POI 3x07 and 3x08 watchalong
Jun. 20th, 2014 07:03 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kindkitEpisode summary in the post; comments will be here on my LiveJournal. Everyone's welcome to join in the discussion, but bear in mind that my co-watcher, ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
halotolerant, hasn't see S3 before. Don't post any spoilers for episodes beyond the ones discussed here, please.
3x07, "The Perfect Mark," by Sean Hennen
I'm not going to go into every detail of a plot-twisty episode, so this is just the highlights. The episode's number is Hayden Price, a "hypnotherapist" who is actually a con artist. He gets his clients to reveal information that helps him break into their bank accounts, and also runs other cons such one in which he fakes a shooting so that the mark will leave his money behind.
One of Price's clients/marks is Sven Vanger, an antiques dealer who also launders money for HR by buying fake antiques. Price tricks Vanger into buying the wrong lot, a baseball signed by the 1927 Yankees; Vanger, thinking he's bought another worthless item, sells the baseball to a young boy for $5. Later Price buys it back from the boy--clearly it was all prearranged--for $20.
Meanwhile, HR is closing in on Price, having discovered he's conning Vanger. Price wants to flee--the baseball scheme was meant to be his big score that would allow him to go away and start a new life with his girlfriend, Natalie Boal--but he won't go without Natalie.
HR orders Laskey, Carter's new partner, to kill Sven Vanger; Carter and Fusco fake the murder for him, but meanwhile HR kidnaps Natalie to force Price to turn over the ball. Shaw and Carter free Natalie while Terney and other HR cops have taken Price into the antique dealership to have the ball authenticated--but it turns out to be a fake, to Price's surprise. Reese and Shaw rescue Price and he calls Natalie, who reveals that she's been conning Price all along. We see her buy the real baseball from the boy for $100 and walk away. Shaw and Reese let Price go, suggesting he become a real hypnotherapist--but not in New York.
Simmons orders Terney to get Laskey and find the ball, or else. Terney goes to Laskey's apartment and discovers Laskey in the lobby talking to Carter about the evidence they've been gathering against HR. Terney kills Laskey but is shot by Carter. As he's dying, Carter persuades him to point out the head of HR--Alonzo Quinn.
Meanwhile, Finch is still holding Root prisoner in the library. She keeps insisting that the machine wants her to be free, and says that while neither she nor Finch can stop what's coming, they can at least be prepared for it if Harold would just trust her.
3x08, "Endgame," by Nic Van Zeebroeck & Michael Sopczynski
Condensing the plot to save my time and energy for talking about my reactions to the episode. So: Carter singlehandedly engineers a war between the Peter Yogorov's Russian mobsters and HR by stealing a shipment of Russian drugs that HR was supposed to protect, shooting at Alonzo Quinn to make him think the Russians were on the offensive, funnelling information on HR members to Yogorov, and then once Yogorov's organization is broken and his life is in danger, cutting a deal with him to get him to testify against HR.
Throughout, she refuses assistance and keeps Reese, Finch, and Shaw as much at arms' length as possible. But in the end, when she is betrayed to HR by the very judge she chose to issue the arrest warrants, we learn that at the last minute she did ask for Reese's backup. Reese helps her escape with the wounded Alonzo Quinn--they're planning to take him from the judge's suburban house to the FBI building in Manhattan because they can't trust the police--but in the process a police dashboard cam gets a good photo of Reese, and Simmons sends it out to HR and all its allies with orders to find and kill Reese immediately.
Interspersed with this, we see flashbacks from Carter's earlier life and police career, specifically her relationship with her ex-partner Paul, a troubled Iraq war veteran who refuses to get help. Carter has to refuse him access to Taylor until he seeks treatment; he finally does, and at the end of the episode we see that Taylor is staying with the now-recovered Paul while Carter deals with HR.
halotolerant, hasn't see S3 before. Don't post any spoilers for episodes beyond the ones discussed here, please.3x07, "The Perfect Mark," by Sean Hennen
I'm not going to go into every detail of a plot-twisty episode, so this is just the highlights. The episode's number is Hayden Price, a "hypnotherapist" who is actually a con artist. He gets his clients to reveal information that helps him break into their bank accounts, and also runs other cons such one in which he fakes a shooting so that the mark will leave his money behind.
One of Price's clients/marks is Sven Vanger, an antiques dealer who also launders money for HR by buying fake antiques. Price tricks Vanger into buying the wrong lot, a baseball signed by the 1927 Yankees; Vanger, thinking he's bought another worthless item, sells the baseball to a young boy for $5. Later Price buys it back from the boy--clearly it was all prearranged--for $20.
Meanwhile, HR is closing in on Price, having discovered he's conning Vanger. Price wants to flee--the baseball scheme was meant to be his big score that would allow him to go away and start a new life with his girlfriend, Natalie Boal--but he won't go without Natalie.
HR orders Laskey, Carter's new partner, to kill Sven Vanger; Carter and Fusco fake the murder for him, but meanwhile HR kidnaps Natalie to force Price to turn over the ball. Shaw and Carter free Natalie while Terney and other HR cops have taken Price into the antique dealership to have the ball authenticated--but it turns out to be a fake, to Price's surprise. Reese and Shaw rescue Price and he calls Natalie, who reveals that she's been conning Price all along. We see her buy the real baseball from the boy for $100 and walk away. Shaw and Reese let Price go, suggesting he become a real hypnotherapist--but not in New York.
Simmons orders Terney to get Laskey and find the ball, or else. Terney goes to Laskey's apartment and discovers Laskey in the lobby talking to Carter about the evidence they've been gathering against HR. Terney kills Laskey but is shot by Carter. As he's dying, Carter persuades him to point out the head of HR--Alonzo Quinn.
Meanwhile, Finch is still holding Root prisoner in the library. She keeps insisting that the machine wants her to be free, and says that while neither she nor Finch can stop what's coming, they can at least be prepared for it if Harold would just trust her.
3x08, "Endgame," by Nic Van Zeebroeck & Michael Sopczynski
Condensing the plot to save my time and energy for talking about my reactions to the episode. So: Carter singlehandedly engineers a war between the Peter Yogorov's Russian mobsters and HR by stealing a shipment of Russian drugs that HR was supposed to protect, shooting at Alonzo Quinn to make him think the Russians were on the offensive, funnelling information on HR members to Yogorov, and then once Yogorov's organization is broken and his life is in danger, cutting a deal with him to get him to testify against HR.
Throughout, she refuses assistance and keeps Reese, Finch, and Shaw as much at arms' length as possible. But in the end, when she is betrayed to HR by the very judge she chose to issue the arrest warrants, we learn that at the last minute she did ask for Reese's backup. Reese helps her escape with the wounded Alonzo Quinn--they're planning to take him from the judge's suburban house to the FBI building in Manhattan because they can't trust the police--but in the process a police dashboard cam gets a good photo of Reese, and Simmons sends it out to HR and all its allies with orders to find and kill Reese immediately.
Interspersed with this, we see flashbacks from Carter's earlier life and police career, specifically her relationship with her ex-partner Paul, a troubled Iraq war veteran who refuses to get help. Carter has to refuse him access to Taylor until he seeks treatment; he finally does, and at the end of the episode we see that Taylor is staying with the now-recovered Paul while Carter deals with HR.
