[This story contains major spoilers from the Shrinking season two finale, “The Last Thanksgiving.“]

Shrinking co-creator Bill Lawrence has come a long way since thinking Brett Goldstein wasn’t the right actor to play the pivotal role of Louis in the Emmy-nominated show’s second season.

While speaking with The Hollywood Reporter at the start of season two, the showrunner explained that he saw Goldstein as Ted Lasso‘s Roy Kent and couldn’t picture him playing a more sensitive, sweet character, like Louis.

“This show would only work if you could have somebody that did awful things and yet still want it to work out for them anyway,” Lawrence said of the character. “So, I almost blew it. He would never be so forward as to ask, and Jason Segel made it happen.”

Now, looking back at the season as a whole, Lawrence doesn’t think it would have worked without the actor as Louis this season.