PERSON OF INTEREST Recap: War Crimes

Person of Interest 2.15 Booked Solid

This week’s POI is Mira Dobrika, a maid at an upscale hotel. She’s a Serbian refugee that emigrated to the US alone after the war in Kosovo. Reese is undercover as a bell hop while Finch is a concierge, so he can access the hotel’s computer system.

John runs into Zoe in an elevator on the way up to check out where Mira is working. She’s also on the job, but not the same job. Reese walks in on a guest propositioning Mira. He threatens to call the police and Mira thanks him but explains that she could have handled him. Reese introduces himself to her and manages to clone her phone.

Reese and Finch get ready to go undercover

Finch is monitoring the security cams and sees the manager of the hotel, Derek (who’s a major D-bag),  threaten Mira – he suggests that she revealed info about their “side operation” to the police. She denies that she was involved. He tells her that he’d be very upset if he found out it was here. Reese hopes that Derek is the perp, because he is looking for an excuse to beat him up or shoot him.

Hersh, the agent that tried to kill Reese at Rikers, has managed to get out and is back on Reese’s trail, assuring his boss at the Special Council office that this time he knows what Reese looks like. He steals a police car and drives off.

Carter’s BF, Cal Beecher, comes to visit her. They talk about where their relationship is and decide that it’s time for him to meet her son. Before they can make plans, Carter gets a visitor – Agent Moss from the FBI. He is cleaning up some loose ends after Donnelly. He has found out that Donnelly suggested Carter become a field agent and he’d like to start the official procedures – a thorough background check and a polygraph exam.

Reese and Finch touch base – they expect that Derek’s side business may be prostitution. Derek’s not going to let them have even a moments break, however, and he walks by and tells them off for talking. Carter calls Finch and tells him that there was an anonymous tip a few weeks back and they picked up a girl who was then bailed out by Derek’s right hand man. She also talks to him about the FBI position and the polygraph. He suggests that she avoid him and Reese and lie on one of the baseline questions to throw the machine off.

Mira is working when a man exits a room on her floor and insists on talking with her. Finch alerts Reese who separates himself from a middle-aged admirer and goes to her rescue. He barges into the room where she is having a heated discussion with the man, Charles Harris. She leaves the room and tells Reese off for following her, accusing him of following her because of Derek. Reese accuses her of tipping off the police about the prostitution and she confirms that it was her. She tells him to stay away from her. Finch researches Harris – he’s an international freelance journalist who has ticked off a lot of foreign dignitaries.

Reese notices a suspicious guy in the lobby and they send Zoe in to check out the situation. She spills her wine all over him and he jumps up and starts talking on his phone. Soon another guy who was sitting in the bar comes and takes his place. There is a third man, as well, who moves to the bar. It appears to be a military hit squad. They call in Fusco to stake out the bar.

Reese checks out the room of one of the squad members. The man checked in under a German passport and has a file on Harris. Included in the file are articles written by Harris accusing a Serbian military official named Petrovic of war crimes.  Finch detects his Harris’ laptop on the hotel WiFi and hacks into it. He finds out that Mira is Albanian and the only surviving member of her family. The rest were executed by Petrovic.

Reese waits for Mira when she finishes her break in the kitchen. She’s not happy to see him, or that he follows her down the hall. A man, one of the hit squad, approaches them and pulls a gun. Reese shoots him and ties him up. Reese tells Mira that the man wanted to kill her to cover up what Petrovic did to her family.

The Machine picks up two gunshots in Harris’ room and Finch loses the connection to his computer. The hotel computer shows that he has checked out of the room remotely. Reese and Mira go to Harris’ room. A chair is out of place and they find blood on the wall behind it. Mira confides in Reese about her family and talking to Harris about it. The neighbor who saved her talked to Harris and he made a recording of it. A few days later the neighbor was dead. Reese realizes that Harris’ room was bugged (and still is) and so her discussions with Harris were overheard. Reese goes next door and disables a woman with a lot of surveillance equipment.

Mira runs in the commotion and gets into an elevator with a member of the hit squad, the elevator closing before Reese can get there. The hit man obscures the camera and then directs Mira to use her key card to send it to the basement. He demands she hand over the recording from her old neighbor, but she denies having it. Reese climbs down into the shaft with an ax and gets into a gunfight with the hit squad member, killing him. Mira tells Reese that she does have a disk and wants to use it to put Petrovich behind bars.

Fusco confronts a hotel guest

Finch sees another member of the squad leaving with a huge suitcase – likely Harrison’s body. He asks Fusco to intercept them. One the way out of the hotel, he runs into a man in a back hallway. The man says he got lost looking for a bathroom and Fusco rushes by. Fusco approaches them as they are loading the suitcase into their vehicle and they pull their guns. He shoots them and opens the suitcase, finding the body.

Carter takes the polygraph. She admits to smoking marijuana in college (her lie?). She is then asked whether she’s ever knowingly associated with a criminal, etc, and she lies and says no, trying to remain calm. An agent enters the interrogation room, whispers to Moss, and hands him some papers. Carter asks what it is about and Moss asks her the nature of her relationship with Beecher. She tells him that they see each other socially. He tells her that he’s currently the subject of several ongoing IAB investigations and asks if she knew about it, which of course she doesn’t. 

Reese asks Fusco to keep Mira safe and then he collects the disk from her locker.  He’s about to leave the hotel when Hersh shows up, having tracked Reese to the hotel via the body trail reported on the police scanner in his stolen car. Hersh puts a gun to his head and takes his phone.

Agent Moss tells Carter that he is rescinding his offer for her to join. She asks why, and he advises her to choice her company more wisely in the future.

Fusco puts Mira into a room at the police station and goes to his desk to talk to Carter. Nearby is a man reporting a mugging – he’s the guy that Fusco ran into in the back corridor of the hotel. He’s told to wait until an officer is available to take his statement.

Reese and Hersh go into the hotel kitchen. He wants to know for whom Reese works. Reese manages to disarm him and the two fight. Reese finally stabs him with a chef’s knife and gives him back his empty gun, encouraging him to head to the hospital before he bleeds to death.

Hersh makes another attempt at assassinating Reese

Beecher approaches Carter but she’s clearly stressed and tells him that she’s not ready for him to meet Taylor yet. He asks her if she wants to talk, but she tells him that she needs time. He tells her to take as long as she needs – he’s not going anywhere. Meanwhile, the “mugged” guy slips into the room where Mira is and tries to strangle her, but  Carter shoots him through the window and rescues her.

Finch, Reese meet at a bar in the hotel and watch the news – Petrovic is going to trial for war crimes. Zoe shoes up and congratulates them on bringing down a prostitution ring. Her workload is increased as all her clients scramble to make sure that they are not on the client list. The tell her that Finch has bought the hotel and has put Mira in a management role. Reese offers Zoe a job in “crisis management” at the hotel, but she turns him down. He also has a key to the penthouse suite and invites Zoe to join him.

Hersh’s boss calls him and tells him that he needs him to come by right away. Hersh is in the hospital, but he answers the phone and agrees to come, pulling out his IV as he talks. The Special Council’s assistant comes into the office and brings his suit and an anniversary gift for his wife. He compliments her for how well she knows him and she says it’s her job. Her voice sounds very familiar and we finally get to see her face – it’s Root!

My Thoughts:

This episode was a great mixture of a stand alone plot and some additional pieces of the mythology. I’d like to think that Reese sparing Hersh’s life has to come back to benefit him later, but that plot is rather clichéd, so maybe it will come back to burn him instead.  Zoe’s contribution to this episode was welcome, as usual. I hope she took Reese up on his offer. They are good for each other.

We’re left with the obvious question of whether it was Beecher, Finch and Reese, or all three that caused Carter to fail the polygraph test. After how well she lied to Donnelly, my bet is Beecher. It will be interesting to see what else we learn about him in upcoming episodes.

Obviously Finch is very wealthy, but lately there seems to be no limit to how many 100s of millions he can drop at a time. We’re due some back story on exactly how he managed to amass such a vast fortune (maybe he won it all having the Machine help him gamble). Buying the hotel and putting Mira in charge was definitely a feel-good finish to the episode, however.

The final reveal that Root has been working as the assistant to the Special Council for 2 months suggests some very exciting possibilities for future episodes. As if it wasn’t bad enough that the Special Council guy is after Reese, having Root involved as well doesn’t bode terribly well for our dynamic crime-preventing duo.

Memorable Quotes:

You sharing anything personal is peculiar – Reese

They were hiring a bell hop and a concierge, the choice seemed obvious – Finch

John, I haven’t seen you since the divorce – Zoe

Mr Reese, can you try not to get fired before lunch? – Finch

I feel like I’m back at boot camp and we still haven’t zeroed in on the threat to Mira yet – Reese

It’s just a machine, right, how smart can it be? – Carter

Catch Person of Interest on Thursday nights, 9/8c on CBS!