The heroes of Obliterated work hard, but they party harder. So when the government agents realized that the nuclear bomb they disabled was a fake and Las Vegas was still at risk, they had to cut short their celebratory rager, clear their heads, and then hustle even harder to disarm the weapon that threatened to, um, obliterate the city of sin (and all the revelers inside it).

Thankfully, their persistence paid off, despite being double-crossed, taken off their own mission, and scattered across the Nevada desert — all while trying to sober up (and, in the case of one team member, find a snack). In the final moments before the nuke was set to explode, bomb expert Hagerty (C. Thomas Howell) rode into a casino on a camel (long story) and saved the day. But how did we get there? And what does this mean for our team going forward? 

The cast, along with creators Josh Heald, Jon Hurwitz, and Hayden Schlossberg, explain how we got that ending — and what could be next.

Ursula Coyote/Netflix

Did the team defuse the bomb?

Yes, thanks to the magic of teamwork. In the finale, Maya figures out that Anastasia (Alyson Gorske) — formerly known as Lana, more on her in a bit — hid the real nuclear bomb in a slot machine in the Plaza Hotel. “From the very beginning we knew that we wanted this to take place in Las Vegas, and we kept thinking that they’re going to be going all over the city and into the desert trying to get this bomb. At the end of the day, where is it located?” co-creator Schlossberg explains. “We just figured putting it inside of a slot machine felt like the final best spot for it.” 

This decision leads to Hagerty’s glorious, slow-mo camel ride to glory. After being separated from the team for most of the day, he makes it to the site of the nuke and gets to work — with the help of his favorite Michael Bublé covers, performed live for him by his new wife (Lindsey Kraft). At the very last second, he snips the correct wire and disarmed the nuke once and for all.Wait, what’s that Michael Bublé song in Obliterated?

An army explosives expert is not who first comes to mind when you picture “Michael Bublé fan,” but Hagerty can’t work without listening to the Canadian crooner. What, you don’t associate Bublé’s cover of “Feeling Good” with high-pressure military operations?

“It’s the last song that you would expect Hagerty to be playing,” Hurwitz tells Tudum. “In our early plans, we were thinking of lacing throughout the season that Bublé is performing in Vegas and then have him show up in the finale, and [in] our initial scripts at the very end, Bublé shows up and is singing live there. He was touring at the time when we were filming, so we made a script adjustment that we think turned out even better from a character standpoint.”

Howell thinks his character’s offbeat passion for Bublé keeps him from becoming a “quintessential macho dude,” he says. “Because when you read it on paper, he could have been played that way pretty easily. I wanted to make him a lover.” 

And, hold on, who is Lana in Obliterated?

The Las Vegas party girl the gang picked up during the mission wasn’t the well-meaning woman she pretended to be — Lana was actually Anastasia Koslov, the presumed dead sister of villain Ivan Koslov (Costa Ronin).

“When casting, we wrote scenes that were in the voice of Lana and scenes in the voice of Anastasia,” Hurwitz explains. It required a versatile actor to bring the two-faced character to life. “Alyson Gorske, from her very first audition, blew us away. The biggest surprise for us was that this was her first big acting role in Hollywood. We brought her back a few times just to see what different kinds of things she could do. And she showed up every day on set and crushed it — and had to learn Russian dialogue sometimes very last minute. It was crucial to find somebody who could play both roles very convincingly.”

So, Gorske auditioned with Lana scenes and Anastasia scenes, and was excited about the opportunity to play such contrasting personas. “Lana, she’s the typical party girl with sexy, super tight clothing — putting it all out there,” Gorske says. “But Anastasia has bad bitch energy! Skin tight leather, red lips? It was so exciting.” Costume designer Frank Helmer made sure Gorske was outfitted with authentic leather motorcycle pants that were durable and sexy. 

Does that mean Gorske got to do her own motorcycle stunts?  “Absolutely not,” she admits with a laugh. 

Why couldn’t Trunk get one bite to eat?

Trunk (Terrence Terrell) is a highly trained, very fit Navy SEAL who requires constant fueling to keep his engine running. Thwarted in his quest for snacks at every turn, his gnawing hunger becomes a source of suspense almost equal to the show’s literal ticking time bomb.

Explains Schlossberg, “We come from the Harold & Kumar universe where it’s all about a craving, and you get drunk or high, and you want to sop up all that with food. So we made it where Trunk, in the beginning of the series, took a bunch of weed gummies and he’s drunk. So he’s starving. In Episode 2 he’s hangry. And then he has all these near-misses of almost eating, and by the end of it you’re like, ‘Still? Are you still playing that card?’ And we do. It hits you over the head constantly, but it all leads to an amazing payoff.”

That payoff includes a perfectly choreographed kitchen fight scene involving a chocolate fountain. “I call it the Popeye the Sailor Man scene,” Terrell tells Tudum. “We went full throttle with the food, and they had so much food because they thought we would have so many takes. But I did most of everything in one take.” 

Stunt coordinator Marcus Young is particularly proud of how food plays into Terrell’s kitchen brawl. “It’s like a video game power-up,” says Young, explaining what happens once the desperately hungry Trunk finally gets something to eat. “Coming up with the food, and creatively using it to tell the story about how Trunk’s getting stronger –– then he gets beat down a little bit, but becomes stronger as chocolate goes into his mouth –– it’s like Pac-Man powering up.” 

Is Trunk really leaving the team? 

In Episode 6, Trunk reveals he’s planning on leaving the armed services for a glitzier lifestyle — namely, becoming Lady Gaga’s bodyguard. But after the epic highs of Obliterated, Terrell isn’t so sure his character is ready to let go of his friends. 

“He loves McKnight too much. That connection with McKnight over everything,” Terrell says. The fact that Trunk offers McKnight one of his hash browns is proof of his loyalty and love. “If I’m willing to share the food, that’s a huge thing. So he ain’t going nowhere,” Terrell opines. 

Are there any Cobra Kai Easter eggs?

For the most part, Obliterated is full of things that would never happen in Cobra Kai. Says Hurwitz, “We love making Cobra Kai, but our roots are in R-rated comedy. It was fun to let our brains run wild and do the kind of R-rated comedy that we’ve always done, but also put the action that we fell in love with while making Cobra Kai. All the stuff that we don’t do on Cobra Kai is all over Obliterated.”

That said, “there is a Cobra Kai egg,” says Heald. “One of our series regulars actually shows up on the show, but if you blink, you’ll miss her. Courtney Henggeler, who plays Amanda LaRusso, was shadowing one of our directors. She’s going to be directing in the future, and she had the opportunity to be on set, and she was there having fun with all of us. So she ends up attending Hagerty’s wedding, and she’s sitting right next to Joe Piarulli, who is one of our Cobra Kai and Obliterated writers.”

And you won’t actually see this one on-screen, but the stuntman who handled Hagerty’s naked fall onto a glass table also played a cop in an episode of Cobra Kai.

Ursula Coyote/Netflix

Are there any other action movie Easter eggs in Obliterated? 

As anyone who (correctly) believes Die Hard is a Christmas movie can tell you, the answer is yes. De’voreaux Sefas White, who plays the Stevie Wonder-loving limousine driver Argyle in Die Hard, returns to his on-screen chauffeur roots in Obliterated Episode 8. White portrays Delray, Hagerty’s limo driver.

“We love Easter eggs that are not big, shiny flashing signs. When we knew we had a storyline that involved a limousine driver, we just asked [for White],” co-creator Heald explains. “He was amazing enough to say yes… We were buzzing because we were doing that.”

The team surprised Howell with White as his scene partner. “I was just like, ‘Holy crap!’ I’m a huge Die Hard fan. I love Bruce Willis,” he says. “I was the John McClane!” 

Do Ava and McKnight end up together?

The show gives viewers two different but equally strong heroes: McKnight (Nick Zano) represents a throwback ’80s-style action hero, while Ava Winters (Shelley Hennig) is a modern iteration of the archetype. 

Says Schlossberg, “There would be a natural antagonism between Ava, who represents the intelligence side of the operation, and McKnight, who represents the pure muscle. He’s the old-school wild card who comes in and jumps-off-a-building-onto-a-car kind of guy. We love the idea of these two people, who have been butting heads all mission, actually being made for each other.” 

But while Ava intends to forget their initial hookup, McKnight catches feelings. When the mission is extended, “they have to be together with all the awkwardness. At the end you realize that they actually are the yin to each other’s yang, and they feel for each other. We built up this little romance in the midst of all this soulless, drug-fueled adventure.”

Explains Heald, “We like McKnight having that vulnerability from Episode 1. You’re used to seeing the Stallone- or Schwarzenegger-type action hero, and you don’t get to see underneath the surface like that. He has this crush, basically. Nick and Shelley just instantaneously had chemistry. They’re both really strong actors, they’re both hilarious. So anything we threw their way, they were ready for, and they were ready to give it their all. We are glad that it was a fulfilling romance track throughout the season.”

Their romance closes out Season 1, with McKnight and Ava sharing a literally steamy shower scene. After a season of difficulties, McKnight finally finishes his mission — as a metaphorical bottle pop tells us. “After I saw it, I was like, ‘You actually ended the season like that!’ Which is amazing,” Zano says. 

But Zano and Hennig aren’t sure what’s next for the couple. “They may fly too close to the sun,” Zano says. Meanwhile, Hennig jokes, “It’s going to be this relationship… that just never goes away. Will it be the kind of romance Ava’s group chat hears about forever? “Exactly! That’s it,” she says.  

Is Lana actually gone? 

Not at all. In the finale, Ava requests for Las Vegas metro police to pick up Anastasia and put her into custody. And, that’s the last we see of the Obliterated supervillain. “She better come back. She’s just not done. She has so much more work to do,” Gorske says. “I don’t think Anastasia takes defeat well… Wherever she goes, she’s conniving and she’s going to come up with something genius, bigger, and badder. Watch out!” 

Even Ava herself has her fingers crossed that Lana isn’t off the Obliterated chess board. “I want her to be a problem for the team in the future because I love Alyson,” Hennig says. “Team Lava: Lana and Ava.” 

Could there be another mission for our Obliterated team?

“Absolutely,” confirms Heald. “We look at every successive season of Obliterated like a big movie sequel. You have Die Hard, everything wraps up. That doesn’t mean you don’t have Die Hard 2, possibly in a different party city, different set of stakes and suspense, but [the] same team that we know and love having to go back into action and under less-than-ideal circumstances.” 

Hennig has her own ideas for the future of the squad. “More debauchery, but in a tropical setting,” she says. “More camels. And let’s get some kangaroos as well.” 

Obliterated is now streaming on Netflix.

Additional reporting by Chancellor Agard.