‘The Fosters’ season 4, episode 10 (summer finale) review: Callie in danger; Brandon’s world crumbles
“The Fosters” would certainly not be “The Fosters” without some sort of enormous finale, with a wide array of surprises, and we certainly think that this is precisely what we had on Monday night’s new episode. Unfortunately, the majority of these surprises were not of the people-throwing-you-a-party variety. They are more the sort of surprises that make you hate surprises in general.
Callie – She spent most of the episode fighting hard for Jack’s Law, a way to fight back at Justina and her plans to further her own political agenda on the foster-care system. Callie was threatened over the letter, but she still defied that in fighting for what she believes in. What’s interesting is that the Kyle Snow investigation is so dramatic at this point that that it almost completely overshadows what happened here. Mariana was missing at the end of the episode, and she took up an “offer” for a ride to aid in her search. Little did she know that she may have been getting into a car with the actual killer, and someone who really wants her to stop digging…
On a romantic note, it appears that we’re looking at some chaos with AJ and Aaron moving forward. Yet, there are other priorities that must be attended to first.
Mariana – The reason she went missing during the festival was because Jesus’ medication was starting to cause her to hallucinate, and in turn, she thought that Nick was there when he wasn’t. She bolted, and as a result of the suspected danger Nick himself tore off his ankle bracelet looking for her. This was him actually doing what he could in his mind to help, not realizing in the end what it would mean. He eventually found her, but when Jesus saw him the two got into an altercation that led to Jesus getting knocked out. Clearly, there’s nowhere Nick is going now other than jail over violating the terms of his parole.
Stef – She made a bold decision in calling up Internal Affairs, even though she was well aware some dirt could be dug up on her own past. For Stef, we just assume that she’s happy that she and Lena still have a house. However, she’s probably not so thrilled that things seem to be falling apart completely for her kids.
Jude – Probably the weakest storyline this season. After everything that has been going on, him doing some weed just doesn’t seem altogether interesting.
Brandon – In addition to the Mariana – Callie situations, Brandon’s devastating reveal about Julliard will stick with us the most. Him impersonating someone else at the SATs came back to haunt him, and now he’s left without a future. It’s terrible for him, but at the same time he did put himself in this position … and you probably figured it’d come back up.
We won’t say that the summer finale had the emotional terror or the impact of the premiere, but it certainly did a great job of paying off many stories for this season and setting up the second half in a super-compelling way. Grade: A-.
If you want to get some other news related to the series, including a look towards the future and also an exclusive postmortem with co-creator Peter Paige (who co-wrote and directed this episode), be sure to head over here! Meanwhile, sign up over here to get some additional TV news on everything we cover via our official CarterMatt Newsletter. (Photo: Freeform.)