PERSON OF INTEREST RECAP: The Tangled Web We Weave

POI 3.16 RAM

In a flashback to 2010, a Reese-esque man, Mr. Dillinger, saves a woman from certain death, then takes advantage of her thankfulness to bed her. He works for Finch, doing the same stuff that Reese does, but with less heart and more arrogance. He and Finch butt heads in some of the same ways that early Finch and Reese did.

Dillinger isn’t the only one looking for their next number, Daniel Casey, a seemingly average computer nerd. Reese and Kara are also trying to apprehend him for stealing state secrets and Dillinger makes them rather easily.

They have also made Dillinger, of course, but aren’t going to take him out unless he proves to be a problem for them. They are after Casey because he stole state secrets. Both Dillinger and Reese have Casey bugged while he meets with representative of the Senate intelligence committee. Casey realizes that the man is an imposter and leaves the restaurant.

Dillinger tries to apprehend him but is greeted by Reese and Kara. They tazer Casey and throw him in a car. Reese is about to kill Dillinger when they are interrupted by other suits in guns. During the firefight, Dillinger escapes and rescues  Casey. Dillinger tells Casey that he’s there to protect him and asks him why everyone wants him. Casey tells him that he was contracted by the government for his computer skills, to look for weaknesses in a machine…THE Machine.

Finch hears this admission and insists that Dillinger put Casey somewhere safe – fast. Dillinger, who doesn’t know about the Machine, brings him to the library, which makes Finch very unhappy.

Our favorite wife-impersonating super evil government witch, Claypool, isn’t happy, either. Reese and Kara failed to bring in Casey and she takes it out on Special Council,  foreshadowing her later order for Hersh to assassinate him at the end of season 2.

Reese and Kara managed to capture one of the gunman and she tortures him for intel, clearly enjoying herself. Reese tries to rein her in but she’s having too much fun. Before she gets anything useful, though, the man kills himself. In another revelation, we find out that the gunmen were working for Greer, the leader of  Decima.

Casey is impressed by Finch’s computer set-up. Sensing a kindred spirit and grateful to be safe, he tells him about his government job trying to breach The Machine. We see that Dillinger bugged the room before Finch sent him out.

The Machine was the most advanced programming that Casey’d ever seen – almost sentient. After weeks working on it, he found the backdoor to the system and was able to pull a bit of code before he was locked out. The code was 9-digit numbers, which he conveniently doesn’t recognize as social security numbers. 

Casey shows Finch the laptop that he used for the project and the code that he accessed. Not long after he found the numbers, he told the government that he wanted to quit. They tried to kill him in an elaborate set-up worthy of a James Bond villain,(although lacking sharks with laser beams) but he managed to escape and went to the erroneously Senate thinking they would be safe.

Finch thinks everyone is after Casey for the contents of the laptop and suggests selling the laptop on the Darknet after he modifies it in the hope that it might offer Casey some protection. He has made Casey a new identity and will help him escape.

Casey realizes Finch knows more than he lets on about the Machine. Finch tells him that everyone who knows anything about what he was working on has been killed.

Dillinger shows up and confronts Finch about keeping intel from him and putting him at risk. He’s done working for Finch and he’s found his own buyer for the laptop – the Chinese. Finch realizes he drugged his tea. Dillinger tells Casey to run, takes the laptop and leaves with Finch too drugged to do anything to stop him.

Casey runs to a friend for help and walks right into Reese and Kara’s trap. He’s on the phone with Finch when Reese intercepts him. Meanwhile, Kara gets a visit from Greer’s guys and manages to kill several of them.

Outside, Reese stares down Casey with his gun drawn. Kara asks if Casey’s dead yet and she and Finch hear a gunshot. But Casey isn’t dead – Reese realizes that Casey is innocent and scared and helps him fake his death and escape – after handing him a pair of pliers to extract 2 of his own molars (seriously, it is *not* that easy to pull out a molar and you certainly couldn’t do it yourself if you aren’t Finch, Shaw, or Kara!) as proof of his death. Finch overhears this conversation as well.

Finch manages to overcome the drugs in his system enough to track down Dillinger on his way to the meet to sell the laptop in Central Park. He begs him to return it. Dillinger suspects that it has something to do with how he gets the numbers and is sick of working for Finch without knowing the whole picture. Finch tells him that he will get killed. He threatens to shoot Finch if he doesn’t let him go.

Nearby, he meets with some Chinese representatives. He turns over the laptop and then gunshots ring out – Dillinger and most of the Chinese are killed as Finch watches, horrified. The man with the laptop is apparently bulletproof, though, as he escapes. Finch is left to bury Dillinger’s body in the woods.

Claypool meets with Special Council again and we learn that their agent (Shaw!!!) killed Dillinger and almost recovered the laptop. She has tracked the laptop back to China, so she orders him to send Reese and Kara to China to confirm the laptop is the right one and then kill them both.

2014 – Casey is hiding out in a remote cabin in some cold climate when he gets a visitor – Root. She tells him that he has a higher calling now, men with guns are arriving any second and she’s rigged his cabin to explode. He has a new assignment – he needs to go to Colombia to look or a man named Greenfield. The Machine needs his help.

My Thoughts:

Wow, this episode answered *a lot* of questions! How Finch ever got involved with the laptop in the first place was always something that bugged me. Kudos to the writers for coming up with such a plausible (and delightfully intricate) explanation for how Reese’s fate ended up unavoidably intertwined with Finch’s (and Shaw’s).

After his experiences with Dillinger, Finch clearly sought out Reese for his moral compass as well as his skill set. How he knew that Reese survived the airstrike in China remains to be seen, however. It also makes you wonder about Finch’s moral compass – he is always trying to get Reese and Shaw to tone down the violence, yet he knows that everyone who gets close to the Machine usually dies a violent death. Finch is definitely an “if-the-end-justifies-the-means” kind of guy, even if he won’t admit it.

After a pretty terrific episode, the last 2 minutes only ratcheted up the intrigue. Just as I found myself wondering how the events from the flashback would integrate into the present day and wondering what ever happened to Root, both of those questions were also answered. I can’t wait to see where the Machine self-protection theme is headed.

Memorable Quotes

I grew up in Tucson, you need to do something to pass the time! – Casey

You knew I was a shark when you hired me. Don’t be surprised when I smell blood in the water – Dillinger

Catch Person of Interest on Tuesday nights at 10/9c on NBC!