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This story contains MODERATE SPOILERS for "The Palindrome Reversal Palindrome," the first season finale for "The Middleman" on ABC Family.

Instead of a 13th episode, the ABC Family series "The Middleman" will wrap up its first season with "a bigger, better 'Middleman' than anything that's come before it," said program creator Javier Grillo-Marxuach.

"We were working on a 13th episode, and we came to an arrangement with the network to throw an extra day at this 12th episode and some extra money in exchange for the 13th episode," he said in an interview with Zap2it.

True to its genre roots, the series will be exploring yet another sci-fi concept as the characters discover an alternate universe.

In the episode, a bad guy named the Palindrome who has been able to psychically contact his mirror self, who is a good guy. When the evil Palindrome decides to go to the other universe, Wendy ends up going with him and discovers other things are very different there.

For instance, Wendy's roommate, vegetarian socially conscious artist Lacey, now eats meat and runs a gentlemen's club in their apartment. Android school marm Ida has become a hot blonde. And the straight-laced and upright Middleman is a grimy, eyepatch-wearing, mullet-haired soldier of fortune.

Also, a source tells Airlock Alpha that everyone in the mirror universe will have goatees, reminiscent of the famous Star Trek episode which featured Spock with a goatee from the mirror universe.

To emphasize his positive, upbeat view of fighting evil, Grillo-Marxuach ends the season that way, saying "all is right with the world. I thought, really, that's the best note to end the season on. Leave it on a note of optimism."

"The fate of the show is uncertain, and that's really no secret," he said. "I thought a conclusive note that states what the show is about was a better way to end the first season and go into the possibility of a second season or perhaps not the possibility of a second season."

Can fans help the show get renewed? On his blog, Grillo-Marxuach shows pictures of M&M candy and subtly hints that fans might consider sending them to ABC Family to indicate their support for the show. (Maybe M&M is short for "Middleman"?)

No matter what happens, Grillo-Marxuach said he has no regrets.

"ABC Family was the only network out there," he said, "that took a look at the script and said, 'We want to make this show exactly the way you want to make it.' Doing 12 episodes that are my vision as opposed to 129 that are compromised and watered down, is priceless."

"They love the show," he said. "They want the show to succeed."

If the network won't bring the show back, what then?

"If ABC Family decides this is not a show that is, right now, as compatible with this brand as it could be," he said, "and if they decide to take it elsewhere, I'm on board."

"They produce the show," Grillo-Marxuach said. "They stand to profit from the success of the show. If we have to go to another network, they will be the ones spearheading that. My impression is that they're not uninterested in aggressively pursuing a sale to another network."

"The Middleman" airs Monday nights at 10 on the ABC Family cable network.

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