‘Task’ Episode 6 Recap: Bloodbath

Eighteen minutes of cat-and-mouse action open this episode of Task. Actually, it’s more like cat-and-mouse-and-cat-and-mouse-and-cat-and-mouse-and-cat-and-mouse action. Working from creator Brad Ingelsby’s script, director Salli Richardson Whitfield expertly maneuvers a dozen armed and dangerous players through dense woods and empty cabins as they chase each other down, beat each other up, blow each other’s brains out, stab each other’s guts out, and run each other down in the road. Two of the show’s kindliest characters don’t make it out alive — but man, what a run.

Picking up directly where the previous episode left off, this week’s chapter shows what happens when Tom, Robbie, Tom’s team (including at least two double agents, Grasso and McGinty), Dark Hearts leaders Perry and Jayson, and a gaggle of Dark Hearts redshirts collide in the forest along the river. There’s a knock-down drag-out hand-to-hand fight between Tom and Perry, of all people. Aleah proves her marksmanship is no joke as she methodically takes down biker after biker in order to help save Kath, who gets wounded. Lizzie kills a biker too, as does Grasso, blowing out Lizzie’s eardrums in the process. As she attempts to get help, Perry and Jayson — who’ve escaped with Grasso’s help — run her right the fuck over. Meanwhile, Jayson stabs Robbie before fleeing an approaching Tom, who is unable to get Robbie to a hospital in time to save his life.

It’s all mopping up after that, involving all manner of messes. Jayson and Perry, for instance, are camped at a safehouse between hunts for the bag of fentanyl Tom tossed into the river during the chase. Jayson is preoccupied by the apparent disappearance of his partner, Eryn, whom Perry secretly killed, so that’s a combustible mix. When they find the bag and it turns out to be a ringer, I’m guessing tensions will mount even further.

The drugs are apparently long gone, sold as per the plan concocted by Robbie and his contact, Shelley. After Robbie’s niece Maeve is arrested, interviewed, and released regarding her involvement in the case, Shelley shows up at the door with a backpack full of cash Robbie left for her as his share of the sale. Apparently there is some honor among thieves.

Sam, the boy Maeve’s been caring for all this time, winds up in the care of none other than Tom. Still a registered foster parent, he brings the boy home rather than leave him behind in underfunded, basically carceral conditions. This surprises his daughters Sarah and Emily, who are getting along and turning personal corners — Sarah is finally honest with everyone about the end of her marriage, while Emily accepts a date.

Everyone who cared about Robbie mourns him. Everyone who cared about Lizzie mourns her — even, or especially, Grasso, who basically got her killed with his double-agent bullshit but also cared about her and felt her lifeless body in his arms, a feeling he tells his equally crooked police captain he can’t shake.

He’d better. Tom comes knocking, after learning from Kath that Grasso has been involved with the Dark Hearts in the past, which she says the Bureau missed because no charges were filed. (More likely, she, a Dark Hearts asset herself, put him on the case for that exact reason.) After a brief discussion of Catholic confession, Tom warns Grasso he’s coming for him now, and he’ll be doing it with Aleah’s help.

Even after hell stops breaking loose, this episode moves along at a swift and sure pace, never really letting up on the suspense. Who is that ringing Maeve’s doorbell? What is Perry gonna do with the knife he’s using to gut that fish? What will Grasso do when he learns Tom knows he’s a rat? When will Jayson figure out his mentor killed his girlfriend? All of these questions carry life or death stakes that could be settled at a moment’s notice. 

On top of that is the terrible pathos of it all. Think of how many lives were shattered by those 18 minutes: Robbie’s kids, Maeve, Sam, Lizzie’s hated ex-husband, Aleah, Tom, even Grasso will never be the shame. And all those bikers had friends and families, too — isn’t that how all this started, because Robbie and his buddies got into a shootout at a safehouse and discovered they’d killed the biker parents of an adorable kid?

Every bullet fired, every child taken, every person shoved into the gaping maw of the system — the damage doesn’t start and stop with those victims alone. It spiders out in all directions, taking on consequences no one can predict, but anyone with a working soul can foresee.

Sean T. Collins (@seantcollins.com on Bluesky and theseantcollins on Patreon) has written about television for The New York Times, Vulture, Rolling Stone, and elsewhere. He is the author of Pain Don’t Hurt: Meditations on Road House. He lives with his family on Long Island.