So much went down in the Spinning Out finale but the ending left us all on the edge of our seats. Kat and Justin had just freshly reconciled and headed out onto the ice to begin their free skate. Just when they’re about to start their Romeo & Juliet routine, that’s where Spinning Out ends. Fans have no idea how these two skaters fare in their quest for the Olympics. HollywoodLife talked EXCLUSIVELY with Kaya Scodelario about the ending and she revealed that she has no idea how Kat and Justin’s performance goes. “I begged the showrunner to tell us,” Kaya said. “Evan and I were like, ‘Tell us what happened.’ Because we felt as though we’d done all this training and we’d pushed ourselves, and it was almost like me and Evan felt like we had been in a real skating competition and we really wanted to know if we’d won or not. But Sam would not tell us. I think it’s quite cool because in that final moment when she looks up at her mom and at Serena, she’s channeling everything that has happened, everything that has led her to this point. I think for me personally, the second she steps into the routine is the win for her. But I really, really want to find out if we won or not.”
Just before their free skate, Kat tells Justin that she really does love him and everything about their love is real. Their love story blossomed over the course of the season and they ended the season stronger than ever. Just like most Spinning Out fans, Kaya is totally a Kat and Justin shipper. “I think that both characters progress so much because of each other,” Kaya continued. “For Kat, it’s a lot more complicated because she’s dealing with her mental health struggles and her emotions. She has to take a moment to see that what she feels for him is real. But I do believe when she realizes and she lets him know and she knows that she feels safe around him, that’s kind of the most genuine moment that she has in the entire show. I do think they’re good for each other. I think Justin’s character develops so nicely because of her. He’s able to open up, he’s able to love, he’s able to let go of being the bad boy. I really loved them as a couple.”
To play Kat, Kaya didn’t just have to learn how to ice skate, she had to prepare to play someone living with bipolar. This is not an unfamiliar subject for Kaya, but she wanted to make sure she depicted someone living with bipolar disorder in the right way. “Bipolar, in particular, I have dealt with growing up in very close proximity and it’s something that I’ve always been very private about,” Kaya said. “I’m not entirely sure why, but I’ve always not really spoken about it and I haven’t wanted to tell any stories that involve mental health because I always felt as though they weren’t portraying it honestly, and it was disrespectful towards people that I love that do struggle with it. With Spinning Out, I spoke to Sam [Stratton] about the development of it and the reasons why. I could immediately tell that they’d done their research and that was the most important thing to me.”
Kaya admitted that she’s read “so many scripts that handle mental health and bipolar particularly badly.” However, Spinning Out was different. “Every symptom, every emotion that Kat feels or experiences along with Carol, I’ve seen first-hand,” Kaya continued. “I’ve done a lot of research with a charity called MIND that works in mental health. I’ve worked with them before on previous projects. I went and spoke to my family members’ therapists and discussed it with them because I wanted it to be a good thing if that makes sense. I want the takeaway from this to be that we can talk and we can depict it. Let’s have that conversation. Let’s start that dialogue.”
In addition, Kaya also read a lot of blogs and watched YouTube videos of former skaters to “try and understand the darker side of the skating world.” A major aspect of Kat’s journey is dealing with her PTSD and overcoming her fears after a nasty injury. “What we see on the Olympics is all smiles and sparkles, but the truth is that it’s a lot darker than that,” Kaya said. “A lot of skaters have experienced severe mental health problems because of training or because of coaches or for various other reasons. But I did a lot of that research to kind of put it all together. Then the kind of final step was to make sure that I wasn’t triggered, so I had my therapist on hand. She would call me, I would call her. I had my husband with me and my best friend. When I got home from a long day, she’d pour me a glass of wine and we’d talk. She’d talk about work, but then we’d talk about her love life or who she’s matched with on Tinder and these kinds of silly things that helped me get back to being me.”
Spinning Out hasn’t been renewed for season 2 by Netflix yet but Kaya has ideas of what she’d like to see in future episodes. “I kind of want to keep following Kat and Justin and I would love to see the kind of storylines between Kat and Serena develop more because I just love that relationship in the show,” Kaya said. “I think it’s so precious. I’d love a little bit more of that.”