Michael Emerson, Greg Plageman Talk 'Person Of Interest' On WGN America & Season 5! EXCLUSIVE

Before Season 5 of Person of Interest returns to CBS in 2016, WGN America gives viewers, both longtime followers and new ones, a chance to catch-up on the sci-fi crime drama. In an exclusive interview with MStars News, actor Michael Emerson (Lost) and executive producer Greg Plageman discuss reliving Harold Finch's adventure from the beginning.

In our fourth season finale recap, the war between the Machine and Samaritan left casualties and forged new alliances in its wake. After presumed dead, Sameen Shaw (Sarah Shahi) was last seen walking away willingly with Samaritan's agents. While Samaritan was executing its master plan, Greer's men put a bag over Control (Camryn Manheim)'s head and took her hostage. In the cliff-hanger, as Pink Floyd's Welcome to the Machine started playing, Finch walked out, with no gun, alongside Reese (Jim Caviezel) and Root (Amy Acker) as they started shooting down Samaritan's agents.

As we previously mentioned, WGN America presents the sci-fi thriller as the latest addition to their new "Prime Crime" programming block. Beginning from the pilot, in season one, Harold Finch (Emerson) and John Reese (Caviezel) find themselves working together to save an innocent life, their latest number chosen by the artificial intelligence known as The Machine. On September 7, WGN will air a 12-hour Labor Day marathon of both Person of Interest and Elementary beginning at 1pm.

Before the Labor Day marathon on September 7, the Lost actor and the POI showrunner dish on the upcoming fifth season, their favorite moments from previous seasons, and filming in the streets of New York.

MStars News: After playing Harold Finch for the past seasons, what is it that still holds interest to you about the character?

Michael Emerson: Well I think because the character has been evolving over the course of four seasons, I think there's still a lot we don't know about him. And I'm interested in that journey, moving forward.

I'm interested in the kinds of problem solving that the narrative imposes on Mr. Finch, you know, personal problems, philosophical problems, practical problems. There seems to be a fairly inexhaustible list of them, and its fun to tackle. And I don't think we have, by any means, run out of material.

MStars News: And as for creating and writing about the character, what qualities within Harold Finch were you looking for in Michael Emerson?

Greg Plageman: I think the interesting thing for us, in terms of writing Harold's character, Michael's character, Harold Finch, is that, you know, there was so much. When Michael came to the show, people imbue so many different ideas on to him, because he played a villain on another show you might have heard of.

But his character was never that character on this show. It was in fact a character that endeavored to do something to better the world, to help change the world. And I think it's become a burden in some ways to him. I think it's an extremely heavy mantel to bear, particularly when he lost Ingram and he lost so many people close to him, including, you know, a personal life. His fiancé; he hasn't been able to see her anymore. And I think it's become a tremendous weight on Harold Finch's character.

MS: What would you like to explore about Harold Finch in the upcoming fifth season?

GP: I think we'd like to explore particularly this season is, what happens when someone, you know, is able to transfer some of that burden to others, but also when something so dramatic happens that there may become a shift in the character that we haven't seen before.

MS: One of my favorite episodes from this past fourth season is If-Then-Else, which showed how high concept and character-driven the show can be. Do you have any anecdotes from filming the episode?

ME: Well that was certainly a really interesting and conceptual episode. I loved reading it! It was hard shooting, because it was repetitive, but with subtle differences every scene. That's a unique experience in my television career to have shot an episode that was constructed that way.

GP: I think it was, you know, an episode which sort of proved that this show can do, be a lot of different things. We can twist genre. It can be a straight ahead sort of number, case of the week, type show. It can be a paranoid thriller. This show, the great thing about this premise, it allows us to do so many things.

MS: With Person of Interest airing on WGN America, what is it about the first season that stands out to you?

GP: I have a lot of favorite episodes, going back to the pilot. You know, I loved Many Happy Returns. That was for me, one of the first very emotional episodes where we understood more about when Harold Finch sort of first saw John Reese for the first time, as well as what happened to John Reese's former fiancé.

So a lot of those episodes in the first season really stand out to me, because they were seminal in the sense of setting the tone for the relationships of the shows. And we've been able to play with a lot of them since, and we're still having fun.

MS: Tell me about shooting on location in New York, especially dealing with the winter weather of the Big Apple.

ME: Oh God! There are too many stories to tell and the weather is often a factor. And shooting in the snow, I mean, that doesn't need much explanation. When people are coming out with whisk brooms between takes to know the snow off of your head, you know that that's not exactly what you signed up for; so there's always that.

But what's rich is our interaction with the citizenry of this great city and also with the great buildings. One of the chief pleasures of the work is being on top of skyscrapers or being in great civic buildings in the middle of the night when no one else is there. To be in the Guggenheim Museum at 3:00 am or in the main Post Office building. There's something eerie and wonderful about having a license to be there at that hour and have it all to yourself. It's cool!

MS: Now that the show is airing on Netflix and WGN, plus the fifth season coming up, what is it that you want audiences to come away with?

ME: I would just like them to be entertained. I would like them to have fun and have some laughs, and white knuckle the living room chair for a while, and come away from it with something to talk about.

GP: Definitely. And you know, I would love it for people, and whether it's young people or older folks I don't really care, to be that show where if you missed it the first time around, it was the show that someone said, "Do I need to be watching that?" People say, "Yes." And they have an opportunity now to see it and say, "That show was sneaky good and you missed it." Now you can see it.

The fifth season of Person of Interest will premiere on CBS during midseason.

Watch Person of Interest from the beginning on WGN America and Netflix.