Diksha Sundriyal
In Netflix’s ‘Man on Fire,’ Poe Rayburn survives an explosion that takes out an entire residential building, which includes the apartment her family lives in. There are two reasons why she survives that tragedy. First, she sneaks out of her house in the middle of the night to go to a party with her boyfriend. She falls asleep, and by the time she wakes up, she has a very small window in which to return home, none the wiser about where she went. In her haste to return home, she almost crashes into a convoy, which consists of two white vans and one biker. This is the second reason that ensures her survival. If it weren’t for them, she would have reached home on time and died with the rest of the building. But then, if it weren’t for them, there wouldn’t have been a bomb in the first place. SPOILERS AHEAD.
The Mysterious Biker Turns Out to be the Orchestrator of the Explosion
When the two vans appear out of nowhere in front of her, Poe pulls the brakes hard enough for her bike to slip. It isn’t too bad, and she quickly pulls herself back and rides back home. But while she is on the ground, she takes a good look at the white vans and, particularly, the biker who follows them. He, too, takes a second to look at her and pulls the visor off, which allows Poe to see him as well. In any other situation, she would likely have forgotten the man’s face, but it became a core memory because it happened so close to the explosion. John Creasy is another reason why the memory sticks in her head for so long.
He knows how important it is for memories to be contaminated, so he makes sure that he is the only one who talks to her regarding the events of that day. He puts a blindfold on her to make sure she is entirely focused on the events before the explosion, and sure enough, she correctly identifies the vans’ model. She even remembers the biker’s face, but before she can start describing it, the memories of the explosion overwhelm her, leaving Creasy without the critical information that could have made things so much easier. He doesn’t get the answer until he breaks into prison and meets with Ferraz, the leader of FRP, the organization that claims to be behind the explosion.
Ferraz reveals that he was blackmailed into being a patsy, while the real culprits were President Carmo, his assistant Soares, and a CIA agent named Henry Tappen. He even states that Tappen was in Rio to make sure everything went smoothly, which meant he was there when the explosion happened. Because Creasy has worked with Tappen before, he cannot process the fact that his colleague is the one behind all this bloodshed. To confirm that Ferraz is not lying to him, he asks Poe to search for Tappen on Google. When she looks at his photo, she instantly identifies him as the biker from that night, confirming Ferraz’s claims.
Tappen’s Selfish Ambition Leads Poe to Lose Her Family
With the truth about Tappen and his wrongdoings out in the open, it begs the question of his intentions. Why did he need to create a state of emergency through an alleged terrorist attack in a foreign country? Carmo asks him the same question, and he has a very simple answer. Once Carmo takes hold of the country again, more permanently this time, then he will have full control over what happens next. From time to time, Tappen will need his help in regional matters, and with the President doing his bidding, he can do whatever he wants.
Since he has heavily incriminating evidence against Carmo and Soares, they will forever be in his pocket. With them running Brazil, Tappen will have control of the entire country, in a way. That’s quite a thing to pull off for a CIA agent. His superiors, who don’t need to know the entire truth, will acknowledge his “good connections” with the president, which will surely come in handy in the future. Through this, Tappen will pave the way for his own advancement in the agency and even further. He might even have been thinking along the lines of a political career.
This was quite a long-term plan, and it would have fallen apart if Paul Rayburn had been allowed to keep looking into it. When Paul brought in Creasy, Tappen realized that things were getting serious. So, he decided to kill two birds with one stone. He directed Carmo and Soares to destroy the building that the Rayburns live in. This way, the duo will get what they want, while Tappen’s path will be cleared. Unfortunately for him, Creasy survives and unravels everything.
Read More: Man on Fire Ending Explained: Are Tappen and Soares Dead?
You must be logged in to post a comment.