A metahuman known as Chainlink seems to have some leverage against football star Dulé Jones.
Tropes:
- Alas, Poor Villain: Averted. Despite being The Resenter, Chainlink is not treated sympathetically. His resentment is more or less treated as an excuse to shake down a wealthy former friend, which is cemented when he decides to kill Dule when he decides to come clean rather than pay up.
- Bittersweet Ending: Dule's secret is revealed and he's forced to quit football as a result. However, Chainlink loses his leverage over Dule, and Dule is still going to be able to make something out of his life, even if it's not in pro football.
- Blessed with Suck: Chainlink is a lot more powerful than Dule; his tentacles are not only physically stronger, but have the ability absorb metal to become even stronger. However, this comes at the cost of being unable to retract his tentacles like Dule can.
- Blackmail: Chainlink demands 90% of Dulé Jones' football earnings in exchange for not exposing Jones as a metahuman.
- Blackmail Backfire: Dule pretty quickly decides that Murder Is the Best Solution to keeping his secret, and lures Chainlink into what was meant to be a death trap. Chainlink narrowly escapes death, only to find out that Dule would much rather confess his secret than pay Chainlink off.
- Comic-Book Time: Given the timeframe of Dule getting counseling from Sharon and being present at the Big Bang, it would make much more sense for Dule to have gone straight to the pros out of high school. However, it's implied that he played ball in college first.
- Dramatically Missing the Point: When Sharon learns that Dulé has gotten mixed up with another metahuman and has hidden that he himself is a metahuman, she calls himself out on why he's let things go as far as they did. To this, he tries to justify that he doesn't want to lose what he's gained by being able to hide his metahuman nature. In response, she explains that she didn't just want him to "make good": she also wanted him to "be good", in the sense that he be a man with integrity, meta-human or otherwise.
- 555: The viewers don't get to see Chainlink's whole phone number but it starts with 555.
- I Know Madden Kombat: When Chainlink appears on the football field to take Dule out in retaliation for revealing his secret, he finds himself being tackled by two opposing football teams. Dule is also the one to defeat him by using a tackle to pin him to the ground.
- Reformed Criminal: Double Subverted. Dule's story is that he was a gang member who turned his life around thanks to counseling from Robert and Sharon. Chainlink coming after him makes Sharon suspect that he never got out of the gang life. He admits that he was still gangbanging while he was getting counseling, but he did leave the life behind after the Big Bang.
- The Resenter: Chainlink resents the fact he cannot hide his metahuman status and live a normal life while Dulé Jones not only can do it but also became rich and famous.
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Suspiciously Similar Song: Throughout the episode, music that sounds very much like a remixed version of the NFL on Fox theme song
can be heard playing.
