Warning: This post contains spoilers for the May 9 episode of Raising Kanan season 4.
Erika Woods did not see that coming either.
The penultimate episode of Power Book III: Raising Kanan starts off with a bang — literally — as Pop (Woods) kills Krystal (Aaliyah Turner) in cold blood, a move that Woods tells PEOPLE is “really going to throw the fans into a frenzy.”
“Finally, she gets to step up, and you get to really start to see — Pop gets to reveal herself to people. I mean, she’s just a complete badass,” Woods says.
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At first, it seems to Krystal like Pop is rescuing her from where she’s being held against her will. Last fans saw, she was picked up by two New York Police Department officers who escorted her off a bus and told her detectives at the police station had questions for her about Famous’ death. Unbeknownst to Krystal, the cops are in cahoots with Snaps (Wendell Pierce) and Pop, which leads her right into their hands.
After seemingly rescuing Krystal, Pop starts making her a sandwich and asking her for her theory on Famous’ (Antonio Ortiz) mysterious death, and when Krystal says she believes Raq (Patina Miller) is innocent despite how convinced Kanan (Mekai Curtis) is, Pop shoots her.
STARZ
Wendell Pierce as Snaps, Erika Woods as Pop in ‘Raising Kanan’ season 4
“Usually she has people doing her dirty work, but sometimes you just got to do your dirt all by your lonely,” Woods, 52, says of the surprising move from Pop. “I don’t think anyone will see this coming. And I was so excited when I read that. I was just like, ‘Wow.'”
“I just had to rationalize, why would I do it? I am used to having my crew do stuff for me, so I’m like, damn, this is a different side to her. She’s not as loyal as she thought,” Woods says of the thought process behind Pop’s dramatic move. “It was a lot of things [that] went through my mind. I was very shocked. I did not see that coming.”
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Woods says that at the table read for the episode, “everybody was shocked” to learn Krystal’s fate. “That’s a whole other layer of her,” she says. “it was very shocking. It was one of the most shocking moments, I think.”
It’s even more shocking, she thinks, than Famous’ death, which was revealed to be Pop and Snaps’ handiwork too in last week’s episode.
STARZ
Mekai Curtis as Kanan Stark, Aliyah Turner as Krystal in ‘Raising Kanan’ season 4
Filming the death scene with Turner — whose character is eating a peanut butter sandwich when Pop takes out a gun and shoots her — was “very hard,” Woods says.
“It was brutal. It was a long scene. I think we spent around 10 hours filming that, and it was very emotional and just very hard because she’s tied up, [because of] what she had been through. Yeah, it was rough.”
Cara Howe/Starz
Wendell Pierce as Snaps, Erika Woods as Pop, London Brown as Marvin Thomas, Patina Miller Raq Thomas and Omar Epps asDetective Malcolm Howard in ‘Power Book III: Raising Kanan’ season 3
Teeing up what fans can expect from next week’s season finale, Woods says that, in “true Power universe tradition,” things are “definitely going to heat up.”
“Pop is really starting to step up and reveal herself to the fans. And I just really think you’re going to see a big evolution of Pop from season 3 to season 4,” she says. “People are always saying ‘Snaps and Pop’ — I think you’re going to be hearing a lot more ‘Pop,’ and I think it’s going to be a lot more of the women and what they’re going through and their war.”
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Season 4 of Raising Kanan now streaming on Starz, and the season finale premieres Friday, May 16 at 12 a.m. ET.
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