History Series / Blindspot

* GreyAndGrayMorality: TheGovernment vs Sandstorm is starting to look like this.
** The FBI is full of good-minded if flawed people who uphold the law to the best of their ability, but the investigations Jane leads them on expose ''unforgivable'' corruption which they often accept as business as usual... and upon exposure, they blithely accept orders from higher-up not to investigate further -- one particularly intense case is Jane being held and tortured in a CIA "black site" in direct violation of both American laws against torture and the CIA's mandate against operating domestically. Kurt and Jane actually ''meet'' the man in charge of the site several months later, and Kurt basically makes Jane ''suck it up.''

* FreudianExcuse: This turns out to be Madeline's entire reason for going after the FBI. Her father was a rising politician who had one meeting with J. Edgar Hoover and was forced to revoke his career and then killed himself. Madeline blames the FBI so much for one man's actions that she wants to destroy the entire agency, ignoring all the good the FBI does because she thinks they're also incredibly corrupt.

* FrameUp: Happens a few times but none as effective as in the season 4 finale as [[spoiler: the team realize too late that ''everything'' that's been happening that season has all been part of Madeline's epic job to frame them all for murdering innocent people and behind a terrorist cyber-attack, making the team fugitives.]]

* CreepyGymCoach: Revealed to be the crux of "In the Comet of Us", [[VillainWithGoodPublicity Coach Mike Jones]] seemingly a caring and supportive figure at Agent Reed's Alma Matar is secretly a sexual predator who has been preying on his students for decades. However, cause his football program brought the school millions the corrupt board covered up his crimes and silenced his victims, this causes two of them to snap and go on a [[SpreeKiller shooting spree]]. As Edgar realises whilst trying to build a case against him in season two, Jones also abused him and he'd been suppressing the memory all these years. In end one of Jones former victims kills him, and Reed helps him escape.

* BrokenPedestal: On a mission, Zapata runs into Madeline's son, Greg and lays out how his mother is part of a vast conspiracy out for power for herself and even had Greg's father killed to help it. Naturally, Greg doesn't believe it although he covers for Zapata escaping. Later, Greg meets with Madeline to thank her for helping his "vaccines" get through. He's first struck when she mentions she's in the running for the Vice Presidency. Then when Greg presses on his dad's death, Madeline shuts him down and it hits Greg that his beloved mother is a monster. And then she seals the deal by having her own son locked up to keep him quiet.

** Patterson's father, played by Creator/BillNye is not only an accomplished scientist (like Nye himself), but he also mentions an old rival named [[Series/StargateAtlantis Rodney McKay]] (Nye appeared in one episode of the show).

** Sandstorm is a group of WesternTerrorists who commit unspeakable acts and do lots of collateral damage, but they are fighting that corruption tooth and nail. It goes straight into NotSoDifferent territory as both sides consider [[TheNeedsOfTheMany individual lives to be expendable]]. Jane even {{Lampshades}} this in ”Heave Fiery Knot";

* ItsAllAboutMe: [[spoiler:Madeline Burke wants to destroy the FBI just because her father apparently died of despair after a meeting with J. Edgar Hoover fifty years ago, ignoring the good the Bureau does on a wider scale]].

* BigBrotherInstinct: A villainous example. One of the perps from "Eight Slim Grins", with the help of three others, tries to break his brother out of the hospital. The brother, a fellow criminal, was in police custody after getting shot during a robbery. [[spoiler: Not only does his plan fail, it gets him killed and causes his brother to succumbs to his injuries]].

** Patterson's father, played by Creator/BillNye is not only an accomplished scientist (like Nye himaelf), but he also mentions an old rival named [[Series/StargateAtlantis Rodney McKay]] (Nye appeared in one episode of the show).

* AsHimself: It's revealed that Patterson's father is famous scientist Bill Nye the Science Guy, played by the man himself. Everyone else is in awe at this, except Jane [[PopCultureOsmosisFailure who doesn't know who he is.]]

* DrivenToSuicide: [[spoiler: Sofia Varma, Mayfair and Carter's co-conspirator, took her own life when it appeared that Operation Daylight would be exposed.]]

The show has aired the fifth and final season.

* AmbiguousEnding: A major one for the series as the finale [[spoiler: has Jane stopping the ZIP bomb from exploding. She and the team are forced to leave the FBI but gather for a big dinner...during which, Jane has flashes of her dying in Times Square of a ZIP overdose. It's unclear whether she's merely imagining what could have happened...or if this "happy ending" is her dying thought.]]

* CastingGag: Patterson's father, played by Creator/BillNye is not only an accomplished scientist (like Nye himaelf), but he also mentions an old rival named [[Series/StargateAtlantis Rodney McKay]] (Nye appeared in one episode of the show).

The show is currently airing the fifth season, which serves as the last season.

* BittersweetEnding: On the season 4 finale, the FBI team gets to interrupt [[spoiler:Project Helios, but Madeline takes over the FBI and is seeking to damage it. The team is now living as fugitives, if most of them are still alive at all]].

* FreezeFrameBonus: At the end of the series finale, as the team leaves the FBI office for the last time, they see the director giving instructions to a small group with physical attributes remarkably similar to Kurt, Jane, Patterson, Zapada, Reade, and Rich. We can only imagine how amazing it would have been to have the two teams meet face-to-face.

** All episode titles in Season 1 are {{Significant Anagram}}s. Once decoded, the first ten form a non-rhyming poem regarding the plot of the series. On top of ''that'', the anagrams form a coherent, intriguing paragraph; [[spoiler:Who is Jane Doe? Taylor Shaw, the missing girl, or maybe not. The past will cloud our eyes. Suspect everyone. Lift the curtain, and unveil the mastermind. In case of emergency, follow these instructions; stay where you are. Find a secure line to contact your handler. Find what you need in almost the last place you look. To begin the sequence, focus on the time, then head first road west to your new safehouse. The final order will be revealed when it's filed away.]] The creators have stated that the episode names of future seasons will also have hidden messages, possibly encoded in other ways.

The show is currently airing its 4th season. In May 2019 it was renewed for a fifth, and final, season.

* ArmiesAreEvil: In "A Stray Howl" it is revealed the US military is operating and carrying out drone-strikes on civilian targets over U.S. soil without regard to casualties. They are also said to have directly recruited convicted felons into the [=SEALs=], and nobody even blinks twice at the idea that a woman might be kidnapped, trained and then have her memory wiped for a black op.

* ArtisticLicenseBiology: The scene of [[spoiler:Mayfair's murder]] is cleaned down with bleach, yet Patterson is somehow able to swab a sample and run a DNA analysis on it. While it's not unrealistic that traces of blood remain behind, the bleach should have rendered it completely useless for any forensic analysis.

* ArtisticLicenseLaw: The second season premier shows a CIA "black site" in Oregon, even though the CIA is forbidden by law from operating on U.S. soil. It also shows them using torture as an interrogation tactic, even though that is also now forbidden by law. It also would be impossible for the CIA to grab up a domestic terrorism suspect since counter-terrorism is the province of DHS and handled by the FBI. Traditionally, when the CIA needed to interrogate someone captured in the U.S. they would have to fly them outside the country first; this is the origin of the controversy over "rendition" flights. Of course, a CentralTheme of ''Blindspot'' is that abuses just as grotesque as this are rampant in American government, but attempting to expose them usually leads to being made subject to them.

** "Im Memory: "[[spoiler: Roman dies. Zapata takes over as the new leader of an evil organization. Jane collapses from an influx of ZIP that has reverted her back to her old Remi persona.]]