Dan Fogelman

Its next season will be the show’s farewell.

The best Sylvester Stallone performances can already make you cry, so This Is Us might deliver a one-two punch in Season 2. The breakout NBC drama has tapped the Rocky icon for a paternal Season 2 role – yes, as himself.

Dan Fogelman, creator of decade-spanning relationship drama This Is Us, seems to be a big fan of ambitious storytelling projects. His latest reported project, entitled, naturally, Life, Itself, has a similar premise to his NBC show: One couple leads a story that spans many years and relationships and generations, taking them from America to Spain and back again. Annette Bening, fresh off her starring turn in last year’s 20th Century Women, is the latest to join the all-star cast that includes Oscar Isaac, Olivia Wilde, Antonio Banderas, and Samuel L. Jackson.

The most surprising breakout hit of the new fall TV programming crop would probably be NBC’s This Is Us, an unconventionally structured drama about family, time, and interconnectedness. Stretching across decades, the Dan Fogelman-created show follows the struggles of a couple (Milo Ventimiglia and Mandy Moore) as they cope with the difficulties of parenthood, while at the same time tracking the lives of their children as adults years later. The pilot presented the revelation that part of the show takes place during the ‘80s as a big twist, but has gradually gotten out from under its own narrative hook. On a wide-scale canvas, Fogelman likes to trace grand arcs connecting characters far removed from one another, and he’ll get the chance to do just that with a new reported film project.