A prescient quote from the first season of “Power” still stands out as one that encapsulates the six season struggle of its protagonist, James St. Patrick.
“I don’t know any old, wrinkled drug dealers. They’re either dead or inside,” James explained to his skeptical wife Tasha in the series’ third episode, when she questioned about whether they could maintain their lavish lifestyle if he became an honest businessman.
In a page out of “Dallas’” Who Shot J.R. playbook, the mid-season finale ended with the crackle of a gunshot and the image of an anguished and crestfallen James plummeting to the first floor as an acapella version of “Big Rich Town” played out the credits. If the fall doesn’t do him in, the blood gushing from his chest will probably finish the job.
For five seasons, the successful businessman running an ironically named Truth nightclub, while simultaneously living a double life as the drug kingpin Ghost, lived underneath a Sword of Damocles.
Every season, James’ Sisyphean attempts to escape the drug game and go legit became more harried. Every two steps forward resulted in one hop backwards. However, The sixth and final season’s mid-season finale, “No One Can Stop Me” saw James finally celebrating the triumphant moment he’d been striving for all these years.
“No One Can Stop Me” also served as a trip down memory lane and its conclusion addressed whether James would wind up in a coffin or eventually spend his remaining life inside prison for his alter ego’s heinous crimes.
First, the past finally came back to haunt James metaphorically as he hallucinated visions of Kanan, Angela Valdes and his daughter, Raina speaking to him from beyond the grave throughout the episode.
With his enemies seemingly defeated, James’ hubris got the best of him as he took a smug victory lap and issued polemics against his living rivals as he prepared to run on a gubernatorial ticket as the next lieutenant governor of New York.
This season has seen the supporting cast pruned with shears each week. The love of James’ life, Angela died in the opening five minutes of the season premiere. His personal lawyer and fixer, Joe Proctor was murdered by his best friend, Tommy Egan. Tommy’s on-and-off girlfriend Keisha Grant was murdered by James’ estranged wife, Tasha. Andre Coleman knocked off the convivial Agent Jerry Donovan.
However, the possible death of the show’s protagonist was an unexpected twist. Yet, there’s been no confirmation that Ghost is actually gone.
As five seasons worth of loopholes closed, “Power’s” final act will introduce a new post-James/Ghost chapter for the series. During the Power: Confidential aftershow, show creator Courtney Kemp acknowledged that one of James’ shooters is one of the seven main characters glimpsed trudging towards Truth in the closing montage. Each had their own set of motives.
Andre Coleman
After being framed for the murder of James and Tommy’s supplier Jason, resulting in his plans to succeed Ghost as the biggest drug dealer in New York go up in smoke, Dre is out for blood, although how he’s out of prison is a mystery. Being killed by a conniving and aspirational grunt like Dre would be true to the reality of James’ life.
Rashad Tate
The trajectory of Councilman Tate’s political career has been in a steady downward spiral since he met James in season 5. Two weeks ago, his promising gubernatorial campaign was scuttled because of James’ betrayal. Yet, despite their personal beef, Tate still tried to warn James about the feds. Instead, James cut Tate off and belittled him while the councilman seethed. However, Rashad as the killer would lack the emotional gravity and require a suspension of disbelief to believe he’d go that far.
Cooper Saxe
Against all odds, Assistant US Attorney Cooper Saxe has outlasted every one of his colleagues in the Eastern District Office investigating Ghost. Angela, Jerry Donovan, Mike Sandoval, Greg Knox, are all dead. John Mak and Tamika were either fired or reassigned. The disgraced attorney is now facing time for illegally planting evidence in James’ home and found rock bottom in a bottle of liquor. He was last seen toting a handgun and despondently heading towards Truth with revenge in his eyes.
Paz Valdes
Angela’s older sister has been convinced that James was bad news from the beginning. Since Angela’s death she’s been convinced that he was responsible. Paz was apoplectic upon learning that James wouldn’t be brought to justice once their Terry Silver case fell through.
Tommy Egan
James adopted brother became his nemesis this season after Tommy killed Angela in retaliation for James tricked Tommy into executing his own father. As James’ partner-in-crime, Tommy embraced the streets with more vigor than James and balked at the idea of going legit. If he discovered that Tasha killed Keisha, killing James would be his brand of revenge.
Tasha St. Patrick
You want a woman’s loyalty? Give her security. You give her that, she’ll never betray you” Tasha to Ghost in the aforementioned third episode.
Despite being the woman who stuck by James since they met in high school, Tasha has had to cope with the realization that she was the backup plan since his high school sweetheart popped back into James’ life during the series premiere. To make matters worse, James murdered her paramour Terry Silver, threatened her financial security emphasizing their pre-nup and sabotaged her daycare business. Ghost gloating about her being a part of his old life at their daughter’s gravesite would have been the coup de grace to their fractured relationship.
Tariq St. Patrick
Tariq has the most obvious motive to get rid of his father. With James out of the picture, Tariq can pin the murder of his sister’s killer on his father. Tariq has always been a petulant and entitled brat, but his evaluation of his father as a selfish narcissist has been spot-on. This season, he’s been less opaque about his disdain. James going back on his word from last season to protect Tariq by requesting he admit to killing Ray-Ray may have been the final straw. His father’s story about betraying and murdering a former drug kingpin named Breeze while he watched Jeopardy when he was Tariq’s age, because he was ‘getting in the way of his future’ may have been the inspiration. The tag line for this season was The Final Betrayal and this would certainly qualify as one.
However, other questions remain as well. Will James posthumously be publicly outed as Ghost? What will happen if Tommy discovers Tasha killed Keisha? Will anyone escape unscathed? And what exactly was James’ final request to an imprisoned 2-Bit?
The series will have five episodes to close these intersecting plot threads when it returns on Jan. 5.
