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Episode Review: "Hey, we should all get matching tattoos after this." [S04E21/22]

Well, it’s been a long time coming, but here, at long last, is our review of the season 4 finale. Just in time for season 5! Better late than never?

The season 4 finale can only be described as “explosive,” both literally and figuratively. What did we think of the end of the penultimate season of Blindspot?

Y: Hands down my favorite Blindspot finale ever—and definitely up there in my top three episodes of all time. It’s been almost a year since it aired, but still, every time I watch it I am left with the same feeling of… MIND. BLOWN. HEART. RACING. PROTECT THE TEAM!

L: It was a masterpiece. There were a lot of moments in season 4 where I wondered where the overall plot was headed, but now that I see the whole picture.... Wow. And this team... I am simultaneously giddy and heartbroken and terrified and elated. Verklempt, that’s what I am. Utterly verklempt. Bravo, Blindspot.

The team is still racing to stop Madeline’s plans, even though they don’t know exactly what they entail. But they quickly find themselves changing from hunter to hunted. How do they fare in this final battle?

L: Our team starts this episode right where we left them, still fumbling around in the dark, trying to figure out what Helios is all about. The only leads they have are Madeline’s henchmen, Dominic Masters and Barry Wallace. (I’m not sure how they discovered Barry, but let’s just assume that Tasha encountered him in her travels with Mad Maddie’s inner circle.) Dominic has vanished, but Barry shows up in Queens, so the team sets out to bring him in for questioning. They find Barry, but he isn’t alone; Jake Keaton is there. He tells them that Barry used to be CIA before he went rogue. And then Weitz shows up, followed by Lucas Nash, a CIA bigwig (more on him in a bit) who says that he was the one who trained Barry. Inter-agency posturing ensues as they fight over who gets to interrogate “the most popular girl in school.” They settle on transporting Barry to a neutral location, but Barry gets blown up on the way in our first, but by no means last, explosion of the evening.

The only clue the team has to go on is a message on his phone, “Retrieving virus at 1200. Will be ready for today,” which is even more alarming in the context of Barry’s area of expertise at the CIA: chemical, biological, and viral attacks. The team seems terrifyingly stuck until Dominic helpfully turns up on camera at Bellmore University, which we remember from 3.15, when yet another pissed off CIA operative tried to take out her former boss and coworkers. (I’m thinking maybe the CIA needs a better benefit plan to keep their agents from turning on them. Or, you know, maybe they should stop screwing over their employees?) The team figures out that 1200 doesn’t mean noon, it means Building 1200, the bio-science building and the logical place to look for a biological weapon. The teams heads out to look for the woman seen meeting with Dominic, minus Keaton, who gets pulled to have a little chat with Nash and discovers that—surprise!—he’s being reassigned to Malta.

Which brings us to Nash. He apparently outranks Keaton, who replaced Carter as the Deputy Director of the CIA. The only person who would outrank the Deputy Director would be the Director. Which would make sense, since Nash is up for the promotion to Director of National Intelligence alongside Weitz, the Director of the FBI. And it would explain Sabrina Larren’s witch hunt on the Director’s behalf (as well as calling it off once Tasha was embedded with the team again). But no one refers to Nash as the Director, which seems odd. The FBI is pretty big on titles and respect and formality. Reade would certainly have recognized Nash and referred to him as “Director,” and Weller would have been “sir”-ing him all over the place. So it’s strange to me that Nash is never directly identified as the Director. It also seemed a little odd to me that the Deputy Director could just be reassigned to Malta (which would definitely not be a “promotion” of any sort, since the only logical promotion from Deputy Director would be Director). But Madeline clearly wouldn’t want someone she doesn’t control taking over the CIA when Nash gets promoted to DNI. So they’d have to get Keaton out of the way before they promote someone else to Director, thereby preserving Madeline’s control over the FBI, CIA, and the Director of National Intelligence. (Shepherd’s plan to nuke the White House and replace all of these folks with Weller and Keaton is looking better by the minute!)

Meanwhile, our diligent FBI team locates the woman seen meeting with Dominic and brings her in for questioning. Her name is Erin Sandler, and she insists that she’s working for the CIA, making a computer virus instead of a biological virus. If her story sounds familiar, it’s because this isn’t the first person we’ve met who has been exploited this way. Ana Montes, the teenage hacker we encountered in 1.06, believed she’d been recruited by the NSA to develop an app that was instead being used by criminals. These computer geniuses aren’t quite as smart as they think they are. (Sadly, both Rich and Patterson were otherwise engaged at this moment and missed this cautionary tale.)

Unfortunately, knowing what weapon Dominic plans to use doesn’t help them figure out where he’s going to unleash it. The team drags Madeline into the FBI to interrogate her, but she’s her usual helpful self. (Honestly, I think the team should get bonus points for resisting the urge to punch her. And while I have some issues with the way Madeline’s character was written this season, I cannot give enough credit to Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio for the phenomenal job she’s done portraying this season’s archvillain.) Weller puts pressure on Madeline, and she finally coughs up Dominic’s phone number. Of course, the phone is turned off. They turn it on remotely, but as soon as they do, the signal disappears, and when they check out that location, they find a dead body that Rich identifies as part of a team that monitors the power grid. Ruh-roh!

Dominic, of course, has already headed over to the facility, used a badge stolen from his victim to get inside, executed the rest of the employees, and cut off access to the outside world. Our team heads to intercept him, and Dominic goes out in a blaze of glory, after texting a touching goodbye to Kathy for reasons that escape me. (Kathy’s struggles with autocorrect tie with Erin’s breakdown as the most relatable moments in this episode. I find it oddly comforting that even computer geniuses have their texts helpfully mangled by autocorrect.) I’m left still puzzling over Dominic’s participation in Madeline’s scheme. As we learn in this episode, Madeline clearly had an axe to grind with the FBI, but as far as we know, Dominic didn’t. I’m sure she promised him a lot of money to carry out her plans, but he seems pretty willing to sacrifice his own life at the end to carry out Madeline’s scheme, and we’re not given any reason to explain this level of commitment. And why text goodbye to Kathy? I thought he was just manipulating her to carry out the grand Helios plan. Dominic, you will forever remain a mystery.

Patterson struggles to undo the virus that Dominic uploaded, but for the first time, we see our tech-genius-in-charge fail. The power grid goes down, and the Eastern Seaboard goes dark. (Which is a refreshing change from someone trying to nuke it, although no one else seems to appreciate this variety.) Rich’s hushed, “We failed,” sums up that moment perfectly. (Fortunately, he’s not subdued for long. His post-apocalyptic humor was on point in this episode. And also really necessary, since we are steadily approaching maximum freak out.)

Patterson and Rich find Dominic’s texts to Kathy on his phone and use Rich’s “Deep Fake” app (which he really ought to patent, because he could earn more than an enough to pay Patterson back, and then they could bicker over whose app is making them more money) to pretend to be Dominic. They are able to get a lock on Kathy’s location... in the Perlan Museum in Reykjavik, Iceland. Which seems a really odd place to hang out until Rich explains that there’s a rumor on the dark web that the Perlan is sitting on a secret cryptocurrency mining operation. (And while that particular rumor might not be true, apparently Iceland is actually big for cryptocurrency mining, because it has both cheap electricity from the geothermal heat generated by its volcanoes needed to power supercomputers as well as arctic air to cool the processors. Not for the first time, I admire how the show’s writers draw from the weird-but-true science featured in the likes of Wired magazine.)

The team persuades Weitz to let them go after Kathy (and the long flight to Iceland gives them plenty of time to air all their personal grievances), while Madeline’s lawyer, Richard Shirley makes his long-anticipated return to the NYO. (His line, “I’ve been up since, well, I don’t really sleep anymore. Do you have kids?” is right up there with Kathy’s autocorrect for relatability.) In a bit of brilliant cross-cutting, we finally see Madeline’s plan to bring down the team spelled out for us, as the team themselves is forced to face each of their own personal failings from each other’s perspective. We could easily spend an entire review on that scene alone, but we’ll get to that in a minute. Because first we have to acknowledge: Madeline’s plan is absolutely brilliant.

Every step of the way, all season long, the team thought they were getting closer to Madeline. But in reality, they were stepping neatly into the traps she was setting for them. Tasha believed that she was gathering evidence on Madeline, while instead Madeline was setting her up for the murders of Blake Crawford, Kira Evans, and Claudia Murphy. Patterson and Rich believed they were paying off Kathy to silence her, but instead they appear to be financing her attack on the power grid. Everything they’ve done to try to bring Madeline down has been twisted to make it look as though the team were guilty of Madeline’s crimes. And the narrative that she spins, revealing the team’s darkest secrets, ascribing “their” crimes to her own motive (“they crave power, and they sought to gain control of one of the most powerful companies in the world” so they “mastermind[ed] a plot to infiltrate the FBI and hide behind its integrity and wield its power for their personal gain” because they “only care about themselves, and anybody that gets in their way, that person is eliminated”) makes her whole case utterly, chillingly, brilliantly plausible.

It is clear that this is a trap that our team will not be able to magically talk their way out of, nor is there any way that Weitz, as their boss, or anyone else at the FBI can exonerate them. And the beauty of it from a story perspective is that everything our team ever thought they “got away with,” every infraction that their higher-ups forgave or covered up, comes out. And I love that, because it takes away a lot of the “magical resolution” aspect of these supposedly neatly wrapped-up storylines. There is a comeuppance for all the times our team has skirted the law, and it’s huge. And it’s a bitter pill to swallow, but maybe it’s true that our team has gotten a bit too cocky, a bit too willing to bend the rules to achieve the ends they desired, and yes, a bit too assured of their ability to talk their way out of things. (In other words, Reade isn’t entirely wrong.)

In some ways, Madeline’s plan is like looking at the photonegative of Shepherd’s plan. Shepherd set out to bring down all the corrupt individuals and replace them with people who would uphold their offices honorably. Madeline set out to do the exact opposite: To control everyone she could and eliminate the ones she couldn’t, until the entire national security system was under her control. It’s brilliant, and in some ways, it’s even more terrifying than a nuclear blast. Because there is no one left who can stop her.

Certainly no one sitting at the table with Madeline is willing or able to stop her. Nash orders Weitz to call the Icelandic Minister and have the team arrested when they land. Fortunately, our favorite criminal-turned-FBI-consultant Rich is listening in and gives the team a heads up. With no other options available to them, the team parachutes out of the plane (giving us many drool-worthy shots of Iceland and making me deeply grateful for this on-location shoot) and meet up with one of Rich’s dark web contacts, a guy known as “Ice Cream.” (Yet another colorful secondary character I hope we will see again.) Ice Cream helped to design the system that secures the crypto floor beneath the Perlan. And he’s willing to give them the elevator password to access it... if Rich gives him the Gardner paintings. And I absolutely love how we come back to this earlier heist. It would have been easy to ask Rich for money or bitcoin, but this is something unique to our team (and the fact that Boston is the key to retrieving them gives me hope that we haven’t seen the last of him either).

Patterson, Kurt, and Jane head to the Perlan, posing as tourists to get into the building, while Tasha and Reade meet up with Ice Cream to facetime Rich and get the password. Everything seems to go according to plan, but Kathy is gone by the time they get to the crypto floor. Patterson dives in and tries to restore the power grid, but Kathy rigged the system so that instead of fixing the problem, Patterson knocks out the power in London and Paris, all while being recorded by security cameras. She manages to restore the grid, but it’s too little, too late, especially once Rich discovers that the money he put into Kathy’s ransom account (despite being ordered not to) is being moved into accounts in their names, the final nail in the coffin that frames the team for all of Madeline’s crimes. The cops are on their way to the museum, so Jane and Kurt pretend to take the museum visitors and employees hostage to buy Patterson time to escape out the back exit. (And I am not going to lie, I loved the way Jane improvised and Kurt went along with it, getting into the role enough to shoot up the ceiling and include pizza with vegan cheese in his list of demands.)

Things look pretty grim when the Icelandic SWAT officers bust onto the scene, setting off gas canisters (in much the same way that the FBI captured Barry less than two hours ago, in what feels like pretty much another lifetime at this point) and taking Kurt and Jane into custody. But the officers turn out to be owned by Ice Cream. (Not that this show is making me horribly cynical, but is anyone in law enforcement really operating under free will, for the good of the general populace?)

Back at the NYO, things are going... less well. Weitz finally realizes the deep doo-doo he’s in, and when he tries to warn Rich, he instead leads Nash right to him. Nash takes Rich, draped in a black hood, to “the boat” as Weitz looks on. And Madeline neatly manipulates Weitz into issuing her a public apology, which she follows by announcing that she is heading up a new “Civilian Oversight Committee.” And then she kicks him out of Reade’s office, which she has apparently claimed as her own. (There is a strange irony watching Madeline call the shots in the NYO. As a civilian, she has no place there, but yet, technically, neither does Jane, and we’ve been feeling like she does belong there for four seasons now.)

We finally have to admit how horribly badly things are going... and then we find out that Nash has gotten a drone strike on the team greenlit by the DOD, the CIA (who the hell is in charge there now?!), and the White House. And I’m not gonna lie, there is a part of me that really loved watching the light dawn on both Weitz’s and Briana’s faces, as they realize their part in the team’s imminent assassinations. And then we get a really impressive explosion (as much as we have joked about efforts to blow up Kurt over the seasons, this is taking things a bit too far), followed by a lovely close up on Jane’s face as she watches her family go up in smoke and a distinctly less lovely long hiatus before we find out who survives. As often and as many times as we rewatch these episodes.... that will never be easy to watch.

One of the things that I love so much about the finale is the way it plays so much on our expectations and deliberately avoids following the formula we anticipate. In season 1, we were presented with two central mysteries: Who did this to Jane? And what happened to Taylor Shaw? Both of these were resolved—or at least answered—by the end of the season. Seasons 2 and 3 followed similar formats, introducing a main villain who matched wits with our team but was ultimately defeated in the season finale. We had every expectation that this season would take the same path, which makes the finale unexpectedly shocking. But the best part of it is that it wasn’t just shock value for the sake of shock value (cough, Game of Thrones, cough). This was actually impeccable storytelling that told us what was happening all along, we just chose to believe it wasn’t true (or hoped that our team would escape) because of our expectations—a technique that Blindspot has been using on us since the pilot, to brilliant effect.

My favorite thing about this show has always been that it’s a smart show created by smart people for a smart audience. And this finale (and the season as a whole, viewed in retrospect) really highlights that. There was an interview a few years ago with David Kwong, the puzzle consultant on the show, who said something along the lines that mysteries where the audience isn’t given all the clues and can’t solve it themselves aren’t as satisfying to the viewers as those where the audience can put the clues together themselves. And that’s kind of stuck with me over the seasons. Blindspot does that so very well—they show us everything, but they misdirect our attention, so we ignore clues. (This is what happens when you have a consulting magician on the payroll. I mean, they showed us in the pilot that it was Remi’s choice to have her memory wiped. But we didn’t believe it even when we saw her say it, some ten episodes later!) This season, the writers were misdirecting us in every episode, and really, right into the second half of the finale, we didn’t even realize it. I think that it gives us a sense of empathy for these characters, too. We got played just as much as they did. And I have to respect that!

And on that note (pun totally intended), you have to love the way they used the Rolling Stones at the end of the last team scene. “You can’t always get what you want... but if you try sometimes, you just might find you get what you need.” This finale might not have been what we wanted, but it was what we needed to re-ignite our passion for this team and this story.

We’ve talked before about the fact that one of things that sets this show apart from other police procedurals is the fact that our team doesn’t always win, which makes their struggles seem more real. They’ve had some tough losses over the seasons, but never one to this degree. They lose in every way it’s possible to lose: The bad guy not only gets away, she ends up running the FBI and CIA. They don’t just lose a case, their entire professional reputation is destroyed. And they don’t just lose their reputation; some of them might have even lost their lives. These are a lot of hits to a team that’s gotten pretty good at taking down villains. And maybe they’ve gotten a little smug about it (or maybe that’s just Rich rubbing off on them). But this definitely knocks the wind out of their sails and forces them to do a bit of soul-searching about who they really are inside, so I loved what this does for the characters on an individual level. I can’t wait to see how they emerge from this (both literal and figurative) wreckage, how they cope with what’s happened, and how they chose to move forward in season 5.

And I love the questions that this finale opened up for the overall mythology of the show. When did all of Madeline’s planning begin? Clearly it was in motion even before Madeline assumed control of HCI. Tasha went undercover before that. On Nash’s orders? All of this keeps bringing me back to something Madeline said, talking about her father, “Did you know at one point, he was being groomed for the presidency? Until the powers that be had a change of heart. And they ruined him instead.” By the “powers that be,” she seems to be referring to some sort of shadow organization, operating within the U.S. government. An organization like maybe Orion? No, there aren’t any clues that point directly to that. But think of how perfect it would be if Remi had her memory wiped as part of a plan to wipe out corruption within the U.S. government... and Jane ended up working to wipe out the same source of corruption within the U.S. government. It would bring her story full-circle, and would remove the last barrier to her fully accepting the parts of her that are Remi, proving to herself that she was always heading toward the right goal (even if her methods were a bit questionable). And I am not going to lie: A large part of me is really hoping that this will be the case!

But whatever happens in season 5, season 4 was definitely a tour de force. And this finale was absolutely brilliant. Blindspot has always had amazing season finales, but this one really knocked them all out of the water. Bravo, everyone!

Y: I know that on more than one occasion during this season, I grumbled about how little we know about Madeline’s motives or where it was all going. But I am not too proud to admit when I’ve been wrong. So consider this me bowing down to the geniuses in that writing room who managed to craft one of the most perfectly structured and executed stories told over twenty-two episodes. Not only did they blow my mind with that finale and the long game that both they and Madeline played, but they made all the confusion and annoyance along the way worth it. This finale not only tied up almost every loose end from this season, but it also tied in loose ends that date all the way back to season 1. They managed to bring it all together—all those tiny moments, little almost insignificant plots and events that happened—in the most devastating way possible.

And one of the best things about it all is that our team was dealt such a huge blow. It’s not every day that your protagonists lose—and lose in such a big way—but our heroes just did, and this has breathed new life into the show and set forth the final chapter in the most exciting way possible. We’re so used to brushing the dust off after every episode, tallying the scores, and finding that the team somehow snatched a win despite everything. There have been very few incidents before when the team came out on the losing end—off the top of my head, I can think of 2.09 when Shepherd blew up half the NYO agents and again in 2.21 when she raided their offices—but this time, I believe, the loss is far more devastating especially because it hit so close to home. Not only did Madeline beat the team in their head-to-head, but she’s now sitting pretty in Reade’s office and has the director on a leash.

Having your heroes end the season with a huge loss—not to mention blowing them up in a drone attack—and putting them through all that they went through during the finale, from external forces coming at them to having them implode from within as a team—was a very bold move and a very brave decision from the writers. And I think making that move as a final one before the last season was the right way to go. I think we all knew that there would come a day when they could no longer work from within the FBI, and that fighting the corruption while still being a part of the system cannot last so long. We all expected them to not be a part of the FBI as they completed the last of their tasks. And the fact that they finally got to this point shows how true the writers have remained to the premise and to the original core mythology. But did anyone see it happening like this? I’m just so blown away by the beautiful craftsmanship of this storytelling. I am in awe. Absolutely in awe.

I am also quite in awe of how well these two episodes flowed together. Remember, they were initially meant to run separately but the rescheduling forced the two-hour finale to run as such. Credit goes first to the writers because the story moved seamlessly from one to the other. And also credit to the editors who managed to make it look like one continuous episode. The rhythm never faltered, the pacing never felt off, and it just worked so well as one cohesive episode.

But enough of that for now. Let’s go ahead and dissect Madeline’s devilishly elaborate Helios scheme and see just how she managed to absolutely destroy this team because there is just so much for us to look at and take apart.

We finally find out what Madeline’s motivation is and why she’s been doing what she’s been doing, and it turns out her motives and her drive are far more personal than anyone else’s. It’s true, she never had Shepherd’s or Crawford’s ideological platform or any ambition to change the world and install a new world order. Madeline’s drive was purely a personal vendetta, instigated and fueled by emotion rather than logic. And this is probably why we often felt disconnected from her evil plan but also why she went to such extremes. And honestly, what is more interesting to me than the motive—now that we know it—is looking back at everything she’s done and realizing just how long she’s been planning this and how meticulously and carefully and patiently she’s been orchestrating this. And what is terrifying is realizing that all along Madeline has been the ultimate puppet master. Certain things may have come to her by luck, but she knew exactly how to exploit every chance and opportunity and mastermind this vendetta. And looking back at everything that has happened this season and all the things she reached for from seasons before, it just blows me away to see how every single small piece of this puzzle came together.

I don’t think we’ll ever know exactly when or how Madeline began her scheme, but it’s clear now that Madeline has been focused on taking down the FBI since she was very young—or if not exactly taking the FBI down, at least avenging her father. This is not something you whip up on a slow Sunday afternoon. It’s a plan that takes years of scheming, of placing all the right pieces in place, and of waiting patiently until it’s the right time to move these people and the right time to strike. I think it’s safe to assume that she was not always after this team specifically but when certain things fell into place, she did not waste any time jumping to the opportunity to target them to complete her revenge.

Placing herself on the board of HCI was probably always part of the plan. It’s the perfect seat to be in to have access to all this information, and access to all of these people to control, and in many ways remain protected. Taking out Hank Crawford was probably always on her to do list, but I guess we can say she got lucky when the team got to him first. That gave her the perfect opportunity to pounce and take his seat and also gave her the perfect target within the FBI—our beloved team. And once she got her target, Madeline wasted no time building Helios around taking them down, and honestly you have to give credit to her research team, who managed to dig up so much on them. And you also have to give her credit for managing to build such an airtight case against them—designing Helios in such a way that it is so convincing even if she had to pin a few things on the likes of Tasha and Kurt to paint the full picture.

Speaking of Tasha, looking back now, I cannot help but wonder if the orders to Keaton to send Tasha undercover were orchestrated by Nash who we now know is on Madeline’s payroll. I think what is more likely is the other option—that Nash had nothing to do with Tasha going undercover with Blake but everything to do with Madeline knowing all along that she was CIA. And what better than keeping Tasha by her side long enough to build a decent rap sheet against her? I think Madeline knew from the beginning who Tasha was and what she was doing there and that had been—along with the team taking down Crawford—the first perfect piece to the Helios puzzle: make sure Tasha is part of and witness to enough crimes that Madeline can pin on her because at the end of the day it is going to be Tasha’s word versus Madeline’s, and if everything goes according to plan, Madeline’s is the word that is going to win.

And after that, all Madeline needed to do is make sure the team stays on her trail, gather dirt on them, and ultimately get them arrested. Yes, I honestly believe getting arrested had always been part of the plan—making Madeline the perfect victim of this vicious vindictive FBI team and garnering all the sympathy towards her as well as hatred for the team—nothing like spreading some fake news to gather the mobs. Just before she gets arrested in 4.17, Madeline tells Tasha, “And while I always suspected you might be working for the government, I also suspected there was a chance I could turn you.” And to this Tasha replies, “Sorry to disappoint,” but it’s Madeline’s reply that—in hindsight—gives me all the chills. She says, “Oh, no, you haven’t. I wouldn’t change a thing.” And this just again convinces that every single thing that happened, every move that the team made, had all fallen just in the right places that Madeline needed them to fall in to fit perfectly into her master plan.

Gathering dirt on the rest of the team could not have been that hard. Rich has a colorful history that is known to everyone. Having access to Crawford’s hard drive, which she got from Kira, meant she had access to intel Crawford got from Hirst, which it’s safe to assume included Reade’s drug problems and probably his involvement with Coach Jones’s murder and the disappearance of the lone suspect, and I’m sure Hirst knew all about Megan. And then there’s Jane, and while her file is classified, Madeline has Nash and all the CIA black site intel that he has access to, so knowing the truth about her identity and her past must have been a breeze. And as for Weitz, well there’s a guy walking with not a closet but an entire wardrobe department full of skeletons. Getting dirt on Weitz was probably also rather accessible, especially again with Hirst’s intel. Finding out about Patterson’s involvement with The Three Blind Mice was probably a little bit harder but also I think not so impossible. With Madeline’s connections and Kathy being Kathy I can see the former eventually finding out the truth and recruiting Kathy. It’s a bit trickier than the others which would explain why Kathy came much later in the game. And finally, there’s Kurt Weller. And while he has made a few decisions along the way that Madeline could have used against him, whether it’s his covering the truth about what happened to Taylor or more recently with Remi’s return and what she had done, I love the fact that Madeline could not find these things out and had to resort to framing him for things that he did not do. She had Briana steal his personal gun and then have Dominic use it to kill innocent people to incriminate him for this crimes. And she also resorted to some elaborate conspiracy theory about him and Jane setting up this whole thing to infiltrate the FBI and whatnot—which I love because it’s the same crazy theory that Weitz had tried to pin on them all the way back in season 2.

It’s interesting that what she has on Kurt is so flaky and can easily be exposed if only Briana would come forward with the truth. Against everyone else, she has more concrete evidence—and what she has against Tasha is also a frame job but less easily exposed. So it should be interesting seeing how long those accusations against Kurt last. But we’ll get to Briana and what she might and might not do in a bit. But before I close this on Madeline and Helios, I have a few questions about Dominic—which might now never get answered but still—why was he so loyal to Madeline and Helios? What was his personal motivation to be part of it? Was burying Jane a part of the plan all along or did he act out on his own? And what about his relationship with Kathy? It seemed staged at first but his sending her the message before he basically kills himself felt like maybe he wasn’t faking it?

There is no denying that our team has been put through the wringer this season. But the finale tests them in ways they could never have imagined. How do they hold up... and what do we think the future holds for them?

Y: Wow. Just wow. Everything surrounding the team—what they went through as a group, and what they went through individually, what happened to them, and what they did to themselves—was absolutely brilliant. Watching them fall apart and fight after seeing how close they’ve become as friends and as a family was absolutely heartbreaking. But then watching them make up and stand there together, having lost everything, realizing that they still have each other and that is enough to take on the world and promising to stick together until the bitter end? That healed my broken heart and filled me with so much joy. It was incredible to watch them go through this.

And then they got blown up. No big deal. And honestly, the emotional implosion was more powerful than that drone strike.

The actors carried the plot and the characters’ emotional response to everything so wonderfully, and honestly that is one of the main reasons that the finale was almost flawless. And the writers somehow managed to make these two episodes huge for every single one of these characters, and I am not only talking about our regulars. So this week’s team section includes all our favorites and almost as many of the familiar recurring characters. That’s how good the writing was for the two-hour finale. Everyone got so much to work with and every single character who appeared in these episodes got so much story. We have so much to discuss when it comes to both our core team as well as Briana, Weitz, and Keaton.

Let’s start with Briana, shall we? Our once mild-mannered and often forgotten assistant has suddenly become a major player whose involvement with Dominic proved catastrophic for a certain Kurt Weller. And her involvement has put her in the middle of everything, not just for this isolated incident, but also for the story moving forward. I mentioned in last episode’s review that the way they got Briana into the mix bugged me a little bit. I think if they’d shown her flat out refuse Dominic’s offer and then only give in when they threatened her family that would have made us sympathize more with her and not just feel anger and betrayal towards her. But in the opening scene of the finale, we do see just how guilty she feels about her actions and her own disappointment in her actions. It does make me feel bad for her, enough that I am rooting for her to do the right thing moving forward.

We don’t see much of Briana for the rest of the episode. She’s in the background for most of the day, but she does not get called upon by either the team or Madeline’s people. And we don’t really see her react to the accusations until the very end. We know for a fact that Briana is in perfect position to clear the team, or at least clear Kurt’s name. It’s true that doing so will put her in a very bad place and potentially get her in a lot of trouble. I don’t know how helpful to her case it would be that Dominic threatened her family, but she owes it to the team to come clean. She really screwed them over. Madeline could not have taken Kurt down without Briana’s involvement.

Briana can have a huge role to play as we move into the last episodes. For starters, she’s one of the very few left at the FBI, and she holds valuable information. She is going to be in a precarious position and definitely on Madeline’s radar. But more than that, the team do not know about her betrayal and if they are going to ever try to reach out to anyone back at the NYO, Briana remains one of the options. (As is Afreen. I am dying for my girl to be the hero of the day and help the team, but that’s another conversation.) I don’t think Briana will necessarily become a regular but something has to be said about the fact that during that last scene, as Madeline green lights the drone attack, they made sure to focus on Briana. She got three very specific close ups during that scene—the guilt and terror evident on her face—and that has to mean something moving forward, right?

The team are going to need people in their corner, especially people who can help them out in any way possible, and as much as I am disappointed in Briana, I am also rooting for her to do the right thing.

L: Absolutely. You can do it, Briana! This is your chance to save the day and be a hero!

I have to admit I was a little bit worried at the start of the episode, when Dominic met Briana with no effort to conceal his identity. Obviously, he wasn’t worried about her being able to identify him. And even more worrisome to me was that Briana didn’t seem at all surprised to see him. Dominic’s picture would have been all over the NYO as the investigation progressed, especially while Jane was missing, so Briana would have been able to identify him instantly. Did she always know she was communicating with him? He disguised his voice when he threatened her parents and presumably whenever he made contact with her before, so at what point did she realize who she was dealing with? And at that moment, wouldn’t she have realized she was in way over her head, consorting with the very criminals she was sworn to stop?

I agree that her motivation was kind of a weak link for me in this storyline. I would have liked to see more of what led her to talk with Dominic in the first place. I know the earlier storyline with the crime novelist was meant to show us that she wasn’t satisfied with her job, but there’s a pretty big leap between “I feel unappreciated at work” and “I want to betray my sworn duties and my country.” I would have liked to see some steps in the middle there.

But that said, I do think that Briana’s heart is more or less in the right place. She did tell Dominic that she wouldn’t work for him and only gave in once he threatened her parents. But she knows that he’s dead now, and she does know a few people who might be able to keep her parents safe from any threats. So I hope that she’ll go to Weitz and start their own little rebellion to take back the NYO in season 5.

Which brings us to the guy running—or mismanaging, as the case may be—the FBI.

Y: Speaking of rooting for people to do the right thing, Matthew Weitz sits firmly at the top of that list. It’s been quite an interesting season for Weitz, and this last episode was huge for him. The writers managed to give him an entire arc, to dive deep into his character and set him up nicely to be more involved in the next season. Ever since he first appeared on the show, Weitz has been the character we love to hate. He’s obnoxious and smarmy and self-serving and the polar opposite of our team on the moral compass. Every time he’s around it spells bad news for the team, even when he’s technically on their side, he somehow finds a way to make things worse for them. He’s always managed to walk the very fine line between the sides of the law, making sure he leans just enough towards safety that he keeps his hands clean of any real mess and knows just how to hide anything that might tip him to the other side. He knows how to take care of number one, to make sure his needs are met and to hell with everyone else. And so it seems quite perfect that the episode starts with him trying to get himself into a better job than the one he’s in—how many jobs has this man had?—and hoping to get out of his current position with nothing but a stellar report card.

And what makes Weitz interesting is that he knows all that about himself. He doesn’t pretend to be something that he is not. He is ambitious and vicious and doesn’t care about who he hurts or what he has to do along the way to reach where he wants to reach. He says just that in the episode while arguing with Kurt in the car. It’s the way he’s been since we first met him. But by seeing more of him this season, we did witness a few moments where we thought that maybe Weitz could change, that maybe being around the team might be the trigger he needs to better himself, and that maybe it’s his turn to shine under the spotlight of character development. Coming into the finale, and with his feud with Kurt, the odds were against him. But then the events of the day unraveled, and I like to think that maybe this was the gut punch that Matty needed to take a step back and have a close look at his life and the choices he’s made. He’s not used to ending up on the losing side. Even when he couldn’t take the team down in season 2, he still managed to come out of it with a win and a nice new job. But this loss is like nothing he’s ever seen in this episode, and I really think the learning curve for him was pretty intense.

I’m not saying Weitz has been reformed. No, far from it—he still has a long long way to go. But this episode was really a wake-up call and I think by the end of it, Weitz was on the verge of turning a page—of making a choice that would alter the course on which he had thought his life belonged. Rich’s line to him about them not being similar really stung—you could see it clearly on his face—and from the minute Madeline took apart the team in the conference room, Weitz’s demeanor completely changed. By the way, I really appreciate him trying to stand up to Kurt. They might have never seen eye to eye, but I think Weitz has so much respect for him and it showed in that moment. But I really think it was that slap in the face from Rich and the way the day ended that are going to be what pushes Weitz into hopefully doing the right thing next season and seeking his redemption.

And yes, I am on the team that believes that Weitz was the one to warn the team about the drone attack when he left the SIOC with his phone in the moments before the green light.

L: Honestly, until season 5 definitively tells me otherwise, I remain firmly convinced that Weitz was the one who warned the team.

Since we first met Weitz, as an Assistant US Attorney, we’ve known that he was smarmy and self-serving, yes. But he’s not evil like our bad guys have been. He went after Mayfair because he thought it would help his career, but also because he believed she was guilty. Same with the team and Weller. And he’s been a pain in the ass, certainly, as a boss, but he’s also grown to trust and respect this team, who, for the most part, have made him look like he’s doing a pretty good job. He’s like a cat; he generally lands on his feet. And so it’s interesting to watch that moment when he realizes that instead of being a player, he’s the one who has been played. Nash used his own ambition against him, to set him up. And just like with Patterson and Rich, Weitz falls right into the trap. That’s gotta sting for a guy who prides himself on his ability to come out of trouble smelling like the proverbial rose.

Weitz may not be smart the way Patterson is, but he’s not dumb either. He’s very clever at figuring out how to spin a situation to his own advantage. We’ve always seen him land on his feet. And so, just as it is unexpected to see Patterson and Rich being outsmarted by criminals rather than the other way around, it’s refreshing to see Weitz set back on his heels, at a clear disadvantage. Unfortunately, we’re too worried about the team to really revel his discomfort during the press conference the first time around, but it was really a moment to savor during my rewatch. As pissed off as I am at him, I think he’s just fallen down the slippery slope he was skirting. He ordered an illegal drone strike against an innocent man to cover up evidence of wrongdoing, and by the end of the episode, he sees the same tactic used against the team, a group of people who had been nothing but loyal to the FBI—and to him. Despite all of his blustering, Kurt didn’t expose his secrets to the world. And even when the team finds out, none of them do either. And for their silence, they are punished.

And so it’s going to be interesting to see what Weitz does in season 5. He’s going to want to hang onto his job, of course, but to do that, he has to be willing to allow Madeline and Nash call all the shots. How far is he willing to go? Would he be willing to sacrifice his career in order to bring down Madeline? And even if he is, will the team be willing to trust him again? Because the only way they are going to be able to fully exonerate themselves is by someone with some power and clout making sure the truth they reveal is heard and exposed to the world, and they will need someone on the inside who is willing and able to do that for them.

I have to say, this is the most interested I have ever been in seeing what Matty Weitz does next!

Y: And if Weitz needs a good role model to emulate on his journey from “a character we love to hate” to simply “a character we love” then all he has to do is look to Jake Keaton. We’ve never been subtle about how much we have grown to love Keaton and how impressed we are with how the writers have managed to develop his character and turn him from Jane’s torturer whom we vowed to hate forever to a character we care about and root for and who has become one of the team’s most dependable allies—in his own CIA way.

I know that there are other characters whose fates at the end of the episode are far worse than being relocated by your boss to Malta—I mean being escorted to a black site and getting blown up do kind of suck more than a having to move to a picturesque Mediterranean island—but still I do feel kind of bad for Keaton. All the guy ever wanted to do was serve his country and do the right thing. He definitely did not deserve to be the fall guy for this mess, but I guess that’s what it’s like to work for the Company, and the way he talked about it, it seems like Keaton always knew that. Also, Nash is an asshole. One last thing, Keaton’s “new assignment” while it fit the narrative of the episode itself also gives the writer something to play with next season and places yet another character in a position that might be useful to the team.

Just like Briana and Weitz will both still be at the FBI, or so I assume, having Keaton in Europe could fit in well with our team being on the run. We know Keaton has CIA contacts, and he can definitely help the team travel around undetected; get them safe houses, money, and weapons; and could also be a source of intel for them. And just like Briana can be the one to clear Kurt’s name, Keaton is in position to do the same for Tasha, but the question remains if they will let him or not. Keaton can prove to be a very useful ally to the team some way or another. I just hope they don’t kill him or send him into another coma. But either way, I am pretty sure that this isn’t the last we’ve seen of him and now he too has a score to settle, at least with Nash, and it should be fun if he once again teams up with our group of plane-jumping fugitives.

L: Yes, I think that Keaton is definitely a player who can help aid our team from the right side of the law, so I am certain that we will see more of him in season 5. And I do think that he and Tasha kind of bonded during her time with the CIA. There is genuine respect between them. And so he is someone the team can trust (no matter what misgivings Reade and Jane might have about him).

And the more I think about Keaton, the more I come back to Shepherd. We know two things about her grand plan: One, she believed that Keaton, like Weller, was incorruptible and could be trusted with leading the CIA, just as Kurt could be trusted to lead the FBI. And two, she believed that she couldn’t fix the corruption from outside the machine, which is why she had to send Jane into the FBI, so they could clean their own house. And I do feel that in many ways, the team’s mission in season 5 is following through with the goal of removing corruption within the government. And to do that, they have to have people inside who are willing to expose it, otherwise Madeline and her cronies will circle the wagons, bury the evidence, and continue to spin the narrative they want the world to follow.

So I expect both Keaton and Weitz (and Briana as well) to step up next season.

And I agree, Nash is an asshole, and I want to see him get his comeuppance almost as much as I want to see Madeline get hers!

Y: And moving from one adversary-turned-friend to another, I think it’s time we talk about Rich, because if anyone has had a beautiful and fulfilling arc on this show it has to be Rich Dotcom. We’ve talked a lot this season about Rich’s transformation, and about how finding this team and this family has given him purpose and allowed him to grow and develop and find redemption. And then this episode comes and throws at him the ultimate test to everything his character has gone through—a test of his goodness, of his loyalty, his friendship, his commitment to his job, his commitment to doing what’s right, his faith in the team and in himself—and I don’t know about you, but at the end, all I can say is that my heart is so full. It’s full of love for this character and his arc and his journey, full of happiness and pride at how far he’s come and who he has become, and of course because this is Blindspot, full of worry and trepidation regarding what’s in store for him.

Every time I rewatch the episode, especially those last couple of scenes with Rich, I’m just blown away to see how far his character has come and yet how true he still remains to who he is—proving that true character growth can be exciting and interesting and take one character and make them the best possible version of themselves without sacrificing integrity and originality of the character. Many times this season, we have seen just how far Rich has come and how being part of this team has helped him grow, and helped learn to think of others and not just himself. He’s grown to become a part of this family. On more than one occasion, he has had to risk his life for them and watch them risk their lives for him and understand the true meaning of being part of a family. And he has even admitted it a few times as well—seeing these changes in himself and appreciating them and also appreciating the team for welcoming him and helping him grow into this better version of himself.

And this finale was a test to all that character growth and a test to see just how committed he is to this new version of himself, to the team, and to being a good person. He had many chances during the finale to stumble, and we would have forgiven him if he had because there is nothing wrong with self-preservation, especially when faced with a force determined to take you down and ruin your life. But even though Rich knew what was at stake and knew that he could have easily saved himself, his loyalty to the team and his determination to help save them remained his priority. And honestly, if you think about it, Rich could have taken that phone and gone somewhere safe and still tried to hack that Helios file from a place he wouldn’t have been caught. I’m sure The Boston would have welcomed him and helped him hack it—because we all know now that he’s free, Boston has all the good toys to help him do all the hacking. But Rich knew that the best resources were at the FBI, and he was not going to opt for a lesser setup to try and help the team. Would anyone have blamed him if he’d left the building and tried to hack the phone from somewhere else? I know I wouldn’t have, and every time I watch the episode, I find myself yelling at Rich to get out of that air duct and go to Starbucks and work from there.

But no, not this Rich.

This Rich never leaves his post, won’t let a silly little arrest warrant and an office swarming with trained agents hunting for him stop him from helping and trying to protect his family. And this is what I loved about Rich in the finale. Yes, he was fantastic while doing all the stuff he typically does as one half of the Wonder Twins, but he really got a chance to shine when he was left alone and especially when we got to see him juxtaposed with Weitz in the final part of the episode. Hiding out in that vent, still doing his damnedest to help the team, to do his part, and do the right thing and consequently getting arrested was all we needed as proof that the growth he’s done hasn’t been for show and that it will stick. It wasn’t just growth when it seemed convenient and with a reset button when things got real.

And that final scene when he is in the interrogation room is just the most perfect Rich Dotcom scene that ever was, and, in my opinion, Ennis Esmer’s most remarkably acted scene. Even with all the growth that we’ve seen in Rich over the past two years, there has always been a certain Richness to his more emotional moments—a certain smart-ass attitude and cockiness that are uniquely him. And even in moments of weakness or vulnerability, that edge to him was always present and always loud. But in that moment, when he confronts both Weitz and Nash, he is just so vulnerable and exposed, and there is that level of honesty and rawness to him, and it’s the most real we’ve ever seen him. His emotions and his vulnerability are there at the surface for us to witness, and if you don’t fall in love with Rich in that moment and if your heart doesn’t simultaneously shatter for him and fill with pride and love, then I’m sorry but we can’t be friends anymore.

All the credit goes to Ennis Esmer for such an incredible performance in that scene and for carrying Rich’s pain and fear and at the same time his strength and his conviction in such a perfect and touching way. And I cannot wait to see where his story goes next season. Rich in a black site is something I am terrified about, because I am scared for him and what they are going to do. But I firmly believe that it will only make him stronger and give him that much more motivation to come back and be a better person and never look back.

L: All of the cast members definitely brought their A games to this episode, but I agree; Ennis was phenomenal in that scene!

There hasn’t been any question of where Rich’s loyalties lie this season, not since he turned down Hirst’s offer last season to turn on the team in exchange for his freedom and Boston’s location. But I’d be lying if I said it didn’t warm my heart a bit every time he puts the team ahead of his own well-being. And the way that he does that in this episode was just awesome. He doesn’t run—despite being told repeatedly to save himself—and he continues to help the team right up until he’s caught by Nash. And even then, he refuses to tell them anything about the team. (He also refuses to give Weitz Dominic’s phone with the Helios intel, so I have high hopes for a retrieve-the-phone-from-the-NYO-air-duct heist next season.)

Now I do have to admit that I have my concerns about how well Rich is going to hold up in a black site, but frankly, the team is going to need his dark web contacts (like Mr. Ice Cream) and also probably the bitcoin he’s got stashed away, so rescuing him should be pretty high up on their priority list.

After Jeller, Patterson and Rich might be my favorite pairing. Not in a romantic sense, but in a Wayne-and-Garth, Han-Solo-and-Chewbacca, iconic duo fashion. I love these two nerds. I love watching them be the smartest people in the room, waiting for the mere mortals to catch up. I love watching them fist bump when they pull off something huge. But as I mentioned in the case section, I think maybe they were due for a wake-up call. They were so sure they were outwitting Kathy and Madeline that they never considered that they might be the ones being outwitted. The team has been playing right into Madeline’s hands all season, but in this episode especially we see Rich and Patterson being so convinced that they are right that they tune out any dissenting voices or evidence to the contrary. We see Patterson going ahead with her plans to fix the grid, even as Rich yells at her that she’s making it worse. And then we see Rich going against Weitz to put bitcoin into Kathy’s ransom account, only to discover that the money was immediately re-directed to accounts in the team’s names. Yes, Madeline’s plan was fiendishly clever, but these two are pretty smart. Giving Kathy money, not checking to see what else she did while she was tapped into the New England National Bank—these are the kinds of things that they most certainly would have caught (especially new accounts in their own names!), if they’d been looking around for them. But they had kind of tunnel vision, believing they were the cat and not the mouse. Like all of our team, Patterson and Rich will be sadly wiser for this lesson in season 5.

Which brings us to Rich’s partner in crime...

Y: Agent Patterson, whose first name remains a mystery despite the endless inside jokes and endless teasing from the writers.

Patterson has been an absolute MVP from the first moment she popped upon on our screens. She is, after all, the LeBron of the FBI as voted unanimously by everyone. Week in and week out, our Patty saves the day, saves the millions of people living on the east coast, and saves her team’s butts out in the field from her awesome lab. She also has a whole lot of money, an awesome relationship with her parents, and has plans to adopt. Yes, she’s a little unlucky in the dating department, but that has never stopped her from being an absolute superstar.

She knows it, and the team knows it. Jane says as they’re trying to escape the museum in Iceland that as long as Patterson is out there, as long as she’s not captured, the rest of them stand a chance. And that’s true.

And that’s also kind of a little scary because making her the most valuable also makes her the most likely to “die” in that drone strike—which I think is what they will lead us to believe for some time before we find her alive and well.

But back to this episode. So, we’ve known for a long time just how badass and invaluable Patterson is. But in this finale, Patterson had her most iconic moment to date—her “birth of a leader” moment—and it was epic. I’ve always thought that a day will come when Patterson will be running the show. I just never expected it to be out of a cabin in the middle of nowhere in Iceland and as a wanted fugitive accused of terrorism and treason. Patterson had a few incredible moments in the finale but for me that one absolutely stood out and I believe defines her as we move towards the final stretch and will probably go down as one of Patterson’s most iconic moments.

Every so often, you have a character who finally grows into their own, embraces all their potential and has that “birth of a leader” moment. And our Patterson got her “birth of a leader” in this episode as the team gathered around her and she gave a speech that got them to drop their differences and united them as they basically pledged their allegiance to her.

Reade did a great job when they needed someone with diplomacy and a suit, and Kurt’s always been the one to go to when it’s about gut instinct and split-second decisions, but now, it’s Patterson’s turn to take charge, and boy is she ready to do so!

And yes, I am ignoring how the accusations Madeline made against her are ones that she’s actually guilty of and would totally stick if it comes to it, because right now all I care about is that incredible scene where Patterson took her rightful place at the throne.

L: I completely agree about Patterson’s “birth of a leader” moment. While there is no question that Patterson frequently saves the day for our team, it’s usually been from a more subordinate role; she provides the information they need at just the right moment (like how to land a jet with no working engines), but she’s not the one on the ground leading the team and calling the shots. But if there is anyone who can take this team of alpha dogs and make them work like a pack, it’s Patterson.

Patterson’s arc has been an interesting one over the course of these four seasons. In the early episodes, she seems quite young—brilliant in the lab, but still trying to establish her career at the FBI. Over the years, we see her grow in confidence, even as—or perhaps because—the universe deals her one blow after another. The girl who breaks up with David after criticism from Assistant Director Mayfair becomes the woman who stands up to Director Weitz—and wins! This season we see her running her lab like a boss and, at times, the whole NYO. This transformation is not without cost to her, though. Although she began the series more on the straight and narrow—not unlike Weller—by the end of season 2 we saw her burned out enough to leave the FBI, start a new career, and engage in a bit of cyber-activism on the side.

These hacking adventures provide some great foreshadowing for her role in season 5. Because there is no question that she’s going to be absolutely critical in the fight to take Madeline down. They’re going to need all of Patterson’s (and Rich’s) tech skills to get the information they need to bring down Madeline. (Man, I need to know what’s on that phone like yesterday!) And you know at some point Patterson is going to have to hack into the FBI. She’ll know every backdoor into that system (which she can conveniently blame on the now-dead designer of the new system). Wouldn’t it be awesome to see Patterson and Afreen going head-to-head electronically? Although I’m hoping Afreen will join the team of rebels working inside the FBI to help clear our team.

I really can’t wait to see what brilliant feats Patterson pulls off in season 5.

Y: Then of course we have, the ever elegantly dressed Assistant Director Edgar Reade. There’s no denying that Reade has been doing a great job as AD of the NYO especially given that he has already had to clean up after Hirst turned out to be dirty and then deal with having Weitz as his boss. He also cannot be envied about having this team working for him. Don’t take this the wrong way, I love the team and I think they are the most badass team there ever was, but they are not the easiest to have under your command—there’s the former dark web criminal, the former Navy Seal turned terrorist with memory problems, the little genius with the side white hacking hobby, his best friend slash soulmate who went on a little “assistant to the devil” sabbatical, and finally his former boss, a ridiculously alpha control freak male. So yes, given all that, I’m surprised Reade hasn’t quit his job and opened a hot dog cart. I know I would have. So given how far he’s gone to cover for all these people and protect them from the suits upstairs, I don’t really blame Reade for snapping when he realized that people were still keeping things from him and going behind his back.

Yes, there is a level of hypocrisy there, and we’ll get to that in a minute, but I do feel bad for him. One minute he thinks everything is under control and the next minute, he finds out about Kurt and Weitz, and then he finds out about Patterson, Rich, and Kathy. And I understand him getting so mad because I believe that had he known, he would have still had their backs. But it still hurt hearing him say those things, and not just to Jane, but also to Kurt and Patterson and of course Tasha—the one person he owes almost everything to. But I especially liked how real it all felt, when the team finally let it all out, in that they dug deep, and they went all the way back and brought up things that have been hidden and buried under the surface since season. It especially worked with Reade, who in season 1 had been the most vocally opposed to Jane’s joining the team and her effect on Kurt. Listening to him attack Jane—and Kurt—on the plane and before that in the locker took me straight back to early season 1 when Reade would warn Kurt against Jane’s participation in the team and when he would be straight with Jane about his discomfort with her presence especially around Kurt, when he said, “When he’s around you, the guy I lean on, the guy I know... isn’t there. And that scares the hell out of me.” And he’s said to Kurt about Jane, “Look, we have no idea what we’re getting ourselves into. You sure you want to bring her today? […] All right, honestly, the idea of having her armed and out in the field makes me nervous.”

It just goes to show that these things never went away, and it felt so real because who hasn’t done the same? When you find yourself getting in a fight with someone, you always somehow revert to that one thing that happened so long ago that you had thought you were over or thought that you’d forgiven, but it’s still there, waiting to get out into the open to be properly addressed.

So to a certain extent I do find that moment with Jane somewhat understandable. And the same goes for what he said to Patterson, especially from a purely “I’m the boss and you kept this from me after I specifically asked you about it” point of view. But what I think is completely unforgivable is him going after Tasha especially now that he knows why she was doing what she was doing and how ever since she’s been back she’s been unwaveringly loyal—and mostly because dammit, Edgar, she has kept your secrets for so long and she’s protected you and had your back more than anyone else in your entire life and she’s been the best friend you could have never imagined. What he said to Tasha pissed me off more than what he said to either Jane or Patterson or Kurt or about Rich.

But as much as he had the right to be angry at being lied to and the secrets that others were keeping from him, we do have to point out that he wasn’t all that innocent himself. And what’s interesting is that—for all his being pissed off at the others—the rap sheet he’s got is pretty bad. And with Reade, he is pretty much guilty of the things that Madeline has accused him of—and what Tasha threw back at him with regards to Coach Jones. It’s all coming full circle here. All these plot lines from earlier seasons, they have not been forgotten—not by the writers and not by the other characters on the show. And it is going to be interesting to see where we go on from here, especially for Reade, because clearing their names would require proving what Madeline has on them is fake but in his case, it’s not. And for someone who’s tried to maintain that facade of being by the book this whole time, how he gets himself out of it is going to be a true test for Reade.

L: I think the thing to remember about Reade is that he knows he was promoted to AD not because of his abilities, but because Hirst believed he would do what she wanted. That knowledge colors everything he does; he knows he has already fallen short of the yardstick by which he would measure himself against Mayfair and all of the previous AD’s (including Weller). So he’s already a little bit insecure when he discovers that his boss and his predecessor are up to something and deliberately keeping him out of the loop. When we take this into account, his actions and attitude in this episode make more sense.

And the thing is: He isn’t wrong. The team has lied. They have broken the law, and they have covered up those crimes. Their attacks on each other are so painful to watch because they’re true. They are disappointed in each other, and they are disappointed in themselves. They are supposed to be the good guys, the ones who stop the bad guys, and instead, they have done bad things and are losing to the bad guys. Maybe they aren’t really better just because they are the ones with badges. And for all of the career law enforcement types, especially Reade, that has to hurt. Because—unlike Kurt—Reade doesn’t have anything else. He doesn’t have a wife or a child to keep him going. He poured everything into his career, and that’s slipping away.

So, yes, he lashes out at everyone, up to and including Tasha. Because of all of them, Tasha hurt him the most. He’d been in love with her for years, but she pushed him away. And then she told him she loved him, and he let things end with Megan on the promise that Tasha’s words meant something. And she sleeps with him and then ghosts him, and when he sees her again, she lies and lies and lies to him. (And ties him to a chair and cold cocks him, but I think that’s probably the easiest thing to get past.) So I think that what Yas said about things from the past bubbling up is true across the board. This wound is just more recent and runs a whole lot deeper.

But we can’t really discuss Reade without also talking about Tasha.

Y: Look, I think we need to get one thing out in the open: I love Tasha Zapata. Like, in case this is the first time you are reading our reviews or “meeting” me and don’t already know, I really really love Tasha. I will defend Tasha until my dying breath. Tasha Zapata is everything. Everything! So this is going to be more me gushing over Tasha than saying anything remotely intellectual or useful. You’ve been warned.

It’s no secret how amazing this season has been for Tasha. After spending three seasons as an incredible supporting character, Tasha—and Audrey—finally got the chance to be in the spotlight and get her own long arc and carry half the plot for quite a while. Going undercover with Madeline gave Tasha the chance to leave her sidekick role and come into her own. It gave her a chance to explore who she is, ask questions about what she wants, what she believes, what she’s capable of, and where she wants to be in the world. After years of feeling out of place and looking for her true purpose, she finally found it, but of course not without the battle scars and cracks in her armor to prove it.

Tasha’s journey this season really highlighted the most integral parts of her character and focused on the same core characteristics and intentions that drove her plots in earlier seasons—helping her friends, following orders, bringing down the bad people. All such noble and commendable goals and intentions. And the things that Tasha eventually gets framed for are all a result of these things that backfire on her so horribly. But also, much like Kurt, she is quite innocent of all these things—at least the things that Madeline framed her for. Luckily for her, the things Madeline does not know about—covering for Reade and her involvement with the Coach Jones case—are actually the things she could get in trouble for.

But all Tasha has tried to do since we met her has been for the side that is responsible for stopping bad guys and ending corruption and doing the right thing. And because she never truly found her place at either the NYPD or the FBI, this led her to the CIA and eventually undercover with Madeline—just because she was following orders and trying to do the right thing. And it really sucks for her that not only was her reputation at the CIA ruined and she had Sabrina Larren after her, she ended being completely screwed over and found guilty of all the crimes Madeline had committed when she was with her. Because Madeline is a freaking evil genius. And what’s worse for Tasha is that she had at least two people who can vouch for her and get her out of this—Claudia and Keaton. But of course, Madeline had Claudia killed—and pinned that too on Tasha—and Nash made sure Keaton has been exiled and his reputation too not so great at the CIA, so even if he does come back to try to clear her name, I’m not so sure how many people would listen.

As usual, the best part of Tasha’s story comes down to her being the best friend a person can possibly have, not just to one but to every single member of her team. Even though she was separated from them for half a season and even though they almost gave up on her for a second, she still remained so fiercely loyal and protective of them. And even after Reade was unnecessarily snippy with her as well, she still had his back. In this episode alone, Tasha had incredible moments with each and every one of them. She defended Kurt’s choices and what he had to do to keep Weitz off Jane’s back to Reade, she supported Patterson when the latter was nervous about stopping the virus, she immediately jumped up to save Jane and Kurt by asking Ice Cream for SWAT uniforms, and her smile and hug with Jane at the cabin was the sweetest and the most genuine thing I have ever seen. But I think the most important moment of all is on the plane when the team were going at it and she let it slip about her covering for Reade. The reaction from everyone else makes it clear that Tasha had never spoken a word to anyone about what had happened with Coach Jones and that she had kept Reade’s secret safe for at least four years now.

And in my heart, I have a special place for Tasha and Keaton’s relationship and how it’s developed and evolved over the years. We saw how theirs was not only a working relationship anymore when she chose not to let him take the fall for the Madeline situation earlier this season and in the finale, that hug between them made me so happy—it was so pure and genuine and sweet. It really showed what kind of person Tasha is—rough on the outside, with walls that seem impenetrable, but in reality she’s the kindest, softest soul who just loves so much and cares so much but is terrified to let it show.

Honestly, I don’t think the universe deserves such a beautiful precious human being. She is too good for us.

L: How can anyone not love Tasha? She’s fierce and snarky and loyal and will totally fight you if you cross someone she loves.

I think her last scene with Keaton might be my favorite Tasha scene in this episode. When he says goodbye, he holds out his hand to shake hers, and she ignores that to fling herself at him for a hug. Honestly, that is Tasha in a nutshell right there. She is cautious and suspicious and slow to warm up to people, but once you worm your way into her heart, you’re there for good. She’s 110% loyal to the people she trusts, and that group isn’t a large one. It took her a while to embrace Jane, but once she did, that was it. Remember the scene in season 3 when she asked Jane if she was going to run again? “[Weller’s] not the only one who would miss you. Don’t go back to that hotel room. Stay at my place. I promise I won’t make you talk about your feelings. I hate feelings, we can just drink.” Once Keaton made it onto Tasha’s list, he became part of her family too. And no, Reade doesn’t get that, because Reade is different. He views everyone, even the people he loves, with a dose of skepticism and reserve. And maybe that’s a result of his childhood; after all, he once trusted Coach Jones, too. And that’s why he’s had such a hard time forgiving Tasha and trusting her again. And that’s why he immediately questions Tasha about both her loyalty and Keaton’s. And it’s why Tasha doesn’t understand why Reade can’t forgive her. She’s always had his back, even when she had to pretend otherwise, and she thinks he should know that and trust her and the rest of the team.

I have to admit, I was a little bit surprised that we’re didn’t get more resolution between Tasha and Reade in this episode. But I guess they were a little busy for a romantic heart-to-heart. But we did get Tasha telling Reade, “You’re not alone, Reade. I’ve got you. Always.” And let’s be real: from Tasha Zapata, that’s even more binding than a declaration of love.

One of the most painful, but also most brilliant things about this episode is the way it tears the team apart, but also makes them really think about what is most important—and what they know in their guts to be true. Who do they know they can trust, who will have their backs in the worst of situations?

Honestly, the team interaction in this episode is really what makes it one of my all-time favorites. In a lot of ways, it echoes the themes this show has shown us so thoroughly in Jane Doe’s character. Jane’s journey over these four seasons could be summarized as going from being alone to being part of a community. In this episode, our team goes from trying to handle things on their own (and, like Jane, sometimes only succeeding in making things worse) to truly embracing their need to work as a team.

And now that the team is operating outside of the protection of the FBI, it makes sense that they might call upon characters that have helped them in the past. Allie and Boston, certainly. Keaton, especially when he finds out that the whole FBI team has been “killed” and branded as traitors. I think Weitz has finally figured out that he’s in bed with a nest of snakes, so he might be willing to help the team—if they are willing to trust him. Briana was manipulated by Dominic, so I am sure she would like some revenge. What about Nas, back at the NSA? And then there are the ones who are a little further outside the law: Rossi? Clem? What about Ana Montes? (I never thought I’d say that I am sorry that Shepherd is dead!) I can’t wait to see who else turns up to help our team in season 5!

When we first met Jane Doe, she was frightened and alone, with no idea who she was. And over four seasons, we’ve seen her grow stronger and braver, find love and a family, and become certain of who she is and where she belongs. What is she willing to do in order to keep all that she holds dear?

Y: Anything and everything. Absolutely anything and everything. From the first day we’d met her, we’ve known that Jane is a person who will go the unthinkable extremes for the ones she loves and to stop what she believes is wrong and evil and unjust. And this year has seen Jane go through a transformation that no other character has ever see. She’s become the best version possible of herself—she’s stronger, more confident, more driven and whole—and if Pilot Jane was a force to be reckoned with, then you can just imagine what this Jane is capable of. Don’t you just love when the writing respects the characters and does them justice? I know I do.

L: We couldn’t ask for more! From the beginning of the pilot, the central thread of this show has been Jane’s journey to find her identity. In season 1, she set out on a quest to discover how she got to Times Square and who she’d been before her memory wipe. Season 2 gave her a name and a family, and ultimately forced her to choose between that family and the life she’d made for herself at the FBI. Season 3 tested her commitment to that choice and asked her how far she would go to hang on to that life. Season 4 finally gave her back all of her memories, both of her lives, and we saw her reconcile them, find her balance, and recommit to her life with Kurt and the FBI. And so it seems terribly, horribly appropriate that the season finale yanks that rug right out from under her. Her new life and everything she built there is stolen from her, and the stage is set for a season 5 that will hopefully allow her to reclaim the future she’s been reaching for since she crawled out of the bag in the pilot.

It’s been a beautiful journey, and what I loved the most about the end of this episode is the way it brings Jane full circle. We have that phenomenal parallel between pre-series Remi, watching her whole team being blown up by an illegal drone strike ordered by the government they served, and season 4 Jane, watching her whole team being blown up by an illegal drone strike ordered by the government they served. In both cases, it was to prevent these teams from exposing the corruption that had been manipulating them. And in both cases, Jane is the one who survives with new motivation to bring justice to the people who ordered the strikes. Jane began this series as someone who had felt betrayed by the people in charge of her country. So betrayed that she was willing to sacrifice everything she had and everything she was to fight that corruption: her memories, her sense of self, even her very skin. She was willing to give up all of it in order to bring an end to gross abuses of power. And now, here she is again, with even more reasons to finish the job she started so long ago.

So we see Jane returning to herself, in many ways. Both of her Remi and Jane selves are finally in agreement, united in the goal of ending this corruption hiding inside of the law. She has her full complement of memories from both of her lives, and her full breadth of skills to call upon. I keep thinking about what Reade says to Jane on the plane. “So, you don’t think people can change?” she asks him, and he says, “No. They don’t change. People just become more like themselves.” And as harsh as that sounds, he’s not wrong. Jane hasn’t changed, she’s finally become fully herself. As Borden told her, “when you joined Orion and then Sandstorm, you were on a search for justice, correct? ... You wanted to right what you saw as a world of wrongs, which isn’t all that different from your role now at the FBI, is it?” This is who Jane is, it’s who she’s always been. It’s why she joined the military, it’s likely how she was recruited into Orion, and it’s how Shepherd was able to draw her into Sandstorm and Phase Two. And it’s why she gets up and goes into the FBI every day, agent or not, and risks her life to “save the world.” Because she knows she can make a difference this way and fix some of the wrongs of the world.

And this is where I really hope that somehow Madeline ties into Orion. It would poetic justice indeed if Madeline’s empire were tied to the organization that Remi first set out to destroy, and if by bringing Madeline down, she could complete the quest she’d set out on four seasons ago. It would bring her journey full circle, and it would be the final step necessary to unite Remi and Jane in her mind, to allow her to view Remi’s actions not as something that she must atone for, but as part of the same battle she is fighting as Jane. It would be both poetic and deeply satisfying for viewers.

I am incredibly excited for season 5, for so many reasons. But near the top of the list is because it finally puts Jane in the driver’s seat. The past four seasons have been all about her finding her way on FBI turf. But now she’s outside of the confines of that institution. This is her home turf; life outside the law, out from under the government’s rules and regulations. We know that she’s no stranger to life on the run. What is even more interesting is how this will affect the team dynamic. For the most part, Jane has followed Reade and Weller’s orders, letting them call the shots. But that was on the FBI’s turf, where they clearly outranked her. But on the run and outside of the law, she’s the one with the most experience and the most contacts. Will she take on a more dominant, leadership role? If they do kill off or seriously injure any of the team members, I think we can expect to see Jane take charge. After all, planning a major government take-down is pretty much what she spent her life training for. She’s got the most seniority in this game.

But it’s also going to be a different game than Remi played. Unlike Remi, Jane has something to lose. She has her whole family: Kurt and the team. Remi didn’t really have a family. Yes, she had Roman, but Shepherd did her best to come between them, to set them up as rivals rather than teammates, so that lone relationship hardly constituted the close bonds of a true family. (Even Avery, the child that Remi bore and Shepherd stole away, falls now on the Jane side, a relationship in the life she built for herself that she needs to fight her way back to.) Everyone else in Remi’s life, even Oscar, fell into the context of Shepherd’s plans. Remi’s value to others lay in what she could do, in her abilities and talents. But Jane has everything that Remi did not: She has love, unconditional love, just for who she is, with no strings attached. She has family, teammates who will guard her back as closely as she would. She trusts her team, in a way that Remi never could, because she knows the lengths they will go to in order to protect the people they love. So Jane is both stronger and more powerful, but also more cautious. Remi had nothing to lose, so there were no limits to what she was willing to risk. She was willing to sacrifice her very skin and all of her memories, because she didn’t have the connections to her life that Jane has. Jane needs to be smarter and more careful about the risks that she takes, because there is too much to be lost if things go wrong. And I think we will see both of these sides warring inside of her in the next season.

Y: In season 1, when Pellington fires Jane, she voices her concern that she does not know what to do now. Coming out of that bag and ending up at the FBI gave her some purpose in a situation that was terrifying and crippling. In trying to uncover the truth, she found a place and purpose within the FBI, waking up every day, coming to work and saving the day. After escaping the CIA black site in season 2, she found another purpose which included stopping Sandstorm and undoing Remi’s terrorist past. Then season 3 came along and she was conflicted between the happy married idyllic life of Colorado and the meaning she found in her K&R work and tried to find that place in between where she belonged. And finally we got to season 4, the most amazing incredible season 4, in which Jane finally got to face off with Remi and her entire past, in which Jane regained all her memories, and in which Jane finally became this whole person she has always meant to be. The list of adjectives to describe this Jane is endless and full of all the best kind of adjectives and all these amazing parts of her came into play in this finale. She’s become stronger than ever, physically and mentally and emotionally—well not so much physically these last few episodes because Jaimie’s injury meant Jane leaned against quite a few walls and cars. She’s also become more sure of herself and more confident. She finally understands and knows who she is and who she wants to be and what her purpose is. She has embraced all that and has found comfort in it. She is fierce as hell in protecting her family, her loved ones, and doing what’s right.

Jane’s relationship with every member of the team has been a journey on its own. And yes this episode did have at its core the team going at each other, but at the end of the day, that implosion had to happen for them to be able to come back closer and more committed. And while the show doesn’t always have time to explore these individual relationships as much as we would love them to, we do always get the rare moments that highlight these connections and emphasize them. And while in many ways Jane has always been a soldier in an army with people around her and part of her team, I don’t think she’s ever allowed herself to let them get so close as with this team, to care for them so much they become a family. As Remi, she only ever had Roman in that same unconditional sense, and even then Shepherd laid such unhealthy and messed up ties to it.

Jane’s relationship with Rich has always been special. Sure, it started with him being slightly obsessed with her and Kurt—can you blame him?—but soon after his joining the team and her return, it developed into something real. Rich early on confided in her that his move to the straight path was very much inspired by her and constantly reminds her that his redemption was very much thanks to her. He was also one of her strongest supporters in her return from being Remi to embracing who she is truly meant to be and despite all his inappropriate behavior, the two have developed a strong and honest friendship.

And honesty in her friendships is something that Jane values a lot and what allows her to be so supportive of these people, to lean on them when she needs to but to also not bend too far backwards that she loses her place. And that was clear in what happened with Reade this episode. They have never necessarily had a warm fuzzy friendship but after the first awkward weeks, I think Reade learned to trust Jane’s abilities in the field and respect her at least for that in the beginning before this family slowly morphed into the beautiful thing we see it now. They had one solid moment earlier this season when Jane was buried and she made him promise not to compromise the case for her—proving that Jane knows exactly what kind of person and what kind of agent Reade is and that she respects him for it. But I also just loved how she stands up for herself when he calls her out on the plane for not being a real agent. She doesn’t say anything when he calls her a terrorist in the locker room because technically she was. But not this. She puts her life on the line every single day, she is out in the field taking bullets and punches more than anyone else, she’s in the lab solving cases and in SIOC writing reports, and she does everything everyone else does and then some. Just because she did not get there like everyone else does not mean she is not very much the agent that they are. After everything she’s been through, she won’t let Reade use that line on her to make her feel unworthy or take away all she has worked and suffered for. And I absolutely loved that from her.

And while friendships in general may or may not have been missing from Remi’s life, I think that one thing we can say with certainty is that Remi never had any girlfriends. You know which kind I’m talking about; the girlfriends who are like your sisters with whom you share a bond that goes beyond just friendship. And I think that this is one of the most important things that Jane has gained in this second chance of hers. Her relationships with Patterson and Tasha—and heck, I’ll throw in Allie here as well—have been one of the most important pillars of who she is now and this incredible person she has become. It’s just so satisfying and beautiful to see Jane specifically have these connections and these friendships. And as a general observation, it’s so satisfying and refreshing to see such genuine and honest and real friendships between women, especially between a woman and her partner’s ex. But for now let’s just take a moment to bask in the perfection that is the friendship among the women of this show and especially Jane’s with Patterson and Tasha.

Of course Jane’s relationship with Kurt is the cornerstone of—well of everything on this show and for these two people—but before I go into how important it is in this episode and how far it’s come, I just want to focus on another relationship that’s a byproduct of this one.

Due to Jaimie’s injury, we couldn’t get all the Jane and Little Bee moments that our hearts desired, but we did get through expository dialogue the confirmation we needed about that precious relationship. Bethany may not be her biological daughter, but we know that Jane adores this little girl as though she were. Her love for her is an amazing thing and adds another admirable layer to Jane and gives her that much to fight for. From her saying “who needs money when we have all this” to saying how lucky they are to have this; from loving having Bethany in bed all night long with them to being heartbroken about the weekend passing by too quickly; and everything about her belief that the reason they do what they do is to provide a safe future for Bethany and being excited about moving to Colorado and watching her grow. In their world where everything can be dark and gloomy and depressing, Bethany brings in an air of innocence and simplicity and adds a ray of hope into their world—and especially into Jane’s.

And finally there’s Jane’s relationship with Kurt. That bond between them and that connection has been at the core of what has allowed Jane to go from the woman who walked out of the bag with no name and no story to the incredible woman she is now. He has been her starting point in every sense of the word. Their partnership—as a married couple and as a battlefield duo—has helped Jane grow and evolve and become whole, and it has been at the heart of that purpose she has constantly searched for. She wants them to grow old together, and in the meantime she wants to spend her days saving the world with him.

And through that relationship and with it as a strength and a motive, Jane has changed and evolved so much. I cannot be the only one who was dreading the possibility of Jane sacrificing herself when the whole Weitz versus Kurt situation started. Jane has a track record of throwing herself in her sword to protect the ones she loves. We’ve seen that many times. And ever since that episode, that worry has been nagging at me—that the writers might try to pull that narrative out to resolve this situation. But all respect to them for showing Jane and her journey and her arc the respects they deserve and not making her do that.

The old Jane would’ve ran away, in one form or another, but this Jane stood her ground, and first of all trusted Kurt, and second she trusted herself and believed that what she has is worth fighting for. She is stronger with this team, and they are stronger with her. And she is stronger with Kurt, and he is stronger with her. And she now has a purpose and a future she wants to fight for. And there’s nothing that will make her abandon it now.

But that was not only the major highlight for Jane in this episode—not the only part of her plot that shined a light on her journey and how far she’s come and this new and improved version of her. I’m going to go out on a limb here and say we all loved when Jane ran back into the museum, pulled out her gun, and turned their unenviable situation into a hostage situation. That was smart and intuitive and the kind of thinking that we know Remi would have resorted to. A major part of Jane’s story from the beginning and especially this season has been about her confronting her past and especially the Remi part of her past, to come to terms to who she was then and to accept and embrace that part of her—as an actual part of her and not an “other.” It was a long and exhausting and painful journey for her, but Jane is finally in this place where she has accepted and come to learn to love all these parts of herself. But what is more important is that she can also now rely on the skills and talents that Remi had but use them in the right ways. Okay, maybe taking a museum full of innocent people hostage isn’t a “right way,” but I know Jane would have never let anything happen to them. I think it was such a great way to show how Jane is now in control to have her do something like that and not be afraid of that idea.

And now with the team on the run, it’s a good thing that Jane has tapped into her Remi archive of skillsets because they are going to need it more than ever.

And finally we just have to talk about that last scene don’t we? The anguish on Jane’s face as she watches that cabin go up in flames is almost too much to witness. I do not think it is lost on anyone, and certainly not Jane, that this is the US government—the same one they’ve spent the last number of years of their lives fighting for and defending and putting their lives on the line for—bombing them, just as it did to her ORION team in Afghanistan and then to the Thorntons’ village after they rescued her. Jane Doe is going to be a very very very pissed off and very dangerous person in season 5. Even if her whole team survives this attack, her rage will be unparalleled.

And another thing that doesn’t go unnoticed is the parallel between Kurt blowing up in her cerebral war against Remi in 4.09 and him blowing up here. This is her worst nightmare. And what will make it worse is the guilt. Kurt was the one who was going out to take first watch but she took his place. That feeling of “it should have been me” will definitely be one to linger there, right next to the rage and the heartbreak.

And Jane just breaks my heart—as Alice she watched her parents die, as Remi she watched her entire team die, as a fresh-faced Jane she watched the woman who protected her, Mayfair, die, and then she held her brother in her arms as he died, and now she’s had to witness her team, her family and the love of her life “die.” Someone get Jane Doe a drink and a lot of vegan pizza.

As long as we have known Special Agent Kurt Weller, we’ve seen him totally committed to his career in law enforcement. We’ve often referred to him as the “moral compass” of this team and this show. But everyone has a breaking point; how does Weller reach his?

Y: Simple. Kurt Weller’s commitment to what’s right and being the moral compass are a hard thing to shake but if you want to see this happen then all you need to do is threaten or endanger Jane Doe. But even then—even when he’s covering up someone else’s crimes to protect his wife and his friends for that matter—you can see how it eats at him and how he suffers and struggles with it and how he still tries to find a way to put an end to it. This boy is good. This boy is very very good.

In fact, Kurt Weller is such a good boy that when Madeline needed to include him in the “FBI agents to pin crimes on and disgrace” she had to go and both make stuff up and plant evidence to incriminate him. And yes, he might have a few skeletons in his closet that she could’ve used against him—the mess with Weitz and not revealing the truth about Taylor Shaw pop to mind—but he’s so clean that even Madeline couldn’t dig this information up. And even though it’s the situation with Weitz that gets the ball of fiery mistrust and heartache rolling within the team, Kurt’s secret and his indiscretion remains within the team. It never gets to Madeline or gets outside the safe zone of the team which means Kurt is still protected.

What was interesting about the whole Kurt versus Weitz situation was that in many ways both were being extremely selfish. Weitz wanted to protect himself and his personal agenda and secure his future ambitions. And Kurt wanted to protect the people he loved. Granted that the choices they made were eating at Kurt whereas Weitz remained unfazed by them. But I think what truly sets them apart is what Tasha said, Kurt did what he did out of love—his love for Jane mainly and his love for the team as well. I’m pretty sure if he had the option of taking all the blame himself he would’ve, as long as the others were safe. That’s what sets the two men apart, among other things. And I think there was a part of Kurt that was relieved when the truth came out despite what happened because that burden was off his shoulders and the nightmare of living with a lie was killing him.

And I love that ultimately what drives this man—this rough around the edges, introverted, “I build builds walls to protect myself” man—is love because as we saw in the finale it has become his drive for many things.

And what is more beautiful than the love this man has for his little girl? I think it’s safe to assume that if prompted we can easily churn out a thesis-length post about Kurt as a father, his relationship with Bethany, and how much we love everything about it. It would include a whole lot of flailing and feelings all over the place, but it would also be a lot of appreciation for Kurt’s journey, his growth and the amazing arc he’s been on since we first met him in the pilot. The purpose and the motivation that having Bethany in his life gives Kurt is unlike anything he’s had before and it allows him this new view on life that’s unburdened by guilt or anything sinister or any baggage that turns it into anything that isn’t pure and genuine. Watching Kurt question his priorities and come out of it making all the right choices is so satisfying as a viewer and as a fan of this character especially with all the daddy issues he came into the show with and all the concerns he had about being able to be a good father. He’s always just wanted to do the right thing and do right by everyone around him and to see him get the chance to be selfish for the first time in his life but be selfish for all the right reasons makes me happy. He just wants to have his kid in his life and wants to be a part of her life and make the world a better place while being there for her.

I never once expected—back when we first met him—that we would ever get a scene of Kurt Weller taping up a toddler’s drawing in his locker. Or that we’d see Kurt Weller going out into battle with that drawing folded and securely tucked into his vest. I think it’s great that it has in many ways come full circle like this for him but gone from something negative to something positive. Kurt went into this life and this career because of a little girl and what happened to Taylor Shaw. And now his drive and his motivation is also a little girl, but instead of being dark and haunting, it’s positive and a promise for the future. And we have to mention here the incredible relationship between Kurt and Allie and by extension between Jane and Allie and everyone involved in this co-parenting setup. It’s so refreshing to see a show that manages to develop a relationship between exes that is so healthy and that is mainly concerned about the welfare of the child involved without any of the pettiness and unnecessary drama and that finds a way to keep a lot of love between everyone involved. Credit goes to the writers for turning this into one of the most beautiful aspects of the show.

It’s interesting that the show set up Weitz versus Kurt as the huge confrontation that we anticipated come the finale but it eventually led to a Reade versus Kurt blow up. Narratively and emotionally that was much stronger, and using Weitz to set it up was a smart move. When the team imploded, they all said things that were extremely hurtful and while it makes sense that Reade’s anger triggered everything, it’s funny that Reade seemed to forget that not long ago, Kurt covered for him just as he is doing now for Jane and that then he had also done it out of love. Anyone in Kurt’s position back then would have rightfully reported Reade’s drug use, but Kurt had protected and covered for Reade instead.

As I was writing down my thoughts on Kurt’s ”we’re not family,” I remembered that this was not the first time someone from the team had said that. And ironically, it was Reade who had said it before back in season 2 during his drug problem phase. When Kurt confronted Reade about it and offered to help:

“But, Edgar, whatever it is that you’re going through, we can help you, but you need to—”

“How the hell would you know what I need?”

“I know that you need help, I know that I’m in no position to give it to you, so, as your friend—”

“We’re not friends. We’re not family. You’re my boss, that’s it.”

It may not have been as heartbreaking to hear it back then especially since it was just the two of them and not directed at the whole team but the parallel remains.

But coming from Kurt, that line was extremely painful and hurtful and the looks on Jane’s, Patterson’s, and Tasha’s faces said everything. Kurt’s “we’re not family” may have been the hardest thing to watch during the episode and probably the most heartbreaking sentence uttered on this entire show—right up there with “Jane Doe, you’re under arrest.” And it’s funny because that’s the same Kurt Weller who bends until he breaks for these people, and who just an episode ago had everyone over for dinner when he could have chosen to spend the evening with his wife and the daughter he barely sees. He may not be the best with words but he’s always been insanely protective of these people and has for a long time considered them family so you know he was really hurting when he said those words.

So yes, this huge fluffy marshmallow of a man didn’t mean it but even before he even got a chance to apologize, his words once again spoke for him, louder than any apology could have. At the museum, as the cops approach and surround the building, without flinching, he sacrifices his life for Patterson.

But still, that moment in the cabin when he actually apologizes to the team—his family—was terribly sweet and heartwarming and I cry every time I watch. So there you have it. Another favorite to add to my endless list of favorite Kurt Weller moments as I live my life of eternal Kurt Weller appreciation.

L: Yup, right there with you!

I recently rewatched the pilot, and there are two things that we learn about Kurt Weller almost immediately. First, he is a bit of a control freak, and second, he is A Good Guy. If you’ve been reading these reviews for a while, you’ve seen us use the term “moral compass” over and over when we talk about Kurt. In a lot of ways, even though Jane may be the main character of this story, Kurt is the protagonist, like the narrator of a book whose motives we never question. He is the guy who takes off with a bomb in his arms, barely 40 minutes after we’ve met him, to try to reduce the loss of human life in the explosion. Not because he’s wearing a badge, but because in his mind, it’s just the right thing to do.

I find it amusing that both Roman and Madeline set out to find some dirt about Kurt they could expose and use for their own gain, and they both had to resort to framing him for murder because there just wasn’t any dirt to find. Even the things that we know he’s guilty of—reburying Taylor Shaw and concealing the identity of her murderer, and funneling money to drug dealers—were done to protect other people, specifically his family. Because not only is Kurt Weller on the right side of the law, he is the most loyal, most loving family man there is. So there is something about watching him being branded as a dangerous criminal that just seems beyond the realm of comprehension.

And he is also a control freak, as Nas rightly pointed out. He is most comfortable when he’s the one calling the shots. He’s a good leader, because he never asks anyone to do anything that he wouldn’t do himself. But he’s antsy when he has to hand the reins to someone else. Which is why we’ve seen him chafe under the command of his superiors. He’s crossed horns with every boss he’s ever had, with Mayfair, with Pellington, and with both Reade and especially Weitz. And while we saw the conflict with Weitz brewing, the spill over into his relationship with Reade was less expected. Yes, it was weird for both of them to have their roles reversed when Kurt returned to the NYO, and there were certainly a few rocky moments there. But once they figured out how things had to work—Reade wearing the suits and dotting the i’s and reporting to the higher-ups, and Weller calling the shots out in the field—they settled into a productive working relationship. So the blowup in the locker room and again on the plane was especially painful after they’d worked so hard to establish a new normal that fit them both so well.

But it’s the scene in the Perlan Museum with Jane that really brings home all the changes that this man has gone through. Jane takes everyone at the museum hostage, and Kurt.... goes along with it. He lets Jane call the shots. And yes, he loves her and trusts her, but he’s still the one who usually calls the shots when they’re in the field, and he’s the one who gets pissed off when she goes off book. And this time, he just goes with her plan. And then he fires his gun into the ceiling—with no regard for how badly he’s scaring the hostages—and really gets into the part talking to the police on the phone. If that doesn’t show how different he is from the man in the pilot, nothing does.

So this is a new Kurt Weller that we’ll see in Season 5. But, like Jane, he’s not really different, he’s just become more himself. He’s still doing what he thinks is right, he’s just doing it outside of the confines of an FBI badge. And instead of protecting the general populous—although I am sure there were will be some of that—he’s protecting his team, the people who are closest to him. Like Jane, he’s figured out what’s really important to him, and he’s going to do whatever it takes to get back to the life they were planning in Colorado.

I kind of feel sorry for the real bad guys.

Which brings us, finally, to Jeller. They begin this episode as tightly in-sync as we have ever seen them. And then... we’re gonna have to talk about the end of the episode, aren’t we?

Y: By “the end of the episode” you mean when Jeller reunite with the team at the cabin, they all kiss and make up, Patty puts on some music, and Jeller share that sweet kiss, right? Because nothing happened after that. Absolutely nothing.

Seriously, though, I hope no one comes here expecting that they will find some intellectual and objective analysis in this section. Honestly, it is a miracle that we can even type in full sentences and using real words instead of just flailing and posting an endless stream of Kermit gifs and heart eyes emojis. Jeller have taken being an in-sync and an in-tune couple to a whole new level. They are best friends and soulmates and an ultimate battlefield power couple. At this point I am just as in love with this ship as I am with how their story is being told. Good storytelling requires your characters to grow and to learn from their mistakes. And after a few hiccups in the narrative, the writers have found the perfect formula for how to give Jeller exactly this. Conflict when it comes to writing a couple doesn’t immediately equal cheating or break ups or lies, and a couple getting together is most definitely not the end of their story.

Jeller have moved on to a whole new level of storytelling and of being an established relationship on a show and of character growth and development. They’re unquestionably madly in love—they know that and we know that—the story isn’t about questioning that now. The story is about that taking that love and making something real out of it—a marriage and a partnership—and going through all the obstacles together, facing problems together, extracting strength from it, growing together and most importantly fighting for what they have and what they dream of having.

They are so confident in what they have and what they mean to each other and in each other. The trust they share and watching it grow between them is as enjoyable and fun and exciting to watch as it was to watch them fall in love and awkwardly flirt and rebuild everything after they lost it all. They know each other and understand each other in a way that no one else can—in the scene in the locker room when Jane walks in to see Kurt staring at Bethany’s drawing, she immediately knows exactly what he’s thinking and what he’s feeling and what he’s struggling with, and what makes it all better is that she knows exactly what to say and what to do to make him feel better and help him through it.

And when Jane pulls her hostage situation stunt at the museum, you know it takes Kurt by surprise and even though it would not be his choice of how to get out of the situation, he trusts her. He immediately jumps into action and joins her. He plays his role perfectly and follows her lead and doesn’t question her choices. And even as criminals, they fall into that perfect power couple rhythm. And don’t tell me you don’t think they made very attractive and extremely sexy criminals? Come on, now!

Another important thing to take out of that scene—aside from the trust and unhealthy level of hotness—is how they deal with issues when they disagree which in itself is another sign of how much they have grown as a couple and as individuals. The communication between these two is just another aspect of their relationship that is so enjoyable and satisfying to watch. Whether it’s in these moments of silent communication or when they actually talk, when they voice their concerns, when they open up to each other and don’t hold anything back because they know that after everything they have been through they are much stronger together and so much better when they talk and discuss things that they disagree on. It’s such a joy watching a relationship grow and develop and blossom on screen as the writers treat it with so much care and love and respect and in such a way that is real and relatable and not overly dramatic for the sake of drama.

And finally, the most beautiful thing is that these two wonderful people have reached the place where even their purpose in life is aligned. They might want different things individually but what they want as a couple is bigger and more important and a driving force for the both of them. They both want a future—the same one—a peaceful future as a family, moving back to Colorado, watching Bethany grow and maybe have a child of their own—and to get there they know that they have to keep on fighting just a little bit more but it would all be worth it if they get that in the end, if they get to grow old together.

I just cannot with them anymore. They are the worst.

L: If the scene in the museum is the one that shows these two in all of their power-couple glory, then the one in the locker room at the start of the episode is the one that shows them at their heart. And after all the upheaval of the past four seasons, and particularly the first half of this one, I don’t think I will ever get over the novelty of watching Jane and Kurt just be quietly happy together. Whether they are planning for the future or talking about getting kidney-kicked by a toddler all night long, there’s pretty much nothing that makes my heart happier than watching these two be so happy and domestic together.

And I agree about the writing. If this were a romance novel, it would have ended about five minutes before the end of season 2. If it was, well, any other television show, we’d have had four years of will-they-won’t-they and both of them would have failed marriages to other people under their belts by now and probably a divorce from each other, too. But theirs has been a line that’s run pretty much straight and true since day one: These two are at their best when they are together. They are stronger, they are smarter, they are more successful, and they are more resilient.

And this is why they are ultimately going to triumph. We might have been content with an ending in which they rode off into the sunset, to live out their lives in safe obscurity on a deserted island somewhere. But they wouldn’t be happy there. They want to get home, to get back to Bethany, to move back to Colorado, and to be a family. They have some serious motivation to clear their names, put Madeline away for good, and finally achieve the domestic happiness they want so desperately.

And when the chips are down, my money is always going to be on these two.

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And that is, truly, all from us. Season 4 was a wild ride. Thank you for sharing it with us! We loved your questions and comments, and we can’t wait to hear from you during season 5!

—Laura & Yas

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