Black Lightning: Back in the Game

Black Lightning | Season 4 | Episode 11 : “Trial and Errors“
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“You know without my powers, I…well, I feel like I’m missing a limb. Like, I’m…half a man or something.” Jefferson Pierce/Black Lightning

Anissa Pierce/Thunder (Nafessa Williams) directs Jennifer “JJ”/Lightning (Laura Kariuki) at a Tobias warehouse to get a sample of the meta genes. While zapping some guards she’s overcome with pain, but pretends it wasn’t anything. Tobias Whale (Marvin ‘Krondon’ Jones III) is playing classical music. He checks on his shipment and his AI shows him video from his warehouse, he sees Lightning. Tobias instructs his AI to check all of Jennifer’s social media accounts and do a DNA comparison between Jennifer and JJ. Jefferson/Black Lightning (Cress Williams) is at a bar with Peter Gambi (James Remar). He tells Gambi that without his powers, he feels like less a man, that he can’t protect his family. Gambi assures him that it isn’t true, and that they will find the emitter. Keith Michaels (Will Blagrove) advises Lynn (Christine Adams) to take the plea deal the government is offering. They have a lot of strong witness statements, but he thinks he can make sure she serves minimum jail time. Jefferson is against it and he and Keith get into an argument. Lynn speaks for herself and tells the two men she will decide for herself if she’ll take the plea deal.

<span style="color: #993300;">DC TV Black Lightning Statue</span> — DC TV Black Lightning Statue

Tobias wins the mayoral election. Chief Ana Lopez (Melissa De Sousa) comes by his office to ask for more firepower for the police department to combat Lightning. Instead of more weapons, Tobias offers her meta boosters to give to her officers. The boosters would last 72 hours. He also has the bracelets that block the nullifying waves allowing them to use the meta powers. She decides to accept his offer and takes the meta boosters. Tobias receives the results on Jennifer/JJ confirming they are the same person, he orders Red to take care of this. Jefferson chastises Jennifer for going back up to the ionosphere. She and Anissa present Jefferson and Lynn with the canister that she took and they explain about the pregnant women having their meta genes harvested. Tobias’s plan becomes clearer to them. He’s carrying out the ASA’s plan.

Jefferson arrives at the Sanctum and TC (Christopher Ammanuel) connects him with Khalil Payne/Painkiller (Jordan Calloway). He tells Jefferson that TC told him about the frame up, since he used to collect for Tobias and knows his operation, he found his accountant and got his ledger. The ledger shows who is on Tobias’s payroll, one of them is a meta named Looker (Sofia Vassilieva), the racist meta from season two. Her powers allow her to control people, they figure out that Tobias is using her to make people frame Jefferson, it’s why it’s so seamless. Khalil is going to bring her back alive to testify against Tobias. Jefferson goes home, Lynn hasn’t decided what to do about the plea bargain, he tells her about Looker and Khalil’s plan to bring her in. Lynn has away to counter Looker’s ability to control people. Jefferson will need Detective Hassan Shakur’s (Wallace Smith) help. Jennifer is sitting at her favorite spot; she confides to TC that something is wrong with her powers. He cheers her up by showing that Uriah (McKalin) didn’t set her up. Freeland PD hacked his account and set her up on the fictional date.

Lynn and Anissa are mixing up an antidote to Looker’s silver. Jefferson meets Shakur at a bar. He asks him to slip the serum Lynn made to Special Agent Kevin Mason (Jamal Akakpo). They believe he’s under Looker’s control. Shakur is understandably hesitant; he would be committing assault against a federal agent. Jefferson lays his cards on the table; he reveals that he is Black Lightning. Shakur is upset, he feels like Jefferson has been lying to him, Jefferson counters that he never lied to him, he just omitted to tell him his secret identity. Henderson told him he could trust Shakur; Jefferson is putting his life in his hands. Uriah meets Jennifer at a restaurant that TC picked out. He’s glad to see her, she apologizes for ghosting him, she had some wrong info on him, but TC straightened her out.

“Don’t cry. Go. Light up the world.” Uriah

Shakur invites Agent Mason to the police station; he tells him Jefferson is ready to talk. When he shows up at the interrogation room Shakur offers him a cup of coffee. He and Jefferson have dosed it with Lynn’s serum. Jefferson stalls long enough for Mason to drink. Once he does his eyes light up and we hear Looker talking through him, he coughs up a silver slug. Mason comes to, he knows something was controlling him, Jefferson tells him about Looker. Mason thanks Jefferson and offers his assistance.

Lauren Caruso (Elena Varela) arrives at Gambi’s place, she doesn’t trust him, he apologizes again and tells her that Tobias has her emitter. Gambi has written an algorithm on his wall which will help them locate it, he asks for her help. Lauren asks Gambi why she should help him, Anissa comes out and tells her that Gambi did all of this to protect her family. She shows Lauren the evidence of Tobias and Monovista stealing meta genes from pregnant women, this convinces Lauren to help. JJ and Uriah are outside the restaurant when Red (Matt Roszak) shows up. He kills Uriah in the street and warns JJ that he’ll kill more people if she continues to be Lightning. Uriah dies encouraging her to light up the world. TC blames himself for what happened, JJ blames herself, her powers keep fading on her, she couldn’t protect him.

Khalil arrives where Looker is holed up. He has to fight her men; they are fast but he is able to handle them easily. After he kills one of them, he follows its silver slug back to Looker. She is impressed when she sees him and plans on keeping him as a pet. Her claws grow out and she grabs Khalil’s head to control him. She gets inside his mind and meets Painkiller. She plans on keeping them for house and field duty. Neither Khalil or Painkiller is down with that so they fight her. Painkiller poisons her, Khalil convinces him not to kill her, they need Looker to get Tobias. Khalil tells her to go back to Freeland to confess what she has done, he’s only given her half the antidote to his venom, he’ll give her the other half once she has confessed.

“Two Mandingos. One for the field, one for the house.” Looker

The emitter’s signal takes Gambi and Lauren underground in the tunnels. They find out that promethium runs throughout Freeland. It will make finding the emitter even harder. Jefferson delivers some good news to Lynn. Khalil has Looker and Shakur is going to pick her up. Lynn is thrilled and ready to ‘celebrate’. Jefferson is down with that. Tobias is practicing his acceptance speech. He finds out his accountant is dead. Tobias goes through the video and sees Khalil. He sends Ishmael after him.

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Tobias sees Lightning steal a canister of meta genes from his warehouse, on a hunch he tells his AI to check Jennifer’s social media and examine JJ and Jennifer’s DNA. His hunch proves correct and he sends Red to deal with her. Red kills Uriah and warns her that if she goes out as Lightning again, he’ll kill someone else close to her. Keith Michaels recommends Lynn take a plea deal; Jefferson is against it and they argue, Lynn tells both men this is her decision. Luckily for her, Khalil has found out that Looker is on Tobias’s payroll and she is making people participate in framing Jefferson and Lynn. Agent Mason is under Looker’s control, so Lynn creates a serum to break Looker’s control. Jefferson and Detective Shakur dose Agent Mason’s coffee and he’s released from her control. Gambi invites Lauren over to his place to help him find the stolen emitter. She asks why should she help him and Anissa emerges to tell her Gambi did everything to protect her family. She shows her what Tobias and Monovista have been up to and she agrees to help them. Khalil retrieves Looker, but he’ll have a new adversary to face, Ishmael.

The Pierce family is on the way back up, they are back in the game. Instead of being just reactive, they are becoming proactive. Tobias has underestimated the Pierce’s resilience. They finally have a good idea what Tobias is doing, and gaining new allies like Detective Shakur and Lauren Caruso to help them stop him. Unfortunately, Red killed Uriah and he says the cheesiest thing as he shuffles off this mortal coil. The action was outstanding thanks to Khalil’s attack on Looker’s hideout, and his and Painkiller’s throwdown with her. The fighting was great, and the quips from all parties was killer. It was smart of them to bring Looker back, she is a great villain. They should have used her more during the series. She is the OG Karen. It seems like Lynn and Jefferson are mending their relationship. Lynn’s ex reminded Jefferson he’s Lynn’s ex-husband, so he is thinking about changing that. This episode was mostly upbeat and fun. I’m ready for the season’s conclusion.

Another great cross section of music.

Symphony No. 3 in E-Flat Major, Op. 55: IV. Finale Claudio Colombo