Blindspot Review: Iunne Ennui (Season 5 Episode 11)
The saga of Jane Doe has come to an end. Blindspot Season 5 Episode 11, “Iunne Ennui,” takes some surprising and unexpected turns, delivering a finale worthy of a series with such intricate mythology. It essentially takes the viewer from the last episode to the first in some surprising and intricate ways.
Some of Blindspot‘s best episodes and moments have been when they dive deep into Jane’s identity. This episode falls into that camp.
The focus on the team, the introspection of Jane Doe, and the one last race to save New York is the type of story that the fans deserve after spending time with these characters. While the ending is ambiguous, it also feels right for a series whose main character whose identity has always been in flux.
I half-expected this episode to put us in Jane’s mind like when she’s reckoning with her inner Remy on Blindspot Season 4 Episode 9, “Check Your Ed.” Watching Jane deal with herself was a fascinating episode and it really drove home the idea that Jane was choosing to shape herself.
Jaime Alexander’s performance shines when she’s allowed to dig deep into Jane’s insecurities, but the decision to take Jane out of herself and make her active was where this finale really had strength.
The ideas that Jane’s recent memory is mixed up in the dark stuff from her past, and as such she has to confront memories of Oscar, Roman, and Shepherd, with her history of being a product of Orion and a Sandstorm operative is powerful.
Remy’s reappearance on Blindspot Season 4 touched on it a little and let us dig a little deeper, but after the two halves of Jane decided to coexist there was never really a process through which Jane dealt with those realizations.
We saw her go to therapy briefly, but given that she has such an unusual history she found it difficult to find someone who understood her. That led her back to Borden, and it wasn’t exactly like she could schedule weekly sessions.
Hearing both Roman and Oscar berate Jane about how causes chaos is heartbreaking. The fact is that if you really strip this down, Jane’s line of work invites the chaos. I think that’s part of her fear, I also think she fears who she’ll become if she isn’t fighting.
So much of finale is about the team’s last hurrah, but it’s easy to lose that for Jane, she’s also giving up the first place she was able to call home after being ZIPed.
So much of Jane’s identity is rooted in her work with the FBI, and the prospect of leading something quiet, given how it turned out at the start of Season 3, is scary.
Her concern about causing chaos and being napalm pick up the thread that we’ve been seeing all season from Jane, like in her dream when Madeline suggested the same thing on Blindspot Season 5 Episode 3, “Existential Ennui.”
But all of that self-talk comes to a head in the final scene of the series. After saving New York from Ivy’s weaponized ZIP bomb and leaving the FBI behind, we see the team enjoying dinner at Kurt and Jane’s house.
It’s the happy ending all these characters deserve.
Zapata had her baby. Rich and Patterson are on another treasure hunt similar to Blindspot Season 4 Episode 14, “The Tale of the Book of Secrets.” Kurt and Jane are fostering kids. They’ve reconnected with Allie, Bethany, Avery, and Boston.
It feels almost too good to be true, and that’s when Kurt makes a comment about how there’s another world where this dinner didn’t happen and a scene in which Jane dies shortly after diffusing the bomb plays. Right down to her going back in a body bag in the middle of an empty Times Square.
The final shot of Jane starring off into space doesn’t fully resolve if Jane’s alive or dead, and while an interview with creator Martin Gero states that that’s intentional so give readers the emotionally satisfying ending they want, I am choosing to believe the dinner was real.
Going into the final act, something seems off. The fact that we didn’t see what happened to Jane immediately after the wires were cut felt strange.
After all, a part of the tension here is that Jane is putting herself at risk to access a memory that will help her team save the day. The fact that the cameras wouldn’t take us to her in medical and instead to the entire team coming up the elevator felt like an odd choice.
I expected the rug to get pulled out from under me. I thought for sure we were going to cut away to Jane dying or on her deathbed. It makes sense for her saga to end this way.
The thing is, I also wanted them to get a happy ending.
Blindspot‘s success has been in creating a character who’s fully formed from a blank slate, but the only life she’s lived is the FBI. As much as I’ve loved Jane’s relationship with Kurt, it has only started to feel real this season with them in constant, close proximity to each other.
After fighting so hard for one another, for so long, these characters deserve a happy ending. Jane deserves a chance at a fuller, richer life, preferably with assassins causing her to go on the run.
As much as I want to believe in the happy ending, the fact is that this double-ending can’t stay ambiguous.
This may be the end of the road for Jane, if there is a spinoff of some kind–I’m all for a Patterson and Rich spin-off or a Zapata P.I. storyline–that show’s canon is going to have to make decisions that will determine the final reading of Blindspot.
It’s possible to run through so many scenarios the way that the final minute is structured. She died and this is her brain imagining what her version of heaven would look like. She’s alive and just had a sobering ‘what might have been’ moment. There are really two Jane Does. Jane is dead, but the legend of Jane Doe lives since she’s really a non-entity.
It’s maddening.
While a concrete answer may have made the ending more definitive, it doesn’t change the fact that this episode ties up a chapter in this team’s lives. Everyone is about to begin a new story, and whatever shape that takes, it doesn’t involve the FBI.
In that respect, the finale is successful. In terms of giving Jane an epic final task, the finale is successful. In terms of giving viewers something a nice and neat bow at the very end: the finale isn’t successful.
Let’s just say, if a spinoff happens and one of the episodes in the first season doesn’t answer, “What really happened to Jane?” and she’s ignored entirely, I’ll be even more disappointed.
Stray Thoughts:
- I’m betting the first time Bill Nye was at Kurt Weller’s house, he fanboyed the entire time!
- The fact that the show was able to line up so many previous guest stars to appear in this hour of television, even for the briefest of cameos just enhanced the very bumpy drive down memory lane.
- Love the bit with Nas coming out of the elevator. Since we hadn’t seen her in a while it makes sense that Jane would momentarily question if Nas was dead or a hallucination. Archie Panjabi’s response to the odd questions also hits the right spot.
- The guest stars are the perfect addition in the Times Square scene. The fact that it ends with the police officer that found the body bag in Times Square asking a variant of that very first line of the series is just another great Easter Egg.
- Things I’ll miss about this show: Ennis Esmer being the built-in cheerleader and fanboy. The way he kept calling out all the “lasts” was a great use of his character, but I also can’t help but imagine the brief mention of he and Patterson’s “spinning-off” was a clue for something.
- Patterson and Rich will forever be a duo that has my heart. The fact that he admits that Patterson was smarter than him is a great touch to one of their final bickering scenes.
- Reade’s photo on the wall was the best way for Patterson, Zapata, and Rich to say goodbye to the FBI.
- Jane’s decision to spend a moment in the holding room where she was taken in the first episode was also an interesting way to circle back.
- That little moment of Jane running through the chapel with all the past relationships that have come to an end because of her involvement in people’s lives was an interesting moment and did show her deterioration and guilt, but it also moved very quickly. Similar to that scene in Times Square you kind of have to pause it as she slips through each vignette.
What did you think of Blindspot‘s series finale? Share your thoughts in the comments below!
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All five seasons of Blindspot are currently available to stream on Hulu and Amazon.
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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.