‘The Strain’ Teases ‘Chaos From The Beginning’ For Season 3

As FX’s The Strain gears up to premiere Season 3, fans are interested to know what to expect, especially with so many human lives dangling in front of the vampire hordes like hot and ready meals. As The Master takes control of his subjects, and the team, sometimes led by Abraham Setrakian (David Bradley), wages a war against the undead, New York City finds itself alone and quarantined against the rest of the world. New teasers for Season 3 of The Strain suggest things will get much worse before they’ll get better, and Corey Stoll, who plays Ephraim Goodweather, says the operative word is “chaos” for Season 3 of The Strain.

The Strain Star Corey Stoll On Bringing Deliverance To The Living People Of New York

Speaking to New York Post, Corey Stoll revealed that, first and foremost, Season 3 of The Strain would permanently do away with one costume prop that was essentially driving fans crazy. Throughout Season 1 and a portion of Season 2, Stoll had been wearing a wig to get into his character as the CDC scientist searching for a biological weapon against the strigoi, and while Corey says the prop helped him get into character, The Strain showrunners received a good deal of negative feedback regarding the wig. In Season 3 of The Strain, Ephraim will maintain his chrome dome.

“It’s nice as an actor to have something that you put on that reminds you that you’re playing a character. It gives you license to be somebody different,” says Stoll. “But it was very clear that the wig was distracting to the audience, so that was distracting to me.”

Of course, Eph has much bigger problems to deal with than his lack of hair, when Season 3 of The Strain premieres, following the second season finale in which his son Zach (Max Charles) was taken prisoner and his partner in love and science, Dr. Nora Martinez (Mía Maestro), met her demise. Adding to those tragedies, Eph finds that his biological weapon is failing, just as the vampire population of New York continues to strength in both numbers and abilities.

“He’s not only dealing with that grief and that agonizing sense that he has to get his son back, but also that sense of failure,” Stoll says. “He really did [feel] that this was his job, to protect New Yorkers from the strain, and he’s failed. He’s a mess.”

The Strain has been progressing toward a complete breakdown of order from the very beginning. In Season 1, the spread of the vampirism virus was so gradual that many people didn’t even realize what was going on, but, by Season 2, that had changed for much of the city. Still, there were parts of New York where it was still possible to function within a degree of normalcy. For Season 3 of The Strain, Stoll reveals that the whole city has finally fallen.

“And now that’s really out the window — it’s chaos from the beginning,” Corey says of those pockets of normal living. “There are pockets that have been secured by this proto-fascist group from Staten Island and then other areas that are just completely overrun.”

The Strain Forces Eph To Face A Tough Choice

Between the start of the series and the point at which The Strain picks up with season 3, Stoll tells Yahoo TV that Ephraim’s sensibilities have done an about face. When The Strain premiered, Corey’s character was focused on his duties as a CDC scientist to the exclusion to all else — even his extramarital affair took place with a colleague — but having his parental duties thrust on him has caused a shift in Eph’s priorities. Now, his top concern is Zach’s safety and Corey hints that his new sense of familial duty may result in dire consequences for the rest of his team.

“In terms of seeing the greater good versus his own familial duties, he’s left the Hippocratic Oath far behind…He can’t leave the possibility of getting his son back on the table.”

Corey says he was introduced into the world of parenthood himself, during the last season of The Strain, so he now understands a parent’s total devotion to their child. He adds that he understands Eph’s willingness to cross the line and commit any possible betrayal, if it means reclaiming Zach from The Master.

“I became a parent at the beginning of last season so it’s not hard for me to imagine doing any number of immoral things in order to protect my son,” says The Strain star. “It’s human nature.”

The third season premiere of The Strain is set to air on Sunday, August 28, on FX.

[Image via FX]