PERSON OF INTEREST Recap: Bury the Lede

Person of Interest 2.05: Bury the Lede

Great setup this week! The FBI is trying to take down the rest of HR, putting Fusco in the crosshairs, and it turns out that this week’s PoI is a reporter who has made it her mission to expose “the man in the suit”.

This week’s PoI is Maxine Angeles, a no-nonsense investigative reporter. Her two main stories that she’s determined to break are identifying the leader of HR, and the “man in the suit” that  rescues people around the city. Obviously, this poses a bit of a problem as Reese needs to be able to protect her without her figuring out who he is.  She’s not the only one determined to bring down HR’s boss as the FBI led by Agent Donnelly are also on the case and are rounding up all the officers that they can link to HR. The FBI is still trying to figure out who was in charge of HR, but Donnelly tells Carter that they are following a strong lead.

All of this interest in HR, of course, causes problems for Fusco as he is concerned that he’ll be implicated when it all goes down. Carter suggests that much of the crackdown is due to Fusco’s efforts, but he doesn’t want to take any credit. He admits to her that Reese didn’t put him undercover in HR because of his “spotless record”. Simmons blackmails him into finding out what the FBI have on HR and making it disappear.He promises him that if he is successful that he can leave HR if he wants. Conveniently, Reese wants Fusco to stick with Simmons.

Meanwhile, the entire city is gripped with election fever, due to a hotly contested battle for mayor between Ed Griffin and Landon Walker. Griffin’s been accused of some shenanigans involving campaign financing, and his campaign manager tells Maxine that he expects Griffin to lose the election and that Griffin is really ticked at Maxine for some of her previous stories.

Back at the office, Maxine gets a call from a blocked number telling her that Christopher Zambrano, the son of a deceased Mafia don, is the HR boss. She calls a source in the FBI that confirms that his name has been discussed a lot lately. Maxine goes out to his import/export business to confront him. His security person recognizes a picture of Agent Donnelly and tells her that he and Zambrano were fighting earlier. Zambrano is unloading some parts of a carousel at his dock when she arrives. She asks him about his involvement in HR and Zabrano denies it and threatens her, so she leaves to go back and write her story, which is posted on the paper’s website.

Reese is between a rock and a hard place trying to protect Angeles without her recognizing him as the “man in the suit”, so Finch, without consulting him, comes up with a perfect (and hilarious!) cover so he can get close to her. After finding out that Maxine is a member of an online dating site, he signs Reese up and sets up his profile to be her perfect match. As if that isn’t enough, he spends all day flirting with her as “John Anderson” and asks her out for a dinner date that night. Determined to make Reese’s cover as tight as possible, Finch even provides John with a set of new glasses, ’cause we all know that women never recognize a hero when he’s wearing glasses!

Reese steals a sweet car to use for the date and they meet at a nice restaurant. Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem like Reese fully read Finch’s notes on his cover as he starts bombing badly within the first few minutes of the date. Luckily, Finch has a contingency plan in place for just this situation (he apparently has little faith in Reese’s natural charm!). He picks up his phone and guess who strolls over to the table to talk with John and make him seem more desirable at that moment? Everyone’s favorite problem solver, Zoe, who is well on her way to being a series regular at this point. Angeles is quite impressed, as a reporter, she’d love to get that close to Zoe.

Zoe’s appearance has the desired effect and gives John a bit more time to redeem himself, which he starts by asking Maxine what she’s working on. She tells him about her mission to track down the mythical “man in the suit” and put him on the cover of every magazine and newspaper in the country.  Reese decides to put on the glasses Finch bought him and changes the subject to Zambrano. Reese suggests that she might want to get out of town when things are hot, but she insists that she’s not going anywhere. Simultaneously, both of their phones ring. Maxine’s editor is on the line – apparently the FBI called him because Zambrano is an innocent man, not the head of HR. Reese’s call is Carter, with similar news. The FBI doesn’t know where he is, but his life is now very much at risk due to Maxine’s erroneous story.

Maxine asks Reese to drive her to see Zambrano. They go out to the docks and she insists that he wait in the car (haha). After a few minutes of her searching for Zambrano, a car full of thugs shows up. Reese manages to dispatch them without them harming Maxine and without her being the wiser. He hears Maxine scream and finds her kneeling next to Zambrano’s body – dead from a gunshot.

This discovery leads to both Reese (with the glasses) and Maxine ending up at the NYPD station where Fusco and Carter work.  Carter does her best to get Reese and Maxine out of there before someone sees through Reese’s minimal disguise, but before they can leave, Donnelly shows up to talk to Maxine. After she tells him about her [apparently] false sources, he tells her that the call was from a pre-paid cell phone and therefore untraceable.  Zambrano was completely innocent; however, his dad was involved in brokering payoffs for HR members. After his dad’s death, he found a ledger that listed all the officers on the doll. He was going to turn it over to the FBI in exchange for an immunity agreement which was set to be approved the evening of his death.

The next day, Maxine is traumatized but more determined than ever to find out who set her up in the aftermath of her career implosion. She calls the disposable cell phone and threatens to find him and put a picture of him on the front page. Reese calls and asks her out for a drink. She shows him her file on and asks him to help, but he tells her that it’s a job for the police. She isn’t willing to give up and so she gets up to leave. Reese follows her and as they talk on the sidewalk, gunshots rain down around them. Reese puts Maxine in the stolen car.  He manages to get off a few shots of his own out of her sight, before jumping in the passenger seat. She pulls away and he takes her the only safe place he can think of – his pad.

Reese’s announcement that they are going to his place leads to a brief moment of panic for Finch when he realizes that he has Bear with him at the library and the dog featured prominently in the dating profile he made for “John Anderson”. Finch races to the loft to drop off the dog and gets there seconds before Reese and Maxine. When he hears the door open, he hides in a nearby closet, which turns out to be the location of John’s rather impressive arsenal. He is stuck in the closet with dozens of large guns until Maxine leaves the room to use the bathroom. He then makes his escape, but not before admonishing Reese for the sheer volume of weapons he keeps at the place.

Turns out that Reese (or Finch) has done a lot with his loft (besides the firearms) since Finch bought it for him last season. It’s gorgeous – airy, minimally, but beautifully decorated, but not out of character with Reese – and she’s impressed. Reese impresses her further by promising to stay by her side until everything is resolved and offering to take the couch. Reese is *really* good at this pretend suitor stuff! The next morning, he’s making pancakes(!!!), in his white button-down shirt, while Maxine showers. Finch calls and tells him that using surveillance footage he has identified two of the shooters – they are ex-FBI. He sends a picture to both Reese’s and Maxine’s phone (anonymously).

Maxine and Reese meet with Zoe. She tells them that she doesn’t know who the head of HR is, but suggests they look into political campaigns. Maxine thinks it is too much of a coincidence that everything is going down 5 days before the election. She’s very suspicious of the mayoral candidates, but she needs to find the ledger to be sure. Thinking back to her conversation with Zambrano, it occurs to her that maybe he hid the ledger in the carousel.

Reese and Maxine go to where the carousel has been assembled and find the ledger in the false leg of one of the horses. Just then the ex-FBI guys show up. They rough up Reese as he can’t fight back without blowing his cover. Carter and Fusco show up, but the bad guys are not intimidated. In the ensuing firefight, Reese finally gets away and turns on the carousel. Using the distraction, Maxine hides and flips through the ledger . She finds a record of payoffs to Walker, one of the mayoral candidates, and texts a picture of the entry to her editor.

Reese, Fusco, and Carter are able to subdue the thugs and Fusco takes the ledger from Maxine. He flips through it and tears out the pages with his and Simmons’ info on it. Fusco gives the evidence to Simmons who tells him that he can never leave HR.

Reese and Maxine finally go on a “real” date and then she dumps him because she thinks he’s still hung up on Zoe. She tells him that she’s done chasing the man in the suit – if he existed, she would have met him already, given the week that she’s had.

Donnelly arrests Walker and Griffin wins the mayoral election. Finch isn’t convinced that Walker was the top dog. Turns out he’s correct – the real head of HR is Griffin’s campaign manager – we see him sharing a drink with Simmons and enjoying their victory.

My Thoughts:

Person of Interest is at its heart, a serious show, but the actors do a fabulous job pulling off straight-faced witty exchanges as well, and this episode had plenty of laughs to go around, most of them surrounding Finch’s set-up of John with Maxine on the dating site and Finch’s ongoing relationship with Bear, the dog.  There was no doubt that Finch was not only doing what he thought needed to be done, but was also having fun with it. It also occurred to me that Finch is probably a much better match for Maxine than Reese. Once again, it was also nice to see more of Reese’s softer side. Last season, we saw him with the baby and with Root before they realized she was evil, and this season we get to see his [sweet] apartment and see him adopt a dog and making pancakes and other foods for his PoI two episodes in a row. Part of what makes this show so engaging is that the characters are so complex; the powers-that-be have done a fabulous job thus far providing the viewers with back-story and insight to the characters at just the right frequency to keep us curious but also satisfied.

Memorable Quotes:

Finch, is that feedback?
No…I simply made the grievous error  of buying Bear a squeaky toy

We’re fugitives, getting illegal information from a secret government machine, John. The last thing we need is publicity. – Finch

I took the liberty of back-engineering the matching algorithm to make you her ideal man. She really likes that you love dogs.
Wait, you’re trying to get me a date with her?
Already have, tonight at 8pm. You’ve been flirting all day.
Finch, what did I just say to her?
<Finch smiles>

Whoever he is, he saves a lot of lives. And shoots a lot of kneecaps – Angeles
Sounds like a great guy! – Reese

I was surprised to hear from you. There’s generally no second date when the first one ends in homicide. – Angeles

Did you get a good look at the men who were shooting at you?
I tried, but they were shooting at me!

 What did you think of the episode? Tell me in the comments!