Every great season of TV has at least ONE. One episode that just doesn’t quite live up to the rest. Season 3 of Game of Thrones has been fantastic, possibly even uniformly the best, given how much the people behind the scenes have to juggle. So it’s a bit ironic, I think, that the most uneven episode of the season was written by George R.R. Martin himself.
Continue reading “Vicarious Viewing- Game of Thrones: “The Bear and the Maiden Fair” Review”
Season two of Person of Interest ends with an action packed and revelatory episode that felt about half as long as it was and left the future of the show in a somewhat nebulous state. Not all was perfect, of course, as the breakneck pace of the episode left some plots feeling undeveloped.
The episode earns its title. In fact, while watching the scene where Reese and Shaw come across a hidden safe and are given the combination by the machine, I thought to myself, ‘it’s like they’re using God Mode’. Imagine my satisfaction when I went online afterwards to research the title and found out that it was indeed ‘God Mode’.
IDDQD 4 EVAH!
Okay, nerdgasm over. Back on track. My favorite points from the episode had to be Reese and Shaw’s continued partnership as they tracked Finch and Root, getting into all kinds of fun side-adventures along the way. One highlights was the opening sequence where the machine gives Reese and Shaw the directions of approaching attackers, allowing them to get the drop on them.
Her reply: ‘To make you feel less inadequate while I drive this thing.’
Some of if was a bit silly, like Reese’s little drive by on a jilted man holding up his ex-girlfriend’s wedding party (while still in the bright yellow Ferrari, no less), but it was all fun.
My other favorite plot dealt with Finch in a flashback to 2010, where we learn how he came to be estranged from his fiance and how he injured his back. This 2010 arc also gave us a bit of background into the Northern Lights assassin tracking Root and Finch.
The Root and Finch story was strong as well, and had them infiltrating what is believed to be a nuclear facility, but is actually where the Machine used to be physically located. I say used to be because it moved itself.
How did it do that? Apparently by placing an order to do so and then posing as the director of the government agency that controls the Machine to prevent any red flags from going up. Not even Finch knows where the actual physical component of the Machine is anymore, and apparently no one is controlling it. It’s making its own choices about who to send numbers to, and the episode ends with it finally calling Reese and Finch with another number. One caveat, however…it also calls Root, who appears to end the episode in what I’m guessing is a psychiatric hospital.
The one weak link in all of this is Carter’s story, and I attribute that mainly to the fact that there was so much else going on that needed to be covered. It’s not bad, it’s just rushed. As the last couple of episodes have dealt more with the meta-narrative on the history and nature of the machine and those who seek to control it (another criticism I’ll get to in a minute), the story of our intrepid LAPD detectives and the HR conspiracy have taken a back seat. Hell, Fusco, who was such a central figure in ‘In Extremis’, has been missing completely the past two weeks for no other reason than the writers couldn’t find anything for him to do (which, I suppose, is better than them trying to shoe horn him in).
Carter does make a pretty interesting decision, however. When she learns that’s she’s being set up by the detective she thought she could trust last week, and that he’s planning to do away with Elias, one of the show’s recurring baddies, she takes a page from Reese’s book, disguises herself, and interferes in an unofficial capacity. The story ends with Carter and Elias in a car together, their futures unsure for now. It’s a bit abrupt, but should be an interesting thread to pick up next year.
Person of Interest hit its stride this year, building up the mythology while also giving us intriguing number of the week cases that informed each other in interesting ways. The mythology is a bit confusing, however, and so many names are thrown around, (Research, Northern Lights, HR, Decima) that it can be a bit hard to keep track of everything. I was also a bit disappointed that the Julian Sands character introduced earlier in the season didn’t make a comeback at some point, but I’m sure he’ll pop up someplace down the line.
The season also gave us plenty of cameos from Zoe Morgan, and who could forget Bear? If you’d have told me last year that Person of Interest would have an animal side kick, I would have rolled my eyes. Instead they waited a year and gave us one in such a spontaneous and entertaining manner that it was easy to accept. Luckily, the show never became about an ex-CIA spy and his K-9 sidekick that only responds to Dutch commands. Bear was just another recurring character on a show full awesome recurring characters.
The best addition of the season though had to be Shaw. Not only did she show us the government side of the machine, she also gave us one of the best episodes of the show thus far. I’ll have to retroactively review it, once the season releases on Blu-Ray.
But I don’t have new picture, or a new video (at least not one that I’m willing to show just yet without some major overhauls). I do have a story, but it needs some polishing, and I want to do a few illustrations for it, so maybe next week, or the week after.
I’m currently beleaguered by a 3D modeling assignment and 3DS Max is being a pain in the posterior. It has little to do with technical limitations or bugs, however. I’m just having a hard time molding the little dots and lines into something worth showing people.
So, having nothing to show for the moment, I dug out this cheesy looking mock movie poster I did for a class I took on film production. It was a pretty interesting class that took us through the steps of conceptualizing a movie, writing a treatment, working out a budget, and pitching it to a studio. Here:
That’s so 1990’s direct to video, right? Yeah? Damn, I was fishing for compliments by being self deprecating. That backfired, didn’t it? Now I’m being all meta and shit.
Anyway, I decided to do mine as an adaptation of a video game I like called, “The Longest Journey.” It’s one of those properties that’s half a movie anyway, and seems like a no-brainer to translate to the screen. And while the game itself isn’t really aimed at the YA crowd, you could easily market it that way, which is pretty much a license to print money. Unless you’re Lemony Snickett. Or Spiderwick. Or that one movie that had Al Swearengen in it as a kind of Obi Wan, mentor type figure. Or…damn. It seems I’ve underestimated the YA crowd.
Of course, taking that route would likely alienate fans of the game. All twenty of us. Just kidding. I’m sure we’re in the hundreds or something.
Pixie Sinclaire…where to begin? Most of her childhood was spent traveling the NorEastern countryside with her father, digging around in old caves and tombs. At the age of fourteen, her father was arrested and deported for grave robbing–ahem, sorry. “Unlicensed Archaeology”–leaving Pixie to fend for herself.
She was recruited into the North Eastern Subterfuge Society, where she served the Empire during the war with Crowndon as an agent provocateur, smuggling plans in and out of enemy territory and sabotaging Crowndon equipment.
It was during this time that she ran afoul of Sir Rigel Rinkenbach and, despite her better judgment, began a long and sordid relationship with him that ended due to a disagreement on whether or not Rigel should build weapons of mass destruction to end the war.
Hey, people have broken up over smaller things, right?
After the war, Pixie went to work for herself, setting up shop on Libertine’s Roost in Demon’s Eye bay, home of pirates, mercenaries, and alchemists without conscience.
This week’s episode takes a breath from the fallout of the last two weeks, and begins to build up to the paradigm changing events to come.
The episode begins with a quiet scene between Sam, Gilly, and Gilly’s newborn son. If it wasn’t already apparent, the fact that Sam is in way over his head was illustrated even more as he tried to build a campfire and Gilly had to tell him how to do it properly. The scene ends with Sam singing the newborn a lullaby about traditional gender roles. It’s obvious that in Sam’s mind, it’s his responsibility to protect Gilly and her baby, and it’s hard to fault him for that given the time period and his highborn upbringing. He’s lived his entire life with the stigma of being a coward, so for him, guiding Gilly south through the forests to the Wall is an act of bravery.
After checking in on Sam and Gilly, we catch up with another group, this one heading North toward the Wall. Meera Reed and Osha are skinning rabbits, and having an argument over who is better at it while Bran tries to foster a truce between the two. Once again we have a statement on gender roles in Westoros. This group is made up of four males: Bran, who is a cripple, Rickon, who is around five or six years old, Hodor, who is simple minded, and Jojen, who is sickly and prone to seizures. The two most capable people in this group are Meera and Osha.
Once Bran negotiates a cease fire and gets the two women to stand down, Jojen has a seizure as he dreams. When he awakens, he tells the group that he has seen Jon Snow, “on the wrong side of the wall and surrounded by enemies.”
This offers the perfect segue way into Jon’s story, where he, along with Ygritte and a number of Mance Rayder’s Wildlings, are preparing to climb the wall. Jon and Ygritte discuss last week’s dalliance, with Ygritte teasing Jon about “that thing (he did) with (his) tongue.” The conversation takes a darker turn, and their relationship deepens in a much more mature way, when Ygritte reveals that she knows Jon is still loyal to the Night’s watch. And she doesn’t care. They’re both pawns to their respective masters, soldiers in someone else’s war that can easily be replaced.
We return to this story midway through, in what could be considered the action set piece of the episode. As they are climbing the Wall, a section of its surface cracks and most of the wildlings are killed. Ygritte and Jon find themselves in a precarious position, dangling freely by their safety lines. One of the wildlings, who has no trust in Jon, tries to use the opportunity to get rid of him, and Ygritte. Jon recognizes what’s about to happen and struggles to find a foothold. It’s a very well conceptualized and executed scene that provides a thrill while further driving Jon and Ygritte together. I wouldn’t be surprised if this scene, coupled with Ygritte’s reveal that she knows about Jon, isn’t leading to a major departure from the novel. Part of me hopes it does.
In another major departure, Melissandre, who we last saw leaving Dragonstone to find the “blood of the king”, arrives in the Brotherhood’s camp. Here, the Brotherhood sells Gendry (who is Robert Baratheon’s bastard son and true heir to the throne) to Melissandre for two bags of gold. It’s gut wrenching to watch, after Gendry gave his reasons for staying with them last week. Arya stands up to her, and in my favorite moment from the episode, tells her that she see darkness in Arya, and in that darkness, eyes staring back: eyes that Arya will shut for good. Given Arya’s story so far has involved lots of revenge seeking and shape shifting assassins, I can’t wait to see what Melissandre means.
A large part of this episode deals with negotiations, and people making decisions for other people. At Harrenhal, Roose Bolton reveals that he will allow Jaime to return to King’s Landing, given that Tywin Lannister understands that he had nothing to do with Jaime’s maiming. What’s so disheartening about this is that Roose is supposed to return Jaime to Robb, meaning another blow to Robb’s cause that he unfortunately doesn’t know about yet.
Speaking of Robb, the King in the North meets with Walder Frey’s men to try and make up for the wrong of breaking his deal to marry one of Frey’s daughters. The price Frey demands is that Robb’s uncle, Edmure, marry one of his daughters. It’s difficult to sympathize with Robb here, as he expects his uncle to pay for his transgression. It also serves once again to remind us that the Game of Thrones has little to do with winning on the battlefield.
Which leads us to Tywin, who is busy securing Lannister dominance throughout the seven kingdoms with a pen…or a broken pen, as the case may be. Lady Olenna has been a bona fide verbal bad-ass since she was introduced, steamrolling her way through Westerosi politics with cunning wit and common sense. She meets her match this week, however, in Tywin Lannister, who threatens to end the Tyrell line by assigning Ser Loras to Joffrey’s Kingsguard, thus ensuring he will never marry and never sire an heir. Olenna, knowing she’s beat, retreats, and the fates of Sansa, Loras, Tyrion, and Sansa are sealed.
The final sequence of the episode begins with Petyr Baelish studying the Iron Throne. It’s a creepy image, and you can just see the wheels turning in Littlefinger’s head, plotting his path to be seated on the ugly thing. As he stares at it, Varys enters and recites the legend of its forging. Littlefinger tells him that the legend is a lie they have told themselves for so long they forget it’s just a story. He then informs Varys that he knows about Ros’ role in keeping Sansa Stark out of his hands. Varys claims to be acting in the best interest of the realm, to keep it from descending into chaos, which he likens to a dark pit.
“Chaos isn’t a pit,” Littlefinger says. “But a ladder.” It’s a sentiment that sums up the series succinctly, as most of the chaos in Westeros has been caused by the machinations of people making grabs for more power.
The speech that follows overlays a sequence that reveals the ultimate fate of Ros and ends with Ygritte and Jon reaching the top of the Wall. It’s an effective juxtaposition of images, the ugliness of Ros’ death and the beauty of the sunrise over the wall that culminates in an old school Hollywood make out session.
Unfortunately, the lyrical nature of these last few moments, as well done as they are, seem out of place in the grand scheme of things. That sunset steps just a little bit past that line of cheese I warned about in my review for “Kissed by Fire”. But then again, if I had just nearly died and found myself standing on the edge of a 700 foot drop next to a smoking hot red-head at sunrise, I’d probably engage in an old school Hollywood make out session, too.
This week’s episode of Person of Interest, “Zero Day”, begins pretty much where last week left off, with the virus propagating throughout the Machine’s systems and blocking Finch and Co.’s ability to receive numbers. What’s more, it appears that the virus is on some sort of a count down, and they only have a few more hours to figure out what’s going on.
I like where this situation puts Reese. Even without a number, he doesn’t give up on trying to help people. We meet up with him sitting in his car, listening to a police scanner on the off chance that he’ll overhear something he can act on. It’s a far cry from the character we first met, a broken man living on the streets of New York who felt completely powerless to change anything.
A number does eventually get through to Finch, for a high profile CEO named Ernest Thornhill. Except Thornhill is one elusive, and strange, cat. He has an office full of people who have never seen him who spend all day inputting what looks like garbage code off of dot matrix printouts into computers, and he’s been going around buying up every pay phone in the city.
It’s also apparent someone wants Mr. Thornhill dead, as they hijack a friggin’ drone and try to blow up his car. Luckily, Reese is on scene to help pull the driver out of the burning car and…no one else. Thornhill wasn’t there.
I wrote last week about the show’s ability to take a simple premise and deal with it in inventive ways, and this week gave us another great take on it. It turns out that Mr. Thornhill is…wait for it…THE MACHINE ITSELF. Apparently, it has the ability to perceive a threat and take measures to defend itself.
The show has dabbled with the idea of the Machine as potentially self aware before, and with the re-introduction of the delightfully amoral hacker Root, that concept gets taken up a gear here. Especially when Finch explains to Root what the machine was having it’s employees do with all those print outs. It isn’t garbage code, he explains, but the machine’s memories.
While building the system, Finch quickly realized that it was learning stuff irrelevant to its purpose, that it was developing an identity. In order to prevent that from happening, Finch built in a setting that deletes this “junk” data every night, effectively killing this identity. But the machine adapted, creating a ghost and starting a company and hiring employees to type its memories back into the system in a futile attempt to preserve itself. It’s a gripping, emotional scene, and one that presents a brand of science fiction that one doesn’t normally expect to see on television.
While Root is blackmailing Finch to help her in her undying crusade to “Free the Machine”, Reese teams up with Shaw. This is the crowd pleasing element of this week’s episode, as Shaw helps Reese escape from police custody by posing as his lawyer and smuggling in a couple of guns duct taped to her back. Shaw has been a ridiculously fun element on this show since her introduction, and her rivalry with Root is an interesting one. I’m hoping that next season has her becoming a more permanent fixture on the show.
It is revealed that the countdown is another of Finch’s fail safes, designed to reboot the system in the event of a threat. When the reboot is complete, the Machine will dial a payphone. Whoever answers that payphone will be granted unfettered control over the machine for twenty four hours.
Meanwhile, Carter continues to investigate the murder of fellow cop/ failed love interest Detective Beecher. She’s still dealing with the cognitive fall out from last week’s episode involving Fusco, but she has begun to worry about Finch and Reese’s inactivity of late. This hasn’t stopped her from making waves on Beecher, however. Another detective asks her about it, and offers his help.
Of course, the guy is dirty, and on a routine call it almost looks as though he’s going to put one in Carter’s back. Before he can, an armed perp busts out of the house and Carter has to shoot him. Unfortunately, once her superiors are on scene, the gun has been removed, setting Carter up for an internal affairs investigation.
This developement is a bit odd. Why was Carter’s fellow detective about to shoot her, if they were going to frame her, instead? I think the machine tried to intervene in this case, as it recognized the threat to Carter as she left the precinct, but given the virus in its system, and Finch being busy with Root, was unable to act effectively. It DID save Carter’s life, but now she’s in serious trouble.
Everything comes to a head as Finch leads Root to the payphone the Machine will call. Finch pulls some kind of trickery that hasn’t been explained yet, and somehow sends the call to Reese. Here’s the thing: Root also answers, and seems quite pleased with the result. I’m not sure what Finch did, but he didn’t seem worried about Root’s pleasure at having finally spoken to the machine.
The call Reese receives is delivered by a composite of different men saying “Can you hear me?”, ending the episode. From next week’s preview, it sounds as though Root receives the same message, only spoken in a female voice. Is this a result of whatever Finch did? Has the machine split into two personalities? Is CBS’ marketing department trolling us? Who knows, but I can’t wait for next week’s season finale to find out!
This is an animatic for a project I hope to produce over the next six months for my senior project. It will incorporate digitally created visual effects with live action footage. Hopefully it turns out like I see it in my head (always the tricky part, that), and I can use it for a Kickstarter or a pitch video to get the web-series I want to produce a chance in hell of existing.
This is very much a work in progress, so suggestions are welcome.
Sir Rigel Rinkenbach is the most brilliant mind in the Imperial Triumvirate, and he knows it. He is also completely devoid of morals and has no time to waste on ethics. The only thing he cares about, if he can be said to care about anything, is the rapid advancement of civilization.
It was this attitude that got him ex-communicated from the Academic Alliance of Alchemists and Alliterators, and led to his estrangement from the equally brilliant Pixie Sinclaire, the only other person on the planet Rigel might consider having the potential to be his equal…someday. Perhaps. Maybe.
Captain la Pierre holds a grudging respect for Rinkenbach, but doesn’t necessarily trust him, and he certainly doesn’t like him…he’s a NorEasterman, after all. But he’s capable, and when you’re on the run for your life, that’s nearly the only thing that counts. He also knows the formula for Blackwood, the substance that makes the world go round.
Rinkenbach has a taste for the finer things in life; gramophones, tea, and chess. He prefers a duelist’s stance when fighting, and uses a rapier. He possess the ability to think around problems, rather than through them (like Klaudhopper), but he realizes the importance of a blunt approach. A cunning strategist, la Pierre often laments not having Rinkenbach on his side during the war.
“I like your brand o’ thinkin, Rink. If not for the loopy machinations of cunning, lunatic minds such as your own, we’d have never gotten off the ground!”
-Roderick la Pierre, Captain of the Pernicious Platitude, overheard during a train heist.
Living up to last week’s episode, what with its fiery dragon apocalypse closing it out, would have been a tall order for any show. But damn if this week didn’t do just that, but from a different direction.
If last week was all about moving the plot forward, then this week was all about character. The episode somehow managed to squeeze nearly every member of its enormous cast into it’s hour long running time, and still somehow managed not to feel imbalanced, rushed, or overloaded. The writers of this show have mastered the art of exposition, explaining the world and how it works without sacrificing the story. It truly is one of the best written shows on TV, on a purely technical level.
Three scenes in particular stood out to me. First, the opening scene, and quite possibly the best sword fight of the series, if not the best on TV in some time. This duel is the fulfillment of last week’s sentencing against Sandor ‘The Hound’ Clegane. Clegane is a monster of a man that few could ever hope to match. He has but one weakness, a fear of fire. Beric Dondarrion knew this and used it to his advantage. The result was an epic face off that was not only visually stunning, but built upon character foundations set down two years ago in the first season. The outcome of this fight also serves to further the Lord of Light mystery, as well as push Arya toward a crucial cross roads in her story.
The second standout scene involved Jaime Lannister (who has quickly become one of the more complex characters on the show) and Brienne of Tarth. This match up was my favorite story in Storm of Swords, and it’s a real treat to see it come alive on screen. It is important to bear in mind that both characters are nude in this scene, though the nudity isn’t primarily sexual. It’s more about emphasizing their vulnerability, Jaime’s in particular, as he finally reveals the full circumstances surrounding his murder of King Aerys Targaryen with a simmering, frustration fueled speech that nearly renders him unconscious due to the festering wound of his right wrist and the heat of the bath. Can a character who once shoved a ten year old kid out of a window in order to cover up his incest ever be redeemed? Maybe not, but this scene goes a long way to do just that.
Speaking of Jaime’s incest, the third scene of particular note involved his sister/lover Cersei, their father Tywin, and younger brother, Tyrion. Cersei spends much of the scene with a smug smile on her face, amused by the secret she knows, but Tyrion is unaware of. Both Petyr Baelish and House Tyrell have designs on Sansa Stark and through her, Winterfell. Tywin doesn’t intend to let either happen. Instead, he intends to wed Sansa to Tyrion, ensuring their supremacy in the north. Tyrion protests, and in another outstanding, low key moment, we are reminded of the horrible event Tywin put Tyrion through years before, when Tyrion says that he’s already been wedded once before.
Cersei watches, smiling that smug smile, but once Tywin is done with his son, he turns to his daughter and tells her that she will be married to Loras Tyrell, thus expanding their power to the South. Cersei’s demeanor changes completely at the drop of a hat as she realizes that she is being shunted off to spend the rest of her life in yet another loveless marriage. The scene ends with Tywin laying down the law to his children, telling them how tired he is of their trudging over the family name before storming out of the room and ending the episode.
While those three scenes were the standouts, that’s not to say there were other goings on in Westeros this week.
Robb Stark’s army continues to falter, despite having won all of their battles. The Lannisters have pulled back and decided to wait the young King out. This has caused discontent amongst the Northern ranks, as Rickard Karstark, one of Robb’s most valuable banner-men, is still angry at the loss of his son at Jaime Lannister’s hands, and Robb’s inability to do anything about it. So, in his rage, Karstark kills two young Lannister hostages. Both Talisa and Catelyn advise him not to execute Karstark, lest he lose support of the house. But Robb, in his stubbornness, believes that if he stands for righteousness, he cannot allow the murder of those under their care to go unpunished, Lannister or no. There goes that damnable Stark honor again…
North of the Wall, Jon Snow and Ygritte share a nice little romantic moment. It’s worth pointing out that anytime a show of this nature adds a romance between two young idiots, proceedings take a turn for the cheese. Luckily, their love scene somehow avoids this trap, even with Ygritte’s “You know nothing” catchphrase. In fact, the catchphrase is used in a great reversal, as Jon shows her that he does know something, despite “being a maid.”
Across the sea, in Essos, we catch up with Dany and her newfound army. As they march, Barristan Selmy and Jorah Mormont reminisce about the reign of Aerys and the civil war. Barristan says that he has served the drunken and the insane, and that just once he’d like to serve a ruler he’d be proud of. Jorah is in much the same boat, and both of them hope that Dany will be that ruler.
The conversation takes a sour note, however, when Barristan reminds Jorah that his reputation in Westeros has faltered since the war, given his crime of selling slaves. He suggests that, if they are to help Dany win the hearts of the people upon her return to the west, then Jorah might consider stepping away, for her sake. Jorah reminds Barristan that he’s no longer the lord commander, and that they are both nothing more than exiles at the moment. The only wish he follows is Dany’s.
As for Dany, she has the officers of her new army meet with her and choose their own commander. His name is Grey Worm, a name given to him by the slave masters to remind him that he is vermin. Horrified, Dany tells him to choose his own name. Grey Worm chooses to remain Grey Worm, because the name he was born with was cursed, and Grey Worm is the name he had the day Daenerys Targaryen of Westeros freed him.
Finally, we take a trip to Dragonstone, where Stannis Baratheon takes the time to visit his wife. This is probably my least favorite scene in the episode, namely because Stannis is probably my least favorite character, and the whole fetus-in-a-jar-of-green-slime motif that the half crazed Lady Selyse has going on looks borderline Schumacher Batman. This scene does eventually lead to the introduction of Stannis’ disfigured daughter, Shireen, and a brief but sweet scene between her and Davos where she learns that he can’t read and agrees to teach him, a small but important plot point further down the line.
Other bits of Note:
Gendry telling Arya that he was staying with the Brotherhood Without Banners. When she asks why, he tells her that they are a family. Arya says that she could be his family, to which he replies, “No. You would be my Lady.”
Lady Olenna continues to wreak havoc on the status quo when she goes to see Tyrion about the cost of Joffrey’s wedding. She tells Tyrion that she’d heard he was a drunken, debauched little terror, and that she is quite disappointed to find nothing more than a book keeper. Then she agrees to pay for half of the royal wedding. It seems not even Tyrion can keep up with the Queen of Thorns.
Prime Time television, and network television in particular, relies heavily on formula. Person of Interest has a simply one: every week, John Reese and Harold Finch get a number from a machine and have to figure out who they need to help and how. It’s a formula that could easily grow old, but after the better part of two seasons, Person of Interest still remains fresh.
Part of this comes from the fact that the show has built an intriguing mythology in the time it’s been on. In some ways, it’s the closest thing we have to a Batman T.V. show, complete with its own Rogues Gallery of recurring characters. The other part stems from the creative ways they continue to subvert the basic premise.
This week sees the most interesting variation on the concept so far, with Reese arriving too late to save his mark. By the time he is able to figure out what is wrong, the doctor he’s been sent to help is already doomed from polonium poisoning. He then teams up with the dying doctor to find his killer. The answer is less than earth shattering, but the plot is well told, if a little by the numbers. It resolves well, and in the mean time we get a couple of great scenes, one involving Warehouse 13’s Allison Scagliotti, who plays the doctor’s estranged daughter. It’s a short scene that plays out much like you’d expect it to, but it’s well acted and believable. The writers of the show had the decency to put doctor’s final face to face with his daughter near the beginning of the story, rather than subjecting the audience to a long, drawn out and unnecessarily sentimental good bye. Even the short phone call he makes near the end is played straight, with him never telling her that there’s something wrong. The other great scene involves the climax of the story, which I won’t spoil. I’ll just say that it’s low key and opens up a moral can of worms with viewed against the other half of the episode. Speaking of which…
Paralleling the doctor’s tale of personal comeuppance is the tale of Lionel Fusco, one of the detectives in Finch’s pocket. We’ve known from the beginning that he was, once upon a time, a dirty cop, and his arc on the series has largely been about his search for some kind of self reconciliation. This week, we are given his origin story, a cop who begins by covering up for a fellow detective and quickly spirals out of control as he starts offing drug dealers.
This story is told in flashbacks against the story in the present involving an IAD investigation into Fusco’s past. It comes down to his partner, Carter (the other detective working with Finch and Reese), to help him out, despite her better judgment. This also causes a rift between Carter and the rest of the team, and it was pretty fun to see her extort help from Finch before following up on his lead.
The episode closes with a huge game changer where the meta-plot is concerned. Finch realizes that their being too late to help the people the machine gives them is becoming a too common occurrence, and it is revealed that a virus has infected the machine. What this means and how they deal with it will be an interesting arc to see as this season draws to a close.
Overall, ‘In Extremis’ was a solid, if largely uneventful episode. I should point out that Reese is largely in the periphery of the Doctor’s story, stepping in occasionally to do something badass, and I think it’s a testament to the show’s quality and the writers’ confidence that they don’t feel the need to constantly have the main character of the show doing something. That they regularly pull it off only makes it better.
Blackwood Empire 