Power season 4 finale review: Tasha St. Patrick’s sacrifice
Let’s backtrack for a moment, since much of this episode ultimately revolved around the death of Raina St. Patrick last week and some of the attempts to secure justice for what transpired. There was some fantastic storytelling watching Tasha, Ghost and Tommy, Tariq, and Angela all in their own ways try to determine precisely what transpired here, and over time many of them did ultimately reach the same conclusion: Ray Ray was the guilty party. The problem here is that Tariq had a leg up on all of them. He was the one who had worked with him, and he was the one who could call Kanan up and get additional information. He was also the one who arrived first to Ray Ray’s apartment and shot the man in cold blood before Jamie could make it upstairs. Ghost, Tommy, and Tasha, eventually made it up there, and from there the story evolved into trying to wash Tariq’s hands of it. Nobody blamed him for killing the man responsible for killing his sister, even though none of them also had the time to fully assess his own culpability in the moments heading up to the crime.
From the moment you could see Tasha ordering her son to clean himself and remove every trace of DNA from his body, it was fairly clear as to what was going to happen next. She confirmed that in a later conversation with Terry Silver, telling him that she was the killer and needed help. She chose to hire him as opposed to being with him romantically, and this begins their new relationship. (Ghost already realizes that the bond between the two is closer than it should be, but he’s had more pressing matters on his hands.)
Seeing Tasha have to make this choice was gut-wrenching, but it does show the sort of person that she is and how there are some things to her more important than her own freedom. She’s going to have to do what she can to fight this, even though the consequences of some of her actions may be severe or even deadly. Angela may only be able to steer the St. Patrick family away for so long.
The next target
After spending the past two seasons seemingly trying to get away from the old life, Ghost is now more immersed into it than ever before. He may be working alongside Kanan once again, and he realizes that Dre is a traitor to their cause and working with the Jimenez. We can imagine that extracting him from that operation will now be tough, and that’s their goal for what their story is going to be moving into season 5 … of course to go along with mourning and doing whatever else that they need to do in order to get by.
What also hurts Ghost at the moment is that Tate really seems to have him precisely where he wants him, and that is as a tool for his own political gain. He’s got Jamie as a figurehead and there doesn’t seem to be all that much that he can do about it. His public persona is being controlled, and his private one is in disarray. His son is becoming a career criminal, his daughter is dead, and his wife is distant. When Ghost said that he had nothing left in this episode, he meant it. There is nothing left for him to fight for, so there’s no other solution for him other than to spiral once more down the drain.
Overall, a killer finale
This was an episode so wrapped in intensity we’re still trying to unravel from it. It linked almost every story in a way that we haven’t seen before, and while we’re not sure the cliffhanger is as dramatic as it was last year, this is still an incredibly effective way to leave people as we start up the long wait until the latest batch of episodes premieres. Grade: A.
What did you think about the Power season 4 finale on Starz tonight? Be sure to share some more of your thoughts on that subject in the comments. (Photo: Starz.)