Following the dramatic conclusion of Season 1 of I Love LA, actor Josh Hutcherson is bracing himself for potential backlash from viewers.

**Warning: This article contains spoilers for the Season 1 finale of I Love LA, now available on HBO Max**

The situation is all too familiar: a lingering fear that one’s partner might be unfaithful with someone they insisted was just a friend. This common scenario is one that many women recognize, and it’s precisely this relatable tension that Rachel Sennott chose to weave into I Love LA. In the climactic moments of Episode 8, titled “I Love NY,” viewers are shocked to find Dylan, played by Hutcherson, waking up in bed next to his coworker Claire, portrayed by Callie Hernandez.

“When I first read the script, my immediate thought was, ‘No, Dylan, not Claire. Anyone but Claire,'” Hutcherson revealed in an interview with DECIDER. He confessed that the scene was so unsettling that it made him anxious about filming it. His nerves were further rattled during the table read when his fellow cast members reacted strongly to Dylan’s indiscretion. “During the table read, with about 30 people in the room, when we reached the part where Dylan wakes up with Claire, they actually booed me. I had to remind them, ‘I’m Josh, I didn’t write this!'” he recounted.

Hutcherson also shared, “When I got home, my girlfriend noticed something was off with me. I explained, ‘I got booed at the table read.’ It was a pretty uncomfortable experience.”

The reaction is appropriate for those who remember Episode 6, when Maia comes home to their apartment to find Dylan’s coworkers over for a game night. Maia quickly singles out Claire as a potential threat and, being heavily under the influence, throws the entire gathering into awkwardness and chaos. Not only does she inappropriately try to seduce Dylan mid-party, she confronts Claire about having the hots for her boyfriend. 

At that time, Claire swears up and down that she and Dylan are just friends and that she has never and would never go after him like that. Cut ahead several episodes later as Dylan and Claire lie in a bed together after Dylan and Maia make up following their brief tiff and separation. While they may have been separated after a big blowup in Episode 7, it’s still not a good look for Hutcherson’s character and it’s one that took some time to come around to. 

“I had a lot of conversations with Rachel and Emma [Seligman] about it to understand it. It was really important to me, how that moment was portrayed, because it’s pretty hardcore in a lot of ways,” Hutcherson explained. “How Dylan arrives to that state, I think, is important, as well. But I’m really happy with how it turned out. Maia is on her journey and screwing things up in her own way and Dylan is doing the same thing.”  

“It all, I think, comes from a lack of them communicating with one another and we’ll see what happens after. But they’re going to be very angry, the people of the internet,” he explained. 

As for whether or not Dylan fesses up or keeps his infidelity (can we even call it that if they were essentially on a break?) under wraps is a question that will have to be answered in Season 2.

I Love LA Season 1 is now streaming on HBO Max.

If you’re new to HBO Max, you can sign up for as low as $10.99/month with ads, but an ad-free subscription will cost $18.49/month.

If you want to stream even more and save a few bucks a month while you’re at it, we recommend subscribing to one of the discounted Disney+ Bundles with Hulu and HBO Max. With ads, the bundle costs $19.99/month and without ads, $32.99/month.