ABC FamilyFirst, the good news: Tonight's Switched at Birth season finale is just that, a season finale.
ABC Family sure took its time renewing the series for a fifth season, something that even had the stars of the show nervous. "We were on pins and needles waiting to hear," Vanessa Marano tells E! News.
With the future unclear, the show filmed two separate endings just in case things didn't work out, which brought about a new set of challenges. "How do you advertise a finale when you don't know how it ends," she says with a laugh. "We know how it ends now. So, there's that."
As Marano tells us, the finale will focus on the series' pair of love triangles and the escalating crisis in the Kenish household. "There's a lot happening in the finale. There's the whole Bay, Emmett, Travis triangle. There's the Daphne, Dr. Quinn, Mingo triangle. There's of course Regina and her live-in fugitive and the Kenishes finding out about that and pretty much everything possible hitting the fan and going wrong," she teases. "So, a lot gets resolved. Like, all the questions anyone has gets answered, but at the same time, you think everything gets tied up in a neat little bow and then the last five minutes of the finale are super shocking."
Speaking of love triangles, it wasn't just Emmett (Sean Berdy) and Travis (Ryan Lane) who had eyes for Bay this season. America's Next Top Model frontrunner Nyle DiMarco returned to the series as Garrett, who found himself smitten with Bay after meeting her at the coffee shop. DiMarco's presence on the Switched at Birth set cause quite a commotion, Marano says. "It was so funny…All of the burly, super macho grips on set were drunk by his beauty. Someone came up to me and said, 'I am completely comfortable in my heterosexuality, but that is a beautiful man,'" she reveals, laughing. "I was doing a scene with Max Adler and [he] had a line and he literally forgot his line and was kind of looking at [Nyle.] He was like, 'I'm sorry, have you seen this guy's eyes?'"
It's been a momentous season for Bay, one that's not only seen her in a crazy love triangle, but also with a greater focus on her art. "I think she gets an incredible opportunity in this finale. She's finally going to have her art show and she's very excited about that, but at the same time, whenever you're an artist, it's a world that's filled with as many downs as ups, and I think that's something she's going to have to come to terms with in the finale," Marano says. "But I'm really proud of her…I really wanted to see her come into her own and start doing things for her, and I think she really did this season and I'm proud of her. I am. I'm like, 'You go girl! You don't need a man to hold you down!'"
Switched at Birth airs Mondays at 8 p.m. on ABC Family.