Arctic Air's Pascale Hutton looks forward to what's in store for Season Three

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      Excitement percolates in Pascale Hutton's voice as she chats about the direction Arctic Air is taking in season three.

      For those of you just tuning in, the one-hour CBC adventure series about a Yellowknife-based airline (and shot in B.C. and the Yukon) was greenlighted for a third season in April. Hutton, who plays the headstrong Krista Ivarson, daughter of Arctic Air owner Mel, is pleased with how the third season will allow the show to truly take flight.

      "The first season's always a bit of gong show," she tells the Georgia Straight at a CBC season preview event at District 319. "Everybody's trying to scramble and figure things out. I felt like in second season, we learned so much. And I feel like in third season, we've kind of sat down and the writers have sat down with the producers and with CBC, and they've looked at the two seasons and they're kind of marrying the best of what was happening in the first season and what was happening in the second season and moving forward into the third season."

      What particularly seems to interest her is how the characters and stories will be developing more depth than the first two seasons allowed.

      "Season one was introducing all the characters and introducing the concept of the show. Season two, we kind of moved way more into action and adventure. And I think now in season three, they really want to keep the action and adventure but have it really motivated and spawned from what the character's personal journeys are."

      She's also pleased with how Krista has become more complex and rounded out as a character.

      "I feel they've really developed her as this very independent, strong, forthright woman. But they've kind of also added this vulnerability and also this sense of humour to her. So it's just more multidimensional. And that's always more exciting to play."

      Of course, one of the show's emotional hooks is the romantic tension between Krista and the co-owner of Arctic Air, Bobby Martin (Adam Beach), who was also her childhood friend.

      "That's probably one of the most challenging relationships in her life and probably will be because they have so much history between them, and so much baggage going into this relationship—or not relationship," Hutton says. "They're on and they're off and trying to figure it out. I think without a doubt, they both know that they love each other, more than anyone else in the world, but whether they can actually make that work then, given all of their baggage, that's going to be the true test for them."

      Although she cautioned that what she knows about season three may change by the time the season airs, she shared some of the arcs that some characters will be undergoing.

      "This season, the character of Bobby is really focussing on his relationship with his son, and trying to really be present in his son's life. So that'll be a really interesting journey for him to suddenly become a father really. And for my character, I come back from Southeast Asia and I've had this big kind of awakening and I wanna make big changes in my own life and in the company and I'm no longer content to kind of just be a pilot and coast along with Mel and Bobby running the show. I wanna be taking much more of an active role in the running of the company and in my life too. So that's going to be exciting, I think."

      You can follow Craig Takeuchi on Twitter at twitter.com/cinecraig

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