The Fosters: Peter Paige Eyes what’s next after that midseason finale

Fans of The Fosters are once again left holding their breath and hoping for the best after Monday night’s Season 4 midseason finale, “Collateral Damage.” Series’ co-creator Peter Paige was telling the truth when he said this would be “a massive episode of television,” and fans are left to worry about the fate of several members of the Adams-Foster clan. After fighting with Nick (Louis Hunter), Jesus (Noah Centineo) suffered what could be a life-threatening blow to the head, and Callie (Maia Mitchell) is unknowingly riding off in a car with the dangerous Troy.

How worried she would be about these characters? What about Stef (Teri Polo) and Brandon (David Lambert) who both are eyeing uneasy and unwanted transitions in their life? To get the answers to all our burning finale questions and more, The TV Junkies spoke exclusively with Paige who directed and co-wrote the episode. He also looks ahead to what fans can expect from the back half of Season 4.

TTVJ: Jesus’s life is once again left in the balance. Did you have any concerns about doing a finale where his fate is up in the air again?

PP: We did talk about that, but I think the main thing was we’re doing it in a very, very different way. What is coming down the pike for Jesus will be way more for him to handle.

TTVJ: We seem to have a lot of the characters on the verge of some major transitions in their life, like Stef and Brandon who are about to make jumps to the next stage in their careers or schooling. Are we going to see those characters having to deal with these transitions next season into positions that they are maybe less than thrilled about?

PP: Yes, we are picking up in the midseason seconds after we left off. We’ll follow all of these threads. The amazing thing that we’ve found when we started the second half of the season, when we started breaking the next half of the season, was that so much was put in motion in this finale that even though some stories felt like they were coming to a head, they actually dovetail into something else. We have all this stuff to follow up on and build on. Every character is in a moment of crisis or transition and that gives us a lot of engine for story.

TTVJ: No matter how good Callie’s intentions seem to be, trouble always seems to find her. How worried should we be about the fact that she’s in the car with Troy?

PP: Well it’s not good. She’s got an immediate problem and then a lot of secondary problems. How she handles the immediate problem is probably going to create some more problems.

TTVJ: We’ve really seen Jude (Hayden Byerly) rebel and act out in several ways this season which isn’t like the Jude we’ve known in the past. Why was that an important direction for you guys to take his character and will he still be continuing his relationship with Noah (Kalama Epstein) going forward?

PP: Yes, he is going to be continuing his relationship with Noah, which some people know about and some people don’t, i.e. his mothers. We just want to honor what it is to be a teenager. Being a teenager you start rebelling and get a little sassier–even on sweet Jude we wanted to explore that. He feels safe and secure for the first time so the fact that he’s rebelling is actually developmentally really great and really important. It’s not super fun for everyone–Callie gets an earful and the moms are suddenly dealing with a fifth kid who is causing trouble. It’s tricky but it’s really, really human and that’s why we wanted to do it.

What did you think of The Fosters midseason finale? What do you want to see happen next? Sound off in the comments below!

The Fosters will return for Season 4B in 2017 to Freeform and ABC Spark.