Cloak and Dagger star Andrea Roth on Melissa’s season 2 journey

Cloak and Dagger Season 2 means more self-discovery for Melissa Bowen, and Andrea Roth discussed how much her character has grown in the Freeform series.

Tonight Freeform brings back Cloak and Dagger, and the Marvel series has a lot left to discover in the second season—not just about its titular superheroes, either.

Melissa Bowen spent the first season looking for answers, not only about her past but about who she wanted to be, and now she’s opening a whole new chapter in Season 2. Andrea Roth spoke to Hidden Remote to talk about what Melissa has learned and where she’s going next.

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Learn more about Melissa and Andrea in our interview below, then tune into the Cloak and Dagger Season 2 premiere tonight on Freeform at 8 p.m.!

Hidden Remote: Melissa ended the first season of Cloak and Dagger almost being killed. Where does season 2 pick up? Has she had time to recover from that?

Andrea Roth: Time has jumped forward and Tandy and [Melissa] are living together. We are in a women’s therapy group. We learn immediately that [Melissa] was a victim of domestic abuse with her father.

And [she’s] not drinking. [She’s] trying to be healthy and we’re trying to work out how we now exist—with the new me, with some new skills, with new revelations, new information for her. We’re trying to sort that all out.

HR: She had so much to work through last season. Was it exciting to come back and have another season to continue sorting her out?

Roth: It was great. I love the [table] reads; we never know what’s going on. They don’t tell us how to play things, what the future holds, so we’re learning episode by episode ourselves and hope that we played it properly to lead into other episodes later.

At the beginning, it was news to me that my character had been a victim of domestic abuse. And as always, [there were] more interesting, deep, complex scenes to play. So I was very excited.

HR: Melissa has had so much adversity, from her alcoholism to now the abuse revelation. Can she ever get to a place where she’s completely healthy and happy?

Roth: I like to think so. I don’t think it’s going to be quick nor easy. I can only imagine that you’ve been so reliant on alcohol and running away from your feelings, to all of a sudden be dealing with them with your daughter—that you not only broke her heart but were a poor mother due to lack of skills and being emotionally out of it.

I think if and when she can, it will be a long road. But I think Melissa is at least proud of the work she’s doing now. Definitely not proud of her actions in the past, but trying to come to some sort of peace with it all within herself.

HR: Her relationship with Tandy is a special part of Cloak and Dagger, and crucial for both of them. What was it like continuing to develop that with Olivia Holt this season?

Roth: Olivia is a wise old soul and brings so much to it. We get along really well and have a lot of fun, so in certain ways, you’ll be seeing a lot more light moments with the two of us. Working with Olivia, she always shows up ready to work and basically we find our relationship while we’re working.

HR: Do you ever wish that Melissa would get to join her daughter in her crime-fighting adventures?

Roth: In my dreams she does. I would totally love my character to fall in a vat of acid or something and all of a sudden I have some sort of superhuman power. But I also think we need a middle-aged woman kicking superhero butt out there.

HR: You’ve been a part of some great TV shows, but being an actor in the Marvel Universe is such a different experience. How has your experience with Cloak and Dagger been just personally?

Roth: I don’t know if I still really believe it, to be honest. I get invited to the Marvel premieres, which is really exciting. It’s just ginormous. It is all-encompassing…It’s unbelievable. I feel very, very fortunate.

It’s a genre that I definitely didn’t have experience with. It wasn’t one that I would have necessarily thought I was a true fit for. But the writers, they’ve given us all complex material. They’re weaving together beautifully intense, relevant stories. So this whole Marvel thing is really great and awesome, but the depth the writers are bringing to [Cloak and Dagger] makes me even more excited.

HR: Since this is new territory for you, what’s been the biggest challenge in playing Melissa Bowen?

Roth: I’ve never played anyone struggling with a drinking problem, so that was kind of great. Let alone what to do when all of a sudden I had taken all of her pills that she had in her bag. I was taking pills and possibly snorting some coke, so I got very caffeinated for that scene.

But that was incredibly challenging because it’s so out of your world. That’s why we do this as actors because it’s fun to psychologically learn, understand and try to recreate so I get to do that. Any time any character is struggling with their own demons and those demons run deep it’s great fun; challenging and pure fun.

Cloak and Dagger airs Thursdays at 8 p.m. on Freeform. For more on Cloak and Dagger, and other Freeform series, follow the Freeform category at Hidden Remote.