Melissa Roxburgh Praises Justin Hartley for Creating ‘Lovely and Warm’ Set, Teases ‘Tracker’ Return (Exclusive)

Melissa Roxburgh is killing it on The Hunting Party — but what does that mean for her role as Justin Hartley‘s sister on Tracker?

During an exclusive interview with Us Weekly about her new NBC series, Roxburgh, 32, revealed whether she would return to CBS in a guest star capacity, saying, “I mean, I hope so. I had so much fun on that show.”

Roxburgh specifically praised Hartley, 48, for creating such a fun set as both the star and executive producer.

“Justin is great. It’s such a lovely and warm set [because] Justin does such a good job of making it that way,” she noted. “So I’d love to go back. Justin is a friend and it’s nice to play with your friends and I love the show, so we’ll see.”

Tracker, which premiered in February 2024, is centered around a survivalist named Colter (Hartley) who travels the country helping to solve a variety of mysteries. Hartley’s role as an executive producer has allowed him to surprise viewers with exciting guest stars such as Roxburgh, Sofia Pernas, Jensen Ackles, Jennifer Morrison and more.

Despite introducing Roxburgh as Colter’s sister, Dory, and Ackles as Colter’s brother, Russell, it remained unclear whether the Shaw siblings could reunite again. By the time production on season 2 started, Ackles, 46, booked the upcoming Prime Video thriller series Countdown while Roxburgh became the lead on NBC’s midseason drama The Hunting Party.

“[Melissa]’s show ends [production] way before we end so we can bring her back in the latter episodes of our show,” Hartley teased to TV Insider in October 2024.

Despite a hope to reunite with Hartley on screen, Roxburgh’s focus right now remains on The Hunting Party. The show premiered in January and introduced viewers to a team of investigators who track down and capture the most dangerous killers in the country after their escape from a top-secret prison that’s not supposed to exist.

“I was open to anything after Manifest since that was so specific. It was very sci-fi and there were so many extraordinary events happening in that show that I was like, ‘Anything else will be different,’” Roxburgh told Us about booking her first role after leading the cast of Netflix’s Manifest. “So when this came up, I thought it was cool. I do love profiling and I love psychology. So this character obviously does that full-time for a job and she does it for very interesting and unique killers.”

Roxburgh is playing Rebecca “Bex” Henderson, an ex-FBI agent recruited to the task force due to her reputation as a profiler who caught the world’s most dangerous serial killers. The actress was excited to join the project as a self-proclaimed true crime fan.

“Who isn’t right? I grew up watching Criminal Minds,” she quipped. “And so you want to know why people are motivated to do what they do. You want to know how they got there and why they’re doing what they’re doing. Who doesn’t love a serial killer story?”

While The Hunting Party has a lot of twists and turns, that doesn’t mean Roxburgh wanted to know all the answers, adding, “I kind of go back and forth. There are some days where I’m so overwhelmed by what’s currently happening in the scripts and making sure that I have my lines down or trying to understand it.”

She continued: “Then there are some easier days where I’m like, ‘I’m going to go be nosy to the showrunner now because I want to find out what happens.’ As the series went on with the mystery, I did start to get a little more curious.”

The Hunting Party airs on NBC Mondays at 10 p.m. ET and new episodes are available to stream on Peacock the next day. Tracker, meanwhile, returns to CBS Sunday, February 16, at 8 p.m. ET. New episodes stream the next day on Paramount+.