Jessica Matten: Bern wants to save someone like her in ‘Dark Winds’ S4

Left to right, Kiowa Gordon, Jessica Matten and Zahn McClarnon star in “Dark Winds,” airing on Sundays. Photo courtesy of AMC

NEW YORK, March 8 (UPI) — Jessica Matten says the case at the center of Dark Winds Season 4 has psychological and emotional ramifications for her character, Bernadette Manuelito, a deputy in the Navajo Reservation Tribal Police.

Airing Sundays on AMC, the drama series takes place in the 1970s and finds Bern and her partners Jim Chee (Kiowa Gordon) and Joe Leaphorn (Zahn McClarnon) trying to bring home Billie (Isabel DeRoy-Olson), a 16-year-old girl who ran away to Los Angeles from her Catholic boarding school on the reservation.

Also hot on Billie’s trail is Irene (Franka Potente), the professional killer who murdered Billie’s family and appears to be obsessed with Joe.

Bern, who graduated from the same boarding school Billie escaped, sees herself in the feisty Billie.

Bern is also looking for something meaningful to distract her from the memory of killing a man in self-defense at the end of Season 3.

“It’s part of her coping mechanism of: ‘How does she re-find herself? How does she grapple with the pain that she’s dealing with?’ That little girl represents essentially herself and how she’s trying to save a version of herself that she couldn’t when she was younger, but also that little girl still exists in her as a grown adult,” Matten, 40, told UPI in a recent Zoom interview.

“There’s a lot of underlying motivations of why she feels so adamant and motivated to save this girl and, of course, indirectly, we’re talking about the potential of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls,” she said. “There’s a lot of relevant reasons why Bernadette would be quite ambitious this season about solving this mystery.”

After three seasons of teasing, “Will they or won’t they?” admit their romantic feelings for each other, Bern and Chee are officially a couple planning a future together.

“Our characters have gotten over the hump of playing hot and cold with each other,” Matten said. “The writers decided, ‘Let’s skip all that and dive right in.'”

“Give the people what they want,” Gordon laughed.

“That allows for the storytelling to really unfold about coping with PTSD and being vulnerable for each other,” Matten said.

While Bern deals with issues from her past and how their current case connects to it, Chee is suffering from ghost sickness, which manifests itself as disturbing visions, body aches and bloody noses brought on because he didn’t take the time he needs to process his feelings after finding a murdered Navajo elder.

Chee then goes with Bern and Joe to Los Angeles, which brings up memories of how his mother took him to live this unfamiliar place as a boy when they left the reservation.

“The whole season kind of delves into that, of each experiencing their own versions of trauma and how they cope and being there for each other in these very vulnerable settings and that ties into their dynamic and how their dynamic evolves over the season,” Matten said.

Gordon added, “It really is just trying to, by the end of it, [show] how we strengthen the relationship, while going through all of this turmoil.”

Another challenge the new couple faces is the fact that Joe confides in Bern that he plans to retire and wants her to take his place.

Joe swears Bern to silence, noting that if three people know something it is no longer a secret, because he wants to tell his department his news on his own terms.

Of course, Chee realizes something is up and pressures Bern to disclose what she knows, then seems insulted to learn his girlfriend and their boss have kept him out of the loop.

“Chee is a detective, so, obviously, he’s going to sniff a little tension there and a little something missing from the conversation,” Gordon said.

“He figures out this revelation through Bernadette because she just couldn’t hold it anymore because she can’t stand lying to her lover, so she spills the beans,” he explained.

“I don’t take it so well because I’m dealing with my own trauma, the past and then the ghost sickness that has grabbed hold of me, and I’m fighting for my life, and then getting this slapped on me. I become very erratic and make very immature choices after that.”

Chee is so upset by the news of Joe’s retirement that he confronts him and says some things that, although they might be true, were hurtful to his mentor.

“We have a whole interaction,” Gordon said. “It was just two men being honest with each other and the perfect lighting, as well. So, that was really fun to do.”

Both Bern and Chee have spent time working for other agencies — such as the FBI and Border Patrol — but they returned to the tribal police force because they think that’s where they can do the most good.

“As cops, you rely a lot on instinct. So, I think that just [proves] the power of their dynamic in working together a lot more,” Matten said. “They understand each other on a relationship level, a friendship level.”

“That really helps them work together and have more camaraderie on the job, working in tandem and working off each other to solve the case,” Gordon added.

“They’re saying less and just feeling each other out,” Matten agreed.

“Just really relying on that instinct,” Gordon concluded.