The final episode of the series tied up several loose ends and featured a particularly powerful turn from Mark Ruffalo. Through its last six episodes, his work involved sadistic FBI agent, Tom Brandis, attempting to put an end to a series of violent robberies committed by a mild-mannered family man. But in the finale, he gets his moment of reflection, presented in a beautifully subdued monologue.
,Read also:Task review: Brad Inglesby’s crime drama is one of the year’s best, with Mark Ruffalo and Tom Pelphrey in excellent form)
,spoilers ahead,
Ahead of the finale, HT caught up with the Emmy winner at a press conference, where he talked about playing Tom’s arc, and what it means to him as an actor to play this role at this specific time in the world. Talking about his courtroom scene in the finale where he decides to forgive his stepson, Mark said, “That was a moment I was really nervous about. At the end of the day I started to feel like the simpler it was, the more we didn’t know what it was going to happen and how it was going to happen, the more impactful it would be.” ,spoiler ends,
The actor took a moment to think about the impact of the show and shared a lesson from it. “What is the function of faith in society?” he began. “Apart from being virtue-signalling or performative? What does that really look like when it involves empathy, forgiveness… How do we trust God, and trust each other and the humanity around us, that, I think, is what the task asks.”
‘It was harder than I thought’
The role of Tom Brandis was in great demand from the actor. When we first meet Tom in Task, we don’t know that he’s a former pastor turned FBI agent whose adopted son is in prison for murdering his wife. Their grief plays out in silences and pauses, without any dramatic dialogue to reveal the twists and turns.
Mark reflects on the role, saying, “The story, the journey she had to go through… it was a lot harder than I thought it would be. It was a lot. The world is heavy, and to add to that heaviness… I think we’re aching for catharsis. We have so little grace, so little joy, so little beauty left in human interaction.”
“So yes, it was hard, but it was everything I learned about life the hard way,” he concluded.
The task also stars Tom Pelphrey, Emilia Jones, Martha Plimpton, Alison Oliver, Fabian Frankel, Thuso Mbedu, Raul Castillo and Silvia Dionisio. The show is created by Brad Ingelsby, who created Mare of Easttown with Kate Winslet.
All episodes of the task are available to watch on JioHotstar.