EXCLUSIVE: 'Blindspot' Boss Talks Winter Premiere Shockers: There's Going to Be 'Payoff After Payoff'

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NBC


Warning: Spoiler alert! Do not proceed if you have not watched Wednesday’s winter premiere of Blindspot.

It’s a new world order on Blindspot.

The action drama picked up right where it left off in Wednesday’s action-packed winter premiere, answering the cliffhanger in question: Who got shot? Turns out, the unlikely victim was Patterson (Ashley Johnson), shot in the stomach by her ex-lover, Borden (Ukweli Roach), who held her hostage with help from Shepherd (Michelle Hurd), who was seeking answers.

Jane (Jaimie Alexander), meanwhile, struggled over her decision to wipe away Roman’s (Luke Mitchell) memory and chose to lie about who erased his memories, as the FBI starts the arduous process of figuring out how best to use Roman as their asset. The Blindspot team also discovered that there was a blueprint for an extra tattoo of a tiger. Why was the tattoo taken off?

RELATED: 'Blindspot' Sneak Peek! Jane Lies to Roman About Who Wiped Away His Memory

Following Wednesday’s episode, ET jumped on the phone with executive producer Martin Gero to get the scoop on what’s coming up for the second half of the season.


ET: Patterson seems to have recovered relatively quickly from getting shot by Borden. Has the door closed on that pair?


Martin Gero:
She’s not interested in rekindling that relationship. He’s betrayed her in every way a person can betray another person. It’s been pretty vile. But she’s not ready to turn the page, in the sense that she desperately wants vengeance. She’s going to be more driven than ever, to the point of almost personal harm on her side to try to find him and bring him to justice. She’s devastated by it; she’s dealing with it in a very Patterson kind of way by going back to work and pretending everything’s fine, but everything’s not fine. We will start to see the cracks this year. She’s had a tough go in the past season and a half and it’s starting to wear on her.


Speaking of Borden, he had a chance to kill Patterson but obviously doesn’t. Is there guilt there on his part?

Borden’s motives are very difficult to know right now. He clearly felt a connection to Patterson. Who wouldn’t? Everyone loves Patterson. One of the things I loved about our winter finale was that it showed his side of it that was very human. We understood why he had done all this. He’s dedicated to the cause and if anyone gets in the way, he’ll stop them.


Now Shepherd has Borden fully under her wing, and it seems like she’s on a mission. What can we expect with that new pair moving forward?

Now that she’s not worried about FBI interference, we’re totally in the dark when it comes to her now. She’s putting the final touches on this massive plan that we don’t understand yet. In Roman’s absence, Borden becomes her right-hand man. Ukweli Roach is such a phenomenal actor; you get to see a completely different side of him now.

RELATED: 'Blindspot' Boss on the Reveal of the Mole and Roman's New Reality


With his memory wiped, Roman finds himself under FBI watch and it’s clear they want to use him as an asset…

He knows everything that we want to know but it’s locked in his brain somewhere and so, like Jane, there are fragments of his past that are in there and they’re trying to unlock it. It’s just a little more difficult because with Jane, they could bring her out in the field, but with Roman, he’s a terrorist, he’s locked in a cell downstairs and the next episode explores the fact that he gets lost. It’s not a great environment for triggering memories, let’s put it that way. But at the end of the day, he’s the only real lead they have so how they deal with him is super interesting and leads us down a lot of interesting paths.


What does Roman’s path look like? Is he a wild card?

That’s exactly right, he’s a wild card. He’s going to go through a lot of ups and downs, and he gets connected – not only with Jane, but the rest of the team now. You’ll see. We have some great story coming up. The second half of the season, if you’ve watched from the beginning or you just started now, it’s the most satisfying 13 episodes of Blindspot we’ve ever done. There’s payoff after payoff after payoff. The story takes amazing turns and everything everyone wants to know and everything everyone hopes will happen, we will at least touch on, if not totally solve and answer. There’s so much great stuff coming up and Roman plays a central part to all of it.


Jane is on the other side of it and seeing Roman go through what she went through, only she’s looking at it through the prism of her past experience. How different of a relationship does Jane have with Roman, now that he’s relying heavily on her and trusting her?

They develop an insanely close bond because she’s the only one who’s truly on his side. To everyone else, they still remember the fact that he’s killed a ton of cops and federal agents. It’s difficult to treat him like just one of the team. In many ways, this season Roman is Jane’s blindspot. She loves him unconditionally and believes, just like she did, he got a bad lot in life and she realizes in a lot of crazy ways, her memory being erased is the best thing to happen to her, which is a total 180 from how she felt at the start of the series.

RELATED: 'Blindspot' Creator: Mole Reveal 'Changes the Dynamic' Forever


How soon does Roman get out of the cell?

It’ll happen earlier than you think.


There was also an unexpected kiss between Reade and Tasha. Can we expect to see that progress?

It’s really complicated with them because they do love each other so much. There’s definitely a security and safeness between the two of them. The kiss took her by surprise and even if she does see him that way, I don’t think she’s ready for that. They try to recover from that quickly, but Reade is going through a lot. Lest we forget, he’s dealing with the fact that he was tangentially involved in the murder of his abuser. That’s an enormous amount of information to process on his side. In many ways, he and Roman are trying to fish around for memories that they maybe don’t want to remember. He and Tasha have a real rocky road ahead but they have a love that’s going to carry them through that.


What can you tease about the mysterious role Weller plays in Shepherd’s grand plan?

Weller seems very central to the whole thing and he can’t unlock it, he can’t understand what it is. But every episode, they get a step closer to figuring out what the hell is going on. They know Weller seems to be at the center of it and they have Roman. What also helps, to be honest, is Weller and Jane have had a rough go at the early part of the season but are finally at a place of mutual respect and support again, and he’s been missing that terribly. No one understands Weller more than Jane and no one understands Jane more than Weller, so they’ve evolved back into a good position of where that mutual respect and love can start to foster again. The strengthening of their bond helps him weather this storm.


What other nuggets can you share?

All of our #Jeller fans, it’ll have been worth the wait. I know they’ve had a rough go but it’s all part of a plan.


Blindspot
airs Wednesdays at 8 p.m. ET/PT on NBC.