Warning! This article contains SPOILERS for Dark Winds season 3, episode 7.The penultimate episode of Tom Spenser's (Bruce Greenwood) trafficking ring, while Leaphorn and Chee have been trying to find Ernesto Cata's murderer. After several weeks of painstaking investigation, Bernadette, Leaphorn, and Chee all made significant progress in finding justice for their victims.

Though there were a lot of reveals in Dark Winds season 3, episode 7, they weren't exactly what everyone was expecting. For instance, Dr. Reynolds (Christopher Heyerdahl) was revealed as pig drawing means in Dark Winds, but she also discovered that Spenser isn't just smuggling drugs, he's also trafficking people as she's expected all along. Those were big reveals, but there were two other misdirections Dark Winds has been using all season long that came as absolute shocks.

Dark Winds Season 3, Episode 7 Revealed The Cases Aren't Connected At All

Ernesto Cata's Murder Has Nothing To Do With Tom Spenser's Trafficking Ring

Perhaps the biggest reveal of Dark Winds season 3, episode 7 was about the very structure of the season. When Leaphorn and Chee found out that Reynolds was the Ye'iitsoh and had killed Ernesto Cata, they also subtly confirmed that their case isn't related to Bernadette's at all. Reynolds was acting on his own when he killed Ernesto, as the boys had discovered he was "seeding" his archaeological dig site. Tom Spenser's human trafficking ring didn't factor into Leaphorn and Chee's case at all, and the same was true in reverse for Bernadette's case.

The only thing that provided any connective tissue to Leaphorn and Chee's investigation and Bernadette's was Halsey (Phil Burke) and the weird farmers. However, Halsey was proven right when he said he had nothing to do with Ernesto's death, and the farmers turned out to be a massive red herring. Chee's entire trip down to New Mexico was, evidently, just a chance for him to continue his slow-burn romance with Bernadette, and had no real impact on his investigation at all. Many viewers were expecting Leaphorn and Chee to work directly with Bernadette in some fashion, but Dark Winds season 3 obviously never planned for that to happen.

Both Ivan And Garza Are Working For Tom Spenser In Dark Winds Season 3

Bernadette Had No One She Could Trust In New Mexico After All

The other big surprise out of Dark Winds season 3, episode 7 came from Bernadette's side of the story. We knew that Ivan Muños (Alex Meraz) was a dirty cop for several episodes, but Dark Winds revealed that Eleanda Garza (Tonantzin Carmelo) was also on Tom Spenser's payroll. Many viewers were likely wondering who Bernadette could trust at Border Patrol, and that may have caused us to forget to consider that there might not be anyone she could lean on in New Mexico. Ivan's reveal as a villain also lulled us into a false sense of security that Bernadette had successfully outed all the cops on Spenser's payroll.

Dark Winds Has Been Clever With Its Misdirection All Season

Dark Winds Season 3 Flipped Traditional Crime Thriller Twists & Its Own History On Its Head

Surprise twists are a facet of the crime thriller genre, but Dark Winds has managed to make some truly shocking reveals nonetheless, and it did so in a very smart way. Even though viewers were expecting some kind of surprise, the cases not being connected and both Ivan and Eleanda being on Spenser's payroll weren't the surprises many of us were anticipating. Dark Winds accomplished that by subverting expectations of the police procedural genre as a whole and of Dark Winds itself. It's not easy to instill genuine surprise in a genre as saturated as the police procedural, but Dark Winds made some masterful moves to make its misdirections work.

Many viewers likely knew that Ivan was going to be a villain. Betrayals are fairly common tropes in the mystery genre. However, far fewer expected both of Bernadette's friends in New Mexico to be dirty cops. Likewise, many Dark Winds fans expected the cases to connect in some convenient way, just as Chee's investigation in Dark Winds season 2 conveniently had him working with Leaphorn again. By using the audience's preconceived notions of what kinds of twists to expect out of a crime thriller like Dark Winds, it was able to craft truly shocking surprises.