‘Task’: Mark Ruffalo Leads a Grim Crime Story Where Compelling Characters Overshadow Action

Alci Rengifo

The best crime stories compel through their human element. Brad Ingelsby’s “Task” sets up a central plot that is really a starting point to explore the tragic, grounded dimensions of its characters. This is the latest HBO limited series from Ingelsby following his acclaimed “Mare of Easttown,” where Kate Winslet provided a harrowing character study as a small town detective with lots of baggage. Mark Ruffalo takes the lead here as another scruffy, haunted agent of the law. The setting is again a rural corner of America where few opportunities abound and it’s easy to make devastating life choices. 

Ruffalo is Tom Brandis, a widower and FBI agent relegated to manning recruitment desks hoping to attract bright university graduates. He spends his free time bird watching and drinking, while still being a decent father to adoptive daughter Emily (Silvia Diconicio). His other adoptive child and Emily’s brother are behind bars for a terrible crime. His superior, Kathleen McGinty (Martha Plimpton), calls in Tom to put him back on the field leading a task force. It’s a diverse bunch made up of focused Grasso (Fabien Frankel), steely Aleah (Thuso Mbedu) and Lizzie (Alison Oliver), a cop who should find another line of work. Their assignment is to bring down a crew robbing specific targets in suburban Philadelphia. We soon learn that the crew is led by Robbie (Tom Pelphrey) and Cliff (Raul Castillo), with their key target being the drug money of a local biker gang, the Dark Hearts. When one of their raids goes fatally wrong the two thieves are on the run with a young boy, Sam (Ben Lewis Doherty), and the FBI and Dark Hearts on their trail.

“Task” doesn’t build suspense by holding too many secrets. It’s not like “True Detective” where much of the tension stems from unanswered questions and the anticipation of a big reveal. By the end of the first episode we know who has Sam, and the very painful and personal reasons for Robbie to want revenge against the Dark Hearts. The writing intelligently creates anticipation by letting us in on betrayals and schemes being hatched by one group while the other is unaware. Like “Mare of Easttown” or even shows such as “Ozark,” there’s the real time feel of watching how everyone operates. In many ways “Task” functions as a story divided into four parallel sections. First, there is Tom, played by Ruffalo as always in a state of emotional exhaustion. He needs to drink to shut out the emotional pain linked to his incarcerated son. He is a genuinely good FBI agent in a terrain where people can be cynical or cruel. Ruffalo keeps much of the role subtle, never erupting even in moments of extreme violence. 

The other three storylines are just as engaging because the characters are all distinct. Tom’s task force is developed in a way where by the end of the series, we feel we know each member well enough. At first, a character like Aleah seems like another stereotypical tough cop, until she reveals details of a backstory involving an abusive relationship. Lizzie is likable for being honest about her insecurities, such as freezing up when a situation gets intense. She must know that this is not the kind of job where you can afford to be a coward, but she ploughs ahead and eventually starts a relationship with Grasso. He is such a disciplined boy scout we’re not surprised to learn there is much more on a darker level to the character. 

On the other side of the fence the fugitives and criminals are a combination of familiar settings but with a strong, grounded angle. Someone like Robbie is a classic, tragic example of how in real life, criminal choices can occur in a flash out of various factors ranging from emotional impulse or plain greed. His anger over the death of his brother is driving him into a dangerous, reckless zone in targeting the Dark Hearts. Others in his orbit will get pulled in and suffer, like Cliff or his niece, Maeve (Emilia Jones), at 21 already bearing too much by letting her uncle stay at the home passed down by her father. She can’t even have privacy when bringing a date over. Vengeance has blinded Robbie to the point where he can’t see the dangers ahead clearly enough. When he and Cliff make serious errors, some you could easily call stupid, it’s refreshing because the series never pretends these are somehow masterminds. True tragedy is felt because there are so many moments where they could just make an easier choice.

The Dark Hearts are the more standard villains in the series, at times strutting and spitting like crossovers from “Sons of Anarchy.” Why one of the members has a deep vendetta with Robbie would be pure melodrama if the writing didn’t treat it so seriously. Jamie McShane is fantastic as Perry, the gang’s seasoned leader whose ruthlessness makes the younger bikers look so small. A great element to the way episodes develop is that even Perry can gradually become stripped of his brutal self-assurance. This is a plot where everyone is chasing after various threads. At first the FBI is looking for the missing boy while tracking down the heist crew. The bikers want their stolen money and stolen drugs Robbie and Cliff run off with after a disastrous burglary. Robbie wants revenge. It’s a lot to juggle but eventually it all does connect with plenty of action and expected shootouts, well done in forest locations.

Ingelsby and team enrich the material by presenting with a sense of almost folk grandeur. The narrative will slip into montages of childhood memories of bygone times in the woods, with Dan Deacon’s music swelling and shimmering. There is scope to the action scenes and it feels that this is the sort of small town area where small life developments can seem like life or death. Sleeping with the wrong person can ignite serious dangers because everyone will know. “Task” offers much of what we expect in a procedural but polished with performances that yearn for more than just playing another badge or crook, and writing that is using the crimes being committed as windows into deeper emotions. You want to get to know these characters even more before they meet their fates.

“Task” premieres Sept. 7 and airs Sundays at 9 p.m. ET on HBO.