"The Exorcist" Season 1 is ending tonight with an "ambitious" finale, and -- as of now -- we can only pray that Fox will renew the show for Season 2.

Show creator Jeremy Slater told Deadline he knows what he wants to do should Fox bless him with a new batch of episodes. Since the interview was done before the December 16 season finale aired, he couldn't quite reveal which characters he wanted to take into Season 2, but he heavily hinted to keeping the focus on the "heart" of the show -- meaning Father Tomas (Alfonso Herrera) and Father Marcus (Ben Daniels) -- and having Season 2 follow a new case of possession with a new family. But he said that didn't mean we'd see the end of the Rance family, whose story was the focus of Season 1.

"I think Tomas and Marcus are the heart of the show and I think that maybe as long as they are both alive they would always be the central focus of the series. But I also think each season would have its own case, its possessed family or individual that needs their priestly help. I think it would cheat our audience to bring in a new set of priests. The show would not exist if we didn't have Ben and Alfonso — they embody those characters even more that I could have possibly dreamed, they brought so much from their own lives and their own personalities to make the characters come alive. [...]

So Season 1 was all about the Rance family and the visit of the Pope to Chicago and a Season 2 would mean our challenge would be to come up with a new storyline that was just as exciting and emotionally gripping – but that doesn't mean we won't see the Rance family again."

Geena Davis has been slaying her role as Angela Rance -- especially in the past two episodes as she ... well ... no spoilers, but you know if you know -- but it would probably get old to keep following the same beleaguered family year after year. The Rances have been through enough.

Slater said he designed the show as a 10-hour story broken into installments, and he doesn't like cliffhangers, so -- if the show is not renewed -- Season 1 will at least have "a satisfying ending" to this particular story. That said, he really wants to keep going for Season 2.

"I definitely know where I want to go in Season 2 and what characters I want to take with me. I have a lot of plans, but one lesson that I learned in the course of this season is that it's great to have big ideas but you have to also have the flexibility to pivot on a dime. I probably had the first half of this season planned out in my mind before we started shooting, but we had no idea what the back half of the season was or how we were going to wrap things up. That was a process of discovery of trusting the writers' room, trusting the writers, it's the most gratifying part of a television process for me. I have a 1000 ideas for another season of The Exorcist but I've learned to keep my options open so we can really craft it."

Loyal fans of "The Exorcist" have been tweeting #RenewTheExorcist to keep the show alive, so we'll have to stay tuned to see if Fox wants to keep exorcising demons into 2017.

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