Jubal shouldn’t have been anywhere near this week’s case.
Yet, there he was, front and center, on FBI Season 6 Episode 12.
As soon as he recognized that the girls who overdosed had gotten the tainted pills from his godson, Jubal needed to tap out.
Instead, he doubled down. And everything went downhill from there.
This is hardly the first, nor will it be the last, case of an agent being too close. There’s been at least one each season.
For example, in this season, how about FBI Season 6 Episode 3, when OA used Gemma’s drug-dealing friend Cate to entrap her Ukrainian extortionist boyfriend, Luka?
Gemma didn’t much like finding out her friend had gotten killed as part of an FBI operation, one of the many things that have set back that relationship. Gemma also didn’t like being quizzed about her drug use. Go figure.
There’s only one episode remaining in this season. The smart money is on their relationship not lasting through the summer hiatus.
Sure, OA deserves to be in a caring relationship. But find someone who can get him, not some pampered rich girl.
This outing got personal for Jubal rather quickly. It was bad enough that four girls overdosed and died on a bad batch of homemade fentanyl.
But when the JOC was fortunate enough to find the image matching the surviving girl’s description of the seller, Jubal recognized him as his godson, Nate.
So, let’s weigh the pros and cons of Jubal remaining on this case.
Jubal is the only one who might be able to get his former partner Joe and Joe’s son Nate to talk to the FBI so they can get the poisoned pills off the street.
The big con was that his mouth was writing checks that his pay grade just couldn’t cash. He was promising Joe and Nate the world, but there was no way he could deliver that.
One thing that was never explained was why Joe, this super FBI agent, was retired. Was it a disability situation? Or was he unable or unwilling to keep up with modern-day expectations?
My money is on the latter. He had no compunction about demanding that Jubal give him the bag of oxy he discovered so that Joe could flush the evidence.
Jubal has adjusted to the Bureau’s new protocols. Joe remained old school and likely never would have made that transition.
Another reason Jubal should have bailed was that he owed Joe, who had saved his life while taking a bullet for him and covered for him during his drunk days. Jubal couldn’t be level-headed about Joe or his godson, Nate.
The other problem was that Jubal understood where Joe was coming from. They were both absentee, workaholic fathers, and their sons have ended up somewhat aimless and screwed up as a result.
Tyler has certainly had his moments as well. Remember when he refused to cooperate when one of his classmates was a suspect in a deadly robbery on FBI Season 5 Episode 3? How about when he got suspended for drinking on FBI Season 6 Episode 2?
So, remembering Tyler’s missteps, Jubal wanted to do everything that he could for Nate. That was his way of paying Joe back a little bit. The problem was he could only do so much.
This whole plan fell apart because it depended on Nate. And, as Scola noted, Nate wasn’t up to the task.
Nate was wobbly as an informant, and having his godfather in his ear or by his side would not change that fact.
Nate created a wealthy, mysterious buyer from Florida seeking pills with whom he just happened to be friends. How unlikely was that?
Then, when things got tense as the sale went down, Nate blew it by calling Jubal by name and blowing the cover of “Dr. Steve.”
But Jubal and Nate weren’t the only ones who shared the blame for this mess of an operation.
Let’s start with Isobel. Maggie wasn’t around to call Jubal on his shit. So Isobel had to be the one to sideline him.
She made a mealy-mouthed attempt to check where his head was at. Of course, he said he was fine. He also does, even when he’s not. She’d worked with him long enough to know when to bench him because his head was not on straight.
Yet she let him play on because it was too late to do otherwise at that point in the game.
Joe gets some of the blame as well. Despite his being retired and home all of the time, he had no idea that the son who was living with him was dealing drugs.
Also, when he locates Nate, he lets him escape rather than drive him straight to the FBI building. So Nate got to add resisting arrest to his charges.
Finally, Nate got shot because Joe chose to rush the scene of the standoff rather than letting the active professionals do their jobs.
Joe was wrong to break things off with Jubal just because Jubal did what was suitable for the job rather than his personal life. Of all people, Joe should understand that because that was his life story as well.
