Like every good network TV show, ABC’s High Potential has two main characters in a will-they-won’t-they dynamic. Kaitlin Olson‘s Morgan and her partner in the LAPD, Detective Karadec (Daniel Sunjata), have had an indescribable tension between them since the beginning. At first, the always by-the-book Karadec was resistant to Morgan joining the fold, especially when it meant her breaking protocol. But as the two continued to solve cases together, and Morgan showed just how invaluable she is to the team, the two have grown stronger and now work together like a well-oiled machine.
But while Karadac and Morgan have now learned how to lean on each other, whether that’s at work or not, the series is potentially changing up their dynamic once more. In new interviews ahead of season 3, which is set to premiere in January 2027, it seems their chemistry will finally be addressed.
‘High Potential’ Will Finally Address the Morgan-Karadec Dynamic
While High Potential has moved away from the fall programming and pushed to January 2027, the teasers from the cast are leaving viewers more excited than ever. Among them is Olson talking about the potential sparks between Morgan and Karadec. When asked about the new season at the Disney Advertising Upfront in May 2026, Olson kept it vague. “Oh, I wish I could tell you everything,” she said, per Good Housekeeping. “There’s always the will they or won’t they with Karadec.”
In an interview with TV Insider, Olson said that she hasn’t been “playing into” a flirtation with Sunjata onscreen, but that it’s more of their characters naturally interacting with one another. “I’m fully just being Morgan, who likes to bust his balls and treat him like a little brother who’s annoying,” she told the outlet. “But I love Daniel’s Karadec and how he’s interacting with this woman. He doesn’t know how to come at it. Is she flirting with him? Does she hate him? Does she love him?” She then gave a hint at where their dynamic is going in the new season. “But we’re going to sort of slow burn that,” she says. “You’ll get an answer.”
Collider Exclusive · Action Hero Quiz Which Action Hero Would Be Your Perfect Partner? Rambo · James Bond · Indiana Jones · John McClane · Ethan Hunt
Five legends. Five completely different ways of getting out alive — with style, with muscle, with charm, with luck, or with a plan so intricate it probably shouldn’t work. Ten questions will reveal which action hero was built to have your back.
🎖️Rambo
🍸James Bond
🏺Indiana Jones
🔧John McClane
🎭Ethan Hunt
01
You’re dropped into a dangerous situation with no warning. What do you need most from a partner? The first few seconds tell you everything about who belongs beside you.
02
You have to get somewhere dangerous, fast. How do you travel? How you get there is half the mission.
03
You’re pinned down and outnumbered. What does your ideal partner do? This is when you find out what someone is really made of.
04
The mission is paused. You have one evening to decompress. What does your partner suggest? Who someone is when the pressure drops is who they actually are.
05
How do you prefer your partner to communicate mid-mission? Good communication is the difference between partners and a liability.
06
Your enemy is powerful, well-resourced, and has the upper hand. How should your partner approach them? The approach to the enemy defines the partnership.
07
Things go badly wrong and you’re captured. What do you trust your partner to do? Who someone is when you need them most is the only thing that matters.
08
What does your ideal partner bring to the table that you couldn’t replace? A great partner fills the gap you didn’t know you had.
09
Every partnership has a cost. Which of these can you live with? No one comes without baggage. The question is whether you can carry it together.
10
It’s the final moment. Everything is on the line. What do you need from your partner right now? The last question is the most honest one.
Your Partner Has Been Assigned Your Perfect Partner Is…
Your answers have pointed to one action hero above all others. This is the person built to have your back — for better or considerably, spectacularly worse.
Rambo
Your partner doesn’t talk much, doesn’t need to, and will have assessed every threat in your immediate environment before you’ve finished your first sentence. John Rambo is not a man of plans or politics — he is a force of nature shaped by survival, loyalty, and a capacity for endurance that goes beyond anything training can produce. He will not leave you behind. He has never left anyone behind who deserved to come home. What you get with Rambo is the most capable, most quietly ferocious partner imaginable — one who has been through things that would have broken anyone else, and who chose to keep going anyway. You’ll never need to ask if he has your back. You’ll just know.
James Bond
Your partner will arrive perfectly dressed, perfectly briefed, and with a cover story so convincing it’ll take you a moment to remember what’s actually true. James Bond is the most professionally dangerous person in any room he enters — and the most disarmingly charming, which is the point. He operates in a world of layers, where nothing is what it appears and every advantage is used without apology. You’ll never be bored. You’ll occasionally be furious. But when it matters — when the mission is genuinely on the line and the margin for error has collapsed to nothing — Bond is exactly the partner you want. He has survived things that have no business being survivable. He does it with style. That is not nothing.
Indiana Jones
Your partner will know the history, the language, the cultural context, and exactly why the thing everyone else is ignoring is actually the most important thing in the room. Indiana Jones is brilliant, reckless, and occasionally impossible — but he is also one of the most resourceful, most genuinely knowledgeable partners you could find yourself beside. He approaches every situation with a scholar’s eye and a brawler’s instinct, which is an unusual combination and a remarkably effective one. He hates snakes and gets personally attached to objects of historical significance, both of which will slow you down at least once. It doesn’t matter. What Indy brings is irreplaceable — and the adventures you’ll have together will be the kind people write books about. Assuming you survive them.
John McClane
Your partner was not supposed to be here. He does not have the right equipment, the right information, or anything approaching the right odds. He has a sarcastic remark and an absolute refusal to accept that the situation is as bad as it looks. John McClane is the greatest accidental hero in the history of action cinema — a man whose superpower is stubbornness, whose contingency plan is improvisation, and whose capacity to absorb punishment and keep moving would be alarming if it weren’t so useful. He will complain the entire time. He will make it significantly more chaotic than it needed to be. And he will absolutely, unconditionally, without question come through when it counts. Yippee-ki-yay.
Ethan Hunt
Your partner has already run seventeen scenarios by the time you’ve finished reading the briefing, and the plan he’s settled on involves at least two things that should be physically impossible. Ethan Hunt operates at the absolute edge of human capability — technically, physically, and intellectually — and he brings the same relentless precision to protecting his partners that he brings to dismantling organisations that shouldn’t exist. He is not easy to know and he will never fully tell you everything. But he will carry the weight of the mission so completely, so absolutely, that your job is simply to trust him — and the remarkable thing is that trusting him always turns out to be the right call. The mission will be impossible. He will complete it anyway.
‘High Potential’ Has Been Setting Up Their Romance
Hints that something more than a friendship could spark between Karadec and Morgan aren’t exactly a surprise given how their love lives ended in the Season 2 finale. While Morgan became romantically involved with Captain Nick Wagner (Steve Howey) in Season 2, even sharing a steamy elevator kiss, the last scene of the finale saw him bleeding out after being attacked by someone who was said to have information regarding Roman, Morgan’s ex. And while his injury gave the series the perfect cliffhanger ending, Deadline confirmed that the Shameless star will not be returning as a series regular and may only appear to wrap up the storyline. Therefore, while Wagner’s injury will certainly play a part in Season 3, it seems his connection with Morgan is no longer going to be a big part of the show.
As for Karadec, Season 2 saw him reconcile with his ex-fiancée, Lucia (Susan Kelechi Watson). But while their relationship was seemingly going strong, with them even starting to plan a future together, the finale revealed that she had helped her con-artist ex-boyfriend Charles gain access to the hotel where a murder occurred. In the end, the team reveals that Charles ultimately killed the victim, and Lucia is declared an accomplice. Karadec is understandably devastated by the news and arrests her himself, effectively ending their relationship. After that, Karadec goes to confide in Morgan for feeling foolish for letting himself fall for her, and Morgan’s the perfect shoulder for him to cry on.
With all that said, while there’s still plenty of time until the third season of High Potential airs on ABC, it seems the series will be finally leaning into the romantic sparks between Karadec and Morgan. And while it might only continue to be an excruciatingly slow burn, their characters are getting along more than ever, are emotionally vulnerable after the events in the finale, and are officially single. It’s a TV romance waiting to happen.
