Jess and her friends embark on their most impossible caper yet.

In the opening, Billie meets with Rafael and promises revenge for his killing her brother. Rafael insists he didn’t do it, but rather the real Salazar did. He also, in the absolute worst and clumsiest bit of setup in this whole series so far, receives a pair of shoes he ordered a long time ago.

Jess and her crew plan the prison break, giving viewers another – mercifully short –  round of I-should-do-this-alone/you’re-not-doing-this-alone. At this juncture Oren breaks his pattern of being gung-ho and announces Jess is right, this is a really bad idea. He says he’s going home, but not before giving them a piece of information they need to succeed.

In his uneasy partnership with Myles, Liam works to figure out where Jess is and how Billie keeps finding her. Liam discovers she killed not only his grandfather, but his father as well. Liam just manages to get away; Myles gets shot and killed in yet another display of the resources Billie can draw on and how swiftly they can react.

Back in the States, Oren has a run-in with Agent Ross who lets him hear the tape. He tells her it’s a deep fake and explains how he knows (due to syntax Jess that would never use but Bobbie would). This reinforces the doubts she has. Her ‘supportive’ boss, though, wants her to ignore her instincts and close the case. So in answer to last week’s question: no, clearly Hendricks did not learn anything from his previous mistakes.

Ethan also catches Liam up on everything that is happening

With Tasha and Ethan’s help, Jess breaks in just fine – only to find her father already gone. She’s nearly caught, but isn’t thanks to her father in a nice bit of humor to break the tension. Then they are nearly caught escaping, but aren’t thanks to Kacey killing a guard to ensure they get away, in an effective bit of grimness to reinforce the danger.

Jess and her father now have all three boxes. Tasha and Ethan are headed back to the U.S.. Liam is on his way to Mexico to help. Agent Ross hasn’t yet stood up to her boss but is working on it. Everything is full steam ahead.

Except Rafael doesn’t want to leave before they retrieve all the twenty-plus-year-old notes he accumulated on the treasure. While they do that, the man who’s been following Jess confronts them. He warns them to abandon their search and reveals Salazar is an organization, not a person. An organization that sounds remarkably like the one Billie works for.

On cue, Billie and company show up and kill him before he can say more. She captures Jess and her dad – and knows everything thanks to his shoes. And the FBI arrest Tasha and Ethan right after they cross the border.

Verdict: This week ends with almost all the protagonists in dire straits and Billie on the cusp of achieving all her goals. For this type of show, the question isn’t if our heroes prevail, but how. With just two episodes left, I can’t wait to see what’s next. (Minus one point for the shoes or it would have been an 8.) 7/10

Rigel Ailur

http://www.BluetrixBooks.com