Person Of Interest

Would that qualify as Covers Always Lie? Maybe it would be more accurate it call it Advertisements Always Lie.

Carter sure was in top form in this episode. She basically kidnapped 3 Mafia dons for their protection. She was sure handling that shotgun-like weapon like a pro! That's probably a Chekhov's Skill, considering how one episode showed her as working in the Army once, and she probably had to handle two-handed weapons in that time.

It seems that Carter found out quite a bit about Fusco, but at least she didn't do anything rash because of that!

I sure liked how Finch did a Deal with the Devil with the HR captain to not work with Elias, and it worked without biting Finch in the butt! Why? Because Finch reveals that Elias's men have been keeping tabs on HR's family and loved ones, and some of those watching goons are murderers, rapists and child molesters. So HR decided to withdraw from helping Elias because of a combination of Even Evil Has Loved Ones and Even Evil Has Standards! Nice.

That was a bit of a twist when it turned out that one of the Mafia dons was The Mole and working for Elias. It's a good thing Carter and Fusco handled that little problem without too much difficulty!

It was a great episode. AND I'm glad that Reese and Carter are back on speaking terms now. I don't believe for a second, however, that Elias is out for the count. I think he could get out at any time he wanted, with all the men he has on the inside. I don't think he planned on getting arrested, but I don't think it's anything too detrimental to his cause.

Agreed. This is one of those times where Why Don't Ya Just Shoot Him? applies to hero/protagonist characters (specifically Carter, in this particular episode's case). Seemed like a huge Idiot Ball for her not to just blow his face off.

Even though it will probably come back to bite her in the ass, I'm glad she didn't decide to just kill Elias, because it would've completely contradicted her character. I admire Carter because she's a straight cop, and she's determined to stay a straight cop.

x4 No, it worked because Finch is just that frakking awesome!

I would be very interested in finding out what happened between John Reese and Cara Stanton, his CIA partner. Mark Snow claims that Reese killed Stanton. So far, all we have is Snow's word, and no flashback, so maybe he's lying. While he makes an interesting point about Reese being paranoid and trying to trust someone, it seems to me that Reese is Properly Paranoid, considering the life he lives. If Reese did kill Stanton, I'm willing to betcha that there's an interesting story about what led up to that.

I bet what happened was that Stanton wanted Reese all to herself, but Reese was too hung up on his ex-girlfriend Jessica. So Stanton murdered Jessica in a Murder the Hypotenuse move and tried to Make It Look Like an Accident. So she thought, "There! Problem solved! Now he'll focus on more important things like his duty to his country...and me!" But Reese finds out what happened, confronts her, and kills her in an Unstoppable Rage. It'll be interesting to see if I'm on the mark or off the mark!

That's not it. Reese and Stanton are ice cubes. There is no way they would get passionate enough for something impulsive like that.

We haven't seen much of Stanton so I don't find it completely imposable for her to have had a hidden Yandere streak. However, I find it relatively unlikely that Reese would flip out and kill her. I think it far more likely that she was a traitor who he had to kill, or that she perhaps even faked her death and framed him for it.

I'm thinking Snow killed her and framed Reese for it.

You know, we haven't seen that much of Mark Snow, either. We don't really know all that much about him. Maybe he is a Well-Intentioned Extremist, or maybe he's just pretending to be one. He did have that one Drug Lord CIA agent killed off, but it's hard to tell if he did it from Even Evil Has Standards, You Have Failed Me, You Have Outlived Your Usefulness, or a combination of the three. Still, the fact that the FBI apparently thinks that the CIA is running illegal operations on American soil makes Snow definitely look like a bad guy.

I got the impression of mostly the second mixed with a bit of the third. He was upset about a cop getting killed but it seemed more due to being afraid of drawing attention.

Well, I caught the new episode last night and it just blew me away!

Why? For starters, the Flashback sequence taking place 2 years before the present time (2012) reveals quite a bit. Jessica called Reese about...something. She didn't say what, but it had to be a matter of utmost importance. Maybe she found out something about her husband Peter that was not to her liking. There were some Meaningful Echoes going in that conversation. Unfortunately, Reese was unable to get right on that matter.

The next parts of the flashback are bona-fide spoilers: Reese and his CIA partner, Cara Stanton, are given a high-priority mission to go to China and retrieve a laptop containing powerful software. Mark Snow takes Reese aside and shows "evidence" that Stanton has been "compromised", and that Reese has to "retire" her. Snow gives Reese False Reassurance that if he does that, he can take all the leave he wants. Reese and Stanton go there, get the laptop and exchange words. So Stanton lays out beacons so they can be found and picked up. Reese pulls out a gun and prepares to shoot her...but he doesn't. He tries to tell her something, only for her to turn around and shoot him. She states that she has evidence that he's been "compromised". He laughs, and explains that he was told the exact same thing about her! He runs off, but not before telling her that he figured out this much: they weren't supposed to come back with the laptop, they were supposed to die with it, and she helped them find it! Missles are fired and the complex gets destroyed, but Reese got away.

In the present day, Finch and Reese are checking out some people who guard important items to be securely delivered via a van. Reese gets to be one of the guards, so that he can prevent a robbery on the van. Sure enough a robbery occurs. Reese gets shot from behind by one of the guards named Tommy, who is secretly working for the robbers. Reese and Finch dig around and discover that Tommy has been cheating on his wife with a girl named Ashley, and that the guy has serious Chronic Backstabbing Disorder. After all, he murdered one of his fellow guards in cold blood, and murdered the two robbers he was working with. But he found out the hard way that Ashley has CBD as well, because she shot him in what had to be You Have Outlived Your Usefulness.

Another plotline going on is Fusco and the Corrupt Cops HR. Apparently Elias being taken down caused HR to lose most of its funding, and now they're pretty much trying to rob people on the streets. That ugly HR captain wants Fusco to get a nice amount of money. The HR captain and Fusco get to where Reese, Tommy, and Ashley are. The captain shoots Ashley, and the captain decides to kill Reese while he's helpless, because he's still bitter about Reese dangling him off a building. Fusco shoots the captain, and decides to make it look like Ashley and the captain shot each other. Unless HR gets new members and funding, I'd say that HR has been crippled beyond repair!

Meanwhile, it looks like the CIA and the FBI are competing over...something. I wonder what the outcome of this is going to be. But there's just one more spoiler I've got to tell here... Cara Stanton is still alive! She shot the CIA black dude agent Evans, but don't worry, a white dude died first for once! It looks like Stanton and Snow are going to have a conversation.

So, tell me, has your mind been blown like mine has?

You should write episode summary pages. You're good at it.

And yes, I agree that this is the best epsiode yet. I applaud the writers for their skill.

Well, thank you for the compliment!

I also saw the preview of the next episode. They made it sound as if Reese is going to go rogue. That makes me raise my eyebrows. Why? Well, as one person around here artfully put it, Reese is an ice cube. He's not the type to just impulsively do something. I just hope he has a very good reason to do something as crazy-sounding as that!

Judging by the description, he may be investigating something about Finch. He's already been suspicious and Finch clearly has been hiding something from everyone.

If that's the case, then Finch might be in big trouble. Still, there was that scene with Carter trying to point out to Reese that he can't just execute someone and he just blows her off. It's got to be something deadly serious if Reese is willing to take such a step!

Keep in mind that previews always lie.

edited 29th Apr '12 7:34:21 AM by tricksterson

Well, okay, that's true! That one preview involving Carter and the Mafia dons made it sound like Elias kidnapping her son was the driving force for that episode. It wasn't. I have to say that Covers Always Lie can be a little irritating at times.

So, a question for everyone: do you think we can all agree that Cara is Root? I think it might be a little bit obvious, but you never know.

edited 1st May '12 4:21:38 PM by zombielovescore

It's possible. I mean, they both have dark hair. But the question is this: is Stanton an expert hacker, on par with Finch? That's what Root is, and Stanton has only been shown as an expert interrogator...so far.

I don't think it's Stanton.

I was actually thinking about that too. I mean, she's CIA, so possibly hacking was one of her specialties, but we never see any indication of that. Honestly, I'm not entirely sure if I think she's Root either. I know a lot of other people have come to that conclusion, and it would make sense why they hid Root's face from us, other than to keep her mysterious; because we would have already known what she looks like. I actually watched Root Cause after this episode to see if there was any indication, but there isn't really.

I guess we'll find out later. but I don't think it would surprise me if Stanton did have those hacker capabilities, but it might come off as a bit of an Ass Pull

Boy, last night's episode totally had me on the edge of my seat!

It started off quiet at first, with Reese being given a birthday present from Finch and being told to take time off. Apparently, in his off-time, he plays a game with an old Chinese man (the guy did say "Happy Birthday!" in Chinese). I can't tell if the game is Chinese chess, Go, or mahjong.

However, Reese smells a rat, and finds out that Finch was trying to track a woman named Sarah, who has been on the run for some time. Finch tried to leave Reese out of it because Reese has a Berserk Button...he doesn't like husbands who abuse their wives. Sarah has a husband who is a U.S. Marshal, and the guy has her on trumped-up charges and has his entire agency chasing after her just to get her back in his clutches! Reese sure had me worried there with the way he sounded like he intended to handle it (i.e. murder the guy).

Meanwhile, Carter is helping the FBI with their investigation into Reese. On her part, she's trying to get evidence and she has to decide what to do with it. She finds out quite a bit about Reese and Jessica.

Oh, yeah, about Jessica, you know how they said she died in a car accident? She didn't. Her husband Peter was a Domestic Abuser, a Jerkass, a Bastard In Sheeps Clothing, and he owed money to a number of Loan Sharks. He killed her in a fit of abusive rage, and then tried to cover it up by making it look like a car accident. The Coroner Doth Protest Too Much, methinks!

The ending was pretty surprising, in a way. Reese didn't kill the U.S. Marshal and Peter. He put them in a Mexican prison, and in the case of the US Marshal, he's in there on cocaine charges. Peter might have been subjected to a No-Holds-Barred Beatdown before he ended up in there. They're not dead, but it's a Fate Worse than Death for them. Carter decides to shred the evidence she found, and keep the picture of Reese and Jessica on her person. Reese's birthday present was a key, but Finch forgot to add an address card. The gift Reese got is actually a spacious apartment, and it's in plain view of the court where he plays with the Chinese guy. Oh, and the guy in the wheelchair Reese bumped into last year was Finch. Finch had been watching him for over a year.

That episode totally had twists and turns! Did you see the preview for the next episode? Apparently, the existence of The Machine will be revealed to the public, and that will almost certainly create Paranoia Fuel, public hysteria, among other things. This time, I'm really hoping Covers Always Lie is in effect here!

I'm pretty sure that they were playing weiqi, the Chines version of go (It was actually invented in China, not Japan). As soon as he bumped into the guy in the wheelchair I figured it was Finch

Watch "Cura Te Ipsum" after "Many Happy Returns". It makes a lot of sense.