'Awake' creator Kyle Killen says that NBC's decision to cancel the drama didn't play any role in how the season finale played out.
"The ending you see is the ending we intended for the first season before it even began," explains Killen. "It wasn't hastily slapped together in response to cancellation. It had been shot long before cancellation."
As for what viewers really saw in the finale, Killen clarifies that the ending -- in which Michael Britten is reunited which both his wife and son -- didn't mean the car accident never happened.
"The idea that we're saying nothing happened, this is St. Elsewhere, was something we actively fought against. It's just wrong and can actually be disproven watching the last four minutes."
"That's how the season ended — while he's able to see his wife and child together, if you take a step back, what it really represents is a further fracturing of his psyche."
"For us, while it provided an uplifting and hopeful ending, it probably would have been a sign that he was getting worse. He had reached a place where he seemed to part with Hannah's world, he seemed to sacrifice that to get the answers that he did. Dr. Evans pointed that out to him, that he's once again on that precipice of understanding and accepting. Instead, he does what he's done from the beginning — and that's where 'turtles all the way down' comes from. Infinite regression."
"'What if I'm still in prison in the red world, and all the crazy stuff that happened after was a dream? Even if one of these is a dream, why can't I have a dream within a dream?' Once he realized he could, it's as if he seemed to dream the thing he wanted more than anything — to be reunited with his wife and son."
"You understand that you don't see your partner in a penguin suit in any version of reality — that grew directly out of the red world in which Hannah is alive seemingly revealing itself to be a dream. He just can't accept that, and then in the conversation with Dr. Evans backs into the idea of, Wait, what if I fell asleep in my cell and then everything that happened after that was a dream?"
"What if for the first time I had dream-like dreams in between being awake and being asleep? Once he does that, it's almost as if his brain seizes that moment and creates precisely the thing that psychologically he's dying for — and that is a moment with everyone together."
Loyal fans of the series that followed it all the way to the end are still hoping another network picks up 'Awake', but Kyle Killen that's never an easy task.
"We're open to another home for the show but the chances are extraordinarily remote, so it's probably best to think of and enjoy it as a miniseries."
“There's so many things aligned against you. Another network doesn't want damaged goods from a competitor. It's hard when you're moving from network to cable, because the budgets and the deals are structured differently. So it's sort of worse than starting from scratch."
Instead, he says, he's hoping that fans can rally around Jason Isaacs for an Emmy nomination.
“Honestly, if you want to take up a cause, that's the one to run with. You probably can't save the show, but you could certainly help him get his due."
'Awake' creator Kyle Killen says that NBC's decision to 
