There is a particular thrill in watching actors reunite on screen, especially when the reunion arrives freighted with time, experience and a very different emotional register.
More than two decades after 13 Going on 30, Jennifer Garner and Judy Greer find themselves sharing scenes again, this time inside a story far darker, suspenseful and more psychologically demanding.
The two star together in season two of The Last Thing He Told Me, which returns to Apple TV today, February 20. Season two picks up five years after Owen vanishes, and fans have been waiting since 2023 for the thriller’s long anticipated return.
The cast includes Australian actress Angourie Rice, David Morse and Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, alongside new additions Judy Greer and Rita Wilson.
“It felt like we had earned it,” Garner tells marie claire Australia on returning to each other’s orbit as performers. “We had really great scenes to play, inspired by Laura Dave’s writing and written by Josh Singer and Aaron Zelman. There is history there, in our friendship and in working together over the years.”
Greer agrees that the familiarity brought a depth that could not be manufactured. “It was as great as you could probably imagine,” she says of the reunion.
For Garner, this project carried an unusually personal pull. Already a longtime admirer of Laura Dave’s writing, she felt an immediate, almost visceral connection to the character of Hannah when she was first cast in season one. “She writes a really beautiful yearning into her characters,” Garner says.
“There is this desperate need for something, someone, some feeling or memory. When I read The Last Thing He Told Me to one of my kids, I could not stop thinking about it. I was kind of tortured by the idea that someone else would play Hannah.”
When scheduling conflicts with the original actress opened the door, Garner did not hesitate. She wrote directly to make her case. “I just knew I had to put my hat in the ring,” she says. “I was like, ‘just humbly, I know there are so many actresses you could go to, and I don’t know if I’m on your list or radar at all, but just I need to tell you why I connect so strongly with this character and this story’.”
Greer came to the series first as a reader. “I read the book because I like to know what [Jennifer] is up to,” she says, laughing.
“When I heard there might be a character I could play in season two, I jumped at it. I got to have breakfast with Josh Singer and Aaron Zelman and convinced them I would be a great Quinn, which is not my normal casting. And well, it worked. It felt like a huge vote of confidence.”
Season two deepens the emotional stakes of the story, particularly in the evolving relationship between Hannah and her stepdaughter Bailey. Garner speaks with visible affection about working with Aussie actress Angourie Rice, who plays her on-screen daughter.
“I don’t know what you guys do in Australia, what you put in the water, but that Angourie Rice is just one of the most special young people. I always fall for the kids playing my kids on-screen, but Angourie is just so special.”
Talking about their characters’ storylines, Jennifer says, “We begin season two where our characters have really created a family unit of two,” she explains. “They love each other and rely on each other. Then everything is destabilised again. They are on the run, and the return of Bailey’s father changes the dynamic all over again.”
At the heart of the season sit questions of forgiveness and redemption. Greer admits she finds herself fiercely protective of her characters, even when their choices are morally ambiguous. “I have to fall in love with them,” she says. “I try to understand the world in which they would make those decisions. By the end, I really understood what was making Quinn tick.”
Garner is particularly interested in the shadow cast by Bailey’s birth mother, a presence that lingers as a kind of family mythology.
“Hannah feels incredibly insecure about her,” she says. “She feels like she will never live up to her. Owen is still so devoted to his late wife, and he has changed his whole life because of that loss. In season two, it is the first time Bailey feels secure enough, because of Hannah, to want to know more about her birth mother. That curiosity pulls her into danger, and that is hard for Hannah.”
Greer’s Quinn offers a darker philosophy, warning that truth does not always bring comfort. “If someone believes that, they have probably been through some things,” Greer reflects. “They have had to make hard decisions. I am the opposite in real life. I want to know everything. I am very nosy. So I was fascinated by a character who warns against knowing too much.”
After years in the industry, both actors speak with admiration for how the other has grown into her craft. Garner praises Greer’s fearlessness. “She takes big swings,” she says. “She comes completely prepared and still surprises herself and all of us.”
Greer returns the compliment with equal warmth. “We have both put in our hours,” she says. “What inspires me about Jen is how seriously she takes the work, how grounded it is in relationships and love, even in moments of action or chaos. It always comes back to the emotional truth between the characters.”
It is that shared commitment to emotional honesty that gives their reunion its quiet power. Time has not dulled their chemistry, but sharpened it.
The Last Thing He Told Me season two premieres on February 20, 2026, with episodes dropping every Friday through April 10 on Apple TV.
