Yes, Jason Clarke Really Did All His Stunts In The Last Frontier's Biggest Action Scene [Exclusive]

Nothing about "The Last Frontier" seems easy. Set in the frigid wilderness of Alaska, the Apple TV+ series shot primarily in the biting cold of Canada, oftentimes exposing its cast and crew to the most extreme conditions they'd ever faced. And then there's the actual story, which focuses on a transport plane full of inmates mysteriously falling from the sky and setting dozens of violent criminals loose, leaving no-nonsense U.S. Marshal Frank Remnick (Jason Clarke) to clean up the mess. Showrunners Jon Bokenkamp and Richard D'Ovidio also craft a maze-like mystery regarding the villain at the center of this puzzle (Dominic Cooper's escaped convict Levi Hartman, codenamed Havlock) and his connections with the CIA agent assigned to the case, Haley Bennett's Sidney Scofield. Yet, the most challenging of all these elements occurs as early as the premiere episode, when the series stages its largest and most ambitious action scene.

With "The Last Frontier" hitting streaming, I had the chance to sit down with Clarke and pick his brain on pulling off this unforgettable moment. Soon after the transport crashes, Frank is among the first responders to show up and contain the scene ... until dozens of jumpsuit-wearing convicts emerge out of nowhere and kick off a brawl for the ages. Shot in a single take by actor, stuntman, and "Extraction" director Sam Hargrave, the sequence is violent, gritty, and chaotic — so much so that I suspected a bit of old-school trickery may've been involved. I asked Clarke whether the show's crew used the "Texas Switch" technique to substitute a stuntman for Frank's more demanding stunts, and he good-naturedly set the record straight:

"No, there's no Texas Switch. [Pauses] There's a little — there's one snippet in there [laughs], see if you can pick it. But no, there's nobody else doing it. We rehearsed the hell out of it. They're dangerous scenes: fingers, faces, [punches], helicopters, snow, cold. But the execution level and professionalism of those stunt guys, that team and the camera guys, is amazing. That was one of the most exciting things for me, that's where we set, for me, the tone of what this show's going to be. The reality of it, the mess of it, the ugliness of it, as well as the execution."

While "The Last Frontier" boasts an enormously talented cast, including a series of notable guest appearances throughout the season that are simply too good to spoil, Jason Clarke's performance as the by-the-book Frank Remnick stands out from the pack. The engine that drives the entire show, Frank is clearly harboring some sort of complicated backstory, along with a wife (Simone Kessell as Sarah) and son (Tait Blum as Luke), who've already been through their fair share of hard times together. But where the drama comes in is through his innate fallibility. He's not the world's greatest spy or the military's most hardened soldier — he's simply a family man who has dedicated his life to doing the right thing, no matter the cost. According to Clarke, this is exactly what makes the character as a whole and specifically his actions during this season-opening fight to the death so compelling:

"Frank's in a brawl, man, he's no [UFC fighter] Georges St-Pierre or Superman or Neo from 'The Matrix.' He's a dude that, a lot of the time, he's taking more than he's giving, you know what I mean? That element, you feel that exhaustion when you get on the helicopter. You think, 'Holy smokes, we just made it out of there.' That's what Apple and 'The Last Frontier' was putting on the screen, that's what you want to see. For me, I wanted more of that."

This tone-setting sequence raises a high bar for the rest of the season to come, but it's a challenge that the weather-beaten Frank and the ultra-cool character actor portraying him (who can also be seen in Kathryn Bigelow's "A House of Dynamite") are eager to embrace. Look no further than Clarke's commitment to a series of knuckle-bruising stunts that he (mostly) did on his own. 

New episodes of "The Last Frontier" stream on Apple TV+ every Friday.