Warning: Mild SPOILERS lie ahead for Dark Winds season 4, episode 7, “Nániikai (We Came Back)”!Titus Welliver is shaking things up and jumping to the other side of the law with Dark Winds season 4.
After spending a dozen years in the headspace of Michael Connelly’s iconic Harry Bosch across Prime Video’s various series adaptations, Welliver has joined the acclaimed AMC crime series as Dominic McNair, debuting in episode 7 of the current season as the criminal mob boss running his operation from behind bars. More notably, this includes being the boss behind Franka Potente’s Irene Vaggan, a ruthless contract killer.
Primarily adapted from 1984’s The Ghostway, Dark Winds season 4 has followed Zahn McClarnon’s Leaphorn working to investigate a mass-casualty shootout at a local diner, leading him down a rabbit hole involving a missing teenage girl from the reservation. This has put him in contention with Vaggan, and later McNair, who are hunting her down for their own means, with Leaphorn confronting the latter in prison in the hopes of saving Billie before it’s too late.
In honor of his series debut, ScreenRant‘s Grant Hermanns interviewed Titus Welliver to discuss Dark Winds season 4. The star opened up about getting to shed his iconic Bosch role to play his villainous new part, as well as the dynamic between McNair and Leaphorn, his love for the book series, and subtle changes made for the show.
Welliver Had “A Lot Of Fun” Getting To Change Sides Of The Law For Dark Winds
While he’s found acclaim in everything from Ben Affleck’s The Town to HBO’s Deadwood and HBO Max’s Titans, Welliver is generally best known for playing the complicated-yet-driven Detective Bosch in the Prime Video series. As such, to see him shed his protagonistic role for something more villainous with Dead Winds‘ McNair comes as different for both viewers and the star himself after over a decade with the prior crime thriller series.
Reflecting on getting to shed the Bosch persona for McNair, Welliver described it as being “a lot of fun,” particularly as he’s one such character who “doesn’t live by societal rules,” the type which he finds “interesting to play” and further means, “Sky’s the limit for where you can go” with one’s performance. Humorously expressing he doesn’t have the same kind of power as McNair — “[except for] maybe over my two dachshunds” — the star further explained that his character’s “fearlessness and arrogance and power” is more like “a drug” for someone like McNair:
A person who operates outside of the rules and gets away with it, and heavily profits from it, not just in the sense of power, but monetarily, large sums of money are at play. And obviously, in the scenes that I got to do with Zahn, where I really am on the opposite side of the table, that stuff was so much fun to play, because I remember the director, before we were doing it, said to me, “What do you think the scene is about the first time they see each other?” Leaphorn comes to visit him. I said, “It’s two wolves, and basically, they’re circling each other, and it’s not macho posturing.”
Explaining that McNair and Leaphorn have “their own skillsets,” Welliver acknowledged that the latter may be “a righteous guy,” but is still someone his Dark Winds character will have to realize is “somebody that you don’t f–k around with” and “should not be underestimated” when going against him. It was this dynamic that was part of what drew Welliver in for the series, being keen to explore the “odd connection that exists between archcriminals and really good cops” as they test “how it shakes out” as they each do what they will.
Welliver also shared that he collaborated with McClarnon and showrunner John Wirth to “fine tune [our scenes] technically to get to the place [we wanted],” feeling it was important that the duo’s conversations didn’t feel like “a power struggle.” Instead, as the star explained, “it’s Leaphorn putting him on notice, completely aware of who he is dealing with,” which in turn sparks a curiosity in McNair:
It’s also McNair measuring Leaphorn to go, “I wonder how far this guy is going to push it.” And when it becomes abundantly clear to him that it’s not just a cop who feels protected by glass. This is a guy who’s saying, “I’ll see you when I see you, and you may not see me coming.” So that was some great stuff, really wonderful stuff to play.
Welliver Was A Major Dark Winds Fan Well Before Joining The Series
With nearly 30 novels in the source franchise, going back to 1970 with The Blessing Way, the world of Tony Hillerman’s Leaphorn & Chee novel series has certainly amassed a large fanbase, including executive producer George RR Martin and Robert Redford — the latter of whom previously produced four adaptations of Hillerman’s novels. Also in that group is Welliver, who shared that his younger brother “turned me onto the books a million years ago” and “loved them” when he dove in.
When word first broke about Dark Winds being adapted, Welliver first recognized there would be “something a little bit daunting” for whoever would take on the role of Leaphorn, having “experienced that firsthand” with the expectations among Bosch fans ahead of the show’s debut. Having also become “a massive fan of the show,” Welliver immediately agreed to joining season 4, chuckling as he shared that “I didn’t even ask who the character was” before accepting, as it “was one of those things” that was going to be an instant acceptance.
Looking at the character himself, Welliver confirmed that his Dark Winds antagonist is “slightly different than the McNair in the book.” Even still, he and Wirth talked “about how it was going to play out” that he and Leaphorn would find themselves on opposite sides of the fence, which he found “very interesting” to hear the direction that the showrunner wanted to take the character.
The star went on to explain that McNair is “definitely a shark” in the world of the series, but that even as “he’s visually and physically contained” behind bars, the villain is “still the puppet master” behind the scenes. He still maintains “all this power and control” over his criminal operation, even in spite of his incarceration, and had many conversations with Wirth about how best to capture his personality:
He has this implement of destruction in [Franka Potente’s Irene] Vaggan, who is so off the rails, and really frightening. So I kind of couldn’t wait to get there. I talked to John, and typically those conversations are like, “Well, this is what we want to do, and blah, blah, blah. Do you have any ideas?” And you go, “Yeah, yeah, yeah.” And then you get on the set. But we started spitballing back and forth. John’s a great writer, and that character was beautifully realized on the page. So, it became a question of coming in and just doing it.
The Dark Winds season 4 finale airs Sunday on AMC and AMC+ at 9 p.m. EST!
