BLOOD & TREASURE: Observations From “The Lunchbox of Destiny”

Blood & Treasure was all new on Tuesday night, picking up where Danny and Lexi’s adventure in Casablanca continued. Here is a synopsis of the episode:

The FBI offers Danny and Lexi information that will help them in their search for Cleopatra, but only if Danny is able to get his incarcerated father, Patrick (Mark Valley), to give up the location of paintings that he helped steal 20 years earlier. Also, Farouk deals with a loose end and takes a big step forward in his master plan.

Danny’s Past

We learned that Danny had a rather complicated childhood. His parent split up when he was a kid. He grew up in Texas with his mother, but when she passed away, he was sent to Boston to live with his father, who was a virtual stranger; but when he overheard his dad planning to kill someone after an art theft [that would eventually become a legendary tale for Lexi was well versed in its history], he turned his dad in to the police.

But now that Danny and Lexi were in FBI custody because of the criminal incidents that have followed them around the globe in their hunt for Farouk and Cleopatra, that heist came back to haunt Danny. The FBI agent who has been trying to find the stolen paintings from that heist made a deal with Danny: he needed to convince his now dying father, who is a Boston prison, to give up the locations of those stolen paintings and the charges will be dropped. Of course, Danny wanted something in return too: he wanted the “Paper Clip Files,” government files from 75 years ago that showed where former Nazis ended up at the end of World War II that could potential help them track down where Cleopatra went after Casablanca.

Farouk

This guy is a madman. He had a doctor create some kind of toxin, and then used that doctor as the guinea pig to make sure the toxin worked. Worse yet, he sent one of his mercenaries into the Rome police station to kill his former right-hand man Omar, who was captured in Casablanca, just as he was about to give Fabi and Gwen the details they needed to finally catch up with Faruok.

The Truth Comes Out

Danny’s dad left a message for his son in 1997 about who was the mastermind behind the museum heist [a name written on the back of a picture of Danny and his mother] because he needed to tell the truth to someone, even if that person was the person who turned him.

Lexi came clean to Danny that Fabi was the one on the other side of that burner phone, telling Danny that she did what she did to protect him because Fabi had threatened Danny’s life; and she also came clean that Fabi is part of the brotherhood. In turn, Danny told Lexi that he gave the burner phone number to Gwen to investigate; but before Danny could reach out to Gwen with the truth, she learned that Fabi was on the other end of that phone. The look on Gwen’s face said it all, didn’t it?

Sidebar: How great was it to see Mark Valley as Danny’s dad (even if he was a cop-turned-criminal) and Anna Silk (of Lost Girl fame), despite the fact that she’s either working for Farouk or someone else who wants that one painting – “The Death of Cleopatra” – that was not recovered from the 1997 museum heist. Who could have that painting?!

What are your thoughts on last night’s episode? Please share them below.

[Photo Credit: Mohammed Kamal/CBS Broadcasting, Inc]

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Blood &Treasure will air its next episode on Tuesday, July 10 at 10/9c on CBS.