I want to start off by apologising for having missed reviewing the past two episodes. That is something that I’m hoping doesn’t continue to happen.
Person of Interest always circles back to loose storylines. The Martine story has been simmering in the background across the season, only really coming to the forefront in ‘Prophets’. This week, the show really pushed at the story, with it serving as the whole ‘B’ plot for the episode and delivering a huge (though somewhat over-intensified) cliffhanger that undoubtedly spells trouble for Shaw.
I can’t help but compare Martine slightly to an evil version of the Terminator we saw at the end of Judgement Day (the one that’s a ruthless killer, but does have some sort of people skills). In terms of the show, she is literally an evil combination of Reese, Shaw and Root – showing traits that all three of our favourite crime-stoppers have. Cara Buono is a joy to watch in the role, and though I hate the character’s motives, I can’t help but enjoy it somewhat when she comes on-screen.
It was intriguing to keep seeing Samaritan attempting to piece together the face of Shaw on surveillance video while Martine was attempting to track her through relationships with people – as Greer stated, “All of whom can be leveraged.” The episode posed a very interesting question – which is more effective, an AI or “good old-fashioned human intelligence”?
Going on what we saw this week, I’d be inclined to say the latter. Martine was able to find Shaw where Samaritan couldn’t. The most telling scene was the end in which Samaritan was unable to find Shaw when she was only a short distance from Martine. However, it’s impossible to deny that without artificial intelligences, Reese and Finch would have no people to save (and in fact, the show wouldn’t exist).
Moving past that question (I’m not keen to turn this review into a philosophical debate – if you want to do so in the comments, be my guest), the more important thing for the show is that Samaritan was shown previously to be virtually infallible. Now, we know it is not. This kind of dilemma is something we’ve seen before in the Machine, albeit in different circumstances (remember when it didn’t try to give Carter’s number until 10 seconds before she died?). We as viewers now know that Samaritan isn’t perfect, and that means that our team may have a chance of taking down Samaritan.
Anyway, Martine’s discovery of Shaw puts her in grave danger, though I have no doubt that she’ll survive the threat Martine posed in the cliffhanger – beyond that however, is a mystery. Of course, now that Shaw has been discovered, it’ll leave Team Samaritan like a young kitten pulling a small, loose thread from a ball of wool and unravelling it with sheer speed and aggression as it unravels the true identities of Team Machine. Here is a visual representation:
Anyway, onto the ‘A’ plot of the episode, which revolved around IA cop Dani Silva, who was undercover in the Academy to flush out a mole. Wait, they didn’t clean up the police department when they erased HR? Apparently not, as Dominic managed to turn one of the trainees and get him to steal some files.
Silva’s storyline was actually a lot more interesting than it once appeared. Though it was glaringly obvious from the get-go that Dominic was involved somehow (and even more so whose files he wanted, but I’ll come onto that), the show did a good job of keeping us on our toes and providing the entertainment factor we’ve come to expect.
As aforementioned, the whole mole story culminated in Dominic getting some files from the NYPD database. But they weren’t just any files – they were files on Elias! DUN, DUN, DUN! In fact, Elias’s number came up before the end of the episode too, so we already know who the ‘person of interest’ is next week. That spells serious trouble for Elias, but I’m really looking forward to seeing how things play out.
Elsewhere, Reese spent some more time with his therapist, Iris. In fact, he saved her life, making her glad he has that hero complex she’s been so worried about him having. The scenes between the two are nice, and I hope we have more of them. Though, if we get more scenes like the last one (Reese was so worried that she knew his true job there), Reese probably won’t like it.
In all, this episode served more as a set-up for next week more than it did anything else. But that's not a bad thing, because 'Point of Origin' was a great episode. Everything seems to be coming to a head and Tuesday's episode is likely to be a huge pay-off from this week, and I'm really looking forward to it.
Odds and ends:
- Bear got some great scenes! “He’s scuba-certified.”
- Finch said he had to go and run an errand, and we never saw what it was. Guesses?
- Can they actually use Greer for more than one scene per episode? He seems slightly wasted of late.
- “Ex-boyfriend?” “More like ex-pain-in-the-ass.”
- “Well, that looks dangerous. You first.”
- Dominic is a little more evil than Elias and slightly less charismatic. I’m rooting for Elias, 100%.
- Reese getting kneecapped in the training exercise was brilliant.
What did you think of the episode? Who will win in the war between Elias and Dominic? Will Shaw survive Martine? What errand was Finch running? Is Bear going to take the lead role in a new superhero series called ‘Bear-ing It’?! If you have any thoughts on these questions, or anything else Person of Interest, leave a comment below! And check out the promo for Tuesday’s episode, for which I am very worried.
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