DAVE CHERNIN: I think one of the first things that we figured out about this guy is that he was a white kid with dreadlocks. I don’t know, I can’t remember how we got to the act of shaving his head, but it probably had to do with those dreadlocks. Totsi was actually a hard character to write! It took us a while to figure out what makes him tick, why he’s a brat, or what separates him for your typical brats on TV.

JOHN CHERNIN: It was a tough needle to thread because you want him to be really bratty, but he can’t be going out of his way to be a dick. The more oblivious he is to it all, the better.

That ending really has an impact to it. Chip seems to finally connect with Howard and then he learns he’s probably never going to see him again. Did you always know that this Howard angle would be temporary?

JOHN CHERNIN: I think that’s something that Dave and I had talked about for a while. We liked the idea of doing this big misdirect where he realizes that his mom slept around so much that there’d be another person for him to need to get close with in the end.

DAVE CHERNIN: There was something funny to us about a 12-year old bonding with this strange elderly man of which he has no relation.