Warning: Spoiler Alert
Hollywood apparently perceives the word “Trilogy,” differently, than the rest of the planet. According to Dictionary. Reference. com the word means “a series or group of three plays, novels, operas, etc., that, although individually complete, are closely related in theme, sequence, or the like. The site actually contains three different descriptions, but all of them center around the word “three.” However over the past decade, we’ve seen a series of movies that were designed as a “Trilogy,” stretch out over four films.
The CBS series “Person Of Interest,” opted to use the broader meaning of the term, as the show’s “Trilogy,” that kicked off in December, ended the third episode of their “Trilogy,” without resolving the problem, that’s plagued Harold Finch and company, throughout this season and throughout these last three episodes. And to make the fan’s wait until February 3, when the series resumes, will only increase the agony for the viewers.
We realized we’d be in for a unique viewing experience, during the episode’s opening credits. Instead of Michael Emerson, who portrays Finch speaking the familiar words, we heard the voice of veteran actress Camryn Manheim, who portrays a high-ranking Government official, known to viewers as Control. Control used to be the director of Northern Lights, which used the information provided by “The Machine,” to stop terrorist threats.
When Harold moved “The Machine,” last season to a location that even he’s in the dark about, he cut off the feed to the Government. That’s when John Greer stepped into the breach and hammered out a deal with Senator Ross Garrison to put his Artificial Intelligence System, Samaritan taking the place of Finch’s creation. However Greer insisted on Samaritan receiving an unfiltered feed of all United States intelligence information, while doling out what they wanted, to United States intelligence Agencies.
The episode opens with a TV news report, about a man and woman wearing ski-masks, who broke into the facility that stores the surveillance footage for the New York Stock Exchange and shot a security guard in the process, a photo’s shown of the pair and we instantly realize it’s Reese and Root. The guard’s interviewed in the hospital, as the shot wasn’t life threatening. He tells the reporter that they just said they were looking for a friend.
We then see Control, for the first time this season, as she drops her grade-school daughter Julia off at her private school. As soon as Julia leaves the car, Control receives a text message that reads come see me. She heads to the White House and meets with the President’s Chief Of Staff Mike Richelli, about what’s being labeled the “Flash Crash,” as Samaritan nearly wiped out the Global economy, only to be thwarted by “The Machine.” Control tells Richelli that the fluctuation was due to a computer glitch and the situations resolved.
As the conversation ends, she gets another text message that reads ops room now. When Richelli gets back to his office he’s surprised to see a young boy sitting in a chair reserved for visitors, Richelli asks him if he’s part of a tour group and lost his way. The boy’s Gabriel, who was the analog-interface, when he met with Root in the first episode of the “Trilogy.”
He tells Richelli that he crashed the stock-market the day before and the Chief Of Staff congratulates him. Realizing that Richelli’s not taking him seriously, he tells him that the market will close at 10, 233 points and then asks to meet with the President. The Chief Of Staff’s flabbergasted and tells the boy no, and Gabriel tells him that’s unfortunate, as he’ll see to it that Richelli’s personal portfolio, will lose 16% of its value by the end of the day. Richelli calls for his secretary and tells her to escort Gabriel out.
Control enters the Ops Room and gets told by a female agent named Shiffman, that they’ve got reason to believe that four terrorists, three from the Middle East and one American born will set off a series explosions at historic landmarks in Detroit. Control asks how they’ve determined the threat’s real and Samaritan representative Travers says because Samaritan’s never wrong, Control repeats the question and Shiffman shows her surveillance footage, of the suspects purchasing pressure-cookers and nails, which convinces Control to give the green light to the mission.
Three Government agents are on hand, including Shaw’s former partner Grice, to take-out the suspects, they kill three, but the American born man Yasin Said’s missing. Control tells her operatives that she wants to see Said’s hard drive on his laptop, but Samaritan denies access. She tells Travers that she wants access to the hard-drive and the Samaritan agent refuses. She tells him he’s a guest of the Government facility and if she fails to give her access, she threatens to arrest him, Travers tells Control she and the Government are actually guests of Samaritan, then shuts the system down.
Senator Garrison heads to the Ops Room to find out what’s going on, when his cell phone rings, it’s Greer on the other end, chastising him for trying to modify the wonderful “car,” he gave him. He tells Garrison that Samaritan’s tracked down Yasin Said, but he won’t stay there for long and asks if he wants to put the key in the ignition again? Garrison realizes Greer’s got him where he wants him and authorizes Samaritan to get booted up.
Grice and his female partner Brooks, have located Said, she’s in sniper position on top of a building, while Grice portrays a wino, she shoots twice and misses, Said runs into a warehouse type building, corners Said and tells him all he wants is his laptop. Yasin gives him his computer then crashes through a third-story window, landing in a cardboard box full of Styrofoam, not moving.
Grice attempts to access the computer’s hard-drive, when the laptop catches on fire and melts down to garbage, he tells Brooks to stand-down and Said gets away in a taxi. Control then calls for her personal security detail, but minutes later two other agents arrive, telling her that her two regular agents were T-Boned in a hit and run by a man and woman wearing ski masks. She tells the agents they’re going into the field.
The three take to the road in a Government SUV, when Control spots a woman driving a motorcycle while the man behind her has a rocket launcher on his shoulder, both wearing ski masks. She tells the driver to take evasive measures, but it’s too late and the vehicle’s flipped upside down. Control survives the crash and slowly crawls out the window, she looks up to see the couple removing their ski masks and she realizes it’s Reese and Root. Reese asks her where’s Shaw and Control passes out.
She wakes up tied to a chair in a warehouse and the first thing she sees is Root, the two aren’t on the best of terms after Control made her deaf in one ear. Root’s got her full hearing back after forcing a surgeon to operate on her at gunpoint. Reese asks Control where Shaw is and she replies she doesn’t know, which is at least distorting the truth, as she told Grice earlier that she knows Sameen’s alive. Now it’s Root’s turn.
The Government official tells Root to feel free and perform the same operation on her, but Root says she lacks a scalpel. She does however have a Taser and shocks Control painfully. Root then pulls out a photo of Control’s daughter Julia and says it’s too bad this sweet girl has a monster for a mother. Root then asks Control how old was she when her mother died and she responds she was nine.
Root then says that’s when Control developed high blood pressure and says well better Julia have her for a mother than not to have a mother at all. She then tells Control that many suspects have died in custody of the police by a Taser unit, usually people with hyper-tension and the place that does the most damage is near the heart. Root starts to put the unit there, when Finch calls out for her to stop, that’s not the way they do things.
Harold explains John’s and Root’s anger over their concern for their friend, then tells her that Shaw did what she did to save the entire world from an economic collapse and Control shows she doesn’t believe him. Suddenly Harold realizes that the Government Official’s in the dark and has no idea what Greer and Samaritan are doing. He tells her Samaritan’s had agents outside her house and instead of being Control, she’s the cleanup crew, a janitor. There’s some noise and Control says speaking of janitors, and Finch looks at her incredulously as he asks her if she thought her agents coming was a surprise for his team.
Reese’s waiting for Grice, pops him the face and takes his gun away, meanwhile Root carrying two pistols attempts to fend off two female agents. Grice sees the blood on Reese’s shirt from the bullet wound he suffered in the previous episode and realizes he can get the advantage over his wounded opponent Grice starts strangling John, but Reese grabs a metal pipe hitting his assailant over the head with it. John takes the advantage and is about to stab Grice to death, when he says this is for Shaw. Grice says Sameen and John realizes his opponent is Shaw’s former partner who let her escape earlier in the season.
In the command truck an operative tries contacting his fellow agents, but Fusco enters the truck, sneaks up behind him and knocks him out. Finch then takes over the vehicle’s computer system and believes he’s found the GPS coordinates for the truck that took Sameen from the exchange. He tells Root he’s got what he needs and Root and Reese escape.
Said jumped a freight train to Canada when Reese took out Control’s vehicle and we see him entering a cabin with supplies, he’s shocked when he sees Control in the cabin with her weapon pointed at him. He tells Control he won the Nautilus contest, the same way that Samaritan recruited a young woman named Claire in the second episode of this season.
That explains why his laptop self-destructed, as Samaritan designed a feature to destroy the computer if someone tried to access the hard drive. He says he and his three friends got jobs after he won the contest and the company assigned them a series of tasks, that they completed hours before his three friends got shot to death. He asks Control to take a moment to think if someone in the Government’s lying to her, she waits about ten seconds says no and shoots Said.
Just after 5:00 pm Mike Richelli returns to his office and finds Gabriel sitting there and the boy tells the Chief Of Staff to look at his computer screen. The market closed at exactly, 10,233 and Richelli’s portfolio dropped exactly 16%. Richelli asks Gabriel who he is and the boy responds that he wants to talk with the President and he’ll be in touch, then leaves the office.
Control heads to the exchange and checks out the floor Harold told her the gunfight occurred. She asks the security guard if the place had recently been cleaned up and the Rent-A-Cop says he isn’t a janitor. Control runs her finger over a wall and fresh paint appears on her finger.
The Story Continues on Tuesday February 3, at 10:00 pm on CBS.
