Prison Break: The Final Break

Prison Break: The Final Break is a 2009 television movie of the Prison Break franchise. It serves as the series finale of Prison Break. The movie aired May 27 in the United Kingdom on Sky1. In the United States and Canada, the movie was first released on DVD and Blu-ray on July 21, 2009. The movie covers the events which occurred in between the downfall of The Company, and the revelation of Michael Scofield's (Wentworth Miller) death, which were not explained in the finale of season four, Prison Break. It details the manipulated arrest and incarceration of Sara Tancredi (Sarah Wayne Callies) for the murder of Christina Scofield (Kathleen Quinlan), the final escape plan which Michael devises for Sara, and the details surrounding Michael's death. It also reveals the ultimate fate of Gretchen Morgan (Jodi Lyn O'Keefe).

Plot

The story starts off with Sara being arrested for the murder of Christina (Scofield) Hampton, during her and Michael's wedding reception. It is implied that surveillance video was altered by agents loyal to the General (Jonathan Krantz) (Leon Russom) by removing Christina's gun to make it look as if Sara shot Christina in cold blood rather than self-defence. She is held in the Miami-Dade State Penitentiary, where overcrowding necessitates that the female prison and jail inmates are housed in the same building. Gretchen Morgan watches from a distance, having been imprisoned after the events in "The Sunshine State".^[2] Sara is attacked as revenge by the Miami-Dade COs for having left the infirmary door unlocked,^[3] allowing the "Fox River Eight" to escape and eventual dismissal or suspension of several staff members of Fox River.

Across the yard is the neighboring men's jail and prison, where Krantz and Theodore "T-Bag" Bagwell (Robert Knepper) are being held. T-Bag continues to help the general, even though the General claims poverty when asked to pay for contraband T-Bag gets him. The General contacts Gretchen and offers her $100,000 to kill Sara. When Gretchen does not get the job done immediately, it is offered as a bounty for whoever kills Sara. Sara is quickly poisoned with strychnine, but is given medical treatment in the infirmary that saves her life and pregnancy. The correctional physician informs her that she will have thirty minutes with her baby when she gives birth before the baby is taken away from her. His advice is to consider herself to be a surrogate mother to her own fetus so as to avoid crippling depression due to the inevitable separation.

Michael learns of the attacks from Sara's lawyer, and asks the warden to protect her, which she declines to do. She also denies Sara visits from anyone except her lawyer. After learning about the bounty on her head, Michael decides the only way to keep her alive is to break her out. He once again enlists Lincoln Burrows (Dominic Purcell) and Fernando Sucre's (Amaury Nolasco) help. Lincoln and Sucre scope out the prison, taking measurements and photographs to create a map of the prison. Gretchen sees Lincoln and Sucre, and demands Sara include her in any escape plan that may be developing.

After analyzing the photographs and plans of the prison, Michael finds a fault in the security system: a blind spot the cameras cannot see. Alexander Mahone (William Fichtner) then arrives and offers his aid, although his true intentions are unclear. He has just been offered reinstatement with the FBI if he finds and reports any evidence incriminating Michael.

Michael develops an escape plan which he relays to Sara using a hidden message in a letter. While he is out however, FBI Agent Todd Wheatley (Chris Bruno) breaks into Michael's apartment, and sees the plans laid out on table. When Michael arrives, he points out that while the plans may look incriminating, he was merely looking for weaknesses to report to the prison warden (Amy Aquino) in the hopes that she may grant him visitation rights.

Sara's attorney secures a court order allowing Michael to visit her. Because the visit is supervised, he subtly asks her if she understood the hidden message, and she indicates she did. As he is leaving the prison, however, Michael sees the camera system being adjusted to eliminate the blind spot he planned to exploit. Special Agent Wheatley apparently discovered it while looking at the documents he had seen in Michael's apartment.

Meanwhile, Sara joins the "Family" of the leader of the prisoners, an inmate who goes by the name of "Daddy" (Lori Petty). Daddy helps her get work in the motor pool, which makes Wife jealous and other Family members suspicious.

Michael comes up with a new plan to parachute into the prison and rescue Sara. Lincoln is sent to offer T-Bag $5,000 to light a fire and set off the fire alarm at 7:00 the night of the escape. T-Bag demands $100,000, and suggests they can get it by robbing the General of the money he has to pay the bounty on Sara. T-Bag did this to settle grudges with the General, including the General's refusal to pay T-Bag for favors in jail. T-Bag provides Lincoln with the name and phone number of Joe Daniels, (Richmond Arquette) the General's agent. Lincoln agrees to steal the money and put it in T-Bag's account by 7:00. Lincoln and Sucre then steal the $100,000 from Daniels.

Wanting to get to Sara away from the Family, Gretchen persuades one of the guards to search Daddy's room. The guards do so, and take Daddy to solitary confinement after finding drugs in her cell.

Sara is attacked by a fellow Family member (Alicia Lagano) but Gretchen comes to her rescue, killing the attacker in the process. Gretchen again demands Sara include her in the escape because she wishes to see her daughter, Emily, and give her a gift. When one of the guards tells Daddy of the death of her family member, and mentions that Sara and Gretchen are thought to be behind her killing, Daddy becomes infuriated.

Following several phone calls with Agent Wheatley in which Mahone divulged Michael's parachute plot, it appears that Mahone has betrayed Michael. But Michael continues to trust him, and gives him a piece of paper and a DVD which he asks Mahone to give to Sara in the event of his death. Michael then visits Sara once more, telling her that the previous escape plan was now impossible. He cryptically tells her of the new plan, in which she must get to the chapel. Michael has discovered they can get from the chapel to an administrative building that has an emergency escape tunnel.

Daddy is eventually freed from lockup, and appears to be stalking Sara and Gretchen. Just before the escape begins, Gretchen distracts a guard, and Sara confronts Daddy. Sara picks a fight with Daddy and purposely pushes her into a powerful and frightening inmate Skittlez (Dot Marie Jones), who then retaliates by attacking Daddy. At the same time, Gretchen punches the guard and knocks her to the ground, but gets stabbed in the leg during the altercation. Sara quickly grabs the guard's keys, and the two of them hide in the kitchen amidst the chaos.

Michael then begins the escape. Knowing of the plan thanks to Mahone's information, agent Wheatley orders all lights shut off, and positions armed officers near Michael's expected landing site. When the parachute comes down, it is riddled with bullets. Upon inspection, Wheatley discovers the parachute is attached to a dummy. Michael is then seen sneaking out from under Wheatley's car and running into the prison.

With the escape underway, Gretchen admits to Sara that she cannot continue on without help due to her injuries. Gretchen then asks her to choose, either to leave her behind or help her. Sara chooses to help Gretchen, however, as they run to the chapel, Gretchen is spotted by guards. She is asked if she's alone but Gretchen covers Sara's presence and stalls the guards. Though Sara is almost spotted by a guard, she manages to unlock the door and get into the chapel undetected. The guards are recalled and they take Gretchen. Sara picks up the necklace that Gretchen made for her daughter, Emily, presumably so she may pass it on to Emily later.

Michael meets Sara in the chapel, and they wait for 7:00 when T-Bag was to start the fire to trip the fire alarm. We see Sucre racing to a money transfer store to transfer the $100,000, but he gets there after the shop is closed. When T-Bag finds out that the transfer did not take place by 7:00 as promised, he angrily reveals the plot to the warden, and tells her that he was instructed to set off the fire alarm. Special Agent Wheatley responds by demanding the fire alarm and other systems that would cover other noises be turned off.

This however, turns out to be part of Michael's plan, as he assumed that T-Bag would double-cross them. With the alarms off, he burns through a locked door with a blowtorch. However, the electronic lock on the next door does not open with the device Michael brought. He needs to cause a power surge from a fuse panel to unlock the door, so he instructs Sara to leave him behind. Sara refuses to leave if Michael cannot go with her, but he emphasizes that there is no other way, touching her stomach and saying that he will be going with her. In one final act of sacrifice, Michael causes the surge, and sparks are shown coming from the fuse box. Sara runs, meeting Lincoln, Sucre, and Mahone just outside the fence. Stunned, Sara is unable to describe to Lincoln what just happened. Mahone revealed that he knew of Michael's plan from a previous discussion and tells Lincoln, "He's gone." They get into the van and drive away, still shocked over Michael's fate.

Back at the prison, T-Bag is put into solitary confinement for aiding Sara's escape.

The next day, just before Lincoln and Sara board a boat to escape to the Dominican Republic, Sucre gives Sara the $100,000 they stole from the General, apologizing for not being able to wire the money to them the night before as planned. Mahone gives Sara the paper Michael asked him to deliver, the results of a medical exam revealing that his brain tumor had returned and his condition was terminal. Mahone also gives the DVD to Lincoln who watches it with Sara while they escape on the boat. In the video, Michael tells Sara and Lincoln that he wouldn't have had much time to live because of his tumor, and that he doesn't regret his choice. He asks Lincoln to promise that he will always be there for his child (which turns out to be a son) no matter what, and he asks Sara to watch out for Lincoln. He says that life is wasted on what people want to, but don't ever, say. He then says what he wants to say is that he loves them both, very much. He tells them to make sure his child is told every day how much he is loved and how lucky he is to be free. The video, and the entire series, ends with Michael's message that they are finally free:

Cast

Starring

• Dominic Purcell as Lincoln Burrows
• Wentworth Miller as Michael Scofield
• Amaury Nolasco as Fernando Sucre
• Robert Knepper as Theodore "T-Bag" Bagwell
• Jodi Lyn O'Keefe as Gretchen Morgan
• Sarah Wayne Callies as Sara Tancredi
• William Fichtner as Alexander Mahone

Guest starring

• Leon Russom as General Jonathan Krantz
• Chris Bruno as FBI Agent Todd Wheatley
• Barbara Eve Harris as FBI Agent Felicia Lang
• Kim Coates as Richard Sullins
• Lori Petty as "Daddy"
• Aisha Hinds as Guard Cowler
• David Starzyk as Blue Phillips
• Amy Aquino as Warden Alice Simms
• Dendrie Taylor as Guard
• Richmond Arquette as Attorney Joe Daniels
• Damien Leake as Detective Marlin
• Alicia Lagano as Agatha Warren
• Joseph Will as Doctor
• Sufe Bradshaw as Wife
• Dot Marie Jones as Skittlez
• Rainbow Borden as Seags
• Livia Trivino as Hucks
• Ian Patrick Williams as Bearded man
• Peggy Dunne as Guard

References