Will Trent Season 2 Plot Spoilers: How It Changed the Show and What It Means for Season 3
Everything Will knew about his traumatic past changed (and somehow became more traumatic) in Will Trent Season 2 Episode 8, and his revelation will have a lasting impact on the show. ABC’s police procedural crime drama is based on the book series of the same name by Karin Slaughter and follows Will Trent, a highly skilled Georgia Bureau of Investigation agent who is dyslexic and scarred (both physically and mentally). His upbringing in foster care fundamentally changed him, and season 2 explores more of his childhood and repressed memories as Will finally confronts his past.
Starting with the Will Trent Season 2 premiere, Will begins to see fragments of memories from his foster care past that he has repressed. As the season continues, Will struggles to piece it all together, and his hallucinations of his younger self unfortunately affect his work at the GBI. He’s been falling apart since Cricket died in the first episode from an explosion that Will tried to stop, and things come to a head in episode 8, when Will finally remembers a terrifying memory he accidentally buried long ago.
While investigating a cold case, the flashes of images Will has been seeing since Will Trent season 2, episode 1, come together to form a specific memory, and that, understandably, leaves him devastated. Will rushes home and begins to recall a traumatic event from his childhood. As a child, Will bonded with one of his foster mothers, Anna, but her husband, Jack, was extremely abusive, both physically and emotionally, to her and the children. One night, Will gets sick of it, so he takes a gun hidden in the house and points it at his adoptive father.
After Will shoots Jack in the arm, the older man takes the gun from him and starts beating him with it. Jack is about to shoot and kill him, but Anna stops him and tries to wrestle the gun from him. Unfortunately, Jack shoots and kills the only person in Will’s life he feels comfortable with and loves. Since she died trying to save Will, he blames himself for this haunting experience.
Given Will’s reaction to the memory (and Ramón Rodríguez’s impressive performance in that Will Trent scene), it takes the GBI agent a while to come to terms with it.
Luckily, Will’s Uncle Antonio arrives at his house just as he breaks down. Will tearfully explains to the only family member he knows how he has repressed that painful memory. Antonio comforted his nephew and told him that his adoptive mother’s death was not his fault. However, given Will’s reaction to the memory (and Ramón Rodríguez’s impressive performance in that Will Trent scene), it took the GBI agent some time to come to terms with it.
Now that Will is aware of the contents of his repressed memories in Will Trent season 2, he can’t go back to the way he was before he remembered his adoptive mother’s murder (and blamed himself). The GBI agent had already suffered enough trauma before he remembered the horrific night his adoptive father killed someone he cared deeply about, and despite Antonio’s best efforts, Will still blamed himself for the incident. Ultimately, Will’s traumatic backstory (all of it) changed the course of the ABC drama as the protagonist tried to come to terms with it.
