‘Slow Horses’: Will James Callis Return as Claude Whelan in Season 6?

Diana Taverner (Kristin Scott Thomas) is where she belongs at the end of Slow Horses Season 5: First Desk. So, what does that mean for the person previously in that position, Claude Whelan (James Callis)? Well, he tries to go up against Jackson Lamb (Gary Oldman) in the finale and, of course, loses.

After River Cartwright (Jack Lowden) saves his life, Whelan thinks he deserves a second chance. As for the rest of Slough House, he’s ready to throw them to the wolves, claim they did nothing to help, and blame them for the season’s mishaps. But Lamb has the recorder with Whelan’s attempt to blackmail Gimball (Christopher Villiers) and about the call girl, and so he dictates how it will go, including Whelan being out of MI5, hence Taverner’s new position, and his Season 6 presence up in the air.

Director Saul Metzstein loves the way that all ties together. “In a way, Whelan seals his fate by being rude to Gimball’s wife when he meets her. So then he ends up going to the house, then the recording is there, then the Slow Horses kill him. Then Whelan thinks he’s won because he’s got rid of the guy who was against him. It ends up with him actually having lost because the Slow Horses had killed the guy. It’s sort of great fun to dissect,” he notes.

“[Whelan’s] useless. Well, not completely useless, but he was kind of slithering his way out of things there and it was hugely satisfying to have that final scene,” executive producer Will Smith tells TV Insider while discussing what’s his final season with the show. “That’s one of my favorite scenes. [Gary] and James, they’d never done — they had to do a scene in Episode 5, actually, with Taverner, which was great, but just them facing off, I thought, was a great way to end, and just bringing back in the dictaphone and all of that. I was just so happy with it.”

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According to Callis, Whelan “has way more respect for [Lamb], but equally likes him a lot less, and he didn’t realize what he was playing with. … Whelan has a bit of a breakdown in the book. He’s like, ‘You have no idea who I am or what I’m like, don’t tell me.’ And that’s where that thing came from, ‘I’m sure I’ll be seeing you again.’ This is actually from the previous book, elements of that scene, and I suppose there’s this thing of, anybody even Whelan would know in the service, there is a long game. So I imagine there’d be a couple of things. It’s like in the future, would you have a meeting of minds at some point, or would you at some point have a hand in kicking a person when they’re down because of what they did to you? Jury’s out. I’d imagine thinking about the duplicity, there’d be elements of both.”

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As for whether that was Callis’ farewell from the show, all Smith would say is, “It’s not Whelan’s farewell from the books. Can I put it like that?” Callis, too, remains vague about his future: “We’ll see. I think the jury’s out. We’ll see.”

Whelan does come back in Mick Herron‘s books on which the Apple TV show is based; he’s even mentioned in the synopsis for Book 8, Bad Actors, which will be adapted for Season 7.

What did you think of what happened with Whelan in the finale? What do you want to see with him going forward? Let us know in the comments section below.

Slow Horses, Season 6, TBA, Apple TV

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