Blindspot Review: The Night of the Dying Breath (Season 4 Episode 17)
Resting on an old procedural trope, Blindspot Season 4 Episode 7, ” The Night of the Dying Breath,” has some great performances but a predictable outome.
I wrestled with what to call this from a narrative perspective and this episode is largely transitory. It’s fun to watch. It’s designed to have high stakes, and it leads to a twist that will propel us into the rest of the season.
There’s a reason this buried alive trope works. You have a beloved character in a space with limited air and a ticking clock. They either have to be saved or suffocate and that’s bound to cause some challenges and high tension.
I keep thinking about The Grave Digger in Bones and the CSI episode where Nick Stokes was buried alive. Both episodes really called on the buried character to have some really intense emotional scenes and the time limits really did bring a strong amount of tension to the plots.
It’s the same for “The Night of Dying Breath.”
The set up works, and the payoff is pretty strong, but the entire time I kept having this nagging feeling that this is the second time Jane’s life has been in danger in the back half of the season. If she didn’t die during Blindspot Season 1 Episode 12, “The Tale of the Book of Secrets,” I highly doubted we’d lose her here.
It’s also hard to not equate the box with the bag that Jane came out of in Times Square in the very first episode. I kept thinking that maybe there was a parallel, and perhaps that might be something to unpack in upcoming episodes. (Perhaps another visit to Borden is in order?)
Even though this episode centered around having to save Jane there are amazing performances both in and out of the box.
Jaimie Alexander does really well in the coffin with her mobility somewhat restricted. Negotiating how she could move with the camera in play is very interesting to watch.
Outside of the woods, the team brought everything to the table as they worked to save Jane.
Ennis Esmer and Ashley Johnson really play into their worried dueling work wives vibe well when deciding to set up the auto-dial to reconnect with Jane’s phone. The banter between Patterson and Rich lends a light-hearted touch to an otherwise tense episode.
Of course, we also have to unpack the Madeline and Tasha storyline, because there is so much going on there. Audrey Esparza and Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio are both powerhouses that really show their chops in this scene. The subtle glances and jabs at the characters are great decisions both the part of the actors and writer Chris Pozzebon.
Blindspot is hitting the point in the season where it’s got to tease out some smaller threads to finish strong, and Madeline’s capture and arrest have given them the impetus to do just that. We still don’t know what Helios is about, but we needed to see Zapata on a slightly more stable footing after the events of this season.
However, despite how much I would like to see Zapata have some closure, we can’t discount the events of Blindspot Season 4 Episode 11, “Careless Whisper,” where an author foreshadowed that Zapata doesn’t get a happy ending.
The scenes between Madeline and Zapata are strong because Pozzebon builds off events that happened back in Blindspot Season 2 Episode 1, “Hella Duplicitous,” and throws the details back into play. This, in turn, causes the secrets to come out and Madeline to confess that she always thought she could turn her.
So much of Mastrantonio’s performance of Madeline hinges on a formidable silence. Having her drop these direct digs at Zapata’s character forces her to lose a little bit of ground, but also opens up the FBI’s hold on her. Especially since she’s in Rikers awaiting trial now.
It’s just the right amount of doubt to cast over the character at this moment, but with Helios still on the horizon who knows what Dominic could use against Zapata. After all, we don’t know exactly what was on that phone.
What did you think of this episode of Blindspot? Share your thoughts in the comments below!
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Blindspot airs Fridays at 8/7c on NBC.
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Lauren Busser
Lauren Busser is an Associate Editor at Tell-Tale TV. She is a writer of fiction and nonfiction whose work has appeared in Bitch Media, Popshot Quarterly, Brain Mill Press Voices, and The Hartford Courant.