Aahana Swrup
Prime Video’s ‘Countdown’ is a crime thriller show in which an interdepartmental task force takes on intense matters of national security. After stopping the terrorist threat that Volchek presented, Blythe and his team find only a short moment of respite before they’re brought together again to tackle another threat. This time around, their target seems to be a skilled sniper who is preparing to make a prey out of Governor Shelby, putting his and, subsequently, the President’s life in danger. Worse yet, the elusive John Doe, nicknamed Todd by the team, has the ability to somehow always remain one step ahead of our heroes. Yet, in episode 13, titled ‘Your People are in Danger,’ Blythe and the others uncover a string of promising evidence that might just become the sniper’s downfall. Nonetheless, unbeknownst to them, deceit continues to brew on the horizon, putting one of their agents’ lives in mortal peril. SPOILERS AHEAD!
The Task Force Finally Gets a Favorable Lead on the Sniper
So far, every time Blythe and his team have managed to gain some sort of information on the Todd, the sniper, it has turned out to be a meticulously planted bait meant to serve the latter’s purposes. Therefore, hopes run high when Shepard discovers a subliminal clue in an earlier find. After studying the sniper’s manifesto and running it through some algorithms, she’s able to find a point of connection between the writer’s vocabulary and a Southern California radio talk show. Thus, their investigative radius becomes smaller, and a new demographic enters their search for suspects. In light of the discovery, Meachum and Oliveras pay a visit to the talk show host, hoping to sniff out any possible obsessive fans of his show.
Fortunately for them, Randy Mankin of the Truth to Power Hour already has a security watchlist of his more zealous fans. Yet, once the team goes over the list, it becomes evident that they won’t be able to find their sniper there. Still, Blythe has faith in the lead, which compels him to demand a broader search of the Powerheads fanatic group. Eventually, things slot into place once the team receives a new clue from their target: a tagged pickup truck burned to ashes in a golf course near Beverly Hills. While this unravels, Blythe discovers that an FBI Agent named Seth Lewis has tried to access information about his task force. Furthermore, the name pops up again in relation to the pickup truck model as well as the Randy Mankin show. As such, the team realizes they have an actual promising suspect on their hands.
Oliveras Doubts Her Relationship With Julio
From the beginning, Oliveras and Meachum have sported a will-they-won’t-they relationship that only grew stronger as the Volchek mission came to an end. The DEA Agent manages to convince the LAPD detective to finally seek further help for his cancer diagnosis, which ultimately extends his life expectancy considerably. The duo decides to wait until the end of Meachum’s treatment to give their relationship an honest chance. However, in the months that follow, they somehow end up falling out of each other’s orbit. In the meantime, Oliveras ends up entering a relationship with Julio, her childhood friend and, coincidentally enough, Meachum’s oncologist.
Consequently, once the duo came back together to work on the task force again, their relationship inevitably developed a more awkward friction. Yet, eventually, Oliveras’ confidence in her existing relationship begins to stumble. Although she likes how normal and laid-back her life becomes with Julio, she also can’t help but feel a disconnect between their experiences. Furthermore, a conversation with Meachum, in which the latter passes off genuine sentiments about their inherent compatibility, ends up opening up a barrage of doubts in the agent’s mind about her pre-existing relationship. Nonetheless, all of this ends up taking a backseat to Oliveras’ narrative when she becomes a victim of an abduction one morning on her way to work.
Countdown Ending: Does Oliveras Die?
Towards the end of the season, Oliveras finds herself in a uniquely peculiar position. So far, the Sniper, Todd, has only targeted Governor Shelby and his associated team as his prey. However, now he seems to have set his sights on the DEA Agent, whom he scouted earlier during the failed mission to Raising Bane. Worse yet, while the task force notices her absence, even going as far as to track her phone, her uncharacteristic disappearance fails to take priority on their schedule. Consequently, while they continue to chase their hunch about Seth Lewis, Todd manages to get Oliveras further away from the city. Thus, the agent finds herself in the back of a car, bound and blindfolded. Ultimately, she arrives at a chilling location: an empty field with the armed sniper behind her.
This presents a familiar beat in the story. Earlier, when delving into Todd’s backstory, the story showcased the adverse way in which he dealt with his wife’s and best friend’s betrayal. After finding the two in bed together, he kidnaps his wife’s dog, Precious, bringing the canine to the same location. Afterward, he pushed the dog to take off in a run, training his gun on him from a distance. Now, Todd puts on the same show with Oliveras, urging her to run in some twisted attempt to hunt her with his superior sniping skills. However, much like Precious, Oliveras’ fate is also left ambiguous with the season ending before Todd can fire his shot. Although all signs point toward the very real possibility that the sniper would successfully kill the agent, no definitive conclusion can yet be drawn, leaving her demise hanging off a narrative cliff.
Is Seth Lewis the Sniper?
While Oliveras fights for her life, Blythe and the rest of the team follow up on a different lead. This time around, the evidence they have is much more promising than anything they have previously encountered. Multiple avenues of their investigation have pointed toward FBI Agent Seth Lewis. The man seems to be an avid listener and even a fan community contributor to the Randy Mankin podcast, which ties him to the manifesto. Furthermore, background checks connect him to the rifle and pickup truck models that have been directly linked to the sniper. The fact that Blythe and the others have concluded that their target must have a law enforcement background of some kind further adds weight to the theory.
Consequently, as the stars align, the task force decides against wasting any more time and sets out for Lewis’ place of residence. For a second, it seems the squad has finally caught up to the right guy when the sniper’s wife answers the door. However, things take a turn when Seth Lewis, the FBI Agent inside the house, turns out to be the sniper’s best friend. Although the viewers are privy to the fact that Blythe and the others have the wrong guy, the agents have no reason not to arrest Lewis as the prime suspect in their investigation. Nonetheless, since the fans are aware of the sniper’s actual backstory and the role Lewis plays in it, it’s evident that the entire operation is yet another setup. Still, in the end, the latter takes the fall and gets arrested under suspicion of conspiring against political leaders. Meanwhile, the real sniper slips from the task force’s fingers once again.
Are the President and the Governor’s Lives Actually in Danger?
In the aftermath of Seth Lewis’ arrest, one can’t help but wonder about the real motivation behind the sniper’s schemes. Initially, it seems the conspirator might be an anti-establishment gun nut who has personally assigned himself the responsibility of ridding the country of politicians he deems to be corrupt. Nonetheless, the reveal that he has set up the dominoes in a way that results in Lewis’ arrest introduces a new perspective. So far, we have little knowledge about the personal life of the Sniper. In fact, we don’t even learn the antagonist’s real name. Yet, the narrative makes it a point to address his betrayal-filled backstory, wherein he gets cheated on by his wife with his best friend as the other man. In the aftermath, Todd is seen exacting some kind of revenge on his wife’s dog. However, what if his vengeful plan extended beyond this horrifying act?
If Precious’ abduction and possible murder had served as revenge on his wife, there’s still the matter of bringing his friend, Lewis, down. The sniper’s apparent plan to murder the governor and endanger the President’s life is an elaborately orchestrated scheme where every piece of the clue has been meticulously placed to point toward a fixed endgame. The finale reveals that the planned conclusion involves framing Lewis for the entire conspiracy, leading to his arrest. Consequently, an argument can be made that the whole debacle has been a ploy for revenge this whole time, with no real intentions of putting any politician’s life at risk. Nonetheless, the fact that Todd goes out of his way to endanger Oliveras’ life adds a different layer to the story. Therefore, ultimately, while this season introduces a piece of the puzzle, the overarching picture still remains uncertain and ambiguous. For the same reason, fans can only speculate on the snipers’ real motives until potential future seasons.
Read More: Where is Countdown Filmed? Shooting Locations of the Prime Video Show
