‘The Diplomat’ Creator Officially Reveals Why They Had to Kill Off [Spoiler]

Published Oct 15, 2026, 3:02 PM EDT Taylor Gates is an Indiana native who earned her BFA in Creative Writing from the University of Evansville. She fell in love with entertainment by watching shows about chaotic families like Full House, The Nanny, Gilmore Girls, and The Fosters. After college, she moved to Los Angeles to pursue a career as a writer, editor, and filmmaker. Today, she’s a sucker for dramedies — especially coming-of-age stories centering around complex female and LGBTQ+ characters. She has been with Collider since May 2022. Sign in to your Collider account Editor’s note: This interview contains spoilers for The Diplomat Season 4. Summary The Diplomat creator Debora Cahn reveals why they had to kill off Dennison. She also breaks down why Jodie Whittaker was the perfect person to take on Prime Minister Vaughn. Cahn talks about the “leap of faith” it took to write that finale cliffhanger. Debora Cahn is a master at writing compelling political shows, having gotten her start on The West Wing and penning several episodes in the last season of Homeland. The Diplomat continues this trend. The first show that Cahn created herself, The Diplomat has been a success with both audiences and critics, claiming the top spot in Nielsen's streaming charts during Season 3 and being nominated for 10 Emmys, with Allison Janney winning one for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series. Each season, it’s hard to imagine how the next installment could possibly improve, and yet, Cahn and her team manage it every time. Season 4 of The Diplomat is truly better than ever, with even more shocking twists, sharper writing, and impressive performances. The season picks up shortly after the Season 3 cliffhanger, which saw President Grace Penn (Janney) and Vice President Hal Wyler (Rufus Sewell) secretly steal a weapon of mass destruction from a Russian submarine in British waters. The season explores the consequences of that, as well as throws some new challenges into the mix with its signature combination of nail-biting tension and hilarious wit. Collider got the chance to speak to Cahn about her work on the season. During the conversation, she discussed the heartbreaking decision to kill off Dennison (David Gyasi), why she wanted audiences to get an intimate look into Trowbridge’s (Rory Kinnear) point of view, how Jodie Whittaker got cast as the new prime minister, and more. ‘The Diplomat’ Showrunner Explains Why They Had to Kill Off Dennison “We had what started to feel like an unrealistic universe.” COLLIDER: Congratulations on the season. I loved it so much. There were so many, of course, shocking moments, twists and turns as always. One of the biggest, I think, was when we found out that Dennison had died at the end of Episode 3. I'm curious if you can talk about the decision to kill him off and the chain reaction that sets off. DEBORA CAHN: It was terrible! It was a terrible decision to have to make. But we had, at that point, been filming in the UK for a few years, and during the time that we were there, there were five different prime ministers, and our show had only had one. We had what started to feel like an unrealistic universe where Kate came in, and she had to learn what the job is and meet all the people, but then she did, and then she sort of knew what she was dealing with and knew how to handle it. It just felt unrealistic. The moments when you have your feet on the ground, and you actually know who the players are in a government, the whole fucking thing changes and turns upside down, and I wanted her and the entire team to have to manage that. I also wanted to have her go through the disorientation of believing that she had been dealing with the Trowbridge government, and Trowbridge was unreliable, and unpredictable, and not in control of his own actions, and that if only somebody sane was there, everything would be okay. And the horrible, sinking feeling that you get when you get exactly what you wanted — which is somebody just like you who thinks the same way and has the same priorities — and then it turns out they think you're the problem. That seemed like a good challenge. ‘The Diplomat’ Showrunner Discusses the Differences Between Trowbridge and Vaughn “I wanted a much different energy — the kind of person that you instantly feel comfortable with.” Image via Netflix That leads so well into my next question. Episode 4 sees this sort of break in form because we get Trowbridge's point of view. Why was it important that viewers get so intimately into his headspace right before he resigns? CAHN: I had such a good time answering for myself the question of, “What does he see in this moment? When he pauses and looks at somebody kind of sideways, what is going on in there?” And the answer to that question was so fun. I was like, “Oh, we're going to do the whole episode like this.” Collider Exclusive · 8 Questions · 2 Minutes Which Netflix Character Would Be Your Best Friend? Dustin · Emily · Wednesday · Gi-hun Some friends drag you out of the house. Some sit with you on the worst night of your life. Netflix has written both, plus the one who tells you the truth you have been avoiding all week. Answer eight quick questions about how you actually do friendship, and find out which of them was always going to end up in your corner. 🧢Dustin(Stranger Things) 🗼Emily(Emily in Paris) 🕷️Wednesday(Wednesday) 🟢Gi-hun(Squid Game) FIND YOUR BEST FRIEND → 01 How do you usually end up making a new friend? The origin story says a lot about the friendship that follows it. AWe got loud about the same obsession and never stopped. BThey invited me somewhere before we had properly met. CWe bonded over disliking exactly the same thing. DThey noticed I was struggling and stayed with me. NEXT QUESTION → 02 What is a perfect Saturday with your best friend? Friendship is mostly built out of very ordinary hours. AA ridiculous plan neither of us should attempt. BSomewhere new, photographed heavily, ending very late. CSomewhere quiet, few people, zero small talk. DSomething simple, and a conversation that actually matters. NEXT QUESTION → 03 You call them at two in the morning. What happens? This is the real test of a friendship, and everybody knows it. AThey are already putting their shoes on. BThey answer instantly and turn it into a plan. CThey answer and say something unflattering and true. DThey listen for an hour and never check the time. NEXT QUESTION → 04 What do you want from them when you are clearly wrong? The best friendships are the ones that survive being corrected. ASupport first. We can review the mistake later. BA relentlessly positive reframe of the entire disaster. CThe blunt version. Do not soften it for me. DPatience, and no judgment about how I got here. NEXT QUESTION → 05 What do your friends actually value about you? The friend you attract says something about the friend you are. AI am all in, always, about everything. BI can turn almost any situation into a good time. CI say the thing nobody else in the room will. DI look after whoever is having the worst day. NEXT QUESTION → 06 You have a falling out. How does it go? How a friendship repairs itself matters more than how it breaks. ALoudly, briefly, then back to normal by Tuesday. BThey apologise first, enthusiastically, with a gift. CCold silence, then one dry joke that fixes everything. DWe talk until we both understand what actually happened. NEXT QUESTION → 07 What do you actually need a best friend for? Everybody is missing something. The right friend fills that gap. ATo make my life bigger than it would be alone. BTo push me out of the house and into my own life. CTo catch me when I start lying to myself. DTo be the person who never gave up on me. NEXT QUESTION → 08 Ten years from now, what keeps the two of you close? Eight questions in, this is the one that decides who you get. AWe would still drop everything for each other, instantly. BWe still make plans, and we still actually go. CWe still cut through each other's nonsense in one sentence. DThey stood by me once when it cost them something. REVEAL MY BEST FRIEND → The Group Chat Has Spoken Your Best Friend Is…Four Netflix characters, four completely different ways of showing up for somebody. This is the one who fits how you actually do friendship, and what having them in your life would be like. Dustin HendersonYou do not do friendship at half volume, and neither does he. What you want is somebody who says yes to the plan before you have finished describing the plan. Dustin is the friend the entire show runs on: loyal past the point of sense, enthusiastic about everything, and incapable of leaving anybody behind. You have the same instinct. Your friendships are loud, specific and slightly ridiculous, and they last for decades because of it. He is also the one person who would take your strangest interest completely seriously, which is far rarer than it sounds. You would have a group chat. It would never once be quiet. Emily CooperYou are the friend who makes things happen, and so is she. Together you would be mildly exhausting to everyone around you and completely delighted with yourselves. Emily treats an ordinary Tuesday as something that could be turned into an occasion, which is either the best or the worst quality in a friend depending on your energy levels. You share her refusal to sit still. Neither of you has ever accepted a night in when something was happening somewhere else. She is far more loyal than people give her credit for. She defends her friends loudly, publicly, and occasionally before checking the facts. She would post the photo without asking. You would forgive her, because it is a very good photo. Wednesday AddamsYou have no patience for pleasant lies, and she has no ability to tell them. What looks like coldness from the outside is the most reliable friendship on this list. Wednesday never says a kind thing she does not mean, which makes the rare ones count for an enormous amount. You would rather be told the truth than be made comfortable. She is constitutionally incapable of offering you anything else. Underneath all of it she is ferociously protective. She simply refuses to make a performance out of caring. Do not expect a birthday message. Do expect her to ruin anyone who wrongs you. Seong Gi-hunYou look after whoever is having the worst day. So does he. It is the least strategic way to move through the world and the best possible quality in a friend. Gi-hun is not the strongest player in Squid Game, or the cleverest. He is the one who keeps choosing to protect somebody else, over and over, at genuine cost to himself. You have the same instinct. You notice who is struggling and you stay with them, long after anybody would blame you for leaving. He is a flawed friend, and that is part of why it lands. He lets people down, then comes back and tries again, which is more than most manage. He would give you his last chance and never once mention that he had done it. ↻ RETAKE THE QUIZ Of course, we get the excellent Jodie Whittaker coming in as Prime Minister Vaughn. How did casting her come about, and then what was it like writing for such a different energy for everybody to play off of? CAHN: Julie Schubert, our casting director in New York, is an absolute genius, and Jodie was her idea. I was not familiar with Jodie’s work, and I went and started watching, and I was like, “Oh my god. She's amazing.” I didn't want it to be somebody who was going to feel like Rory Kinnear if he was a girl. I wanted a much different energy — the kind of person that you instantly feel comfortable with and instantly like — and then see Kate go through that, and then realize she has no purchase on this person. ‘The Diplomat’ Showrunner Breaks Down the Romances at the Heart of the Series “I think they both make terrible, terrible, delightful mistakes.” Image via Netflix There are also two marriages, of course, at the core of this season, but we also see Eidra and Stuart’s relationship really shift and blossom. I'm curious what you think their newer relationship says in conversation with the established marriages of the show. CAHN: We're giving ourselves the opportunity to look at kind of the lifecycle of a relationship: in the beginning, in the middle, and a more mature relationship. One thing that I find gratifying is that Todd and Grace don't really seem like they're on more solid ground than anybody else. In a way, when I look at long-term relationships, I actually find it encouraging that you see people wobbling 60 years into their marriage like they're just getting to know each other. Everybody's a new person every however many years, and so that feels authentic. But I found it so sweet and lovely to be like, “What happens when they have to really problem solve as a couple for the first time? What happens when they have the first really big fight where somebody's got to apologize big?” Those firsts are, like, tectonic. When they happen, they feel so calamitous, so it was really wonderful to be able to see the two of them dealing with that. And we love both of them so much. I think they both make terrible, terrible, delightful mistakes, so it was a lot of fun, and they're such great actors. ‘The Diplomat’ Showrunner Took a Leap of Faith With that Season 4 Cliffhanger “We can push ourselves off a pretty big cliff and figure out how to not belly flop on the other side.” Image via Netflix Vince Gilligan has famously said that he paints himself into a corner and has to figure out how to write his way out. I'm curious if that's similar to how you work with all of the twists and turns. And then, as a follow-up, how much of Season 5 do you have mapped out in your head, and what can you tell us about it? CAHN: Oh, I can't tell you anything about anything in the future! But Vince Gilligan is right about most things — there's a certain leap of faith that you have to make that says you'll figure something out. People face things in their lives that are completely unexpected, and they were prepared for this, and they spent their life building this, and suddenly, that's wiped off the planet, and they're off in a different direction. People do figure it out, and feel like I have a great writers' room working with me, and I do take the leap of faith that says, “We can push ourselves off a pretty big cliff and figure out how to not belly flop on the other side.” But maybe we will. Who knows? I sincerely doubt that! Every season just gets better and better. The Diplomat Season 4 is now streaming on Netflix. Release Date 2023 - 2023-00-00 Network Netflix Showrunner Debora Cahn Directors Alex Graves, Andrew Bernstein, Simon Cellan Jones, Tucker Gates Writers Debora Cahn, Anna Hagen, Julianna Meagher, Mia Chung, Peter Noah, Eli Attie Creator(s) Debora Cahn