Paradise’s second episode, titled “Sinatra”, explores the backstory of Julianne Nicholson’s Samantha. As she delicately pieces together a cover story for the current tragedy, Xavier becomes suspicious of her motives.
Xavier is taken into custody by his boss, Agent Robinson — Cal’s lover — for questioning. Hooked to an elaborate polygraph machine, he’s questioned about his whereabouts that evening and if he killed President Bradford. Samantha and a colleague watch from behind a one-way glass. She instructs her associate to interrupt the interrogation to Robinson’s disdain.
The colleague is Gabriela, a therapist Xavier met once before. She simply asks if he’s glad about Cal’s death. Before answering, she opens her palm to reveal the words, “Say Yes.” Xavier pauses before repeating the message. He passes with flying colors, which satisfies Samantha for the moment.
Later, Samantha instructs a panicking board to proceed with a false scenario: Cal Bradford died of natural causes, and they will move immediately to appoint a new president. She reminds them they must move as a solid front, reassuring the community that they remain in control. While a suspect has yet to be identified, each board member’s security detail will be increased.
Through flashbacks, we learn Samantha managed a small tech startup 12 years ago that became a billion-dollar company overnight. She and her husband have two children, enjoying the bliss of her enormous success. On the day of a monumental merger, making her one of the richest individuals in the world, her son has a drastic medical emergency. For years, they scoured the globe for a treatment. Unfortunately, this latest episode becomes her son’s last. The grief leaves her despondent in her marriage and obsessive with her daughter’s health.
In an attempt to function, she promises grief counselor and therapist Gabriela a fortune to help her decompartmentalize her grief. She admits she’s broken, but she has a billion-dollar company to run and will do anything to keep her from jumping off a roof.
A few years later, Samantha’s idea of a mountain-shelled city comes to fruition during a seminar about climate change. She runs into Cal, who nicknames her Sinatra because she leads the pack.
Jumping back to the present, an emergency town hall is called to announce the new sitting president. Two citizens are absent: Xavier’s daughter, Presley, and Cal’s son, Jeremy. Instead, they share an intimate moment when Jeremy recalls his last moments with his father. Then, they both enter a place from their past. A hangar full of airplanes that erect flashbacks of turbulence when they first arrived at the compound.
In the final scene, Xavier explains to Billy that he doesn’t trust Samantha. He vows to bring her down for her involvement in his best friend’s death.
The writing boasts Fogelman’s strength in displaying carefully nuanced characters that exhibit many facets of the human condition. One would not suspect today’s Samantha to be birthed from her past. But that’s the beauty in three-dimensional characters: they have layers that viewers can relate to, despite their motivations.
Also kudos to the writer’s room for being bold in its assessment of race within the story. It doesn’t shy away from optics with Xavier existing in this role as a Black man. It embraces the fact Cal, a southern progressive, was still a product and environment heavily influenced by the construction of racial stereotypes. An added detail that shows these characters exist in our reality.
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