BLINDSPOT “Two Legendary Chums” Recap

BLINDSPOT — “Two Legendary Chums” Episode 312 — Pictured: (l-r) Darren Goldstein as Donald Shipley, Sullivan Stapleton as Kurt Weller — (Photo by: David Giesbrecht/NBC/Warner Bros.)

BLINDSPOT “TWO LEGENDARY CHUMS” REVIEW

BY PAULINE PERENACK

The Ties that Bind

Last week on Blindspot, we saw the return of Rich Dotcom’s ex-boyfriend, Boston, who helped the team stop a rogue hacker who had made his way into Patterson’s app, and ultimately, every user’s phone.

Meanwhile, Jeller was still on the outs with each other, but had to work together along with Clem to track down and save Jane’s daughter, Avery, who already seems to have been manipulated quite a bit by Roman. And speaking of Roman, he’s still there pulling strings with the FBI, and has made it clear that Crawford is his end target.

So where does that lead us this week? Will we learn more about Avery? Will Zapata finally get a better storyline? Let’s recap to find out.

An Old Partner, A New Mission

Tonight’s episode, “Two Legendary Chums,” has several storylines happening that eventually all come together at the end of the episode. The first begins with Avery. Jane and Weller question her, and it’s clear she’s clearly not too happy to be there. Eventually though, she answers their questions. Turns out, Roman came into her life to help her avenge her father’s death. She had been looking for the man who ruined her father’s life, and ultimately pushed him towards killing himself. Her mother had already died of cancer, so without her father, she was left alone. The man she was looking for? Hank Crawford.

The rest of the team watch as Jane and Weller question Avery, and once done, ask if Avery can be trusted. Weller thinks she can, but Zapata serves as the voice of reason and thinks that Avery needs to be hooked up to a polygraph. Jane reluctantly agrees, and as Avery is being hooked up, quietly asks Patterson if she’s doing the right thing. Patterson tells her she is, and in the end, Avery will come around.

However, Avery is not happy about being tested, and tells Jane that they could be out there getting Crawford, but are instead wasting time interrogating her. Ultimately, she passes the tests with flying colors, but rebukes Jane’s attempts to meet for dinner. Seeing their relationship fail before it even had the chance to begin, Jane brings Avery to Patterson’s lab to show all the information they have on Crawford. They’re on the same team, she explains, and Avery seems to be on board.

The second storyline brings back Director Hirst, who is currently sitting in a CIA black site. Reade sends in Zapata to get more information out of Hirst, because up to now, they haven’t been able to get anything. Using a sort of truth serum, Zapata is able to get Hirst to admit that Crawford has ties to an anti-government group called The Regimen, who is led by a Nils Bresden. As Zapata finishes up her questioning, Hirst warns her to back off of Crawford, because the more connections she puts together, the more she’ll be on Crawford’s radar, which is a place she definitely doesn’t want to be.

The main storyline of course begins with a tattoo – or rather, a clue from Roman. He sends a video message to Patterson, of him putting together a 3D puzzle of a ship which pushes the team to focus on a specific tattoo. The pieces are all found on Jane’s body, and when put together, reveal the words, “Donald Ley.” Weller connects the final piece that it actually points to his old partner, Donald Shipley, who has since found work with a private weapons contractor.

Weller wants to find Shipley on his own, even though the two weren’t on the best of terms, but Jane and Reade go in as backup. Weller finds Shipley, but does so just as a meet is about to go down. Shipley explains he’s working undercover for Homeland Security, and was meeting with a dealer wanting an EMP device to take down a power plant, so Weller has to act the part to not blow their cover.

Back at headquarters, Shipley tells the team that Homeland Security is tracking an anti-government group called The Regimen – the same one Hirst knew about. Because of the increased importance of the mission now, Weller is having to practice putting together an EMP device under Shipley’s tutelage, and it’s clear these two aren’t fans of each other.

However, they put aside their differences to meet up with The Regimen at the power plant. Once there, Weller is forced to test the EMP, which effectively blows out their communication with the FBI and Homeland Security, who are both sitting outside. While in the dark, they’re told that the power plant isn’t the target. Instead, they’re taken to a remote location in the woods, where the Treasury Department has a secret bunker in which all financial transactions made by citizens of the US are monitored.

The Regimen take hostages to gain access to the server room, and as they’re distracted, Weller and Shipley make their move. They’re able to lock the hostages in the server room, and take out many of members of The Regimen before making their escape. Shipley is wounded however, which slows down their movements. They continue to take out more members outside in the woods, but eventually run out of ammo and hope. But then Jane and Reade come to the rescue, and take out the remaining members.

The final storyline of the episode with Roman, is the one that ties everything together. He is currently in Morocco with Vic, waiting on Crawford to arrive for a meet. The tension is palpable, and Vic tells Roman that he knows he’s not Tom Jakeman. While he doesn’t know who Roman really is, he knows that he’s trying to get at Crawford, and vows to not let it happen.

They’re interrupted however as the businessman arrives to make a deal for the land around them, and Vic receives a call that the shutdown of the Treasury bunker servers has been delayed. Since this shutdown would prevent the US government from seeing a huge chunk of money being transferred for the land, it’s imperative the servers be shut down for the deal to happen. Crawford tries to stall the deal, but the businessman walks away.

Furious, Crawford tells Vic and Roman that he knows someone close to him has been working with the FBI, and that’s why The Regimen was taken down. Vic begins to rat out Roman, but is cut short when he’s stabbed in the stomach by Crawford. Roman asks Crawford how he knew, and Crawford admits he had been tracking both of them, and found that Vic was placing calls to the FBI, and had recently been in Berlin when he was supposed to be somewhere else. Not only that, he had sent a video to the FBI just that morning. Turns out, when Vic had been lifting Roman’s fingerprints, Roman had switched their phones.

As the episode ends, Crawford gives Roman a new assignment – to kill every single member of the FBI team who had interfered. Roman flips through the file, and sees pictures of Jane, Weller, Reade, Zapata, and Patterson.

Betrayal in Morocco

Tonight’s episode was much better than the past couple of weeks. While I think Zapata still needs more of a storyline, we at least got a glimpse of who she has become. She’s clearly very high ranking in the CIA now in order to be given access to Hirst, and she’s got to be putting together more connections with Crawford than what we know about. For some reason he’s just as important to the CIA as he is to Roman, and I’m betting Zapata will be using her position on the FBI team to get to Crawford first. Unfortunately however, it seems as though Hirst’s warning has already come to fruition, and Zapata is very much so on Crawford’s radar.

More minor is the Jane/Avery/Weller storyline. Avery seems to be convinced Jane will help her, so will that keep her around? Or will she leave once Crawford is taken down? Either way, it seems as though Jane has forgiven Weller, and Weller just wants her back (even though I’m not convinced he should take her back). So all seems to be becoming right in Jeller land.

The best part of the episode however is that we finally got more insight into what Roman has going on. While it’s a major disappointment that Anthony Lemke will no longer be on the show, this whole new wrinkle of Roman being sent to kill the team is very interesting. He set up Vic to take the fall so that Crawford would focus in on the team, but why? He’s already made it clear that Crawford is his end target, so why involve the team? There must be something there he’s trying to expose, and I’m very much looking forward to what it may be. However, we must wait a few weeks until the Olympics are over, so, until then!