'Cloak & Dagger' Recap: 'Back Breaker'

Written by John Edward Betancourt

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​I personally think it’s an awesome thing when a television series puts forth an episode that more or less leaves you speechless because that’s when you know said series has reached a proverbial apex. Because if there’s little on your mind once that particular tale has come to an end, it’s done its job. It has sucked you in and taken you for one hell of a ride and you were captivated by every single second of it and that’s precisely what happened to me with last night’s episode of Cloak & Dagger.
 
Because for a good ten minutes after watching ‘Back Breaker’, I merely stared at my television in silence over everything I’d just watched play out on screen and oddly enough, the only words that made their way to my buddy Dave (who joined us for a podcast about the show last week) were ‘wow’ several times over and really, what made this episode so incredibly impressive were a pair of key elements. The first one being, that the show did something you rarely see in superhero stories, wherein it in essence laid out the journey our characters were going to go on in this tale, something that took me aback at first, but made sense as the story rolled on because in essence, the show was doing its best to prepare the audience for the fact that we were about to bear witness to Tandy and Tyrone’s darkest hours and it was going to be a bumpy ride.
 
In fact, while it was nice of the show to provide us with that particular courtesy, it barely softened the blow of what happened to these two magnificent characters because my goodness, we’ve never seen them lower than they were in this tale. I mean, come on, Tandy was straight up stealing hope from people’s minds in order to enjoy a brand new high and some semblance of joy in her life and Tryone…well his anger was in essence unleashed in this story since he didn’t exactly receive a hero’s thank you for getting Connors arrested and it was just fascinating and important to see them fall from grace and be forced to finally face their past and their pain because the time has come at last for them save lives, whether they like it or not.
 
But while the cliffhanger ending sets the stage for one hell of a season finale, and while this would be a fine opportunity to speculate upon what comes next since Tandy’s mom and Tyrone are in some serious trouble at the moment, I’m compelled to return to the ‘lessons’ on superheroes that this episode provided us with simply because, I felt it got one of those lessons wrong. Because one particular line (and I paraphrase), revolving around how heroes are in essence weak and reflect our inability to rise up to become something better simply rubbed me the wrong way, in large part due to the fact that heroes like Tandy and Tyrone represent the best parts of us. They rise above their pain and suffering to inspire us to be better, and the more I ponder on that aspect of the story, the more I wonder if it was done on purpose.
 
For in many ways, the city of New Orleans in this particular tale is without hope and direction, and the character that spoke those words has some dark clouds hanging over his mind as well, so perhaps this was all a setup, to give everyone that hope. Because it’s inherently clear now that the mysterious element is starting to break loose, and that Tandy and Tryone are going to have to fight the very thing they saw in Ivan Hess’ memories from eight years ago and perhaps in doing so, in overcoming their woes and their pain…they will prove Father Delgado wrong and inspire the city in magnificent fashion and the chance to see to them finally put their demons to bed, and be beacons of light and hope…has me supremely excited to watch next week’s season finale and see this powerful story come to a powerful and likely moving conclusion. Until next time. 

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