After a year of waiting, this first episode of season 5 did not disappoint! We got some amazing badassery from Root and Reese, and some extremely emotional scenes with Finch and the Machine, flashbacks aplenty to Finch’s previous life with the Machine, some Bear time, and an intense set-up for the rest of the season.
By the way, in case you didn’t catch it – BSOD stands for “Blue Screen of Death”, which seems reasonably appropriate.
Karen, Rueben, and I discuss the episode below. Be sure to contribute your thoughts in the comments!
1. We didn’t exactly see how they escaped the electric substation, but clearly Reese had a lot to do with that
Rueben: I was kind of surprised to see the action pick up with all of them separated but handling their own assailants individually and pretty adeptly too.
Cay: Part of it seemed like a cop out – not showing us how they escaped a seemingly impossible situation – surrounded by dozens of armed assailants with only one full clip “and God running on double As”. However, having them separated and having to meet up again was a good device to increase the intensity and sense of danger.
Karen: I like how they just picked up with them all scattered to the winds. It allowed us to handwave the escape (knowing full well that Reese handled it) and dive right back in to the action. Gave us an energy right off the bat.
2. Finch’s emotion with The Machine – once he made the decision to save it, he’s all in
Karen: Tied it back in to the ending moments of last season’s finale – which was amazing. He and The Machine have a bond, even though it’s on-again/off-again, it’s always ‘there’. He just can’t quit her.
Rueben: It was great to see the juxtaposition between the Finch from 2006 to the Finch of 2016, trying to decide what to do about the Machine in the beginning and what to do for “her” now. As stated, once he was in, he was all in. My big question is what version of the Machine will we get after all that the team did to research “her”?
Cay: I loved these scenes – they really highlight Emerson’s emotional range! I really wonder *which* decisions he’d do again if he could – is it just allowing the Machine to develop somewhat naturally, or does that go back to decisions like not letting Reese and Shaw kill the Congressman?
3. Root is back to being badass without the Machine in her ear. She also continues to somehow blend stone-cold killer with nurturing and makes it completely believable
Rueben: She really is amazing, isn’t she? I was pretty worried about her when she was surrounded by all of the Samaritan people, but I should know better by now, right?, that Reese seems to have a crazy sixth sense, swooping to save the day at the last minute, right?
Cay: It kind of defies belief and would be hard to swallow if Root and Reese hadn’t been so carefully developed to be capable of this kind of stuff on a regular basis. I’d love to know how Root got away from the transit cop and got his shotgun. Also how she thought to go after the game consoles, both to save her life, and the Machine’s – sometimes it seemed like the Machine was still with her. I just can’t get enough of Root – she’s so cunning, so charming, flirtatious, and deadly…
Karen: Always true. I’ve never been her biggest fan, but I do like that she’s 100% team Machine, and behind them all the way to the end (now). She used to be Crazytown with a capital K, but now she’s essentially a mama bear and I’m loving it. Great counterpoint to Finch.
4. We got a somewhat entertaining reminder of the differences between Reese and Finch’s personalities and how they approach situations
Rueben: Yes, they are very different but that also helps them do what they do. They don’t necessarily understand each, especially Reese understand 1/3 of what Finch tells him but it was great to see that play-by-play again.
Karen: They’ve always been oil and water, but shake ’em up and they make a lovely dressing. So yeah, a great team, but if they come at something, they’re gonna hit it differently. Like WAAAY differently.
Cay: It was a bit of a turn to have Finch be the one panicked while Reese was pretty calm and positive throughout the situation. We’ve seen Reese go off half-cocked way more than we’ve really seen Finch loose his cool and here we have Reese doing his best to comfort Finch while Finch barely is holding it together.
5. Is Fusco’s hot water over Dominic and Elias’ deaths over just like that? It seemed like it would be more drawn out and less tied up so neatly so quickly.
Rueben: I have a bad feeling that this is just the calm before the storm. He was even pretty shocked it was over that soon. I don’t think Samaritan is going to let him slide that easily.
Cay: yeah, it seems like it likely just bought him some time and relative safety. In a lot of ways, he’s one of the more exposed members of Team Machine, even though he is still clearly mostly in the dark about what is going on. I hope they fill him in before the end of the season – I feel that at this point, him not knowing may be more dangerous than him knowing.
Karen: Oh no. I have two theories. Either Samaritan has more nefarious plans for him, or it covered things up because it makes it easier on the people who actually did the deeds. Either way, I don’t think we’ve seen the backside of the case. I’m hoping this may lead to Fusco finally being let in on the secret. I mean seriously… can we please just tell him about The Machine already?
6. Favorite lines/scenes
Karen: LOVED seeing the opening with the characters ‘getting lost’ and trying to stay off the radar.
Cay: Root in the Subway, to Samaritan “you can just call me Root, bitch!” after she took out all of Samaritan’s civilian operatives.
Rueben: I liked when Root was explaining the set-up of all those computers for the decompression to Reese and he simply said, “I don’t speak nerd.” Priceless!
7. Other comments?
Rueben: It was great to see a flashback moment between Grace (Carrie Preston) and Finch. She was also such a good shoulder for him to lean on, don’t you think.
Karen: Mostly that I’m so conflicted about this season. It’s going to come at us so fast – and I’ll dig that, but it’ll be over quickly too. I’ll hate to see it end. AND WHAT IS FINCH’S REAL NAME?!?!
Cay: What was up with that opening voice over from Root? Are we to assume that is the end of the season, and what we saw afterward for the rest of the episode and the season shows how it all got to that point?
And Samaritan is looking pretty darn invincible right now – there seems to be almost no person, system, etc that it can’t get to!
Watch Person of Interest on Mondays AND Tuesdays at 10/9c on CBS!
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