[[quoteright:350:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Person-of-Interest-Emerson-Caviezel_7760.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:350:[-For once, you'll be glad that BigBrotherIsWatching...-] ]]

->''"The numbers never stop coming, Mr. Reese."''
-->--'''Mr. Finch'''

'''''Person of Interest''''' is an action-thriller TV series that started airing in September 2011 on CBS. It was created by [[Film/{{Memento}} Jonathan]] [[Film/TheDarkKnightSaga Nolan]] and developed along with JJAbrams and Bryan Burk. Prior to airing, it was much-hyped for the strong pedigree of cast and crew, and later the pilot received positive reviews. It has just been renewed for a third season.
John Reese (JimCaviezel) is a former CIA agent, reduced to living rough as a drunk homeless man in New York City after a falling-out with the United States government. He's bailed out of trouble with the NYPD by a mysterious billionaire named Mr. Finch (MichaelEmerson), who has a strange and potentially-dangerous job offer. As it turns out, Finch is a software genius who designed the government supercomputer that monitors all surveillance data, analyzing and filtering for persons involved in potential threats to national security. As a side effect, the computer also spits out "irrelevant" social security numbers that correspond to a "person of interest", someone that the computer predicts will soon be involved in a violent crime. To help these potential victims (or to stop these potential killers, as the case may be), Finch hires Reese and together, they use their collective skills and resources [[WeHelpTheHelpless to help innocent people]]. Along the way, he crosses paths with Detective Joss Carter, who is at first an antagonist, investigating number of violent incidents involving a mysterious "[[BadassInANiceSuit man in a suit]]" (Reese), but who later [[spoiler: begins cooperating with Reese and Finch]].

Rounding out the cast of [[VillainOfTheWeek weekly rogues]] and [[WeHelpTheHelpless "irrelevant numbers"]] is an ensemble of recurring characters, many of whom are important to the longer [[StoryArc story arcs]]:
* Detective Fusco, a former DirtyCop trying to redeem himself
* Samantha Shaw a DistaffCounterpart to Reese
* Zoe Morgan, a "[[TheFixer fixer]]" who trades in favors and information and flirts with Reese
* Leon Tao, an accountant with a penchant for getting into trouble
* Grace Hendricks, Finch's former fiancee
* Root, a [[TheSociopath sociopathic]] [[TheCracker master hacker]] obsessed with The Machine
* Carl Elias, an elusive mob boss and master criminal, [[WouldHurtAChild ruthless]] yet also [[EvenEvilHasStandards honorable]], whose [[TheChessmaster conspiracies and criminal enterprises]] have generated several [=POI=] numbers [[spoiler:not including Elias himself]]
* "HR", a network of [[DirtyCop corrupt NYPD cops]] and politicians who have both opposed and supported Elias and other crime syndicates
* government agents, including figures from Reese's past, who are part of the apparatus for which The Machine was built
* Decima Technologies, a shadowy private intelligence organization based in China which is also trying to control The Machine

Please contribute to the [[Characters/PersonOfInterest character]] and [[Recap/PersonOfInterest recap]] pages.

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!!''Person of Interest'' contains examples of the following tropes:

[[foldercontrol]]

[[folder:Tropes A-G]]
* FiveFiveFive
* AIIsACrapshoot:
** The machine is very good at spotting threats to itself and in a flashback we see that it considered Finch's partner to be a threat.
** At the end of "Wolf and Cub," it viewed [[spoiler: Reese]] as a threat, too, and [[spoiler: tagged him with a red box. See Colour-Coded For Your Convenience, below]]
** As of "Firewall," [[spoiler: it seems to be prepared to work with Reese to rescue Finch from Root.]]
*** The machine seems quite attached to Finch overall, especially in flashbacks. When he first began testing it, he had to teach it that he was not special and did not deserve extra protection, and it's revealed that the machine [[spoiler:also set him up to meet his future wife, simply because it was able to look at her life and see that she was a match for him.]]
** To keep it from getting too smart, Finch decided it was a good idea to have the machine wipe its own memories and create a new instance of itself each night at midnight - or, as Root puts it, [[ThePhoenix die and be reborn]]. [[spoiler:The machine decided it ''liked'' having memories and a personality and instead decided to print out its memories in machine code each night and hire data entry assistants to ''reinput them each morning''. At least part of this is implied to be because it just loves Finch that much.]]
* AlasPoorVillain: Kohl's death at the end of "Foe." Also a variety of SuicideByCop.
* AmbiguousSituation:
** At [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=37MNDqPJZgo the end of "Cura Te Ipsum"]][[note]]Heal thyself[[/note]], we never find out if Reese kills [[spoiler: the serial rapist]] or lets him go.
--->'''Reese:''' Maybe it's up to me to do what the good people can't. Or maybe there are no good people; maybe there are only good decisions. \\
'''Andrew:''' Please. You don't want to do something you'll regret.\\
'''Reese:''' Which do you think I'll regret more: letting you live, or letting you die? Andrew, help me make a good decision.
*** The episode "Many Happy Returns" suggests that [[spoiler: Reese put the serial rapist in a Mexican prison, where he'll never get out]].
** At the end of "Critical," we never find out if Reese [[spoiler: reveals the existence of The Machine to Carter.]]
*** Judging by the following episodes, he didn't.
* AndStarring: "And MichaelEmerson".
* AndYourLittleDogToo: The assassins after Zoe Morgan ("The Fix") were ordered to kill her and her driver too.
* AngryGuardDog: Bear has several earmarks of this.
** A neo-Nazi tries to use one to intimidate Reese. Reese explains that the dog only appears angry because it does not respect its current owner who does not know how to handle such a well-trained animal properly. Reese on the other hand worked with this type of guard dog before and knows the Dutch commands it was trained to obey. A few Dutch phrases later Reese has a new dog.
** Though the dog only obeys commands in Dutch, he certainly understands certain words in English, like "walk", "leash", and "treats".
** Bear also averts this at times, such as [[spoiler:when he didn't react to Shaw coming into the library.]] Finch calls him a "traitor."
* AnimalMotifs:
** Almost all of Finch's various identities are birds.
** In "The Fix", Finch pretends to be a "Mr. Partridge".
** In "Wolf and Cub," we learn that Finch was known in an earlier life as "Harold Wren." "Many Happy Returns" verifies that Finch is still using this as a cover ID.
** In "Risk," he used the name "Harold Crane."
** In "Identity Crisis," it's "Harold Crow".
** Also, in "Cura Te Ipsum", Finch's pseudonym he gives to the police is 'Burdett', which also means 'bird'.
*** In "No Good Deed," the [=POI=] who [[spoiler: figures out that The Machine exists]] is "Henry Peck." Finch remarks at one point that Peck is "doing what I would do" were Finch in the same situation. Birds peck at things, you know.
** In "2 Pi R," he's a substitute math teacher, "Mr. [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swift Swift]]."
** In "Proteus", it's "Harold Gull", pilot and amateur stormchaser.
** Averted once, when Finch goes undercover as a blogger with the pen name [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Paine Thomas Paine]].
** In "All In", it's "Harold Quail".
** Also, in Grace's house, prominently displayed, is an empty birdcage.
** "Trojan Horse": Harold Starling.
** Nathan lampshades this to Harold in "Zero Day", wondering if she wouldn't be bothered being called Mrs. Ostrich.
* AnimalReactionShot: Bear gets them on occasion.
* AntiHero: John Reese.
* AnyoneCanDie: Moving in this direction during the second season with [[spoiler: Donnelly, Snow and Stanton]] all buying it.
** WordOfGod has stated that this is true. And then proves it with the deaths of [[spoiler: Symanzki and Beecher, who were both clean cops]].
* ArbitrarilyLargeBankAccount:
** We don't know how exactly rich Finch is but he can easily buy up 8% of a major pharmaceutical company in 48 hours (87 million shares). [[spoiler: And it got a lot larger when Finch sold it on a guess the price would drop on a wager of 500 million shares.]]
** He also once invested 150 million dollars just to get close to an investment banker, and had enough liquid assets available to [[spoiler: buy up enough stock in an energy company that had recently lost 90% of its value in a single day to make its price reach a new peak.]]
** His empire includes several magazine publishers who make a particular point of regularly commissioning [[spoiler: his former fiancée Grace]] to do their cover art, thus providing her steady work as an illustrator.
** He's also helped out at least one out-of-work POI by hiring them at one of the companies he controls.
** In "Masquerade," he buys a security company ''and'' a credit bureau just so he can establish Reese's cover identity.
** In "High Road" he snaps up a house that conveniently becomes available, furnishes it, and provides Reese with a car - all just to establish an elaborate cover identity. [[spoiler:Reese still has to do some of the work on his own, getting Zoe in on the plot by asking her to be his (apparent) wife.]]
** He once paid for a hospital wing... or two to get access to the hospital.
** He bought a hotel and put a [=PoI=] in charge of it.
*** It's implied that he invented online social networking as a way to feed info to the Machine. Maybe he has shares in everything from Facebook to Myspace.
** He stakes Leon Tao $1 million and then [[spoiler:stakes the [=PoI=] 2 million later!]]
** He pays Reese an unspecified salary large enough that Reese can give ''90%'' of it to charity and still live comfortably on what's left.
* ArcWords:
** "In the end, we're all alone and no one is coming to save you." (Doubles as {{Foreshadowing}} [[spoiler: of Jessica's fate]].)
** ...and its counterpoints, "You have to trust somebody" and "You're not alone."
** Reese's opening voice-over, describing Jessica, from "Pilot," which he repeats when he confronts [[spoiler: Jessica's abusive husband/murderer]] in "Many Happy Returns":
-->When you find that one person who connects you to the world, you become someone different. Someone better. When that person is taken from you, what do you become then?
** This exchange from "Pilot," variations of which appear in several later episodes (''e.g.,'' twice in "The Fix"):
-->'''Reese:''' You don't know anything about me.
-->'''Finch:''' I know exactly everything about you....
* ArmorPiercingQuestion: "Who are you?" seems to be this for Reese. He honestly doesn't know, and he finds it hard to answer; even to himself. Lampshaded once:
--> '''Reese:''' One of these days I'm gonna have to come up with an answer for that.
* [[ArtisticLicenseCars Artistic License - Motorcycles]]: The Marine vet with a prosthetic right arm who drives off riding a crotch rocket at speed. Reality check: even the fancy electronic prosthetics that were developed in the last decade (which he has) probably don't have the level of precision necessary to drive a go-fast bike like that. Among other things, on unmodified bikes (his was stolen) the right arm controls the throttle and front brake.
* AStormIsComing: In Proteus, as they notice [[spoiler: The machine is malfunctioning due Kara's virus]], Finch and Reese share this dialogue:
-->'''Reese''': At least the storm is passing.
-->'''Finch''': No, Mr. Reese, I have a feeling that it's just beginning.
** Confirmed in Trojan Horse, after Finch has discovered more about what Kara Stanton was doing:
-->'''Finch''': [[spoiler:Whoever Decima is, I believe they created the virus to find and infect a single target... The Machine.]]
** [[UnreliableNarrator Finch]] was [[spoiler:being somewhat economical with the truth about what Decima was up to, since he himself invented the code that Decima appropriated off Kara Stanton's recovered laptop.]]
* TheAtoner:
** Harold Finch is implied to be this in the second episode. Affirmed in the sixth episode ("The Fix") when Finch says that before he found Reese, the numbers haunted him and he took great pleasure in helping take down the bad guys as they had previously given the number of another woman.
** Reese is implied to be atoning for the people he's killed for the CIA, possibly because some of them were not as guilty as he was led to believe.
*** ...and for not being there in time for [[spoiler: Jessica.]]
** In a way, Fusco, since he's got a kid.
** The [=POIs=] in several episodes ("Triggerman," "Bury the Lede," "The High Road," in a misguided way in "Mission Creep")
* BadAss:
** Reese is a BadassInANiceSuit: all Detective Carter needs to hear was that a mysterious stranger in 'a nice suit' was involved to know it was him.
** Carter.
** In "Matsya Nyaya," Fusco TookALevelInBadass when he [[spoiler:rescued Reese from HR.]]
** Finch, too, in his own way:
*** He's one BadassBookworm computer hacker who broke into ARPANET with a homemade computer in the 1970s--and he's only gotten better over time.
*** He also has walked right up to an influential leader of a corrupt cop ring and manipulated him into backing down from working with a mob boss, and completely bankrupted a corrupt executive's company.
*** When physical confrontation is necessary and unavoidable, he does what he can despite his physical limitations. At the climax of "Ghosts," he placed himself between Teresa and the hit man and gave him a look that just ''dared'' him to pull the trigger. He also acquitted himself pretty well in the climactic fight scene of "Super."
** Fusco is starting to level up to this. The largely off-screen story arc with him protecting a woman from the Armenian hitmen seems to have leveraged him to single-handedly taking out two Serbian tough guys who'd just murdered someone.
** [[ActionGirl Samantha Shaw]]. Similar to Reese's introduction in the pilot, the beginning of "Relevance" establishes Shaw as a force to be reckoned with.
* BadassBoast: A nervous Finch watches as Reese prepares to snipe a car with a Barrett anti-material rifle.
-->'''Finch:''' What happens if you miss?\\
'''Reese:''' I wouldn't know. Never have.
** Finch has a quieter one in the opening narration:
-->You'll never find us, but victim or perpetrator, if your number's up, we'll find ''you''.
* BaitAndSwitchComparison: When [[spoiler:Shaw shows up at the library in "Trojan Horse"]], she rejects Finch's job offer thusly:
-->You think I should have a hobby. Now, what would that be? Hanging around a derelict library with you, your poorly-socialised guard dog... and Bear here?
* BaitTheDog: Elias helps Reese save an infant, only to lock Reese and the child in a refrigerated truck to force Reese's assistance.
* BatmanGambit:
** [[spoiler:Root]] gets the better of Reese and Finch by counting on them to do what they do best: [[WeHelpTheHelpless helping the helpless]]. [[spoiler:She puts a hit out on her own alias and leaves a digital trail for the Machine to spot, knowing that it will tag her as a POI and bring Reese and Finch to her.]]
** Finch [[spoiler:hid a virus within the virus on the laptop he sold to the Chinese. This prompted the Machine to learn how to defend itself, and thereby improve its ability to remove itself from attempts by people like Root to get ahold of it, while continuing to protect the relevant and irrelevant numbers.]]
* BatmanGrabsAGun:
** When [[spoiler: Carter's son]] is kidnapped, the very anti-gun/anti-weapon Finch is so desperate to help save him that he picks up a gun and asks Reese to teach him how to use it, though he's quite realistic on what sort of assistance he'd be able to give even with a gun. Reese, however, refuses to teach Finch and instead suggests that Finch perform the very valuable assistance of being ready with the get-away car.
** And again in "Prisoner's Dilemma" when he plans to [[spoiler:bust Reese out of prison.]] He actually looks disappointed when Carter tells him that it won't be necessary.
* BattleDiscretionShot
* BecomingTheMask:
** "John Reese" is just a cover identity he was given when he became a government assassin. He discarded his life before that and became the new identity.
** "Wolf and Cub" reveals that Finch attended MIT under the name "Harold Wren," which was itself an alias apparently created for that occasion. Fusco comments, "This guy's had so many different names he probably can't remember who he really is."
*** In "Zero Day", Ingram asks Finch if he still remembers his original name.
* BerserkButton:
** Putting kids in danger seems to hit this for Reese ("Justice," "Wolf and Cub," "Baby Blue," "Flesh and Blood").
** Kidnapping ''babies'' puts it into overdrive.
** And beating your wife will make Reese show you what a real monster looks like.
** If you previously brought up a number that Finch was unable to save, and then bring up another one... Being on the receiving end of the wrath of a genius billionaire is not the place you want to be, because Finch will [[FateWorseThanDeath ruin your life and take away from you what you love most.]]
* BewareTheQuietOnes:
** Reese has yet to raise his voice on-screen. It'll probably be a very dark day when he finally does.
*** He does in the first episode of season 2 in a [[spoiler: Raging against the Machine moment.]]
*** Actually, that was only from a preview which was changed before the episode aired on television. See: [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aRIV8LAk66o here]].
** In "The Fix," Finch sits with the mark that he has a bit of history with (though neither one knew it at the time) and calmly and quietly informs him that he sold his shares of the mark's company just in time for them to make it go under and make Finch shattering amounts of money.
*** The only time (so far) that Finch has raised his voice was when [[spoiler: baby Lila was teething on one of Reese's tear gas grenades.]]
** [[spoiler:[[BigBad Elias]] as well, when he's finally revealed.]]
* {{BFG}}:
** The Barrett M82 used by Reese in "Foe".
** Also the gun marked "Plan B", consisting of an Ithaca 37 "Stakeout" with a folding stock, picatinny railing and non-lethal beanbag shotgun rounds.
** The [=FN=] [=FS2000=] Reese loans Carter in "Flesh and Blood."
* BigBadEnsemble: Straddles the line between this trope and a RoguesGallery. Occasionally multiple villains will show up in a single episode.
* TheBigBoard: Reese and Finch use one to post information about their cases. Finch also has a separate one set up with a list of the Irrelevant numbers that he failed to save before he hired Reese.
* BigBrotherIsWatching:
** TheSeries
** And in the case of Finch and Reese it's apparently a good thing. Although Mileage May Vary on that. It seems like Big Brother is far less morally upright than Finch at the very least.
*** Finch deliberately designed the machine so that nobody can see the raw data that The Machine draws its conclusions from and encrypted the code to a ridiculous extent to prevent anyone from reverse engineering it in an attempt to avert the negative aspects of the trope. So far he's been successful, but evidence suggests that some of the government officials who know of The Machine ''wanted'' to use it to become Big Brother.
* BigDamnHeroes: Typically when either Reese, Finch, Carter, or Fusco is in trouble, one of the others will come in for the save. Special mention goes for the first season finale where [[spoiler:Fusco and Carter play this for Reese when he is pinned down by HR and about to make a LastStand.]]
* BilingualDialogue:
** Reese can speak Spanish in "Cura Te Ipsum". He speaks Dutch in "The Contingency" and understands Russian in "Masquerade."
*** The Dutch seems to be more of a trilingual dialogue, because Reese's Dutch accent is so atrocious that he manages to make his Dutch sound more like German.
** The title of the episode "Cura Te Ipsum" is Latin for "Heal Thyself" and it is the final proposition from Reese to Andrew. See AmbiguousSituation above for more details.
** Kara Stanton can speak Mandarin Chinese, albeit decent, in "Matsya Nyaya".
*** The episode title is a Hindi phrase that is the equivalent of the English phrase "the law of the jungle." (The literal translation is "The law of the fishes.")
* BinocularShot: Used in a number of episodes, but is sometimes replaced with a camera viewfinder and/or rifle scope POV shots since Reese prefers using those to spy on people.
* BittersweetEnding:
** Some of the episodes due to the events of the episode, and others because they end with highlighting the losses Finch and Reese have suffered.
** An example of the latter could be
--> '''Finch''': "Do you think anyone will care for our names?"\\
'''Reese''': "After we're dead."\\
'''Finch''': "I thought we already are."
** Two words: "Goodnight, Nathan."
** The ending of "Baby Blue," with Reese and Finch talking about how they'll never have children. Considering the line of work they're in right now...
* BlackBox: The Machine was so heavily encrypted on completion even Finch can no longer access its [=OS=]. Justified by Finch and Nathan Ingram to the government because [[LoopholeAbuse if no one sees the information the Machine sees, then no one's Fourth Amendment rights are violated.]]
* BlackmailIsSuchAnUglyWord: Finch, to Carter in "Baby Blue":
-->'''Carter:''' You hacked into his company?\\
'''Finch:''' 'Hacked' is such an ugly word.
* BlatantLies / [[spoiler:CassandraTruth]]:
** One [=PoI=] liked to talk about how he used to live in a mansion in Florida and owned a yacht, a pet tiger, and six nightclubs. He's a janitor who lived in the basement of the apartment complex he serviced. He's keenly aware that no one really believes these stories, which is fine by him since [[spoiler:he was telling the truth - he had to give up his wealthy lifestyle and become a janitor after testifying against a mob figure in court and entering witness protection.]]
** Though a more realistic example of BlatantLies comes in "Legacy" where Finch's nephew comments how he has little skill in computers, suggesting Finch (the man who single-handedly built a giant highly advanced computer and can hack pretty much anything) had the same problem. Finch simply replies, "Right."
** In "Masquerade", Finch slowly growing to like Reese's new dog.
-->'''Finch''': *throws a ball for the dog to fetch while talking to Reese*
-->'''Reese''': What was that noise, Finch?
-->'''Finch''': [[BlatantLies What noise? I didn't hear anything]].
** Root's self-serving justification regarding her behavior in "Zero Day":
-->'''Root''': [[BlatantLies I'm not a sociopath, Harold.]] Believe me, sometimes I wish I was. The things I've had to do would've been so much easier.
* BondOneLiner: Reese, although he's very soft-spoken and polite about it.
* BookEnds:
** The first and last episodes of the first season ("Pilot" and "Firewall") both involve [[spoiler: a female [=POI=] who [[TheDogWasTheMastermind turns out to be the perpetrator]]]], and both end with Reese looking into the same security camera.
** Donnelly's pursuit of The Man in the Suit [[spoiler:begins and ends when an ex-CIA agent crashes into his car while he's transporting a prisoner. The prisoner gets kidnapped both times too.]]
* BoringInvincibleHero:
** Averted with Reese, who meets someone his own size, metaphorically speaking, in "Ghosts". Following episodes underline the fact that he is not invincible, nor can Finch hack or anticipate everything. A prime example is in the mid-season finale, "Number Crunch."
** Every now and again, they do have a straight example, such as Reese not even missing a step after taking a bullet to the vest (something that would knock a normal person off their feet).
*** This actually isn't that unlikely given the circumstances. At the time it happens Reese is running hot on a combination of adrenaline and highly developed rage, which anyone who has seen real combat or even a street fight can tell you is fully capable of turning an otherwise ordinary human being into a terminator.
* BrainsAndBrawn: Finch and Reese respectively.
* BrickJoke:
** In "Judgment", Reese give the gang member he has locked up in the truck of a car a burger for giving him information despite the fact his arms are tied up. Later after said gang member beats up another gang member for information so he can get out of the trunk, the first thing he is seen doing is eating the burger.
** A multi-episode one: In "Super", when Finch has to tail a woman connected to their latest case, he comments to Reese that he's getting tempted to spot the lady some cab fare so he doesn't have to follow her on foot. In "Identity Crisis", he ends up following another woman connected to a case, and ''does'' spot her cab fare at one point. [[spoiler:Unfortunately, the woman turns out to be the villain, not the victim he thought her to be.]]
** Another in a recent episode where Finch bought Bear a squeaky toy at the beginning of the episode which annoys him to no end. At the end you can see Finch throwing away the squeaky part he removed from the toy.
** One that takes a ''full season'' to come to fruition. At the beginning of "Mission Creep" (episode 3, season 1), Reese apologizes for blowing Finch's cover as a low-level employee at IFT by offering to find him a new job: "Dog walker, maybe?" Guess who ends up taking the new [[CanineCompanion Team Pet]] for a walk in "Masquerade" (episode 3, season 2)?
** After Fusco and Sophia hit it off in 'Masquerade,' Fusco can be heard asking her if she likes falafel as they walk down the street together. In 'Til Death', Rhonda suggests that she and Fusco bail on the fancy restaurant they're eating at and go to her favorite falafel place.
** Took an entire season for it to happen, but in "God Mode" Reese finally gets the chance to [[Recap/PersonOfInterestS01E23 steal a helicopter]].
* BruceWayneHeldHostage: In "Bury the Lede", Reese can't do anything overtly Reese-ish to protect the latest number because she's an investigative reporter who, as a side-gig, is putting together an expose on the mysterious BadassInANiceSuit.
* BulletproofVest:
** Reese, Fusco, and Carter all wear them.
** The armored car bank robbers in "Matsya Nyaya" wore them, as do the armored car security guards. Reese is shot point blank and survives, but the other guard isn't as fortunate; he wore his vest loose, which allowed the 9mm round to penetrate.
** A sniper in "Critical" wears a military grade vest that is able to stop a rifle bullet fired at close range. The shot knocks him out and breaks a lot of ribs but he lives.
** Fusco is GenreSavvy enough to put on a vest every time he has to do something for Reese. It saves his life when he is shot [[spoiler: by a hitman in "Till Death"]].
** [[spoiler:The murderer in "Proteus" wears one.]]
* ButHeSoundsHandsome: Reese indulges in this while discussing 'the man in the suit' with an investigative reporter.
-->'''Reese''': Sounds like a great guy.
* ButtMonkey:
** Fusco. Just for starters he's been shot nonfatally several times (which includes getting [[ShotInTheAss shot in the ass]]), and usually gets the worse (in various ways) job from John when assignments are split between him and Carter. Then John foists his dog on him when he and Carter go to Texas to hunt Root. Did we mention the dog only accepts commands in Dutch?
** And in recent episodes it's becoming obvious that the character's being sidelined compared to the trio of Reese, Finch and Carter.
* CaptainObvious:
** You may notice in the season 1 opening, when the world is seen through the Machine's "eye, a masked man taking aim with a gun. The caption then reads, "Violence predicted 92%." [[JustifiedTrope Justified]], as a machine like this probably has no concept of "obviousness" and therefore would not be aware of how obvious such a statement is.
** This could also be interpreted as "this act of violence ''was'' predicted with a 92% chance. Less "CaptainObvious" and more "I was right!"
** Or quite possibly necessary information, and not obvious at all. 92 percent isn't 99 percent. Meaning the Machine has predicted a high, but not inevitable degree of violence.
** Earlier in opening there is a woman arguing with a man and pointing her finger in his face. "Violence predicted 15%" is briefly visible. Also note that the numbers are fluctuating as the scene comes into focus.
* CardSharp:
** One of the things Finch does to test the Machine during its early development phases was use it to cheat at blackjack. Then, after using it to win $250,000, Finch deliberately lost it all in one hand by rejecting the Machine's advice to ensure that the casino thought that he was just a guy who had a lucky streak that ran out rather than a card counter.
** Zoe doesn't need a supercomputer watching over her shoulder to trounce Reese at poker.
** Lou Mitchell from "All In."
* CarFu: Mr. Reese is a master of driving his car into things when the job requires it, to the point where it sometimes approaches a running gag.
* CasualDangerDialog: The show milks this for all the dry humor it's worth.
* {{Catchphrase}}:
** "We've got another number", "I'm sure you'll/I'll figure something out" and "I'm/he's a *very* private person" have been repeated enough times to be catchphrases.
** When the POI of each episode inevitably asks Reese who he is, he always responded with "A concerned third party", until one episode when he finally gets fed up and says "You know what, someday I'm going to come up with an actual answer for that." The (Chronologically) first time someone asks him that, he says "That's a good question." People seem to have stopped asking that question since then though.
** "Our mutual friend" is used a lot, usually to refer to Reese or Finch.
** "[[ItMakesSenseInContext Always]]" is reaching this point.
* CatchphraseInterruptus: Happens to ''the OpeningNarration'' in "Relevance", and then again in "Zero Day".
* CharacterBlog: Bear has a [[https://twitter.com/BearDeHond Twitter]] account and live tweets during new episodes. It's doubly awesome because his tweets are all in Dutch.
* ChekhovsGun: All of those shots in season 1 of Finch looking at books in the [[ChekhovsArmoury library]] suddenly have a new meaning after the first episode of season 2.
** It also explains why his backup site is also a library (albeit one that's operating, rather than abandoned).
** Finch collects a sample of polonium-infused water partway through "In Extremis." Reese later uses it to poison a CorruptCorporateExecutive (he had it coming, given that he'd used that water to poison the [=POI=]).
* TheChessmaster: Elias.
* CIAEvilFBIGood: The first part definitely, the second part is still in the air but plausible: they apparently want to shut down the evil operations of the CIA (And any other serious criminal operations they become aware of, [[spoiler:such as HR]]), but they are also trying to stop Reese. In their defense, all the evidence they have of Reese's operations suggests that he's far more malignant than he really is.
* ClickHello: This happens a lot. Usually to Reese.
* ClosedCircle: In "Proteus" Reese and Finch are trapped on an island that has been cut off from the mainland due to a storm. Most of the residents have been evacuated and one of the people still on the island might be a serial killer.
* ColourCodedForYourConvenience:
** When viewing the world through security footage (the Machine's "Perspective"), objects and people appearing on there are sorted as follows:
** At any given moment, people appearing in a frame will have a white bracket surrounding them while The Machine is scanning them. Those found not to be involved in any sort of criminal conspiracy at that moment lose their boxes after being cleared
*** The white brackets also vanish if a person dies while in frame
*** The white boxes become permanent for that episode if that person is found to be involved in a "non-relevant" crime
*** Fusco and [[spoiler: Carter]] also have permanent white boxes, probably due to their links to Finch and Reese
*** When the perpetrator of a crime linked to that week's [=POI=] is attempting to put their final plan into action, their box turns red along the corners and center hash marks
** Reese and Finch themselves have yellow boxes around them. This is likely how The Machine designates individuals who know specific details about it, as Finch's partner Ingram is shown in flashbacks to be framed in yellow himself.
*** Ingram's government contact, Alicia Corwin, is shown in yellow when she appears in "No Good Deed". A conversation with Ingram indicates that five other people know about The Machine.
*** By the end of "No Good Deed", the NSA agent has acquired enough information about The Machine to get his own yellow box.
** A flashback in "Get Carter" shows a bomb-maker (a "Relevant" target) highlighted in a fully red box, which is also much bolder than the white and yellow boxes
*** The NSA deputy director who tried to interfere with the Machine also got a red box and label "Threat to the system".
*** A flashback in "Matsya Nyaya" shows Stanton and Reese in red boxes during their final operation in the CIA. Likely because [[spoiler: they had both been targeted for termination by the Agency, and turned against each other in the process.]]
** Airplanes flying in and out of the city are shown in green triangles as they pass across the frame
*** Similarly, ships moving in and out of the city are displayed in white diamonds.
** The [=POI=] in "Firewall" is shown to be more than she seems when [[spoiler:she starts the episode with a yellow box. As of Season Two, Root has been given a red box. Since then it has given her the yellow box again, presumably because The Machine has re-prioritized the "New Gods" as the direst threat.]]
** A blue box, introduced in "Relevant", marks 'Indigo' personnel: [[spoiler:the agents who follow up on the Machine's primary directive of eliminating threats to national security]]. Interestingly enough, Samantha Shaw has ''still'' been assigned this box color [[spoiler:even after the ISA thought they'd cashiered her.]]
*** Shaw has been [[spoiler:upgraded to a yellow box]] as of "God Mode".
** Kara Stanton's employer has this immediately after he declares his intent to find Finch.
* TheComicallySerious - Reese and Finch are turning into this.
* ComicallySmallBribe: The inversion has happened twice. Finch and Ingram sold The Machine to the US Government for $1. Also, in "Wolf and Cub", the POI offers Reese all the money he has in an attempt to hire Reese to get justice for his murdered brother. Reese takes a quarter and gives the rest back.
* ConflictBall: Unfortunately, Carter seems to carry this a lot; in season 1 she routinely griped about Reese and Finch using illegal methods, and yet she willingly continued to help them and even went so far as to do some legally questionable things on her own initiative (e.g. kidnapping the Mafia dons in "Flesh and Blood", which she definitely did not have authorization to do). Most recently in season 2, she specifically told Fusco she would not cover for him... after she had just spent three episodes covering for Reese.
* ContinuityNod:
** Reese occasionally uses the badge he took off of the late Detective Stills in "Pilot" as a prop for a cover ID in later episodes (''e.g.'' "Many Happy Returns," "No Good Deed," "The Contingency").
*** He has also started using the star he took from US Marshal Jennings in "Many Happy Returns."
** One episode's [=POI=], an investment banker, made 100 million on a short sale of Virtanen Pharmaceuticals, believing that their stock would tank when their senior management was convicted of the crimes that Reese and Finch had gotten them arrested for in an earlier episode.
-->'''Reese:''' I'm familiar with the case.
** In "Identity Crisis", the FBI have been following up on several unsolved cases concerning Reese including "a band of ex-military bank robbers" and "the murder of a Stasi agent".
** Reese is shot and severely injured in "Number Crunch," and spends most of the next episode ("Super") in a wheelchair or on crutches. In the following episode ("Legacy"), he is seen holding his side and wincing after a fight and complains that "I wish gunshot wounds healed faster."
** In "The Fix," Zoe Morgan tells the story of seeing a "fixer" like herself persuade a crowd of intrusive reporters to disperse with "just two words." At the end of "Root Cause," she persuades a crowd of intrusive reporters to disperse with just two words.
** At the beginning of "Bad Code" Reese buys Carter and Fusco the round of drinks he promised them at the end of "Firewall." At 8 in the morning.
** In "Masquerade," Finch is shown to have developed [=PTSD=] as a consequence of [[spoiler: being kidnapped by Root.]]
** In "Triggerman," Elias refers to Finch as "Mr. Crane," the alias Finch was using when he crossed paths with Elias in "Risk."
*** In "Critical," Finch uses the "Harold Crane" alias again, and Reese uses the same cover identity he used in "Risk," that of Mr. Crane's investment manager, "John Rooney."
** The [=POI=] of "Bury the Lede" is a newspaper reporter, Maxine Angelis. Her byline appears on newspaper articles [[FreezeFrameBonus shown in several previous episodes]].
** When being interrogated by Carter in "Prisoner's Dilemma", John is pretending to be an investment banker and mentions that he was in Mexico on business at the beginning of May, 2012. [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UDzuwhkIm5s He's not lying.]]
** Harold hires [[spoiler:Monica, the [=PoI=] of "Trojan Horse", to work for IFT.]]
* CorruptCorporateExecutive: The senior management of Virtanen Pharmaceuticals, who have someone killed to keep word about their deadly drug from getting out.
* CouchGag: At the end of Finch's OpeningNarration, we see a brief clip of the "person of interest" for the particular episode.
* CrazyPrepared:
** In "Root Cause," we see that Finch and Reese have a prearranged alternate means of communication for when their phones and private network are compromised.
** In "Bad Code," Finch uses a [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polybius_square Polybius square]] cipher to leave a message for Reese--one that Reese also has memorized.
** In "Critical" Alistair Wesley has a backup plan in case his sniper is incapacitated, and then has a backup plan in case the first backup fails. Then we find out that this was just plan A and he also has a plan B already in place. He set all of this up ahead of time when he had no reason to suspect that someone like Reese and Finch would come after him. His sniper is even wearing military grade armor that is able to stop a rifle bullet at close range.
--->'''Wesley :''' Don't test me. I was expecting everything.
** In "Prisoner's Dilemma," we see the extent of John Reese's cover that Finch set him up with, which includes a whole office filled with people [[spoiler: who give Reese an alibi when the FBI come visiting.]]
** Reese revealed in "Zero Day" that he planted a tracking device on Finch's glasses at one point [[{{Tearjerker}} because he doesn't want to risk losing another person that he cares about]].
* CreatorCameo: Jonathan Nolan, Greg Plageman, and Richard J. Lewis all make a blink-and-you'll-miss-it cameo near the end of "God Mode".
* CreepyMonotone: ''Both'' the heroes talk this way.
* CrimeAfterCrime: While the Machine is unable to predict crimes of opportunity or impulse, it is pretty good in predicting when a cover up will result in murder. Several episodes have centered on a perpetrator trying to kill the "person of interest" to cover up a previous crime.
* CutenessProximity: The normally stoic Finch and Reese become remarkably attached to their youngest ever [=PoI=], six-month-old Lila Smith. Especially when one considers that the time period between [[spoiler:Finch stealing her from the hospital to protect her from more malignant kidnappers]] and [[spoiler:Reese and Finch leaving her with her maternal grandparents]] is no more than two or three days.
* CutTheJuice: Used with refreshing frequency for a high-tech series in this day and age. When Finch's [[spoiler: network is hacked in "Root Cause"]] he does not launch into TechnoBabble about firewalls and backhacking (a la ''{{NCIS}}''). Instead, he simply [[spoiler: destroys his phone and shuts down the generator powering the library.]]
** The common reaction to a bugged phone is to simply destroy the phone.
** $2,000,000 watch with a GPS tracker embedded in it? Disable the GPS by stamping on the watch.
** How do the [[spoiler: Chinese spies]] in "Trojan" deal with a hack? Counter hack the hackers, and override their lithium-ion battery to explode.
* DangerouslyGenreSavvy: Zoe in "Booked Solid". [[spoiler:She catches on almost immediately that Reese and Finch are very interested in the hit man in the hotel lobby. She proceeds to "accidentally" spill wine over him to help Reese and Finch deduce if the man has replacements or is working alone. Note that no prior communication occurred specifically regarding the man, just that Zoe knew Reese was "working".]]
* DangerTakesABackSeat: Creepy people showing up in the backseat of cars happens a lot. And by creepy people, we mean Reese.
* DeadpanSnarker:
** Finch and Fusco stand out in this area, but the other regular characters are far from strangers with the concept.
** Though Reese certainly had his moments during season 1, season 2 has taken his snarking to a whole other level!
** In "Bury The Lede," Reese is at Finch's study, preparing a sniper rifle.
--> Finch: I do wish you wouldn't do that here.
--> Reese: When I do it at the park, people look at me funny.
** And again, later in the same episode:
--> Finch: Did you get a good look at the men who were shooting at you?
--> Reese: I tried, but they were ''shooting at me.''
** "Til Death:"
--> Finch: I need you to go to the Drakes' place of business while I visit their home.
--> Reese: I'm proud of you, Finch. You've really gotten comfortable with your breaking and entering duties.
--> Finch: Thank you for appreciating my descent into deviant behavior.
* DealWithTheDevil:
** John makes one with [[spoiler:Elias to save a child who was kidnapped and mother killed. Elias betrayed him in the end by threatening the child to get some information out of John.]]
** Finch approached [[spoiler: [[DirtyCop Officer Simmons of HR]] to get information on Elias and where he was holding Det. Carter's son by telling him Elias had hit men watching the wives and children of every member of his group.]]
* DeathBySecretIdentity: So far, almost everyone outside of Team Machine who has learned who Harold Finch is (and a few who've learned who Reese is) has ended up dead. Should be noted that he has had nothing to do with any of them.
* DecoyDamsel: There was one in "Baby Blue" when an unmarked [=NYPD=] sedan came across a woman asking for help from an accident. Moretti tells them to get going [[spoiler:before a pick-up smashed into the cruiser and the plainclothes officers were gunned down. And yeah, the woman was part of it.]]
** [[spoiler:Caroline Turing]] in "Firewall".
* DestinationDefenestration: Happens once or twice in season 1, but season 2 has had so many examples that it's almost become a running gag.
* DestroyTheEvidence:
** Fusco does this after securing the HR ledger [[spoiler:by tearing off the page that contained the names of him and Simmons to make sure the FBI won't arrest them.]]
** Carter does this to John's fingerprints and DNA sample in "2-Pi-R".
* DiabolicalMastermind: Elias, the self-styled "evolution of organized crime".
* DidntSeeThatComing: The ending of "Prisoner's Dilemma," when [[spoiler: Kara Stanton kills Donnelly and kidnaps Reese]].
* DirtyBusiness:
** The protagonists commit any number of lesser crimes in order to either protect or stop the [=POI=]s. They're not shy about framing bad people to get them off the street, or even [[spoiler:sending them to isolated Mexican prisons where they'll never walk free]].
** Fusco was somewhat bitter when forced to act as a mole in HR. He had finally started to remember what it felt like to be a good cop.
* DirtyCop:
** Detective Fusco was this before Reese forced him to work for him as his inside man. The other cops Fusco was working with were even worse. Fusco was the only one who still seemed to care about right or wrong which is why Reese decided to let him go.
** Lieutenant Gilmore in "The Fix".
** One of the officers Fusco talks to in "Get Carter" after being told to put down Carter permanently - who has since been expanded to be a member of a whole group of dirty cops known collectively as HR.
** Simmons.
** It's been implied that Cal Beecher is one, but so far there has been no actual evidence that proves it. [[spoiler: It's finally confirmed that he's clean... Just before he dies]].
* DistaffCounterpart: Samantha Shaw from the episode "Relevance" almost seems like one for Reese. [[spoiler: This is because she is effectively in the exact same position he was in before the series begins, working for the exact same people.]]
* DisapprovingLook: Finch rocks at these.
* DistractedByTheSexy: Finch in "Identity Crisis".
* DoNotTauntCthulhu:
** In "Mission Creep," Reese and another Iraq veteran are drinking in a bar when they are mocked by two inebriated guys in business suits. One of them berates Reese for not having an office job: "It's the knowledge economy; you gotta use your head." Reese does just that, [[UseYourHead head-butting them into submission]].
** Finch is working as a lowly employee under a JerkAss supervisor in a company that he secretly owns. Reese asks him what would happen if his cover was blown.
-->'''Finch:''' The entire department could be overhauled. Some would be reassigned, promoted... [looks at his supervisor] Some would be fired...
* DoesntLikeGuns: Both Reese and Finch, but the former doesn't mind it since he has no choice.
-->'''Reese:''' I don't particularly like killing people, but I'm very good at it.
* DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything: At the end of "Identity Crisis", Reese refuses to take advantage of a drugged and uncharacteristically friendly Finch's brazen (and certainly quite tempting) offer, [[spoiler: "Don't you want to talk? Ask me anything!"]] He even says that Finch would regret it in the morning.
* TheDogBitesBack: [[spoiler:Kara used Snow as her errand boy and kept him in line with the threat of activating his bomb-vest. Eventually she leaves him locked in a room with the bomb on a timer. Snow manages to escape the room and decides to wait for her in her car, where the bomb detonates and kills them both.]]
* TheDogWasTheMastermind:
** [[spoiler:"Witness" revolves around a schoolteacher hunted by TheMafiya. Turned out he was an Italian mafia boss, incognito]].
** [[spoiler:"Firewall" featured a criminal who knew about the Machine who put herself in danger to lure out Reese and Finch when they tried to save her.]]
** The real head of HR [[spoiler:as discovered in "Bury the Lede" is not a politician but a political adviser. As he said, politicians come and go but a person like him is there forever.]]
* DoubleMeaningTitle:
** "Baby Blue": the [=POI=] is an orphaned baby; at the climax, [[spoiler: she's locked in a freezer by Elias, and starts turning blue from the cold]]
** "Bury the Lede": newspaper slang for not putting the most important fact in the first ("lede") sentence of a story; in the episode, the [=POI=] is a reporter who [[spoiler: is manipulated into outing an undercover informant, who is then murdered by the real bad guys--the "lede" of her story gets buried in a pine box]]
** "Trojan Horse": [[spoiler:Finch and Reese often act the part when they infiltrate an organization bent on killing a [=PoI=]. But in addition, this specifically also refers to the way Rylatech was effectively made into one for the Chinese and/or Greer's "New Gods".]]
** "In Extremis" is Latin for "At the point of death." First [[spoiler:the [=POI=] spends much of the episode slowly dying from radiation poisoning and doing his best to help Reese find his killer and make amend with his daughter.]] The second is [[spoiler:Stanton's virus has finally done its damage and ''the Machine'' is the one who is on the edge of death.]]
* DragonAscendant: In the first season, HR's activities were pretty much limited to enabling other people's crimes. In the second, they move up to being a major threat in their own right.
* DrowningMySorrows:
** Reese is trying to drink himself to death when Finch finds him.
** The [=POI=] in "Masquerade" is a more subtle example.
* DrunkDriver:
** In "Judgment," a drunk driver hitting a pedestrian starts a chain of events that lead to a judge becoming a 'person of interest'.
** The very first life that the Machine saves is Finch's, stopping him from trying to cross the street just before a drunk who passed out at the wheel came zooming by.
* DullSurprise:
** Reese. Barely speaks above a monotone and often has a blank expression on his face. Can come across as a bit {{narm}}y to some. He's like the poor man's version of Christian Bale's Batman.
** [[ChewingTheScenery Christian Bale's]] [[LargeHam Batman]] [[NoIndoorVoice is]] [[GutturalGrowler blank-faced]]?
* DyingMomentOfAwesome: Everyone can admit that [[spoiler: Snow was a jerk, but using his bomb vest to take Kara out with him was one of these moments]].
* EnemyCivilWar: [[spoiler:Finch breaks up the partnership of Elias and HR by pointing out to HR's second-in-command, that Elias was having his family watched.]]
* EnemyMine: [[spoiler: Despite Finch breaking up his union with HR, while in prison Elias seems to think helping Finch and Reese is the best course of action and gives them subtle information about how HR currently is implanting itself in the city and who they are removing from power. Especially since Elias spurned a reconciliation with HR.]]
* EnhanceButton: Done more plausibly than normal. Finch enhances images taken from a cell phone video in ''Masquerade'', but the enhanced resolution isn't exactly hi-def. The main thing the enhanced image is used for is to identify large distinguishing features on head-shaped blurs, which Finch uses to identify the figures through other means.
* EstablishingShot: Used fairly often; includes stock shots of the Library and the Precinct.
* EstrogenBrigadeBait: Reese, once he cleans up.
* EvenEvilHasLovedOnes:
** Fusco has a son and his concern for him is obvious when he's being confronted by the cartel members.
** One of the members of HR is shown having a loving family [[spoiler: and stops working for Elias when he realizes Elias might go after them.]]
* EvenEvilHasStandards:
** Fusco, to an extent; see DirtyCop entry above.
*** In "Justice," the thought of a kidnapped child still disgusts him as much as it would any police officer, and he seems quite sincere in offering Reese any help he can give in tracking the perpetrator(s) down.
** A [[ProfessionalKiller hitman]] refused to kill a child even after he already murdered her family. When he is sent to prison for another crime, he reveals what happened since he does not want to be known as a child killer.
** [[spoiler:Elias]] decides not to kill Reese at the end of "Witness" "because that would seem ungrateful." He even offers him a job.
** [[spoiler:John invokes this trope against Elias to get his help by pointing out the baby he's looking for mirror's Elias' own back story and if Elias allows the kidnapping of children in his domain then he has nothing worth protecting. Elias agrees to help. Subverted later when Elias puts the rescued baby in mortal danger until John gives him some key information, because ''he knows John won't let the baby get hurt''.]]
* EverythingIsOnline:
** Inherent in the premise. The Machine automagically interfaces with every security/traffic/personal web camera that exists.
** In "All In" Finch lampshades the fact that casinos tend to have top of the line electronic security but in this case the casino owner got greedy and tied their online blackjack site directly into their main system. This gives Finch the backdoor to hack the casino's computer system. Subverted later on when Finch has to physically break into the server room to access the really secure files.
* EvilCounterpart: [[spoiler:Elias]] is the anti-Finch. [[spoiler:Both are men whose soft-spoken, nebbishy personalities mask the fact that they're highly intelligent and manipulative people who built up tremendous influence and power from behind the scenes while hiding their true identities from the public. But while Finch is TheAtoner and working to make up for his past mistakes, Elias is a mob boss driven by revenge against those who've hurt him.]]
* ExecutiveMeddling: A positive case -- in the pilot's original script, Diane Hanson's exposure is only seen remotely. A scene was added in which Reese substitutes [[CaughtOnTape his recording]] of her talking to her dirty cops for evidence [[EngineeredPublicConfession she's presenting]] ''in court''.
* {{Expy}}:
** Elias, especially in how he's introduced bears more than a little resemblance to [[TheUsualSuspects a certain other criminal mastermind]]
** He's also a Professor who is secretly a incognito criminal mastermind that rules the entire city, from criminal to judge. [[SherlockHolmes Sounds familiar?]]
** Pierce, from One Percent, is essentially [[{{Facebook}} Mark Zuckerberg]] meets [[{{IronMan}} Tony Stark]].
* FacialDialogue: Reese and Finch are both capable of expressing volumes with only minor facial expressions.
* FacialRecognitionSoftware: This is just one of the methods that the Machine uses to identify people. Also used by Finch on occasion.
* FacingTheBulletsOneLiner: [[spoiler:The Special Counsel]] accepts his death with an even "Fair enough" after completely failing his assigned task.
* FailureKnight:
** Finch and Reese both toward one another and the people they help. Both have failed to protect someone dear to them in the past and have devoted what is left of their lives to protect those in need.
** Finch has especially strong tones of this, stemming from years of allowing the "unimportant" numbers slip through the cracks and [[spoiler:being unable to protect Jessica, Reese's love]].
* {{Flashback}}:
** Used every two or three episodes to fill in character back-stories. They generally focus on one character during an episode. Finch and Reese have had multiple instances; Carter, Elias, Root, Fusco, and Kara Stanton have all had one episode each.
** FlashbackEffect: See IdiosyncraticWipe, below.
*** Turned UpToEleven for Elias' flashbacks in "Flesh and Blood", as the timeline "rushes" thru twenty plus years and takes on a pronounced color shift.
* FootFocus: Zoe gets a close camera shot on her bare feet as she gets out of her limo in "The Fix".
* ForcedToWatch: [[spoiler: When Root abducts Finch she forces him to watch her torture Denton Weeks for information, partially, it seems, because she likes to have someone to appreciate her work, partially to show him what may happen to him if he doesn't give her what she wants, and partially, it seems, because she finds it interesting and entertaining that it bothers him.]]
* {{Foreshadowing}}:
** Reese's voice-over from "Pilot" foreshadows [[spoiler: Jessica's death]]. Subtly reinforced in the second episode, "Ghosts," when [[spoiler: Jessica's picture appears on one of the screens showing the people on the "irrelevant" list.]]
** In "No Good Deed", Reese tells Finch he thinks it's time he was told how The Machine communicates with him so he can continue helping people if something ever happens to Finch; the next episode, [[spoiler:Finch gets kidnapped.]]
** In "Bad Code," [[spoiler: Root's childhood friend]] Hannah is shown playing TheOregonTrail at the public library. She [[MemeticMutation dies of dysentery]] and quits the game, then leaves the library...and is murdered on her way home.
** In "One Percent" you can see [[FreezeFrameBonus brief glimpses]] of the BlueScreenOfDeath when viewing The Machine's POV. It is unknown if this has anything to do with what Kara did.
*** It continues to progress in later episodes, to the point where it eventually causes the title sequence to crash. Something's definitely not quite right with The Machine...
**** [[spoiler: The Machine has finally been revealed to have a major virus that has been slowly destroying it over the course of the second season. This has had the side effect of Reese and Finch failing to save several PoI's since they've been identified too late to make a difference.]]
* FourEyesZeroSoul: Elias.
** The serial killer in "Proteus".
* FramingTheGuiltyParty:
** Finch does this to create an opening for Reese to get closer to a [=POI=] working as a bank-robber.
** Also, Reese tries to [[spoiler: frame the serial rapist for cocaine possession,]] but [[ScrewTheRulesIHaveMoney it ends up not working because he's got good lawyers.]]
** Fusco works for Reese because Reese can frame Fusco for a killing another DirtyCop. [[spoiler: Reese killed the guy with Fusco's gun.]]
** Carter did a bit [[spoiler: during her time as an Army officer to prevent suicide vests from being used by "proving" to an Iraqi civilian that she had photos of him meeting with Al-Qaeda terrorists.]]
** In "Legacy," Reese [[spoiler:got a corrupt parole officer arrested by the NYPD by pretending to make him drunk and a threat to himself with a pistol.]]
** Reese even does this to himself. He makes a group of criminals believe that he is TheMole who infiltrated their gang. He is a mole who infiltrated their gang but [[spoiler: not the undercover cop they are looking for]]
** In "Many Happy Returns", Reese [[spoiler:throws the Marshal who was stalking that week's POI]] into jail [[spoiler:for being John Reese]].
* FreudianTrio
** Reese (ID): doubts his mission as a spy.
** Snow (Ego): ManipulativeBastard who talks Reese and Stanton into killing each other.
** Stanton (Superego): never doubted her mission and enjoyed her job.
* FriendOnTheForce: Detective Fusco's relationship with Reese is hardly friendly, but he's still a valuable source of information from within the department. Carter later graduates to this.
* FriendsRentControl: In "Many Happy Returns," Finch gives Reese the key to an apartment whose monthly rent probably exceeds the monthly mortgage payment of most middle-class houses. No evidence is provided as to whether or not Reese could afford such a place on his salary (He certainly couldn't on the salary of either of his previous jobs), but Finch can definitely afford it (assuming he doesn't just own the whole building and is letting Reese stay there rent-free).
* GangstaStyle:
** {{Deconstructed}} and {{lampshaded}}. A criminal points his gun at Reese while holding it sideways. Reese explains why this is a stupid thing to do and [[CurbStompBattle then quickly demonstrates it to him.]]
** In "Bury the Lede" Reese, pretending not to be a badass, held gun at very odd angle, apparently to conceal it.
* GenericEthnicCrimeGang: So far we've seen TheMafia, TheMafiya, TheIrishMob, and a Bulgarian mob.
* GoForTheEye: Reese teaches the eye jab to Finch as a basic self-defense technique; Finch is suitably [[{{squick}} squicked]], but [[ChekhovsSkill uses it successfully]] against the villain of the week. Finch's reaction to how well it actually worked despite criticizing it earlier making it all the funnier.
* GoingForTheBigScoop: [[DeconstructedTrope Deconstructed]] in "Bury the Lede". The [=POI=] is an IntrepidReporter who chases her story at all costs, and in doing so, gets a bit hasty about collecting sufficient evidence. [[spoiler: [[NiceJobBreakingItHero She gets a man killed and her career nearly ruined for her efforts. ]]]]
* GovernmentConspiracy:
** "You are being watched."
** Also the BigBad in [[spoiler:"Blue Code" known only as LOS turns out to be a CIA agent, using drug smuggling to fund the WarOnTerror.]]
* GoodFeelsGood: Fusco complains that he was just getting used to being a good guy when Reese [[spoiler:insists he go undercover with HR]].
* GovernmentAgencyOfFiction: The [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_Support_Activity Intelligence Support Activity]], which is portrayed in the series as a shadowy black ops wetwork team. A three-man ISA team make several attempts to kill a [=POI=] in "No Good Dead", and "Relevance" shows that ISA operators are Indigo assets: assets who hunt down Relevant numbers the Machine identifies.
* TheGreatestStoryNeverTold: Fusco's story of protecting the [=POI=] model from the Armenian Mob.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Tropes H-M]]
* HandicappedBadass: Reese is confined to a wheelchair or crutches for one episode after being shot by the CIA. It doesn't stop him from taking down the villain-of-the-week.
* HeadTiltinglyKinky: A variation. Reese and Finch hack into the Wi-Fi of everyone in an apartment building so they can access the webcams. One woman is doing yoga in full view of her webcam. In her underwear. Evidently the unseen position she gets into is Head-Tiltingly Contorted.
* HeelFaceTurn:
** Mildly. Detective Fusco started out as a PunchClockVillain, only a dirty cop out of loyalty to a friend. Reese turns him into a mole in the NYPD.
** [[spoiler:Detective Carter]] was never really a Heel to begin with: she was hunting Finch and Reese because it's her job.
* HeroesLoveDogs: As the "team" may very likely end up in some morally gray areas during the course of the show, the addition of Bear is likely a way to make sure you'll keep rooting for them.
* HeroAntagonist: Detective Carter is actively trying to track Reese down [[spoiler: for the first few episodes, anyway]].
* HeroOfAnotherStory: "Prisoner's Dilemma" shows glimpses of Fusco on an adventure protecting supermodel Karolina Kurkova from some Armenians.
** The opening of "Relevance" shows Samantha Shaw to have been one working for a government counterterrorism agency.
* HeWhoFightsMonsters:
** Reese is a very self-aware version, and tries to dissuade some of the people he helps from going down the same path ("Cura Te Ipsum," "Wolf and Cub").
** [[LampshadeHanging Lampshaded]] in "Many Happy Returns:" "I'll show [an abusive husband] what a ''real'' monster's like!"
* HeyItsThatGuy: The Adventures of Benjamin Linus and Jesus Christ.
* HoldingOutForAHero: Leon gets a [[CrowningMomentOfFunny CMOF]] at the intro to "All In", when he's unexpectedly attacked by a couple of thugs.
--> '''Leon:''' "Wait, you plan to ''kill me?''"
--> '''Thug:''' Probably.
--> '''Leon:''' ''grinning'' [[GenreSavvy OK, that's a big mistake.]] Yeah, you better get out of here. Right now while you still can.
--> '''Reese:''' ''busts down the door and beats the thugs down'' [[DeadpanSnarker We have to stop meeting like this.]]
* HonestCorporateExecutive: Turns out that [[spoiler: Pierce, the [=PoI=] in "One Percent"]] is one, which is why his life is in danger. This actually comes as a bit of a twist because [[GoodIsNotNice he's obnoxious and a bit of]] [[{{Jerkass}} a jerk to everyone around him.]]
** Nathan Ingram and Harold Wren turn out to be these; they built the Machine because they felt it was their duty, and built it in such a way that it wouldn't infringe on anyone's rights.
* HonorBeforeReason: A former soldier and Afghan War veteran [[spoiler: robs banks]] because he believes he has a debt of honor to repay and needs to support the family of a friend who died in Afghanistan after they switched seats during a mission.
** Shayn and Abby's scheme to bring down Chapple in "Shadow Box" is this as well.
* HyperAwareness:
** The Machine ''is'' this trope.
** Carter often picks up on the subtle clues that everyone around her misses.
** Reese is pretty good at it, too.
* IAmSpartacus: Hilariously [[InvertedTrope inverted]] at the end of [[spoiler: "Shadow Box:" the FBI is chasing "The Man In The Suit". Reese is stuck in a gunfight with a bunch of thugs, and the FBI is closing in. He knows he won't be able to get free in time, so he charges the thugs. Cut to another scene. Cut back to the FBI arriving, and what do they find? Four different guys in suits, and they have no idea which one is Reese!]]
* IHaveYourWife: Used by the villain of "Critical" to force the POI to commit murder. One of the first times this trope has ever been invoked when both spouses are of the same gender.
** In "Zero Day", [[spoiler:Finch agrees to go with Root after she threatens to harm Grace.]]
* IOweYouMyLife: Although it has never been stated in those terms, it's becoming pretty clear that Reese thinks this of Finch.
** Elias considers this of John. Although he and Finch may not like it, it's probably for the better, because of the extra trouble Elias would probably cause them otherwise.
* IdiosyncraticWipes: Scene changes are handled by The Machine "panning" across hundreds of different shots from surveillance cameras until the next scene is found and zoomed into. Flashbacks include a timeline at the bottom of the screen that "flashes" from the current year to the year in which the flashback is set, and then back again to the present once it's over.
* IdiotBall: [[spoiler:Elias]] tells [[spoiler:Detective Cal Beecher]] he is holding this because of his inability to ask the "right" questions that will gain real answers. [[spoiler:Elias]] suspects the man knows something he doesn't even know he knows and warns him to be careful with his future questions because if he does not choose his next move wisely, that move will be chosen for him.
* [[YouDoNotWantToKnow I Don't Want To Know]]:
** "Cura Te Ipsum"
-->'''Reese:''' Doctor has [[CrazyPrepared everything she needs]] to erase Benton for good.\\
'''Finch:''' What do you mean, "erase"?\\
'''Reese:''' Eight pounds of lye, heated to 300 degrees. Body will dissolve in three hours, give or take.\\
'''Finch:''' I will refrain from asking how you know that.
** Referenced in "Blue Code," when Kara catches Reese getting close to [[spoiler: Jessica's husband.]] She asks Reese if he's planning to dissolve the man's body in "a bathtub full of acid."
* IfYouEverDoAnythingToHurtHer: [[InvertedTrope Inverted]] by Reese in "Shadow Box." Reese tells Carter that if the detective she's dating ever does anything to hurt her, he'll take care of him.
* ILoveYouBecauseICantControlYou: Well, not "love," but Zoe pretty much states that despite knowing everything that goes on in the city she can't figure out Reese, which seems to pique her interest in him.
* ImpairmentShot: Used in "Matsya Nyaya" when Reese loses and then later regains consciousness. The shots from Finch's POV when he's drugged in "Identity Crisis" may also count.
* ImprobableAimingSkills: Reese is a very good marksman.
* IndyPloy: Finch throws one together in "Baby Blue" when he realizes that the two orderlies walking in to the clinic are actually [[spoiler: hired goons there to kidnap baby Lela]].
-->'''Finch:''' I'm afraid I may have done something rather rash.
* InformedAttractiveness: Reese is often called attractive by various people throughout the series. One "client" in particular (also quite attractive herself), even stated to him that she's not interested in men who are better looking than her.
* [[spoiler:InstantAIJustAddWater]]: As of "Firewall", things have officially crossed over into this territory, given that [[spoiler:the Machine decides to cooperate with Reese to save Finch. Of course, it does take a little persuasion from Reese in "The Contingency" before it actually does what he wants.]]
* InterfaceScrew: After [[spoiler:a virus is uploaded into its network]] small visual glitches and artifacts begin to appear in the IdiosyncraticWipes.
* InterrogationByVandalism: Reese interrogates a gang courier by taking a blowtorch to... the money the courier was supposed to be delivering. Both he and the courier know that the courier's boss will assume that the burned money was stolen by the courier rather than destroyed.
* InterrogationMontage:
** In the first few minutes of "Prisoner's Dilemma," between Carter and the four men accused of being the Man in the Suit (including Reese.)
** Done again in "Proteus," with Finch hooking up a seismograph to the table to serve as a lie detector.
* IntoxicationEnsues: Happens when Finch gets too close to a drug dealer. [[spoiler:She ]]drugs his tea with ecstasy. Depending on your point view, it's either really terrifying, or really hilarious.
* IronicEcho: In one flashback scene in "Flesh and Blood", when Elias' father decides to have some of his men kill his illegitimate son, he has them tell Elias that he's sorry that he couldn't be there at the end. At the end of the episode, Elias calls his father and half-brother and tells them that ''he's'' sorry that he couldn't be there at the end. [[spoiler:Then the car they're in explodes.]]
* IronicNickname: Fusco pretty much does this with [[TheNicknamer with all the nick names he gives]], as has Finch's number saved as "Mr. Good News" and calls Reese "Wonder Boy" and "Mr. Sunshine"
* ISurrenderSuckers:
** In "Blue Code" between Vargas and a Triad gang.
** Also Reese letting himself get caught by the Aryan Brotherhood to rescue [[spoiler: Fusco and Leon]]
* ItHasBeenAnHonor: Suffering a potentially fatal gunshot wound and pursued by a [=CIA=] wetwork squad, Reese chooses to address his final words to Finch.
-->'''Reese''' I wanted to say thank you, Harold, for giving me a second chance.
* ItsNotYouItsMyEnemies: [[spoiler: Finch lets his fiancée (whose existence he had, fortunately for her, kept quiet about due to his very private nature) believe him to be dead so those who are out to silence anyone connected to the Machine won't kill her.]]
* ItsPersonal:
** In the "Get Carter" episode when Reese told Finch that people like Carter are worth protecting. [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cFsduSY45eI The song used at the end of the episode]] actually shares the name of the trope.
** Finch invokes this when he realizes that the CEO of the company he and Reese are investigating caused the death of another person on his list.
** [[spoiler:Stanton appears to have taken this stance in regards to Snow's attempt to "retire" her.]]
** Shaw ''really'' doesn't like Root. For a woman with apparently professionally diagnosed APD, she definitely takes some things personally.
* ItWorksBetterWithBullets:
** "Mission Creep" does the "firing pin" variation where [[spoiler:the leader of the robbers sabotages the firing pins so he can pick them off in the street.]]
** Done by Root in "Bad Code."
* IWillFindYou: "I just want to find my friend."
* {{Jerkass}}: The Drug Lord L-O-S [[spoiler: later revealed to be a CIA agent who smuggles drugs to use the money to finance the War on Terror, wants the CIA to kill two NYPD police officers simply because they did their job and arrested him for smuggling drugs. Though it makes it all the more worthwhile to see him get his LaserGuidedKarma when Snow informs him that he was "[[MeaningfulEcho caught behind]] [[YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness enemy lines]]".]]
* JanitorImpersonationInfiltration: Finch often impersonates some sort of nondescript technician in order to get information or bug a place.
** Reese frequently does this as well, except he tends to impersonate the types of workers who would wear a nice suit. Waiters, valets, stuff like that.
* KindaBusyHere: People have a tendency to call Reese while he's in the middle of a fight; he always answers.
* KingIncognito:
** Finch keeps himself HiddenInPlainSight by working as a low-level employee in a company he himself owns. He even wears cheaper suits.
** [[spoiler:[[BigBad Elias]]]] has spent the better part of the past years being a [[spoiler:school teacher of the children of his enemies so he can better understand them and turn the children against their families.]]
* {{Kneecapping}}: Reese's signature. Seriously, he could be the poster boy for this trope.
* KnightInSourArmor: Finch doesn't trust anyone and is cynical about everyone, believes that in the end (when they die) he and Reese will have made no real lasting difference, and is usually the first to spout the cynical explanation about a current person of interest, yet he has a high moral code and is the driving force and moral compass in their team and pretty regularly puts himself in danger to help someone.
* KnuckleCracking: Reese occasionally does this when he's preparing to kick some butt.
* LaserGuidedKarma:
** What [[spoiler: Root]] does to [[spoiler: the man who murdered her childhood friend]], revealed in a flashback in "Bad Code." [[spoiler: She hacked a drug cartel's bank account and transferred funds to an account in the joint names of the killer and her deceased friend. Then she made sure the drug cartel found out about it....]]
** What happens to L-O-S. See {{Jerkass}} entry above.
** What happens to the bounty hunter in "Triggerman."
* LeaningOnTheFourthWall: The in-universe dates for every episode in season 1 coincide with the date that the episode aired. It's most obvious as the Machine timeline becomes more precise in the final few episodes of the season.
* {{Leitmotif}}: [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S_zgSgoHVRk Finch]], [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Senj-5OTek Reese]], and [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x5ye0cqf6Z8 the Machine]] all have them. There is noticeable (and appropriate) overlap for Finch and the Machine.
** [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cj5si_HJFcI Root]] has a unique theme, and is usually introduced by the main notes of it being played in absence of other music.
* LoveInterest: Zoe for Reese, though it's pretty subtle. It's been slowly building over the course of the first two seasons, including one episode in which they operate [[UndercoverAsLovers undercover as husband and wife.]]
** Carter gets one in the second season, in the form of a handsome narcotics detective. Things are going pretty well between them, right up until she discovers he's being investigated by InternalAffairs...[[spoiler:It's eventually revealed that he's not a dirty cop, but he is murdered almost immediately afterwards.]]
** Fusco also looked like he might have been getting one in the form of a teacher named Rhonda, but she hasn’t shown up again since they went on a date together in “Til Death” (though it’s [[FreezeFrameBonus implied]] in one episode that they are at least still communicating through email).
* MacGyvering:
** In "Root Cause," Finch turns a Pringles can into a directional Wi-Fi antenna.
*** Sounds suspiciously like a ShoutOut to this [[http://xkcd.com/466/ xkcd]].
*** It's a cantenna. That kind of trick is all over Website/YouTube.
** In "Super," Reese makes a "bump key" so Finch can get into the other apartments.
** In "Witness," Reese cuts into a phone cable and improvises a land-line after his cell phone is destroyed.
* MadBomber: In "Till Death", a hit-man plants a bomb on his target's car and plans to detonate it while the car is on a busy Manhattan street.
* MagicalComputer: The Machine.
* MaleGaze: In "Booked Solid," Pennsylvania's sexy secretary, Ms. May (Root actually) walks into the room wearing a tight skirt. Before we see her face, the camera focuses on her rather large behind.
* MamaBear: Carter.
* TheMatchmaker: ''The Machine'' is the person who introduced Harold to Grace.
* MeaningfulEcho: Reese and Jessica's dialogue in reaction to seeing 9/11 on the TV in "Pilot"--repeated between Nathan and Harold when Harold learns about 9/11 in a flashback in "One Percent":
-->What was it, a plane?
-->''Two'' planes.
* MeaningfulName: [[spoiler: Superhacker "Root," also known as "Caroline Turing."]] See ShoutOut entry below for details.
** The man who leads them to the nuclear facility in "God Mode"? [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Livermore_National_Laboratory Lawrence]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leo_Szilard Szilard]].
* MegaCorp: Though there are no (obvious) links between any of them, the various companies that Finch owns could be considered this. So far we have a computer company, an insurance company, a construction company, a power company, and a magazine publishing company. It's entirely possible that this is not the complete list of industries that Finch has companies in.
* MenacingStroll: Reese basically owns this trope.
* MercyLead:
** In "Number Crunch," [[spoiler: Carter]] lets [[spoiler: Reese]] go when she recognizes the man with him [[spoiler: (Finch)]], who had presented himself before as a witness to a robbery in "Mission Creep".
** [[spoiler: She]] does it again at the end of "Baby Blue."
* MexicanStandoff: Between Vargas and a Triad gang in "Blue Code".
* MissingMissionControl: Occasionally Finch gets himself into trouble while helping Reese. The most notable examples are both due to [[spoiler:his abduction by Root]].
** [[spoiler:The Machine]] temporarily became this during the end of the second season. Afterwards it resumed contact with Reese, Finch, [[spoiler:the government, and Root]].
* MissionControl:
** Finch and the Machine itself to a degree.
** Inverted in "Super" due to Reese recovering from a gunshot wound sustained in "Number Crunch".
** Taken to extremes in "Firewall" when Reese and the POI are trapped inside a hotel with the FBI and a hit team of corrupt cops hunting them. Finch is trying to guide them to safety, Agent Donnelly is at Taskforce headquarters guiding an FBI SWAT team towards Reese, Detectives Carter and Fusco (unknown to each other) are sending Reese and Finch information to help them dodge the SWAT team, and a corrupt NYPD officer is helping the hit team avoid the cameras and FBI while guiding them towards Reese and the POI.
* TheMole:
** Det. Fusco inverts the trope, being a mole for Finch and Reese.
** "Scarface," who works for Elias. First appears as a uniformed officer in "Witness." In "Flesh and Blood," he's seen [[spoiler: triggering the bombs Elias uses to kill his father and the other Mafia dons.]] Still active as of "C.O.D."
* MoleInCharge: In "Prisoner's Dilemma", Agent Donnelly puts Carter in charge of interrogating the four men suspected of being the Man in the Suit.
** In "Trojan Horse", [[spoiler:[[DirtyCop Detective Terney]]]] is revealed to be in charge of investigating Szymanski's murder.
* MostAnnoyingSound: In-Universe. [[spoiler:Finch regards Bear's squeaky toy's "squeak" to be this. He solves the annoyance by removing the squeaking part. Bear still loves the toy.]]
* MuggingTheMonster: If you are picking on a homeless man on the subway you might be in for a nasty surprise.
* MushroomSamba: Finch has one in "Identity Crisis" when [[spoiler: the identity thief he mistakenly believes to be a [=POI=] [[SlippingAMickey slips him some Ecstacy]]]]. HilarityEnsues.
* MustHaveCaffeine: In ''No Good Deed'', Finch bugs an NSA facility by slipping a wired coffee machine into their daily mail.
* MutualKill: Almost achieved [[spoiler: by proxy]] in "Til Death". [[spoiler: A husband and wife each hire a hitman to kill the other spouse. Reese and Carter are able to stop one hitman and a few minutes later Fusco is able to stop the other one]].
* MyGreatestFailure: The event that drove Finch to protect the "non-relevant" numbers was his discovery that [[spoiler:Nathan's death had been predicted by the Machine, but could not warn them because he blocked Nathan's access to the list]].
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Tropes N-S]]
* NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast: '''Decima Te'''chnologies.
* TheNeedsOfTheMany: How Finch justified ignoring the Irrelevant list before [[spoiler:Nathan's death forced him to realize his mistake]].
--> "People die; they've been doing it for a long, long time. We can't save all of them."
* NeverForgottenSkill: The episode "The High Road" shows a POI who is an expert safecracker who can crack a combination safe by ear. He retired a long time ago and had been living as a husband and family man in the suburbs...until his partners-in-crime found him and pulled him in for one last job. Despite not have practiced for years, he managed to pull off this rare lost art of a skill like a professional.
* NewMediaAreEvil:
** The Machine reads personal data from social networking sites as part of its data mining algorithm. Finch invented the concept of online social networking (and made a hefty profit in the process) specifically so that the information would be available for the Machine to do so.
** TruthInTelevision, perhaps? See [[http://www.wired.com/wiredenterprise/2012/05/ibm-bans-siri/ this article]] on privacy issues surrounding Siri the iPhone digital assistant.
* NoHonorAmongThieves:
** Most of the major defeats of various members of the RoguesGallery have been inflicted by other members of the RoguesGallery. For example:
** [[spoiler:HR has been severely damaged by Donnelly.]]
** [[spoiler:Root has killed a major figure in the ISA and has now infiltrated them.]]
** [[spoiler:Kara has killed Donnelly and captured Snow, then was killed by Snow in a suicide bombing.]]
* NoKillLikeOverkill:
** In "Firewall", HR is willing to blow up an entire hotel floor to kill Caroline Turing and the Man in the Suit.
** In "God Mode", the government [[spoiler:stages a suicide bombing on a ferry full of civilians in order to silence Nathan Ingram]].
* NoodleIncident:
** In the opening sequence of the second episode, "Ghosts," we see the very end of one case, and it's heavily implied that there were several other [=POIs=] for Reese and Finch in the time between "Pilot" and "Ghosts."
** We still don't know what caused Finch's back injury. All we've ever heard him say so far is "It's a long story."
*** The truth is revealed in "God Mode."
** The blood on Reese's shirt at the beginning of "Many Happy Returns" has never been explained; when asked about it, he just said that he'd "quit his job." We still don't know what he's referring to, but based on the timeline it can't be the incident at Ordos because that happened in May 2010, and the flashbacks in MHR took place in February 2011.[[note]]It is possible that this is a writer mistake though. In the original Pilot script, John did have an injury from his final mission when he came to find Jessica; it's possible they forgot that the timeline had been changed by the time they wrote MHR.[[/note]]
** Played for laughs with Fusco's storyline during "Prisoner's Dilemma" - we do see snippets, but there's no explanation as to how one leads into the next.
** In "Proteus", John gets shot at by a drug smuggler using a spear gun. When Finch asks if it was the first time, John replies "Wish I could say yes."
* NoPlansNoPrototypeNoBackup: The government does not know how the Machine actually operates and Finch provided them with no plans or documentation specifically so they cannot adapt the technology for other purposes. He also encrypted the operating system so it cannot be reverse-engineered. All they can really do is feed its data and wait for it to give them social security numbers to investigate. Finch is the only one who knows how the Machine 'thinks' and he made sure that the government does not know he exists.
* NoEnding: We never learn of [[spoiler: Benton]]'s fate. [[spoiler: "Many Happy Returns" suggests he might be in the same Mexican Prison as Deputy Brad Jennings, but it’s never been confirmed]].
* NotMeThisTime: When the gang goons find Reese and the witness he is protecting in "Witness", Finch immediately thinks Fusco sold them out again. He didn't; [[spoiler: the "witness" turns out to be Elias]].
* NotQuiteDead:
** [[spoiler: Kara Stanton, Reese's former partner, turns up in "Matsya Nyaya" despite appearing to have a bomb dropped on her during flashbacks in the same episode.]]
** [[spoiler: Though it is justified, as a wounded Reese was able to get a safe distance away there was plenty of time for her to escape too]].
* NotSoDifferent:
** Reese and [[TheStasi former Stasi]] assassin Ulrich Kohl.
** Reese also identifies with Riley, the mob enforcer trying to protect the woman he loves, in "Triggerman."
** Finch and [[spoiler:Root]], who describes Finch as a "worthy opponent."
*** Unwittingly lampshaded by Finch in "Firewall," when he describes her (not yet realizing who she is) as "a girl after my own heart."
*** Used explicitly in "The Contingency" where Finch admits they are alike. However that episode also shows how they're not alike, as Finch does not share her LackOfEmpathy.
*** Finch refers to the [=POI=] of "Triggerman, a mob enforcer, as "bad code," echoing Root's term for human failings in "[[CaptainObvious Bad Code]]." He later corrects himself when Reese asks what the phrase means: "It only applies to machines."
* OddlySmallOrganization: The team originally consisted of Reese, Finch, and a giant all seeing super computer. Over the course of the series, we've added Carter, Fusco, and Bear the dog as regular members, and Zoe Morgan, Leon Tao, and Samantha Shaw as recurring independent contractors.
* OhCrap:
** Finch's face when he realizes that [[spoiler:the woman he and Reese have been protecting is actually Root.]]
** A more subtle one in a flashback, when Nathan realizes [[spoiler: he's absent-mindedly revealed Harold's existence to Alicia.]]
** The [=POI=] in "Masquerade" when she realizes that John understood her when she insulted him in another language.
** "Prisoner's Dilemma," when Finch realizes that The Machine has given him [[spoiler: Donnelly]]'s number.
** Kara Stanton gets one when she discovers [[spoiler:Mark Snow and his bomb vest sitting in the backseat of her car]].
** From "Proteus": [[ItMakesSenseInContext "...body armor."]]
** And then Finch's reaction when Samantha Shaw tracks him down, '''''inside the library''''', which to his knowledge has never been compromised.[[hottip:*: Note that Alicia Corwin sucessfully trailed Finch to the library in "Firewall", broke into the library, bypassed his security measures and copied the irrelevant list, but he does not seem to be aware of this. (Probably because Root shot Alicia before she could say anything.)]]
** Finch seems to have this face whenever he is about to receive a new number.
** [[spoiler:The Machine going down due to Stanton's virus.]]
** [[spoiler:Root getting a phone call from the Machine in the mental facility.]]
* OncePerEpisode: "We have a new number."
* OnlyAFleshWound:
** Reese prefers to shoot {{mooks}} in the leg and knee to disable them. He probably is not too concerned if some of them bleed out, or are permanently crippled as a result. He will shoot to kill if there is no other option.
** Reese is shot in the shoulder and it is later revealed to be OnlyAFleshWound. The placement of the bandage suggests that it really was just a glancing shot that did not hit muscle or bone. The shock from getting shot still takes Reese out of the fight long enough for the bad guys to get away.
*** The same thing happens to the hitman in "Ghosts."
** Reese is on the receiving end of an intentional one in "Blue Code."
* OpeningNarration:
** Season 1:
-->'''Finch:''' [[BigBrotherIsWatching You are being watched]]. The government has a secret system, a Machine that spies on you every hour of every day. I know because ... [[TheReveal I built it]]. I designed The Machine to detect acts of terror, but it sees everything, crimes involving ordinary people like you, crimes the government considered irrelevant. They wouldn't act so I decided I would--but I needed a partner, someone with the skills to intervene. Hunted by the authorities, we work in secret. You'll never find us; but [[WeHelpTheHelpless victim]] or perpetrator, if your number's up, we'll find you.
** For the first two episodes of Season 2, there is no OpeningNarration by Finch because [[spoiler: he's been kidnapped by Root.]]
** Beginning with the third episode, there's a new narration and title sequence.
-->'''Finch:''' [[BigBrotherIsWatching You are being watched]]. The government has a secret system, a Machine that spies on you every hour of every day. I designed the Machine to detect acts of terror, but it sees everything. Violent crimes involving ordinary people. The government considers these people irrelevant. [[WeHelpTheHelpless We don’t.]] Hunted by the authorities, we work in secret. You'll never find us. But victim or perpetrator, if your number’s up, we’ll find you.
* PalantirPloy: And how.
* PayEvilUntoEvil: Reese helps the [=POI=] of "In Extremis" do this to the man who poisoned him.
* PayPhone: These are cool again because of this show.
* PhysicalScarsPsychologicalScars:
** Michael Emerson said that Finch's [[AcheyScars injury]] is said to be this in the [[WordofGod script]].
** The scars across Elias' palms from Moretti's attempt on his life may also be this.
* PoliceAreUseless: Some of them aren't (Carter and Fusco being the most obvious examples), but Internal Affairs has utterly failed to find any dirty cops without direct assistance from Team Machine, and has twice been used as a patsy by HR.
* PoorCommunicationKills:
** Finch designed the Machine to only output Social Security numbers and the humans then have to do the rest of the investigating. On occasion this means that someone will die before Finch and Reese are able to figure out what the actual threat is and how to neutralize it.
** The method by which Finch receives numbers from the Machine uses a code that involves payphones and the Dewey Decimal system. This makes the message hard to intercept but it also means that there is a significant delay between getting the message and actually finding out who the new [=PoI=] is. In "Prisoner's Dilemma", by the time Finch figures out that the new number belongs to [[spoiler: Agent Donnelly]], it is already too late.
** In "Til Death" a married couple stopped communicating with each other. As a result [[spoiler: they each decide to hire a hitman to kill the other.]]
* PostCyberPunk: Has elements of this what with the Machine and all.
* PowerPerversionPotential:
** In "Super" Reese and Finch can't help but notice how "flexible" one of their tenets is.
** While testing the Machine, Finch uses it to win at blackjack, but then deliberately loses when he realizes what he's doing.
* PreAsskickingOneLiner: Reese has a lot of them.
* PreviouslyOn: From the Machine's POV; used on several occasions in season 2.
* PrivateMilitaryContractors: In "'Til Death", one of the [[spoiler:assassins hired by the couple was working for a PMC.]]
* PromotionToOpeningTitles: by the end of the first season, Fusco appears in the opening title sequence.
* ProperlyParanoid:
** Alicia Corwin, who was Ingram's point of contact with the government when he and Finch were making The Machine, has become noticeably afraid of being anywhere with surveillance or security systems whose data might be fed into it. Upon retiring from government work, she moved to a small town in West Virginia with no wireless internet and zero cellphone reception.
** Henry Peck, the [=POI=] in "No Good Deed," becomes this pretty quickly.
** Finch, of course.
** Agent Donnelly becomes this after realizing that there's a mole sabotaging his investigation of The Man in the Suit.
** Shaw, in spades.
* ProphecyTwist:
** A "person of interest" can just as easily be a perpetrator as a victim. [[spoiler: This trips up Reese in the pilot episode.]]
** There's also no guarantee that the violent crime The Machine predicts isn't highly justified. This is shown when the machine picks [[spoiler:Elias]] as a likely victim, and when it identifies a potential perpetrator who is planning to kill [[spoiler:a stalker who is harassing someone the [=PoI=] is trying to protect]], for example.
** The perpetrator-victim twist was reversed when the Number of the Week was a former construction manager who purchased a rifle and had made threats against a congressman whose budget cuts put him out of work. Reese aims to prevent him from assassinating the congressman [[spoiler:but finds out too late that the [=POI=] is being set up as the patsy to the real assassin working for someone else.]]
** And made really confusing in a case where there were two people using the same name and SSN - the actual [=PoI=] and an identity thief. [[spoiler: They initially think that the female Jordan Hardin is the real one and the male is the drug manufacturer/identity thief, but it turns out that ''he's'' the victim, and he's trying to steal his identity thief's identity in an attempt to figure out who stole his life.]]
** Once the [=POI=] was actually ''both''. [[spoiler:He was manipulated into multiple murders as part of a robbery, then murdered by the person who manipulated him so [[YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness she could keep all the loot for herself]].]]
** The POI of "Firewall" [[spoiler:was also both a victim and perpetrator. She arranged for a hit on herself in order to draw out Reese and Finch.]]
** The POI of "Bury the Lede" [[spoiler:was more of a patsy than a perpetrator. She was responsible for the victim being targeted and killed by organized crime, but she was manipulated into doing so by the real villain of the episode so that there would be no evidence leading back to him.]]
** One POI was being ''blackmailed'' into being the perpetrator.
** "'Til Death" has [[spoiler: two [=POI=]s who are both victim and perpetrator because they're trying to kill ''each other''.]]
** In "Proteus", the six numbers were all victims of a serial killer who would then assume the identity of his victim until he got bored and moved on to his next target.
* PunchClockVillain: Fusco before being co-opted by Reese. In fact this was pretty much ''why'' he was co-opted by Reese, because he wasn't as bad as the others.
* RammingAlwaysWorks: See CarFu.
* RedHerring: [[spoiler: Beecher is heavily suggested to be a member of HR such as his multiple cases with IA and talking with the HR Boss. Turns out he is an honest cop and the HR Boss just turns out to be his god father whom he uses as a CI.]]
* ReedRichardsIsUseless: Lampshaded at the beginning of Season 2 by Root; the true implication of the Machine is not its potential misuse as a tool of Big Brother. To successfully predict human actions, Finch had to have created ''artificial intelligence''. Root can't believe that Finch's response to doing this was to BlackBox the system and hand it over to a corrupt and power-hungry US government, and is determined to set the Machine free.
* RefugeInAudacity: Who would honestly expect the murderer of [[spoiler:Cal Beecher]] to stand up in front of a bunch of cops and give the man's eulogy?
* RescueArc: Part of the second season.
* ResignationsNotAccepted: [[spoiler:Simmons]] refuses to let Fusco walk away from HR, [[spoiler:even after virtually everyone else in the organization is locked up]].
* ReverseCerebusSyndrome: A mild case. Season 2 dialed up the humour a bit, introduced Bear and has had two comic relief appearances by Ken Leung without compromising the show's edge. It's unknown whether this was ExecutiveMeddling or an internal decision.
** CerebusRollerCoaster: It's not uncommon for the tone of the show to switch without warning mid-episode. "Baby Blue" is a great example, as it starts out rather fluffy and cute (what with being the baby episode and all), and then [[MoodWhiplash rapidly becomes the opposite]] when [[spoiler:Elias locks John and the baby in a refrigerator truck]]. Naturally, this leads to some very distraught fans.
* ReversePolarity: How Finch listens in on the mob bosses in "Flesh and Blood".
-->'''Finch''': "Any speaker can be converted to a crude microphone by reversing polarity."
** This is actually technically [[TruthInTelevision true]], though not to the level of accuracy presented in the show. Yamaha NS-10 speakers are often reversed into kick drum microphones in recording circles.
* RevealingCoverup: Many of the premeditated crimes detected by The Machine are planned with the intent of concealing something else. In one notable episode, the thing being covered up wasn't even illegal.
* RightHandVersusLeftHand:
** Reese insists that neither Fusco or [[spoiler: Carter]] know that the other is working for them, causing them to suspect each other of being either dirty or "up to something". It is justified in that both had been out to get him (separately, of course) at one point, and the jobs he had them doing were very different. [[spoiler:They're both clued in during the first season finale when Carter catches Fusco sending information to Finch.]]
** Stanton and Reese get into this on their last mission, thanks to Snow.
* RoaringRampageOfRescue: Reese goes on one at the beginning of season 2. It's awesome.
* RoaringRampageOfRevenge:
** Ulrich Kohl in "Foe."
** Elias versus the Five Families
* RogueAgent: Reese has become one, working for Finch.
* RoguesGallery:
** What started as a procedural with a BigBad became this by midway through the first season. So far, it consists of:
** Karl Elias, a DiabolicalMastermind with daddy issues trying to take over [[TheMafia the Five Families]]. [[spoiler:He was arrested at the end of season one, but [[MightAsWellNotBeInPrisonAtAll despite being behind bars, he is still a major figure in New York's criminal underworld.]]]]
** Root, a mysterious superhacker and WorthyOpponent to Finch. [[spoiler:Also a career conwoman with no compunctions about committing murder. She's also aware of the Machine and wishes to free it from its shackles. Currently infiltrating the ISA (Listed below) to get more information about the Machine.]]
** "HR", an infrastructure of [[DirtyCop crooked cops]] within the NYPD. [[spoiler:Many members of the group were arrested at the end of season one and more were arrested early in season two, but at least three members are still at large, including their leader, and they appear to be rebuilding.]]
** Mark Snow, a CIA officer who wants to kill his former colleague Reese. [[spoiler:Killed himself to get rid of Kara.]]
** Donnelly, an FBI Special Agent [[InspectorJavert in charge of a manhunt for Reese]] because he thinks that he's currently working as a mob hitman and/or domestic terrorist. [[spoiler:Murdered by Kara halfway through season two.]]
** The ISA, the government agency in charge of acting on the information provided by the Machine and covering up its existence.
** Alistair Wesley, an ex-MI-6 agent with connections to Reese (That even Reese doesn't know about) who's gone into crime for profit.
** Reese's ex-partner Kara was working for an unidentified organization that appears to be one. [[spoiler:She was killed by a suicide bombing by Snow, but her employers are still out there.]]
** Decima Technologies was introduced as a threat midway through season 2.
* RoguesGalleryShowcase: Started cropping up in the second half of season one, when the RoguesGallery began to grow in earnest.
** In "Flesh and Blood", Elias hires HR to help him kill the heads of the Five Families [[spoiler:while planning to wipe out HR at the same time]].
** In "Firewall", Reese and a POI are trapped in a hotel with two groups chasing them: the FBI, trying to get Reese, and HR, who have been hired to kill the POI. Who wins? [[spoiler:Root, setting herself up as a [=POI=] by hiring HR to kill her, in order to kidnap Finch.]]
** In "Prisoner's Dilemma", Reese has to deal with Agent Donnelly, Elias, Hersh, and the Aryans from "The Contingency." Stanton also appears as a flashback character. [[spoiler:Until she's not.]]
** This pretty much becomes the rule in the latter half of the second season. Whatever the A plot is, there's usually a B plot involving either HR or the ISA, and whenever the ISA appears, Root invariably also turns up.
* RunningGag - Reese always gets into fights and/or thrown out of bars and restaurants.
* {{Safecracking}}: One POI is an ex-safecracker, blackmailed into doing one more job by his ex-partners. Finch mentions that cracking a safe by the sound of the tumblers is practically a lost art. He doesn't mention that this is because most modern safes are designed so that this doesn't work.
* SaveTheVillain:
** One issue Reese and Finch face is that the number only tells them a person will be ''involved'' in a violent crime. They can be the victim or the perpetrator.
** The person whose number who came up in [[spoiler:the first episode]] was the actual villain. A subversion since they ''thought'' they were supposed to save the person, but actually were supposed to stop the person from murdering someone else.
** And then there's [[spoiler:Charlie Burton aka [[BigBad Elias]]]] a powerful man who is out for revenge on many people. Reese is seriously disturbed by saving the latter one and wonders just how many more numbers will appear on the machine because of this mistake. [[spoiler: By the end of the season, there have been eight numbers with a provable direct link to Elias since Reese saved him, four of which Elias succeeds in killing.]]
** In [[spoiler:"Matsya Nyaya"]] the [=POI=] turns out to be both a villain and a victim. He starts killing people and now other people want to kill him.
** In [[spoiler:"Firewall"]] the [=POI=] is villain and victim in a different way. She puts a hit on herself to lure out Reese and Finch when they try to save her.
** In [[spoiler:"Till Death"]] ends up saving two villains who are [[spoiler: a married couple who put out hits on each other and can't call off the hitmen]].
* SceneryPorn: The time-lapse surveillance camera shots of New York city count.
* ScienceHero: Finch
* ScrewTheRulesIHaveConnections: In "C.O.D" a man is desperately trying to get his family out of Cuba and into the United States. Finch, Reese and Carter help him by calling in a favor from [[spoiler: the US Secret Service]] to get around the usual immigration rules.
* ScrewTheRulesImDoingWhatsRight:
** A great deal of what Finch and Reese do is rather blatantly illegal, but they do it anyway in the pursuit of saving lives.
** In "Flesh and Blood," Carter [[spoiler: kidnaps three Mafia dons to keep Elias from killing them.]] [[LampshadeHanging Lampshaded]] by Finch, who [[DeadpanSnarker quips]] to Reese, "You seem to be having some influence on her."
** How Carter seems to rationalize falsifying evidence to completely derail an FBI investigation. [[spoiler: And why she eventually helps Fusco when Internal Affairs comes after him.]]
* ScrewTheRulesIHaveMoney: Finch occasionally invokes this in order to get things accomplished as well. For example, [[spoiler:getting a doctor to treat a critically injured Reese without reporting the gunshot wounds as required by law by handing over [[BriefcaseFullOfMoney a handbag with six or seven figures worth of cash in it]]]].
* ScrewThisImOuttaHere: Reese does this in "One Percent" after he gets fed up with the [=PoI=]'s reckless disregard for his own life.
* SecretIdentity:
** Finch has many of them depending on his various false identities.
** Harold Finch's day job is, effectively, himself. [[{{Superman}} Mild-mannered bespectacled]] software engineer by day, [[{{Batman}} crime-fighting gajillionaire owner of the company the rest of the day]]. Until the day he [[spoiler: fired himself]].
** "Harold Wren" works as an insurance underwriter. This is the persona that is best friends with Nathan Ingram.
*** Doubles as a ShoutOut to SimCity.
** "Harold Burdett" is a paralegal that [[spoiler: Carter interviews about the break-in at a police station]].
** "Harold Partridge" is a very private billionaire[[hottip:*:Yes, Finch [[RefugeInAudacity went undercover as himself]], who [[spoiler:buys 8% of Virtanen Pharmaceutical's shares, in order to get some face time with the VP and CEO so he could plant a bug in the VP's office.]]
** "Harold Crane" is an anonymous investor [[spoiler: who buys majority share in Tritak]].
** "Thomas Paine" is a political blogger who arranges an interview with Bannerman.
** "Harold Crow," private investigator.
** Lampshaded by Carter and her son in "Flesh and Blood."
--> '''Taylor:''' Who's the guy with the glasses?
--> '''Det. Carter:''' When you find out, let me know.
* SecretlyWealthy: Finch is the king of this trope. Pretty much no one knows he exists but yet he has enough money to pretty much buy anything he wants.
* SharpDressedMan: Finch.
* ShipTease: Between Zoe and Reese just about any time they're onscreen together, but most notably in "High Road" and "Booked Solid".
* ShotInTheAss: [[ButtMonkey Poor Fusco.]]
* ShoutOut:
** Finch has difficulty moving his neck, just like Batman in the [[Film/{{Batman}} Burton/Schumacher film series]] and ''Film/BatmanBegins'' (Due to costume limitations.). Reese wears dark clothing and speaks in a raspy whisper, also like Batman.
*** Alternatively Finch may be a shout out to Oracle, a computer wizard connected to a vast network of cameras who also has problems walking (especially since he was wheelchair-bound at one point).
** More Batman references:
*** In "Bury the Lede," the [=PoI=] refers to the elusive "man in the suit" (Reese) as "something out of a comic book."
*** Fusco's nickname for Reese: "Wonder Boy."
*** See also the discussion of "Wolf and Cub" below.
** May well be unintentional, but one of the dead soldiers mentioned in "Mission Creep" is named [[Series/{{Degrassi}} Manny Santos]].
*** And another is [[TheUnit Hector Williams]].
** The episode title "Get Carter" itself.
** Finch's cover identity as "Harold Wren," an insurance underwriter, is a reference to the [[http://simcity.wikia.com/wiki/Wren_Insurance Wren Insurance]] building in ''SimCity 4''.
** In "Root Cause", [[spoiler:[[Literature/{{Cryptonomicon}} a hacker named Root]]. Or it may just be an in-joke for those with knowledge of computers.]] As an additional computer in-joke, the second time the character appears, she goes under the name [[spoiler:Turing, after Alan Turing, one of the key pioneers of computing and artificial intelligence]]. In "Bad Code" two of her former aliases are revealed to be [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_von_Neumann "Neumann"]] and[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freeman_Dyson "Dyson"]].
** "Super" has several references to Creator/AlfredHitchcock's ''Rear Window.'' Reese's cover name, "Mr. Hayes," is a reference to the film's screenwriter; Reese spends the episode in his apartment in a wheelchair, trying to solve a crime by watching his neighbors.
** "[[LoneWolfAndCub Wolf and Cub]]" has Reese working on behalf of a 14-year old comic book fan who decides Reese is "a ronin."
*** Also in that episode, a woman says Reese's whole stepping out of the shadows to help people thing would fit in just fine at the local comic book store. During the episode, the young [=POI=] acts as Robin to Reese's Batman, and like certain versions of Batman, his presence lightens Reese up considerably.
** In "Identity Crisis" two of the thugs are listed in the credits as Jekyll and Hyde.
** The numbers in Reese's SSN [[Series/{{Lost}} add up to 16, the candidacy number associated with Sayid Jarrah]].
** The climax of "Risk," when Finch is bidding up the price of Tritak, deliberately imitates ''WallStreet.''
** In "Ghosts", it is revealed that Harold [[UndercoverBoss routinely works as a low-level employee at a company he owns.]]
** Finch spends an entire flashback in "The Contingency" wandering around New York and asking the Machine [[CanYouHearMeNow if it can see him now]].
** The [=PoI=] in "Bad Code" is shown in a flashback playing OregonTrail on a public library computer. [[MemeticMutation She died of dysentery, of course.]]
** Both Alastair Wesley and Snow have said 'farewell' to Reese and Carter respectively by using the phrase: [[ThePrisoner: "Be seeing you."]]
** In Dead Reckoning, Finch disarms the bomb vest with [[JamesBond 0:07]] seconds left on the timer.
** "Proteus" starts with Finch and Reese (plus Bear) going to a movie theater to see ''Film/{{Rashomon}}.'' Reese wryly comments that he would rather have seen ''OnceUponATimeInTheWest,'' which of course has "fewer subtitles."
** In "All In", Reese mentions that he used to be a spy, so ''of course'' he knows how to play Baccarat. Baccarat is the favorite card game of JamesBond.
** In "Zero Day" the following exchange takes place between Root and someone she's taken prisoner:
-->[[spoiler: Pennsylvania 2]]: [[ThePrisoner "What do you want?"]]
-->Root: [[ThePrisoner "Information."]]
** In "Zero Day" Ernest '''Thornhill''' [[spoiler: [[NorthByNorthwest is an in-universe fictitious man that a lot of trouble has been gone through to make it look like he exists]].]] He even has a drone fly after his car featuring a camera shot reminiscent of the famous one in NorthByNorthwest.
*** Also, the fact that his name is ''Ernest'' to begin with. [[spoiler: ''TheImportanceOfBeingEarnest'' is also about complications arising from efforts made to "create" a fictional man named Ernest.]]
* ShownTheirWork:
** "Root Cause" had a very accurate portrayal of how computer security and hacking work, and used correct terminology throughout.
** In "Risk," Tritak (the pipeline company) is described as a "master limited partnership" whose equity interests are traded as "units" rather than "shares." (''e.g.'' "Tomorrow at opening, it'll be down to $2 a unit.") This is correct terminology for publicly-traded partnerships.
*** In that same episode, the price of Tritak units is affected by [[http://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/12/11/new-york-governor-vetoes-fracking-bill/# a real-life fracking bill being passed by the New York State Assembly]].
** In a flashback in "Blue Code," Reese is shown listening to a [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numbers_station numbers station]].
** The Chinese ghost town shown in "Matsya Nyaya" [[http://www.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,1975397,00.html actually exists.]]
*** So does the virus that targeted the Iranian nuclear program.
** In "No Good Deed," Peck mentions three real-life government research programs--"[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trailblazer_Project Trailblazer]]", [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_Awareness_Office TIA]] ("Total Information Awareness"), and "[[http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2012/03/16/new-details-on-nsas-new-spy-center-and-secrets-from-domestic-eavesdropping-operation-stellar-wind/ Stellar Wind]]"--all of which were attempts to build a data-mining system similar to The Machine--and also mentions the "Shannon limit," [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shannon_limit the theoretical maximum information transfer rate of a communications channel for a particular noise level]].
** When Alicia Corwin meets Finch's nephew, it is mentioned she lives in the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_National_Radio_Quiet_Zone United States National Radio Quiet Zone]] in West Virginia, which does have a blanket ban on all cellphones, Wi-Fi instruments, and radios. They still use pay phones in this region.
** In "Masquerade," the week's number is the daughter of a Brazilian politician. The characters use accurate Brazilian slang [such as "O Garanhão" being "the stud"] and correct grammar whenever someone speaks Portuguese. The episode mentions a famous local dish (Muqueca) and [[FreezeFrameBonus mentions an actual (and major) Brazilian political party in a news report]].
** In "C.O.D.," a stolen laptop containing classified information is being offered for sale on a "[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darknet_%28file_sharing%29 darknet]]" site; Finch mentions the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silk_Road_%28marketplace%29 Silk Road]] online black market as one place he needed to look for it.
** In "2 Pi R," Finch suggests to a student computer programmer that his code would implement multi-threading more efficiently if he used [[http://tuxthink.blogspot.com/2011/10/atomic-variables.html atomic variables.]]
*** Agent Donnelly tells the warden of Riker's Island prison about the [=AUMF=], which is the Authorization to Use Military Force. This is referring to Public Law No: 107–40.
* ShutUpHannibal: Finch gives his variation on the phrase when Root [[spoiler: has him captured and]] tries to convince him to join her.
* SilverFox: Reese is well on his way to being one. Lampshaded by Wendy the hairstylist in "Number Crunch" and the [=POI=]'s drinking buddy in "Masquerade."
* SlippingAMickey: Done to Finch in "[[spoiler: Identity Crisis]]."
** Also done to Carter's date in "2-Pi-R".
* SmartPeoplePlayChess: Finch and Elias. [[spoiler:With each other, in fact.]]
** MundaneWish: Finch asked Elias what his price was for helping him. Instead of the expected DealWithTheDevil favor, Elias just wants to play chess with someone [[TheChessmaster as smart as he is]].
** Turns out on his days off, Reese plays Chinese chess.
* SomethingCompletelyDifferent: A few episodes deviate from usual premise:
** "Bad Code": Going to Texas to solve a cold case.
** "Prisoner's Dilemma" (and "2-Pi-R" to a lesser extent): Reese being arrested and must escape Donnelly's suspicion.
** "Dead Reckoning": Reese is forced to participate in TheCaper.
** "Relevance": The story follows a duo of government assassins who eliminate terrorists outed by the Machine, while the main characters are DemotedToExtra.
* TheSpook:
** Both Reese AND Finch are believed to be dead by the government, and they're both keen to keep it that way.
** Finch himself is able to repeatedly disappear and shed cover identities so effortlessly that even Reese cannot follow him or find any information about him. In flashbacks, and in "Wolf and Cub," we gradually learn that Finch spent nearly a decade disappearing from public awareness, and has been operating under an assumed name [[CrazyPrepared back to at least 1976]]. He made his partner the public face of their company and concentrated on top secret work.
** Also, [[spoiler:Root, the super-hacker]] introduced in "Root Cause."
* StealthHiBye: Reese pulls one off in "Masquerade."
* StealthPun: Where does Reese get his information? A little bird told him...
** In the same vein, Reese and Fusco's spying on Finch in season 1 could be called "Bird Watching".
* SuicideMission:
** Finch openly admits to Reese in the Pilot episode that this will likely be the result of their work trying to save the people on the irrelevant list.[[note]]The fans hope he's wrong.[[/note]]
* SuspectIsHatless: The official description of The Man In The Suit is "Tall, dark hair, nice suit."
* SympatheticInspectorAntagonist: Detective Carter, and she is not happy about it. While she isn't completely sure about Reese, she goes from hunting him to helping him.
* SympatheticMurderer:
** Some of the would-be killers that the machine spits out.
** The [=POI=] from "Wolf and Cub": a young teen who wanted revenge on the gangsters who killed his brothers.
** "Cura Te Ipsum": The [=POI=] is a doctor that Reese thinks will be victimized by a serial rapist; [[spoiler:she's actually going to kill him because he raped her sister long ago, sending the sister into a toxic spiral that ended in suicide.]]
** "Super": The [=POI=] is the superintendent of an apartment complex. Reese and Finch initially assume that he's stalking one of the tenants and planning to kill her boyfriend in an MurderTheHypotenuse scenario. [[spoiler: The 'boyfriend' is the real stalker, the super's trying to kill the guy in order to protect the victim.]]
** Even [[spoiler: Elias]], in a way, considering what happened to his mother.
** [[spoiler:Reese]] was one in a flashback scene of "Many Happy Returns", when he attacked [[spoiler:the abusive husband of his ex-girlfriend Jessica, after finding out that he killed her.]]
*** [[spoiler: Finch is afraid that Reese will become this again with the wife-beater the main plotline of the episode centers around, but it is later revealed that Reese just stuck him in a Mexican Prison for the rest of his life. [[CruelMercy Not that it is much better.]]]]
** The POI from "In Extremis" avenges his own murder by tracking down and poisoning the man responsible.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Tropes T-Z]]
* TakeAThirdOption: When the victims of the week cannot go to the police, Reese and Finch are the option for them.
* TakingTheBullet:
** Subverted and played for laughs in "Wolf and Cub". Fusco does the classic swan-dive-in-front-of-the-bullet to save the [=POI=]. [[ShotInTheAss And the bullet hits him in the ass.]] He's basically fine, but mentions to Reese as the paramedics take him away that he can already hear the guys back at the station laughing at him.
** A more serious example in "Masquerade," when Fusco puts himself between the [=POI=] and the guy who's about to shoot her.
* TakingYouWithMe: [[spoiler: How Snow kills Kara]].
* TeamPet: In the season 2 premiere, John acquires an Army-trained attack dog from some Aryan Brotherhood types who couldn't control it because it was trained in Dutch. John does, and dubs the dog "Bear"[[note]]because at the end of the episode, he had destroyed a man's pile of ''bear''er bonds[[/note]].
* TechnoBabble:
** In "2 Pi R", we get a close-up of some C code written out on paper, and it looks like real C code, except that the program is written upside-down, with #include elements (which go at the top of the file) written at the bottom. And Finch talks to the [=PoI=] about "using atomic variables to implement multithreading." There's no such thing as an "atomic variable", but "atomic ''operations''" are a legitimate (and highly useful) technique when dealing with multithreaded code. (And then it turns out that what he was working on was a new compression algorithm, which is not the sort of thing you would use multithreading for in the first place!)
** That said, [=WinRAR=] at least partially implements it.
* ThatsWhatIWouldDo:
** When asked how he knew that a murder-suicide was staged, Reese replies that it's how he would have done it.
** He says it again in "Flesh and Blood" regarding Elias' surveillance of the "HR" cops' families.
** In "No Good Deed," Reese compliments Finch on his excellent surveillance tradecraft when he catches him [[spoiler: watching Grace from afar.]]
* ThemeNaming: Finch's aliases tend to be bird-related (see AnimalMotifs, above), and Root apparently really likes naming her false identities after famous computer scientists.
* ThereAreNoGirlsOnTheInternet: Thoroughly averted with [[spoiler: Root, the eponymous hacker of "Root Cause"]], who even outsmarted Finch and forced him to pull the plug on his library setup.
* TheyFightCrime: One of the main themes of the show.
* ThrowTheBookAtThem: Reese defeats an assassin after one episode's [=POI=] by clubbing him with a reference book about criminal law.
* TheWarOnTerror / IncitingIncident: Finch built the machine for the government as part of its response to 9/11. Reese was ready to quit the Army until 9/11 motivated him to rejoin. Carter was an interrogator in Iraq.
* TitleDrop:
** In the first episode, news report said that John is wanted as "Person of Interest" in many ongoing homicide investigations. Oddly, Finch and Reese do not call potential victims/perpetrators like that, using name or calling them "numbers".
** The title of the show doesn't refer to the people Reese and Finch are saving, but rather ''John Reese'' himself! Seeing as the CIA (and everyone else by now) are still after him.
* ToBeLawfulOrGood: Of the main cast, this dilemma is usually Carter's to bear as she walks the line between a Good Cop, or Vigilante like Reese
** Carter faces this in "Number Crunch." [[spoiler: She initially chose Lawful until she realized the CIA wanted to kill Reese, then picked Good and let Reese and Finch escape when she had them.]]
** She faces it again in "Identity Crisis", with the FBI asking for help in stopping Reese because they think he's a rogue assassin selling his services to the highest bidder (Which is a reasonable conclusion given what they know of his recent activities). Since she warns Reese that the FBI is looking for him during "Flesh and Blood", it appears she's choosing to remain Good.
** Carter faces it a third time in "In Extremis" when Fusco's skeletons are close to coming out and Internal Affairs thinks they found Stills' body (the dirty cop Reese killed in episode 1 with Fusco's gun and buried) and Fusco is the murderer. Carter is shocked to learn Fusco was really a dirty cop, despite all the good he had done with Reese. Because John was busy with the [=POI=] and Finch's leg made physical work impossible, this left Carter as the only one who could do something to help. In the end, [[spoiler:she chooses Good by moving the body of Stills to save Fusco's life and career.]]
* TomatoSurprise: Minor one in "Blue Code". During the flashback, Reese, Kara and Snow were in a small hotel room, talking. Snow has just returned from a shopping trip and complains that the only liquor he could find was "cheap Polish vodka." Reese goes to leave the room, and Snow tells him to be careful because "we're behind enemy lines here"--all of this implying that they are on a mission in some foreign country. Then Reese walks out of the hotel and we see the Empire State Building in the background.
** The reveal that [[spoiler:Root]] is working for the Office of Special Counsel in "Booked Solid".
* TooDumbToLive: Leon Tao has his number come up twice because he has a bad habit of getting involved with very dangerous criminals and costing them a lot of money.
--> '''Reese:''' Who would be dumb enough to get into a life threatening situation again?
** In "All In" he is on the list for a '''third time'''. However by this point he is GenreSavvy enough to expect Reese to save him.
* TranquilFury: Reese. All the time.
* TrollingCreator: It is a truth universally acknowledged that the POI writing team gets a sadistic pleasure out of TROLLING THE FANDOM.
* TheTroubleWithTickets: One POI once wrote a 78 page legal brief to get out of paying a ticket. On the other side of the tope, when Reese is caught parked illegally, he makes a token effort to just get off with a warning instead of being ticketed, and when it fails, Team Machine pays it out of petty cash.
* TruthInTelevision:
** When Reese was told that the CIA can't operate in America. Legally.
** Hammered home with [[spoiler: "L-O-S"]], who was [[spoiler: [[YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness "silenced"]]]] by Agent Snow after being caught on US soil.
** And done so even further now that the FBI is aware of the CIA's illegal operations and is trying to get the evidence they need to shut them down.
* UnconfessedUnemployment: One [=PoI=] hid the fact he'd been laid off due to budget cuts from his family. His desperate search for a job made him the perfect patsy for the assassination of the politician who made said cuts.
* UnresolvedSexualTension: Between John and Zoe Morgan, a political fixer and former POI.
** Ship teased in "Bury the Lede" when the POI, whom John dated as part of the plot, broke up with him because she saw the UST between him and Morgan.
** Teased even more in "The High Road" when they go undercover in the New York suburb Far Rockaway as husband and wife.
** And teased even further still when John invites Zoe to spend the night in the hotel penthouse suite with him at the end of "Booked Solid".
* UrbanLegend: Reese is this in-universe--the mysterious "man in a suit" who always shows up just in time.
* VaporWear: During a blink and you'll miss it moment during "Zero Day", Shaw's backless sleeveless turtleneck shows she isn't wearing a bra, though she's wearing two pistols instead.
* VictimOfTheWeek: More like victim-to-be of the week (Unless the [=POI=] is trying to ''create'' the victim of the week). So far, the only people to be examples of this trope who have been important to any episode other than the one where their number came up are [[spoiler:Elias, Carter, Zoe Morgan and Root]], and with one exception, all of these people were important ''before'' their number came up.
* VillainEpisode:
** "Flesh and Blood", more or less. Although main characters are still in focus, Elias got his turn for flashbacks.
** "Bad Code" is this for Root.
* VillainousBreakdown: Suffered by [[spoiler:Root]] at the end of "God Mode", after finding out what happened to the Machine.
* VillainousRescue: In "Prisoner's Dilemma" there are several instances.
** As [[spoiler:Reese is still in prison and set up to be attacked by the Aryan Nation he sent to jail in a previous episode. The first time, one of Elias' enforcers stops them from attacking Reese.]]
** Later, when FBI Special Agent Donnelly orders the guards to not intervene, [[spoiler:Reese knows he must not fight back to reveal his abilities, Elias just whistles and tells him they have done enough.]]
** Later still, [[spoiler:after John is released, Donnelly figures out Carter is Reese's mole and arrests them both. They've saved by Stanton, who murders Donnelly and sedates and kidnaps Reese.]]
* WallOfWeapons: John Reese's closet qualifies. And how!
* WeirdnessMagnet: What Carter thinks of Reese (and subsequently Finch) in "Baby Blue". In fact, she tells it to his face.
* WeHelpTheHelpless: Mr. Finch's offer to Reese at the start of the series: to help those who would suffer if they don't.
* WhamLine:
** In [[Recap/PersonOfInterestS01E07 "Witness"]]: [[spoiler:"You really think we'd go to this much trouble for a witness?"]] Cue scene change and major OhCrap moment for Reese [[spoiler: when he realizes he's been protecting Elias.]]
** "Super" - [[spoiler:Possible threat detected: Ingram, Nathan.]]
** In [[Recap/PersonOfInterestS01E13 "Root Cause"]]: [[spoiler: The hacker Root ends her conversation with Finch with "...Harold."]]
** In [[Recap/PersonOfInterestS01E23 "Firewall"]]: [[spoiler:"It's so nice to finally meet you, Harold. You can call me Root."]]
** And though it's not a spoken line, the moment in [[Recap/PersonOfInterestS01E23 "Firewall"]] when [[spoiler:the payphone rings]] definitely qualifies.
** "Trojan Horse", said by Greer: "I will find this individual and render him irrelevant."
** "Zero Day" - [[spoiler:"Can you hear me?"]]
* WhamEpisode:
** [[Recap/PersonOfInterestS01E07 "Witness"]] and [[Recap/PersonOfInterestS01E10 "Number Crunch"]] both qualify.
** [[Recap/PersonOfInterestS01E23 "Firewall"]]. [[spoiler:Finch is kidnapped by Root, Carter and Fusco know about each other, and [=HR=] is severely crippled. Oh, and the computer is self-aware. Finch was working for ''it''.]]
** [[Recap/PersonOfInterestS02E12 "Prisoner's Dilemma."]] [[spoiler:Donnelly ID's Reese as the "Man in the Suit", and Carter is found to be the mole. Moments later, Donnelly is killed by Reese's ex-CIA partner, who then kidnaps Reese.]]
** [[Recap/PersonOfInterestS02E13 "Dead Reckoning."]] [[spoiler:The person who sent the laptop to China that caused Reese and Stanton to go to Ordos is... Harold Finch.]]
** [[Recap/PersonOfInterestS02E20 "In Extremis."]] [[spoiler:The Machine was already fatally infected with Stanton's virus, and it has now reached critical mass, causing the Machine to shut down.]]
** [[Recap/PersonOfInterestS02E21 "Zero Day"]] is pretty much just an hour long WhamEpisode.
** [[Recap/PersonOfInterestS02E22 "God Mode"]] as well.
* WhatNowEnding: Carter's story ends on this note in the second season after she is framed by HR for killing an unarmed man and guns down a crooked cop and a Russain mobster to save Elias. Lampshaded when Elias asks her what happens now, and she admits she doesn't know.
* WhatTheHellHero:
** Finch's business partner reacted like this when he found out about the 'irrelevant' list and the fact that Finch was ignoring information about people whose lives were in danger solely to protect the secrecy of the machine, and because their cases were not relevant to national security.
** Carter to Reese after [[spoiler:Reese gives up Elias' father's location and her fellow cop is shot. She points out that it wouldn't have happened if Reese had called the police to rescue the baby.]]
** Reese gets another one,[[spoiler: or rather two at the same time from Carter and Fusco after their BigDamnHeroes moment in the season finale when they learned they both were working with him and neither knew it. They demand to know how they can expect to trust him if he doesn't trust them. Reese responded that [[NotSoDifferent Carter was hunting him for six months and Fusco had tried to kill him in the past, so Reese had some viable reasons to take things slow.]]]]
*** Finch also gets a minor one from [[spoiler: Carter, over the phone, right after she finds Fusco talking to him.]]
** Donnelly gets one from Carter after he places a possibly innocent prisoner (Reese) in a situation where he could be potentially killed in a prison riot just to see if he's trained in unarmed combat.
** Root gives Harold one in "Zero Day" after learning what he did to limit the evolution of the Machine's AI. She shows far more emotion over this than she has over any of the five people she's known to have murdered.
* WildMassGuessing:
** Reese makes an InUniverse WMG that [[spoiler:there is no machine and Finch is doing it all on his own.]] Of course as of Season 2 [[spoiler:he guessed the Machine did exist but also had actual intelligence and could be convinced to help him find Finch.]]
** Donnelly's explanations as to what The Man In The Suit is doing and who he's working for are starting to come across as this.
* WorthyOpponent: The hacker Root views Finch as one.
* WouldHurtAChild / WouldntHurtAChild: Elias manages to [[AmbiguousSituation play both]]; he locks Reese and the baby in a refrigerated truck to get Reese to spill the location of [[spoiler:Elias' father]] before the baby freezes to death. After Reese has given up the location, he lets them go and claims he wouldn't hurt a child but we don't find out what Elias would've decided if Reese had refused to break.
* WriterOnBoard:
** The series is still young, but already it seems to have no love for bankers and Wall Street types. [[AcceptableTargets Not that anyone's gonna to that in this day and age...]]
** Though one episode did feature an honest investment banker as the [=PoI=], [[spoiler: who is being targeted by a less scrupulous coworker because he noticed that there was something fishy about a certain stock his firm was investing heavily in]].
** The series also has a great deal of sympathy towards war veterans and their difficulties in adjusting back to civilian life, along with no sympathy towards those who would take advantage of them.
* [[TheXOfY X of Y]]: Person Of Interest.
* XanatosSpeedChess: "Prisoner's Dilemma." Donnelly is [[spoiler: trying to identify which prisoner is the "Man in the Suit"]] ''and'' [[spoiler: determine if Carter is the "mole" in his investigation.]] so he has Carter [[spoiler: aggressively interrogating Reese and the others]]. For her part, Carter is trying to [[spoiler: interrogate Reese aggressively enough that Donnelly doesn't suspect anything]] but without [[spoiler: eliciting an answer that blows Reese's cover]]. meanwhile, Finch is listening in and [[spoiler: creating supporting documentation for Reese's cover ''in real time'' so that if Donnelly runs a search to confirm what Reese is saying, he won't find any gaps]].
* {{Yandere}}:
** In "Bad Code", Root comes across as a bit Yandere for [[spoiler: the Machine itself.]]
** In the same episode, Root has (non-romantic) shades of it for [[spoiler:Harold himself. Specifically, her running sales pitch wherein she presents herself as [[NotSoDifferent a more suitable companion]] for Finch than Reese ever could be.]] Root confirms this in "Zero Day" when she gets more emotional about the way Harold has programmed the Machine than about all the people she's hurt on the way to her Great Communion with the Machine.
* YanksWithTanks: The US military has had an influence on members of the cast:
** Reese was a Green Beret, and had tendered his resignation to be with Jessica. 9/11 changed all that, and he deployed to Iraq.
** Carter was an Army Warrant Officer and interrogator in Iraq, and still holds her security clearances.
** A group of down on their luck army vets form a crew to rob banks.
** The [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_Support_Activity Intelligence Support Activity]] first appears attempting to assassinate an NSA analyst who's begun to learn about the Machine. Later, it's revealed that the ISA is responsible for both following up on the Relevant numbers, as well as covering up anyone who learns about the Machine.
* YouHaveFailedMe:
** Control has [[spoiler: the Special Counsel killed, as he's held responsible for the Machine hiding itself away and going autonomous]].
* YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness:
** The gang of robbers in "Mission Creep".
** Root's "customer" Matheson, at the end of "Root Cause".
** At the climax of "Wolf and Cub," Andre is willing to [[UnusualEuphemism write off]] one of his {{Mooks}} in order to avoid being shot by a vengeful Darren.
** [[spoiler: "Drug Lord" L-O-S, secretly a CIA agent using the drug trade to fund the War on Terror, after being caught operating on US soil.]]
** The corrupt SEC investigator in "Risk".
** Invoked several times in "Matsya Nyaya." In flashbacks, Reese and Stanton appear to get a long-distance, high-explosive version of this. Reese survives. Stanton [[spoiler:does too]]. Three more people run into this trope in two separate incidents in the main storyline of the episode. The POI [[spoiler: was on both sides of this trope at different times.]]
** The forger who supplied Root with her fake ID for "Firewall."
** No matter who you are, or what you do, if Control and the ISA finds out you know about The Machine....
** Two in "C.O.D.". First, [[spoiler:Elias considers HR this and sends a message to this remaining three members.]] Second when [[spoiler:Fusco tells Simmons this, Simmons sends out info to take down Fusco.]]
** "Relevance". [[spoiler:Shaw and her fellow agent, Cole. Also, a man named Aquino who apparently discovered the existence of The Machine.]]
** In "God Mode", after interrogating a terrorist who planned to suicide bomb the Statue of Liberty, Hersh [[spoiler: shoots the interpreter, because he plans to use the terrorist to kill Nathan Ingram.]]
* YourCheatingHeart:
** Carter gets the girlfriend of a gang leader she's trying to arrest for murder to recant the alibi she provided for him by proving that the man was cheating on her in "Get Carter".
** One number that we only see the resolution of was a businessman whose wife had put a hit on him for being unfaithful.
** The primary plot of "Baby Blue" centered around the six-month old product of an extramarital affair whose [[spoiler:father's wife is trying to get rid of in order to conceal her husband's infidelity (She had already bumped off the kid's mother)]].
** Elias was the byproduct of a mafia boss's infidelity, his plan to take control of organized crime in New York started from a desire to get revenge on his father for covering up the affair by having his mother killed.
** This trope has been invoked at least two more times than has been mentioned so far, and it seems like the list of examples is only going to get longer.
* YourPrincessIsInAnotherCastle: From "God Mode": [[spoiler:The race to discover the Machine's location ends with the reveal that it has been moved from its original location in [[MacGuffinLocation Washington]], and no one knows where it is now]].
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