ALESSANDRO MINOLI: For example, the threat of the aliens blowing up the planet is a really great way to motivate Jeff to do something. So we use that directly a bunch of times in the season when it made sense to, but then we were like, “Well, we probably shouldn’t use this again for a while.” Audiences are smart and they’ll very quickly figure things out.

SEAN DONNELLY: We’re also the audience though and we want to keep ourselves entertained, so obviously we don’t just want to keep telling the same sorts of stories every week. What’s interesting to us is that these aliens have all of this cool technology, but they also have different perceptions of reality than we do. They have different types of relationships than we do. They have different government structures on their planet…There’s a lot of options that we can dig into.

Could you see an episode entirely with the aliens and without Jeff? Or some episode taking place before they landed on Earth?

SEAN DONNELLY: In our first season I think our goal is to really ground this world, and we do that, but we also get to explore the aliens and their planet a little bit. But yes, that whole area is certainly bursting at the seams to be explored. It’s such a magic power to be able to take Jeff to outer space, but you know, with great power comes great responsibility. Then it becomes an issue of what are you going to do with that. I think we had so much to explore with just Jeff’s life and his town that we’re looking forward to the responsibility of going beyond that. To make it so a human cares about what aliens care about you have to find something that resonates with you. Issues for Jeff are easy for us to care about, but alien issues can certainly go off the rails.

On the topic of keeping things fresh, do you see Jeff’s relationship with the Galactic Council and the very premise of the series eventually changing or evolving over time?