As Kurt Sutter makes his return to FX with Mayans M.C. (on Tuesday, Sept. 4), the newest chapter in his biker-drama universe, he does so with ten years of perspective from his Sons of Anarchy showrunner debut. Prior to those seven seasons of success, Sutter moved up from staff writer to executive producer of The Shield, and after pulling the plug following one season of The Bastard Executioner, he hopes to extend his most beloved mythology in a post-Jax Teller world. Expectations and pressure are both running high as hell, but the notoriously filterless storyteller is keeping it all in perspective. Sutter was gracious enough to speak at length with Uproxx about his hopes for Mayans, which (from the looks of the first part of the season) is a worthy followup and, in many ways, a more advanced chapter of the saga. During the discussion, he tells us why he’d never erase his past mistakes, why there can be no Gemma in Mayans, and the surreal experience of making one of the most bonkers and depraved scenes in Sons of Anarchy history. What advice would season 1 of Mayans M.C. Kurt give to season 1 of Sons of Anarchy Kurt? Let’s see. You know I had the experience of The Shield going into Sons, but I never ran a show before then, so I was driven by a lot more fear, and a sense of feeling like a lot was out of my control. And obviously, I stumbled and made mistakes and set fires and blew shit up, but the reality of it is — and not to sound esoteric — but all that shit shaped the show. It shaped my growth within the process, so I would be afraid to give myself any advice for fear that I would undermine any ugly and sort of clumsy process I may have had. What I learned from Sons in hindsight is that when you’re beginning a project, and you don’t know what it is, and how it’s going to be perceived, you’re only driven by the sense of needing to tell a story. And in hindsight, you can look back and say, “Oh, the show was successful because of X.” Strong female characters, dark sense of humor, whatever, right? All that shit is a result of not having those parameters and those boxes where you think you need to check off to be successful. And coming into Mayans, which is a similar world, a similar process, it’s difficult to not look at the things that worked in Sons and go, “Oh, I should do that.” And I learned in that process that it’s a continuing sense of education in that, “Wait a minute, I didn’t know any of that shit” going into Sons. And because I didn’t know any of that shit, that shit happened. So I really have to create that environment for myself in Mayans, and not necessarily think in terms of what I had to do to make it work. I had to put myself in that same sort of naive mindset, creatively, so I didn’t think in terms of what I needed to achieve. Like I could just tell the stories I needed to tell, and then trust that at some point, I could step back and say, “Oh, that worked.” It feels like a returning audience can be a blessing and a curse. Oh yeah, absolutely. Given that comparisons between these two chapters are necessary and inevitable, how do you deal with the pressure from existing expectations?

One of the most important roles I have in the show right now is that ultimately I want to allow Elgin [James, co-creator] and other voices to help create what this show becomes, so that it doesn’t necessarily become my vision, but a collaboration. I feel like my job, if we’re allowed to continue, will be to handle that transition. So how do I honor the mythology that we’re spinning off of, that people spend seven years working very hard at, creating this thing, how do I honor all that work and love? And the audience that came with it — how do I bring them along, so it feels familiar enough, so they are like, “Oh yeah, this is why I watched Sons“? And yet not have it be derivative or just the brown version of Sons? So creatively, how do I have it be unique, compelling, and exciting, and yet familiar enough for Sons fans don’t go, “Oh this isn’t why I watched Sons.” So that’s really the balancing act that I’m trying to maintain right now. And what I hope happens at some point, yes, is that the world of Sons of Anarchy and that club and that mythology will be in the atmosphere, but Mayans won’t be perceived as happening because of Sons but as its own thing. And that any comparisons or misses or any perceived opinions of what it might be or what it might become go away, and people just show up for what it is. Well, you’re certainly ramping up the bloody and brutal treatment very quickly. And it got me thinking about all the characters you’ve killed off during your TV career. [Laughs.] Some of them were very beloved. Have you mourned any more than others? Not to be goofy, but it’s always hard to drown your babies, right? Some of them, I think, earned their deaths. Obviously, of the big deaths in Sons, the one that probably stands out is Opie. Oh yeah. Oh my god. Opie was a gut-wrenching one. He was Jax’s Horatio, he was his sounding board. Yet to me, we had done so much to that character, and he’d been through so much, and the way Ryan [Hurst] played him was so sincere and vulnerable, it’s like I just don’t know how the guy showed up at the club anymore. It didn’t make sense, it felt like bullshit. And I knew I didn’t want to just send him away, so I thought it was time for the evolution of this character, and how do we use that to send our hero on a collision course and move that mythology forward? Because it happened mid-series, it was also a shock and one I still get hate mail about. Like with a character like Gemma at the second-to-last episode, it’s heartbreaking, but the train was so far off the track at that point, so there was the inevitability of, once she stabs Tara in the head, all bets are off. And you saw where it was going, and you almost didn’t process that death because before you know it, you’re done. Whereas Opie’s death sort of lingered, with the audience and on our characters. That one was the right move, storytelling-wise, but for the cast, it was really difficult. So that one was hard. Sad. Speaking of Gemma, she’s irreplaceable, obviously, but will we see any comparable old ladies from the M.C., or should we expect more from Emily and Adelita?