Milo Ventimiglia is ready to explore Jack’s past in Vietnam

We know Jack so well as a father on This Is Us, but there’s so much to his life we — and actor Milo Ventimiglia — want to see.

Jack Pearson is many things, including a hot dad, but his character as we know him so far is largely defined by his family — as father to the Big Three and husband to Rebecca. These are great things to define him by and the Jack we see on This Is Us, as played by Milo Ventimiglia, is truly a fan favorite. But we also know Jack is a Vietnam veteran, and Ventimiglia, for one, would love to see the show explore that.

We’ve seen Jack as a child, a father and a urn of ashes (sorry), but the time between childhood and meeting Rebecca remains a mystery. We know he was struggling after the war to find work and that he considers meeting Rebecca his life-saving break. But Vietnam is a such a complex part of our country’s history — and the impact of war on the young veterans’ lives so profound — that including that experience more overtly in his story line could provide some really great moments.

Milo Ventimiglia mentioned his own interest in delving into Vietnam speaking to People editorial director Jess Cagle in an episode of The Jess Cagle Interview. While he’s definitely excited to wrap up Jack in the 90s, and see if and how Jack can make it back to his family, the Vietnam character detail strikes a particular chord.

Ventimiglia has previously mentioned how his father inspired different parts of his performance as Jack and his father too was a Vietnam veteran. In the interview, Ventimiglia said:

"Before the conversation even came up about Jack’s real history, even outside his bad childhood with his father, in my mind I had always seen Jack as a Vietnam vet. I started drawing these similarities and these lines between Jack and my father.My dad is such a great man and he was, as I understand it, a seemingly well-adjusted man coming home from a really horrible war and I know even though he presented himself as put together, I know that war impacted him, affected him, I know the names of his friends that died in that war. And so I would start to pull those feelings I saw from my father into Jack. I would love to explore that area of Jack as a young man in Vietnam."

There has been so much focus — preoccupation even — on Jack’s death, flashbacks to the 90s often draw the most interest and excitement from fans. But, with most of the mystery allegedly being solved in the first episode of the second season, we should plenty of time to delve into the events that made Jack the man we know and love.