season. If you’re watching it, you’ve most likely watched all the [episodes]. Why not bring something back?” Then everything clicked, “Then we have the caretakers of the Black River, and so it all felt really right. Then it was able to help Spear get his humanity back.”

Is Primal Season 3 the Final Season?

With one episode of Primal Season 3 remaining, there are still a few questions left to answer about Spear’s humanity. Now that he has regained his old self and Mira has had the baby, it’s raised all sorts of questions about its place in the overall timeline given how the second season came to an end. But with Genndy Tartakovsky bringing this element back from the first season to payoff Spear’s journey in the third, it feels like everything is coming full circle.

This third season has been much different than the first two, but it has also shared a lot of the same spirit that fans fell in love with in the first place. As it gets ready to end, fans are really going to want to pay close attention to see how it all pays off even further with its upcoming season finale.

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