‘Found’ Boss Says You Should Question Gabi & Sir’s Power & Control

[Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for Found Season 1 Episode 2, “Missing While Sinning.”]

Who’s really the one in control in the basement: Gabi (Shanola Hampton), who now has her kidnapper in chains, or Sir (Mark-Paul Gosselaar)? That’s one of the major questions for Found.

As Gabi continues to use Sir for his insight into her missing persons cases to reunite loved ones, he takes the opportunity to turn the tables on her at the end of “Missing While Sinning.” In a few months, it’ll be one year that he’s been in chains in her basement; he recalls when she reached that anniversary with him — and the “presents” he gave her… including the girl (Gabrielle Elise Walsh’s Lacey) he kidnapped eight days later.

Executive producer Nkechi Okoro Carroll breaks down the very complicated dynamic between Gabi and Sir as well as the traumas the rest of her team is dealing with.

Gabi and Sir have that conversation about the presents for her one-year anniversary with him. And while Gabi has been trying to maintain control over him in the present, that does seem to shake her. What does that do to Gabi, and where did you want to leave her at the end of this episode? Because we saw her so in control at the end of the premiere.

Nkechi Okoro Carroll: Yes. The idea is — and this is sort of throughout the whole of Season 1 with Gabi and Sir — to have you questioning, despite who’s in captivity and who is the captor, both in the past and in the present, who’s actually in power. Those things are not always synonymous. We see it in the past, where despite the fact that she’s been in captivity with him for a year, Sir has not been able to break Gabi’s spirit. It is why ultimately, she was able to break out in Episode 1. It’s why she was able to save Bella’s life. There was something about her spirit that could not be broken and allowed her to challenge him in a way that he was not used to.

And we’re seeing that now in the present day where Sir is the captee, but he’s able to push buttons and sometimes manipulate Gabi in a way that’ll have you asking who’s really in power here. That is a question that we’re left with at the end of Episode 2 in terms of, has Sir just flipped the table on Gabi and rattled her enough in present day to destroy everything she’s built with this team and specifically with Lacey? Is he manipulating her? Is he getting under her skin, or is he telling her the truth and she’s having to face the reality of facts? Those are all the questions that we hope people will be asking themselves at the end of Episode 2.

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What is keeping Sir in the basement doing to Gabi that she doesn’t realize yet? She thinks she’s in control, but like you were talking about, that changes.

Absolutely. She thinks she’s in control because she’s so focused on her singular mission and passion, which is find the missing people who’ve slipped through the cracks, the ones the world has deemed disposable, and return them home to their families. She is so focused on, “do not let what happened to me happen to anyone else,” that it’s gotten to the place where she can’t really see past the means justifying the ends. It’s very much a study on what happens when you’ve experienced such a traumatic event and your healing goes right and what happens when that healing goes wrong. And increasingly, we’re realizing while we thought Gabi was the poster child for what happens when you take that trauma and turn it into power, and your healing goes right. [But] she’s actually a poster child for what happens when you think that healing’s gotten right and then you realize you’ve actually had all these mini, I call them, trigger bombs that are like landmines inside her that she thought were healed and dealt with and are now going off unexpectedly triggered by things that are happening in present day.

That is what has landed her in the situation now where, without her even realizing it, she’s become the kind of monster that she hunts every week. And with each case, every victim that she brings home safely heals her a little bit, just like it heals every member of the team. This is why Mosely & Associates do what they do. And so, as that healing happens episode to episode, it is going to reframe Gabi’s thinking around whether the ends justify the means and the reality of what she’s done and if there’s any undoing it. We’ll see her battle with that over the course of Season 1.

How might Lacey react to finding out that Gabi has Sir in her basement and for as long as she has without telling her? Lacey thinks he’s still out there.

That is exactly why Gabi has not revealed it. How do you tell, especially this group of people that have become your family who worship her — they all see her in some way, shape, or form as their hero, and no one more so than Lacey because she literally did save her. Lacey has grown up just in awe of the woman that Gabi is all the way from back when Gabi was 16 and wanting to be her. And so how do you tell someone who looks at you that way, that you’re actually the exact opposite of what they think or that you made a mistake or you had a moment where you did something that some may find unforgivable? There’s so many different ways Lacey could react to it that it’s a never-ending question in Gabi’s mind and is part of the reason why she continues to keep the secret. She has dug herself a hole that just gets deeper and deeper, and it’s harder to get out of because of the people she loves that are in her life right now.

Does she have any idea what the endgame is with Sir in her basement? She can’t keep him there forever, but she’s not going to kill him. I don’t see her going that far. It seems she could be stuck.

What I will say is clearly Gabi is capable of more than even she thought she was capable of. Because if you told her even two years ago that she would become the type of person who could hold someone against their will, even if they’re the most evil person she’s ever encountered, her answer would’ve been, of course not. It fundamentally goes against everything she believes in. And yet here we are. There are reasons why we are here that will be explained over the course of the first season. And so what I would tell your readers and our loyal watchers is just when you think you know Gabi and what she’s capable of, you will be surprised. It’s part of the reason why we continue to tell that storyline of what her year in captivity was like with Sir in parallel to their present-day storyline because we’re going to find that the past has such a significant impact on who they both are, and how they interact in the present.

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There’s this moment in the trailer where Gabi realizes Sir wants to be there in the basement. What can you say about his endgame?

Sir is definitely in captivity, but if you think about it from his perspective, he kidnapped this young girl because he wanted her, he wanted to be in her presence, he wanted them to build this world together. In a way, some could argue he’s still getting that even if the tables are turned. He’s still getting to talk to Gabi every day. He’s getting to work with her on these cases that are something he never thought he would do, but it’s given him access to Gabi in a way that’s better than nothing. So it should have people questioning, which is what it does for Gabi, his motivations for — even though she’s not really given him a choice about his captivity and not giving him a choice about helping her with the cases — who’s really in control, whose wants and needs are really being met. That is something that you think you’ll have an answer to in one episode, and then the next episode, you’ll realize, oh, maybe I was thinking about this differently, just like Sir was. It’s a question you’ll constantly find yourself asking along with Sir and Gabi.

Margaret (Kelli Williams) has been holding out hope about her son all these years, but how will that take a toll on her now going forward?

I say this as a mother myself: There is no worse fear in the world than having your child taken or losing your child and having no closure to that. You don’t know if they’re alive and doing well and just thinking they’re someone else and living with a new family, and they don’t remember the past. You don’t know if they’ve been hurt, injured, buried somewhere, and have actually been dead this whole time. You don’t know if they’re alive but living a very difficult life. The possibilities are endless, and as a parent, that is your worst fear, not knowing the person that is most important to you, your child you loved and raised that makes your heart beat outside of your chest… You don’t have answers to those fundamental questions of, are they alive? Are they safe? Are they happy? Are they OK? That is something that Margaret continues to carry that she has sacrificed to hold onto, this need to get closure and get answers and to find him or find out the real outcome, and it is the glue that is single-handedly holding her together.

Gabi and Trent (Brett Dalton) have a history, but she can’t let him get too close, given she has Sir in her basement. Talk about throwing that obstacle in their way and how keeping that secret will affect their relationship.

Their chemistry is undeniable, and clearly, we learned in the pilot that there was also an impromptu hookup at a time before they really knew each other or worked together that was sort of instinctual, and it was a one-night stand, it was spur of the moment. But that kind of spontaneous chemistry is not something that’s easy to keep at bay when you’re suddenly in each other’s orbits all the time. But I would argue there is probably no bigger obstacle to a healthy relationship, I would argue with anyone, but definitely, a man who happens to be a cop as well, than being someone who’s holding a hostage in your basement.

Again, Gabi’s singular mission of finding victims by any means necessary, returning them home safely, and she’s willing to sacrifice whatever it takes. Clearly we’ve seen that because she is holding Sir hostage and therefore has dug herself a hole that she can’t really get out of. We’re going to see that also be something that she struggles with as her and Trent continue to work together and get closer.

Dahn (Karan Oberoi) seems to be warming up to Zeke (Arlen Escarpeta) a bit by the end of this episode. How do you want to use that dynamic to explore both of their traumas?

That’s the beauty of the entire M & A team is they’re all such different personalities who’ve all experienced different traumas within the same sort of broader category of being a missing person or having a missing loved one. I so adore both of those actors, they’re so phenomenal and brought so much emotional life to this sort of secondary storyline, which is not judging a book by its cover and how sometimes your trauma and your healing can lead to bigger and better and more fulfilling relationships in your life in all sorts of ways.

Will there be an episode just about Gabi and Sir, both past and present, with the present day just taking place in the basement or her house?

No, there will always be a case. That is the engine of the show, and, for me, it’s one of the most important elements of the show, is the lives they attempt to save every week, the missing person that has been forgotten by the world but has not been forgotten by Mosely & Associates. Trying to bring some closure and hopefully, victory to that situation will always be part of the episodes.

Found, Tuesdays, 10/9c, NBC