Mark Ruffalo dishes on ‘Task’ finale drug money, vagrant birds and that devastating letter
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Spoiler alert: This article deals with the “Task” Episode 7 finale, now streaming on HBO Max.
HBO’s “Task” finale elicited powerful emotion from Mark Ruffalo’s FBI agent Tom Brandis, away from the drama’s main cops, robbers and biker gang story.
After the FBI shoot-out and death in the Oct. 9 episode, Sunday’s finale on Oct. 19 featured the former priest and bereft father Brandis facing his adopted son Ethan in court. The parole hearing had been a series-long burden on Brandis and his emotionally fractured family, as Ethan had been imprisoned for fatally pushing his mother, Susan (Brandis’ wife), down a flight of stairs during a mental health episode.
The FBI agent’s ultimate message to his son, read in court from a devastatingly poignant letter: I forgive you, come home, the door is always open to you.
“That’s a big chunk of letter-reading. But by the time we’re there, the show had earned this moment,” Ruffalo tells USA TODAY, adding he pondered and practiced the speech throughout the seven-month “Task” shoot.
“I found simpler was more powerful,” he says. “And on the day, it told (me) what it needed to be.”
Even if the results of the parole hearing are not revealed, the tearful embrace between Brandis and with daughters, Sara (Phoebe Fox) and Emily (Silvia Dionicio), shows that the family healing is underway.
“Task” creator Brad Ingelsby told a compelling whodunit with deeper personal themes through small-town detective Marianne “Mare” Sheehan (Kate Winslet) in HBO’s Emmy-winning 2021 series “Mare of Easttown.”
Likewise, “Task” dwells in both the crime caper and deeper character studies.
“This series 100 percent delivers on the genre, with all the twists and turns,” Ruffalo says. “But while Brad masters the crime, he takes these dives into people’s complexity and their lives within the framework of law and order. These people are so human.”
Brandis ignores ‘Task’ drug loot, letting Maeve begin a new life
Brandis’ complexity shows when overlooking the “Task” missing drug money.
Episode 6 revealed that doomed drug thief Robbie (Tom Pelphrey) left his niece Maeve (Emilia Jones), the caretaker for his two kids, with the cash from the drugs stolen from the Dark Hearts biker gang. In the finale, Brandis pretends not to see the million-dollar stash in the bag in Maeve’s possession.
“There’s a lot of gray area,” says Ruffalo of Brandis’ act. “Who’s to say that some cop wouldn’t let that slide? It’s not to the detriment of anybody. And it’s for the betterment of somebody who’s really just caught up in all of this.”
With the money, Maeve sets out in the finale to start a new life with the kids, finally escaping her downtrodden existence. The Dark Hearts threat ends with the leader, Perry Dorazo (Jamie McShane), being knifed by his protege, Jayson Wilkes (Sam Keeley), who flees. It’s a fresh chapter.
Tom Brandis opens up his heart, house in ‘cathartic’ ending
The “Task” series’ ending features Brandis, fresh paint on his face, preparing the house for Ethan’s eventual return. The former bedroom he had once closed off following his wife’s death has been reopened. Brandis looks out the window on a beautiful day at a singing bird and comes close to a smile.
“You move forward, that’s how it is in real life,” says Ruffalo. “We have incremental movement towards change and healing. The doors start to open. The pain is never 100 percent resolved, but you learn to live with it and manage it. That’s where we end the show. It’s very cathartic and satisfying.”
The ‘Task’ bird theme and the Merlin app
Themes of loss are explored throughout “Task,” and wildly enough through birds.
In Episode 1, birdwatcher Brandis turns on the Merlin bird app to identify a stunning Summer Tanager perilously far outside of its geographic region. These are known as “vagrant birds,” and although beautiful, they don’t often survive.
Using the bird-tastic Merlin app from Cornell University was Ruffalo’s idea. He’s a fan, and it kicks off the bird theme. The vibrant Summer Tanager is the first call in the series set and shot in wooded parks throughout Pennsylvania’s Delaware County.
“It’s a bird that’s lost from its home and can’t find its way back,” Ruffalo adds. “Being lost from home is such a deep theme of the show.”
Brandis even refers to the doomed Robbie as a “vagrant bird,” moments before the endangered thief with a big heart is killed by his Dark Hearts nemesis, Wilkes (Keeley).
After Brandis’ emotional finale breakthrough, “Task” closes the avian theme with the series’ fitting final shots: A series of native birds living their best lives.
