Recap / Person Of Interest S 04 E 18

Season 4, Episode 18

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If she dies, it's my fault. And I will not be responsible for one more friend's death.

—Finch

Reese's latest Number is Frankie Wells (Katheryn Winnick), a bounty hunter from Florida. The fugitive Frankie is chasing leads them into encounters with a ruthless mobster and grifter Harper Rose.

Meanwhile, Beth Bridges arrives in New York to meet with her "angel investor" (a Samaritan agent) and catch up with "Professor Whistler." Finch plans to take the opportunity to activate the Trojan Horse software he planted on Beth's laptop in "Pretenders" and steal some of Samaritan's source code. He asks Root to help him, but she has a different agenda.

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• Action Girl: Frankie Wells is so good in hand to hand combat that she can go unarmed up against Mooks with guns and win.
• Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: occurs when Iris lists the reasons why she has to fire Reese as a patient
  I have feelings for you, John....Which is inappropriate, wrong, completely unethical. I can't have a relationship with even an ex-patient. It's so wrong, it's like a cop dating a fireman, it's that bad.
• Batman Gambit: Following up from "Pretenders," apparently Harold knew Samaritan would want Bridges' heuristic algorithms, so Harold installed an AI as a Trojan Horse on Beth's laptop, laying dormant until he could activate it, in the hopes of crippling Samaritan.
• Bounty Hunter: Frankie Wells's occupation.
• Casual Kink: Becomes an Obligatory Joke after the Chained Heat scene.
  Frankie: So John, you going to lock me up?
  Reese: Maybe next time.
  Frankie: Because I've got handcuffs...
• Chained Heat: Handcuffing Reese and Frankie to each other does little to diminish their ability to beat the crap out of Worthy's henchmen.
• Continuity Nod:
  • Harold and Root reminisce back to their first "field trip" together.
  • Harold must really enjoy using malware to cripple artificial intelligences.
  • Once again Team Machine is faced with the necessity of killing an Unwitting Pawn of Decima/Samaritan. And once again, they end up don't doing it.
  • Harper is working for Ernest Thornhill.
  • Finch still blames himself for Nathan's death (see quote above).
• Death Seeker: Harold comes off as this. He is perfectly okay with Samaritan killing him, and was willing to take the neurotoxin Root was trying to use on Bridges, refusing to go to the hospital until Root agrees to stop trying to kill her.
• Exact Words: Reese has the NYPD arrest the villain later. "I told him he could leave the building, not the state."
• Florence Nightingale Effect: Iris and Reese. Iris fires Reese as a patient because of it but still ends up snogging him.
• Hairpin Lockpick: Frankie uses a paper clip to unlock the handcuffs securing Reese to a refrigerator but she does not have time to open the one tying her to him, before a couple of goons attack them. However, she does while he is distracted.
• He Knows Too Much: Ray killed Frankie's brother. Not because he figured out that Ray had stolen money from Worthy, just because he knew money had been stolen.
• Hypocrite: Worthy laments the lack of integrity in having $100,000 stolen from him, then says that if Frankie doesn't help him find Pratt, he'll kill her and Reese.
• In-Series Nickname: Frankie calls John "Johnny".
• It's Personal: Ray killed Frankie's brother.
• Kiss of Distraction: Frankie plants one on John to throw him off long enough to cuff him to a door.
• Mexican Standoff: A three-way one develops with Reese and Frankie on one side, Worthy and his goons on another and Ray in the third. Harper negotiates an arrangement that lets all parties leave alive.
• Murder Is the Best Solution: Root is set on her solution of killing Bridges.
  • Note that, Root's moral ambiguities aside, this actually makes perfect sense coming from her. The last time the team had the option to kill a threat and didn't take it (McCourt in "Death Benefit"), it led to a series of events that concluded in Shaw's (apparent) death. She probably no longer believes that letting anyone live can guarantee that the people she cares the most about will stay safe, and she can't handle losing anyone else.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Root ignores the Machine when it tells her not to kill Bridges.
• Percussive Pickpocket: Frankie is such a good pickpocket that she can lift Reese’s badge while in the middle of a fistfight with him.
• Post-Kiss Catatonia: It takes Reese a while to get his brain into gear and start kissing Iris back.
• Red Herring: Beth's ex-husband.
• Refuge in Audacity: Root calls Harold's Batman Gambit this.
• "Shut Up" Kiss: Iris kisses John to stop her own babbling.
• Take a Third Option: Instead of allowing Samaritan to find Harold or letting Harold commit suicide, Root frames Harold for trying to discredit Bridges' earlier work, destroying their relationship.
• The Bus Came Back: Elizabeth Bridges and Harper.
• Sadistic Choice: Who should die: Bridges or Finch?
• Shout-Out
  Finch: My breakfast companion. Her number came up at the moment I sat down with her.
  Root: You triggered it somehow. Ruh-roh.
• The Sociopath: Ray. Lampshaded by Frankie in her Pre-Mortem One-Liner:
  A sociopath can't be sorry. So I guess I'm going to have to be sorry for both of us.
• Unresolved Sexual Tension: Iris has to stop her therapy sessions with John because of this.
• Wham Line: Two.
  • "She told me not to."
  • "I must have made ten grand off of Thornhill, easy."
• You Called Me "X"; It Must Be Serious: When Harold calls her Root, you know it's bad.
• You Can't Thwart Stage One: The Trojan Horse might still be out there, but with the activator (apparently) destroyed, its Suicide Mission nature, and Bridges' relationship with Harold in ruins, it won't be used any time soon.