Cut to Reese in a NYC subway car, and now he’s shaggy-haired and in need of a shower. His voice asks: but when the right person is taken from you, what do you become then?
Some thugs who are up to no good enter the car and their leader, Anton, tries to filch Reese’s bottle of whiskey. In a display of supersharp reflexes, Reese grabs hold of Anton’s wrist and scares the bejeesus out of him. But does Anton walk away? No, he taunts some more until Reese flips out and displays straight kung fu style: he knocks three of the thugs out and has Anton in a chokehold, all in the span of five seconds.
The screen fades to fuzzy black and white, revealing that the entire scene has been filmed on security camera. And here we encounter one of the show’s major themes: civilian surveillance. The screen pans to hundreds of other black and white camera shots of ordinary life – the Brooklyn Bridge, the highway, a subway entrance, then a police station. Big Brother is always watching, and now we’re getting meta and watching people just like you and me being watched.
Inside a police station, we’re introduced to another main character, Detective Carter, played by Taraji P. Henson. She’s got no time for the four thugs who sit in the station, not knowing who or what hit them (maybe it was that feisty attitude, Anton). We find out “the bum” who is responsible for this is being held in the station for questioning. Det. Carter watches the tape of the subway brawl (Big Brother benefits law enforcement!) and knows right away that this “bum” is different.
She goes to question the mysterious man, who seems to know the drill already. She tells him she suspects he spent time in the service and tries to get info out of him. He’s short on words but he willingly drinks out of a plastic cup of water she has offered him. Det. Carter says she knows making the transition back from serving in the military is difficult. “Of course, some other guys I knew, they done so many evil things, they felt like they needed the punishment,” she says, while replaying the tape of his subway brawl.
In another room, she runs a background check using his fingerprints left on the plastic cup. Turns out his prints have been found at half a dozen crime scenes over the years, and he has open warrants in various countries.
Meanwhile, a stranger in a suit walks into the station and asks to see “my client.” Moments later, he walks out with Reese. When they are outside, Reese wants to know who’s responsible for this. The answer: “our employer” as Reese is put in a car and taken to a secluded spot underneath the Queensboro Bridge. A man in a dark jacket is waiting with his back to us.
And here we’re introduced to the third main character in the show: we hear his voice before we see him, and it’s unmistakable to anyone who was a fan of “Lost.” It’s Michael Emerson, playing Mr. Finch, a man who says he knows “exactly everything” about Reese: the government work he used to do, the assumption by everyone that he’s dead, and the fact that he has contemplated killing himself.
Reese is understandably freaked out and has no idea who this rich, bespectacled man is or why he brought him here. “Knowledge is not my problem. Doing something with that knowledge, that’s where you’d come in,” Mr. Finch says. He thinks they can help one another, and tells Reese he can give him a job.
Suddenly we’re in midtown, in the middle of a pack of commuters. Mr. Finch, who has a limp, waxes philosophic about how none of the 8 million people knows what’s coming next. Mr. Finch says he knows when someone is going to be involved in a murder or kidnapping. He points to one woman in particular, who is buying a cup of coffee from a street vendor and says she is at the top of his list this week. He doesn’t know if she’s the victim or the perpetrator, but she’s involved in some crime, and he wants Reese to follow her and stop it from happening. Reese, for his part, isn’t having any of it. He walks away, but not before drop-kicking two of Mr. Finch’s security men who try to stop him.
In what appears to be a hotel or a rented room, Reese is suddenly short-haired and shaven, resembling Jim Caviezel again. He’s watching a martial arts video and drinking himself unconscious with whiskey. Dreams of those gauzy curtains and that pretty woman in a tropical room again, in what we’d have to believe is a distant memory.
But a phone ringing wakes Reese from the dream, and he’s now tied to a headboard in a fancy room. The sound of screaming can be heard in the next room, a woman being attacked. Reese’s fighter instincts kick in and he frees himself and bursts into the other room, only to find the screaming is actually a recording. Mr. Finch is sitting with his back to us (what’s with showing us his back?). The recording is of a murder that happened three years ago. Mr. Finch says Reese was too late, then goes for the jugular and says, “Just like you were too late for your friend Jessica. You were halfway around the world when she was killed.” Ah, so that’s the woman in the tropical dreams?
Reese pins Mr. Finch against a wall and Mr. Finch pleads it’s the truth, and he’ll never lie to him, unlike the government. He offers Reese a chance to save the woman who will be in the violent crime this week – a chance to be there in time, he stresses. Reese looks angry and distrustful, but this time he’s listening. Why does he trust him? Maybe he’s got nothing better to do, and he’s obviously got the job skills.
They go to Mr. Finch’s office in an abandoned library, climbing an elegant staircase amid fallen books and scaffolding. Mr. Finch gives Reese driver’s licenses, credit cards, cover identities, and instructions on how to get money. On the wall is a list of social security numbers that are mapped out to a violent crime.
The woman who will be involved in the violent crime this week, the person of interest, is Diane Hanson, an assistant DA for the city. They follow her around in midtown again (they actually follow her a little too closely, but she’s oblivious). Reese says the quick way to learn all about the asset is: break into her apartment, download personal info from her computer, hack into her cellphone and use GPS to track her and listen in on her conversations. Oh, and a wireless camera tracks her everywhere. This show is clearly going to fan our neurotic flames.
The violent crime may have to do with the case Hanson’s working on – Lawrence Pope, who Hanson is prosecuting, who’s on trial for killing his friends in a drug deal. Is Hanson being targeted by Pope’s gang? Or is it her ex Wheeler, who works in the same office? Cue sudden, paranoid thoughts by those of you who’ve ever dipped your pen in the office ink.
Reese eavesdrops on a conversation between Hanson and Pope in his jail cell, and Pope attacks her and tells her to keep her mouth shut. Reese believes whoever framed Pope will be coming after her, and he seeks out Pope’s brother for more information.
Another cutaway to the dream sequence, and we learn that Reese and Jessica were on this getaway in Mexico when the Sept. 11 attacks happened.
More security camera shots transition us back to Hanson. Reese is spying on her and Wheeler in their office, while communicating to Mr. Finch by phone (he’s nothing if not a multitasker). But Wheeler logs onto Hanson’s computer while she’s not looking, and prints out some information. Something smells rotten in the Assistant DA’s office.
Reese finds Pope’s brother at his school and has to chase him down. He tells the brother he needs to come with him, and the brother yells to passersby that the man is trying to put him in a cab and take pictures of him (quick thinking, actually) so Reese lets him go, but not before slipping a cellphone in the brother’s backpack that will track him (who’s the quick one now?)
All of a sudden Reese is back in Mr. Finch’s office at the decrepit library. He travels fast. He decides to pay a visit to the thug he beat up, Anton, who is at a warehouse with others with a new shipment of guns. Reese uses some fancy firearm-work to take control of the situation, grab all the guns and go.
Mr. Finch and Reese overhear Pope’s brother being kidnapped by unknown men. Mr. Finch is bug-eyed and raising his voice on the phone, while Reese is calmly getting out of a cab at 97th and Riverside. In the coolest scene of the episode, he puts on a ski mask and whips out a rifle, and shoots at the SUV holding Pope’s brother. The car swerves, the two other men are injured, and Reese pulls out the brother unharmed. He realizes after taking one of the men’s ID that they are actually police.
Reese and Mr. Finch stroll through Central Park, and Reese tells him it’s a group of corrupt cops who are involved in narcotics deals. Pope is likely framed for a murder involving them.
Mr. Finch reveals that when the towers came down, he was working at a lucrative job. After Sept. 11, he was hired to design a machine to detect possible terrorist activity. But the machine was meant to prevent the next Sept. 11, and anything deemed “irrelevant” was erased. But that “irrelevant” list also pointed to violent crime, and has been eating away at him. “The machine is everywhere, watching us with 10,000 eyes, listening with a million ears,” he says eerily (it’s so good to have you back, Michael Emerson). He’s able to communicate with the machine to access the “irrelevant” list – just social security numbers.
Meanwhile, Det. Carter learns that the thugs were taken out by just one guy again, and she knows it must be her “bum.” Who is this guy, and what’s he doing on her turf?
Pope was killed in his cell, and Reese knows the crime involving Hanson is about to happen. He spies on an impromptu meeting in a deserted alley. It’s amazing how he never looks tired. In a twist, it’s revealed that Hanson isn’t about to be attacked. She’s actually the ringleader of the bad cops, and says the problem is now her ex, Wheeler, because he knows what’s going on. She gives the order to “take care” of Wheeler. Reese is uncharacteristically found out – one of the cops approaches him from behind. They gather around and interrogate him, then punch him while Hanson walks away, making threats that they need to clean up the mess.
Reese wakes up in the back of a police car, on the way to Oyster Bay. He tricks the cop driving the car, detonating an explosive. Hate when that happens! The car overturns, he crawls out and pulls out the cop, unlocks his own handcuffs, checks to see if the cop is wearing a bulletproof vest, and shoots him. It’s as if he’s done this a thousand times.
Now it’s Wheeler who is the person of interest. Reese goes to Wheeler’s apartment, but three of the bad cops are already there, ready to “take care” of Wheeler. They bring an ex-con whom Wheeler put away to do the actual deed. Wheeler is about to come down the elevator with his son, Henry. As the cops prep the ex-con to kill, Reese appears and takes one of the cops hostage, shaking his head at the other. Wheeler and Henry leave unharmed.
Then, a faceoff between Reese and the other cop, who is still holding the ex-con hostage. Reese lets two of the cops go. He tells the remaining cop he has no friends or family, so he’s got nothing to lose. Cut to a shot of the building’s entrance. We hear two shots, and the freed ex-con runs out the door.
In the courtroom, Hanson is about to give evidence on a recorded phone call. It turns out to be her voice, giving the order to “take care of Wheeler.” All is revealed.
Reese is in the police car with the cop he surprised on the way to Oyster Bay and let live. Reese tells the cop that it was his gun used to kill his partner at Wheeler’s apartment, the cop who everyone now thinks is in witness protection. But the body is actually in the trunk. So the cop has no choice but to bury the body, out in Oyster Bay. The cop must secretly work for Reese to protect his innocence. Reese has a mole on the inside now.
Reese goes back to Mr. Finch under the Queensboro Bridge. Mr. Finch says he’s been watching Reese for a long, long time. It’s revealed that the world thinks both of them are dead. “You’re not the only one that’s lost someone,” Mr. Finch tells him. He offers him an out – money to disappear if he no longer wants to continue. The alternative is a mission that will probably result in both of them being dead.
In the final scene, Det. Carter is putting the remaining bad cop in a car and telling him she needs to find the guy who acted alone. Reese overhears, and knows she’s now on his tail. He stares at a security camera and the screen pans out to a server farm, with row upon row of data being collected and stored.
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