In last night’s Person of Interest, we went from ero to ninety in a matter of seconds. All of the radiating storylines came together at the New York Library for a fateful telephone call. Make that two fateful telephone calls. The Machine is no longer on the frit . It has rebooted and is now in a 24-hour “God mode.†The pivotal question is whether Reese or Root will control its power. The answer could very well be neither because The Machine may be tired of doing others’ bidding – it may try to control its own destiny.
The revised opening sequence was a clever way to tell the viewers that the game has changed. Reese and Finch are languishing with a lack of persons of interest to rescue. The Machine is desperately trying to communicate with Finch, but can’t break past the virus that is crippling its systems. It enters survival mode and is finally able to send out a set of numbers. The target is a man named Thornhill. It doesn’t take long for Finch and Reese to reali e that there is no Thornhill and that The Machine has manufactured this identity.
We take a couple trips back in time to when Finch was less jaded and less benevolent. Former Finch is moving on with life and looking forward to a future with his new fiancée, Grace. In the midst of his premarital bliss, he stumbles across his partner Nathan’s secret. Nathan built a backdoor to The Machine and has been trying to save the irrelevant persons. Former Finch strongly disapproves. The interactions between the two men were fascinating because their approaches to The Machine are so different. We see Nathan tormented and struggling with the burden of saving the persons of interest. Meanwhile, Finch is willing to let the persons be sacrificed for the greater good. Maybe he wouldn’t have felt this way if he knew Nathan popped up as “non-relevant.†It’s interesting that when Finch does accept the responsibility of protecting people, he approaches it in a different way than Nathan. Finch seems less tormented and more pragmatic.
The only part of the episode that didn’t work for me was the Carter storyline. It’s too easy to pull one over on Carter lately. She fell neatly into HR’s trap and is being framed for murder of an unarmed suspect. I’ve complained many a time about the HR storyline. This episode was just another example of why it doesn’t work. Reese and Finch are tied up with the fight for The Machine, so it feels like the writers want to find something to keep Carter busy. The solution is the overacted and half-baked HR conspiracy of crooked cops. I find it problematic that I can buy into the idea of a sentient machine that predicts the future, more than I can get onboard with the convoluted HR web of…. Web of what? That’s the main problem. What is the point of HR? What is its nefarious purpose? Feuding gangs of low level criminals is simply not as engaging as a technological conspiracy of global proportions.
Both Shaw and Root returned this week. I know a lot of people don’t like Shaw, and I am not sure why. Her character is not compelling, but it’s also fairly innocuous. She mostly lingers at the fringes and doesn’t interrupt the flow of the main characters or the action. Root is at her annoying enith. She’s got all kinds of cra y ideas about The Machine’s AI independence and is unhappy with Finch’s efforts to limit its capabilities. Now that she has received The Machine’s god call, we will hopefully see what she’s really after. Of course, since Reese got the same call, it will be an epic showdown to see who gets the upper hand. I feel like we are nearing the end of Root. I’m having visions of her taking a bullet and making some revelatory proclamation about the human condition with her last breaths. Of course, no one will listen because she’s totally insane.
The high points came from the characters’ interpersonal relationships. Reese is determined to protect Finch from Root. His overprotectiveness leads to one of the best lines in the episode: “When I care about someone, I plant a tracking device on them.†Reese also redeemed himself from last week’s questionable decision to allow the doctor to murder the hedge fund broker. Reese had a choice when the drone shot Thornhill’s car, and he chose to assist the victims rather than run off after the perpetrator.
There are a lot of questions that need to be answered in the finale. I have my fingers crossed that HR will finally be resolved. It would be great if we got a Finch/Grace present day run in. It’s also time to find out what really happened between Nathan and Finch. I know the Person of Interest fans are hardcore, so please share in the comments what you’d like to see in the finale and how you feel about the direction in which things are going.
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Person of Interest Season 2 Review “ ero Day”
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