Is Mark Ruffalo's Task a sequel to Kate Winslet's Mare of Easttown? Connection between Brad Inglesby's visions, explained

Mare of Easttown fans, here’s the headline answer up top: Task is not a sequel to Mare of Easttown, it’s a new Brad Ingelsby crime drama for HBO with different characters and a fresh case, even as it returns to Delco’s streets and speech. The seven-episode series, often referred to as “Task HBO” in listings, premiered on September 7, 2025, with Crossings, led by Mark Ruffalo as Tom Brandis, a priest-turned-FBI agent, and Tom Pelphrey as Robbie Prendergast, a sanitation worker pulling stash-house robberies to keep his family afloat.

The ensemble includes Emilia Jones, Martha Plimpton, Fabien Frankel, Thuso Mbedu, and Alison Oliver, with early episodes directed by Jeremiah Zagar. Weekly episodes run through October 19, 2025. Viewers who loved Mare of Easttown for its working-class texture and moral complexity will find an intentional overlap, but the story and stakes are new.

Is Task a sequel to Mare of Easttown? The official word, plus Episode 1’s ending explained

Short answer: no. The task isn’t Season 2 of Mare of Easttown. It’s a separate story built after Ingelsby and Kate Winslet decided not to move forward with a second Mare of Easttown arc that felt “less than” the original. As per TheWrap report dated September 7, 2025, Creator Brad Ingelsby stated,

“I didn’t want to do another whodunnit, because it felt like 'Mare' was the whodunnit show.”

Ingelsby is frank that the two series share a world and sensibility. As per TheWrap report, he also remarked,

“but I’m OK with it looking like ‘Mare.’ And in fact, I said to our production designer and costume designer who also worked on 'Mare' that this is the same world as 'Mare.' Don’t try to make it seem different."

That’s why Task echoes Mare of Easttown in setting, class realities, and faith and family themes while spinning a new, Heat-style collision between an FBI task force and a desperate thief.

Now, that ending. In Crossings, Robbie’s robbery crew spirals into a bloodbath: Peaches is shot dead. The homeowners are killed, and a young boy, Sam, sees Robbie and Cliff unmasked.

Robbie refuses to harm the child and takes him alive, which traps him in a tightening vise of guilt and exposure. As per an Entertainment Weekly report dated September 7, 2025, Ingelsby said,

“It lets an audience know that everything is on the table.”

The choice signals a code, violent lines Robbie will cross, and one he won’t, which is where Task parts ways from the puzzle-box engine of Mare of Easttown.

Tom Pelphrey frames Robbie’s choice as the only move that keeps the story and his humanity going. As per a TV Insider report dated September 7, 2025, Tom Pelphrey, who plays Robbie Prendergast, stated,

“If he didn’t do what he did, the story is over before it starts.”

Calling the finale beat a “truly impossible situation” that rules out killing the child. That ethical line is the fuse that Task lights for the season, rather than Mare of Easttown’s closed-circle whodunnit reveal.

Could there be a crossover? Ingelsby isn’t planning a secret Mare of Easttown "season 1.5," but he’s not anti-ambition either. As per a TV Insider report dated September 5, 2025, he stated,

“It would have to pay off in a way that I found [satisfying]… I wouldn’t want it to be a gimmick. I would want it to be really organic. So if there was an organic way in, I would embrace it.”

Translation: same world, separate shows, unless a future idea truly earns the bridge.

Shared DNA: How Ingelsby’s Delco world links Mare of Easttown and Task

Both shows live in the Philly suburbs and study grief, faith, and the strain of blue-collar life. That’s not a coincidence; Ingelsby grew up there and shot in many of the same neighborhoods, which is why Mare of Easttown viewers will feel the geography in Task. Sound seals the connection. Mark Ruffalo says the cast trained with Mare of Easttown’s dialect coach, Susanne Sulby, to ground the accent work. As per Entertainment Weekly's report dated September 7, 2025, Ruffalo remarked,

“There's nothing like it. It's like the north meets the south, with a mid-Atlantic, it's the craziest dialect I've ever heard,”

adding that the effort made the world feel “so authentic.” That continuity keeps Task rooted where Mare of Easttown lived, even as the plot runs a different race.

Where they diverge: Engine, scope, and stakes

Mare of Easttown runs on a small-town whodunnit, anchored by a single detective and a closed set of suspects. Task runs on a dual-protagonist manhunt: an FBI agent and a thief in parallel, each defined by family debt and personal creeds. Ingelsby cites Heat as a touchstone and writes toward collisions, not clues.

Scale is wider, too. The Task HBO machine toggles between a federal task force and a criminal crew, using robberies and reprisals to escalate pressure. That structure gives Task forward motion whereas Mare of Easttown favored slow unpeeling.

For viewers planning the season: Task drops weekly on Sundays through October 19, 2025, with episode titles from Crossings to A Still Small Voice.

Stay tuned for more updates.