Matlock ended on some major cliffhangers following that surprising reveal — and season 2 is only raising the stakes further.
After winning Breakthrough Talent at the 7th Annual African-American Film Critics Association TV Honors on August 23, Skye P. Marshall spoke exclusively to Us Weekly about the show’s evolution in season 2, saying, “We are picking up right where we left off in season 1. Stakes are high, trust is broken.”
Marshall added that her character Olympia and Matty’s (Kathy Bates) relationship will continue to shift.
“They have to figure out how, with this new discovery of information, can they accomplish their biggest goals — which is justice — without killing each other. I think the audience at the end of season 1 went on this journey with Kathy Bates playing Matty Matlock,” Marshall noted. “But by the end, I think they realized they were rooting for a liar. They were rooting for a con artist and she had the audience wrapped around her finger — only to find out that Olympia was the victim to her demise. So how do they get back to that trust and care?”
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Matlock, which premiered in September 2024, follows a wealthy retired lawyer named Madeline Kingston (Bates), who pretends to be a poor widower named Matty Matlock to get a job at Jacobson Moore law firm. As it turns out, Matty thinks someone at the company is complicit in the opioid epidemic that resulted in her daughter’s death.
Before season 1 came to an end in April, Olympia figured out that Matty was lying to her the entire time. Olympia wasn’t the one at fault in the Wellbrexa case but her ex-husband Julian (Jason Ritter) was. She confronted him about it before he begged her not to expose him — not knowing she actually found the documents because of Matty’s mission at Jacobson Moore.
“The stakes are so high because where is this Wellbrexa document going? And that’s what season 2 is about to take you on a journey with: that document,” Marshall teased before elaborating on how Olympia deals with being lied to by those closest to her. “Throughout season 1, everyone betrayed Olympia — from Julian cheating to Shay cheating with Julian to Matlock being a total lie. Then Sarah takes a case behind her back and Billy helps her. Elijah doing the two-step with Senior on her client because she broke up with him. Like, how does this woman still show up to Jacobson Moore, with this wall up and this protection?”
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Season 2 will show “that wall fall down” for Olympia.
“You start to see people find the cracks and they get in. Then the vulnerability comes out and the hurt and the pain. The trust has to be rebuilt within all of those glass walls,” Marshall told Us. “Season 2, she cuts the grass and sees the snakes. The problem is, you can’t choose your snakes.”
While taking a break from filming season 2, Marshall celebrated the Breakthrough Talent honor at the AAFCA.
“Honestly, I’m just really emotional,” she told Us. “I’ve seen a lot of women and men here who helped me along the way when no one knew my name and no one was answering the calls. So to see them look at me and smile, I have been fighting back the tears.”
Matlock returns to CBS on Sunday, October 12, at 8:30 p.m. ET before taking its regular Thursday night time slot on October 16. New episodes will be streaming the next day on Paramount+.
