KIN star Emmett J Scanlan has said that his character Jimmy Kinsella may be a complex and vulnerable man who will do anything for his family but warns that he can only be pushed so far.
On this Sunday's episode of the hit crime drama, family loyalties are tested as Bren’s influence seeps into each member of the clan and Jimmy begins to take a side.
He appears to have fallen in behind his wife Amanda as the head of "the family business," but is he really as accepting of this power shift in their relationship - both professionally and personally - as he seems?
Speaking to RTÉ Entertainment, 44-year-old Dubliner Scanlan, who has also starred in Peaky Blinders, says, "I love Jimmy, he's a complex character, very complex.
"He loves his wife, and he’ll do anything to make it work and if that means accepting his new role in the family, then fine. If that means having another baby because she wants one, then fine but don't mistake his acceptance as weakness."
Of course, there’s another fly in the already clouded ointment now that Jimmy’s dad, Bren, has been released from prison. At the end of last week’s episode, we saw Bren priming Jimmy's son, Anthony, to avenge the murder of Jamie.
Bren is a truly scary man, whose badness has an almost magnetic quality. His arrival on the scene may leave Jimmy questioning where his real loyalties ultimately lie.
"Jimmy is in a weird position, isn't he?" says Scanlan, holding his cards and, indeed, future KIN scripts to his chest.
"I mean you'll just have to wait and see, I guess . . . but I will say this, Jimmy loves his dad in his own way, and I think maybe on some level he craves approval and affection from him and that's something that he probably never got as a kid growing up in a violent home."
Are we ever going to find out why Bren ended up in prison in the first place?
"I think what you learn is what Bren is capable of, we know what turns him off and turns him on and what we will learn will be an uncomfortable watch . . . "
Above all else, in the best/worst tradition of gangland, family is everything to Jimmy.
"He's loyal and he's a loving person," says Scanlan. "But unfortunately for him that loyalty can be easily exploited and if you want to find someone's weaknesses, you go after what they love."
It means that despite that determined tough guy front, Jimmy can be easy to manipulate, which is not helped by his difficult relationship with his brother, Michael, who is played by Charlie Cox.
"Michael is pretty enraged that Bren is out of prison but when it comes to brotherly love, Jimmy is strong in that department, even if that's at the sacrifice of himself. He loves Michael and supports Michael, he has Michael's back," Scanlan says.
"But we know that Jimmy is capable of shocking anger when the situation calls for violence."
With episode three of season two due to air this Sunday, KIN has proven to be a hit with audiences and Scanlon says he’s felt the love when he’s out and about in Dublin.
"Walking the streets of Dublin is definitely different to season one because nobody knew the show then and I think everybody has been so open towards the show and really, really embraced it," he says.
"They had shown such affection towards me and towards other cast members. They're always very interested in what we’re filming and what we’re doing next, and we would tell them that we were shooting season two and they'd get very excited."
And filming with lockdown lifted made all the difference.
"We got to drink in the city of Dublin in all its glory," says Scanlan, who was raised in Marino and Clontarf. "I got to show Charlie around, too. He lived with me for a big chunk of this season in an apartment on Hanover Quay. It was amazing and as a cast we were a very close family, very close.
"I'm not being too cheesy, but we went to concerts, the cinema, pubs and clubs and like I said, people were so kind and generous and it's just beautiful to be home and experience this fair city."
From roles as the villainous Brendan Brady in Channel 4 soap Hollyoaks, to crooked bookmaker Billy Grade in Peaky Blinders and now KIN’s strong and silent Jimmy Kinsella, Scanlan seems to be drawn to morally ambiguous characters and he says it’s given him a chance to flex his acting muscles.
"First of all, I am just so grateful that I'm getting cast as interesting, complex characters like Jimmy," he says.
"I think for the last couple of years, the characters I have played are quite vulnerable and complex and real and not one dimensional, you know, just real characters.
"My favourite part of any job is reading the scripts and then the show that I see in my head is the show that I signed up to in the first place."
He adds, "I’ve been lucky to get scripts written by Peter McKenna with KIN and other great writers, like Stephen Knight with Peaky Blinders.
"I've been very fortunate with the writers I’ve worked with and the characters. I devoured those scripts so that when I get on set, I don't have to think about it anymore, it’s second nature. The secret of acting is not to get caught acting."
KIN, Sundays, RTÉ One, 9.30pm
