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Bones 9.14: "You Cannot Drink Your Glass Away"

The most profound line in Bones 9.14 tonight comes from a chess mentor who tells Sweets: "You cannot drink your glass away."  The mentor says it's supposed to be an old Russian saying.  I have no idea if it is - nothing comes up when you Google it, except a page in which the word "glass" does not even appear.  But it's a great saying, I think, anyway, because it embodies Bertrand Russell's Theory of Logical Types, which, among other things, helps us understand that a container is different from things it contains.   A glass contains liquid, and that's what we drink away or consume, not the glass.  Similar to a garbage can, which contains stuff that we want throw out, but not the can itself.   Anyway, Bertrand Russell, were he still alive, would have liked that line in tonight's Bones, and so would have a few Greek philosophers, too.  (And if you're interested in garbage cans and theory of logical types, you might enjoy this little essay.)

As it is, Sweets is the most contemplative in tonight's show.  His reentry into the world of chess - his affinity for chess being the glass that he cannot drink away - goes a big way to helping solve the case. That solution, in turn, harkens to another ancient Greek theme - the Oedipal complex, or a son's passion for his mother.   The killer of the chess master turns out to have a fatal weakness - he doesn't want to sacrifice his queen, which in this case turns out to be not only the piece on the board, but the son's mother, who might well have left the son in favor of the master, at least in the son's psycho vision.

So although the lab work made its contribution in tonight's episode with Bones and the assist of the droll Canadian intern, the real star of the plot was human psychology, the Greek tragic kind, and well analyzed by Sweets.

The other element worthy of note is Cam being selected as "outstanding woman of science" - an obvious and frankly absurd slight of Bones, who's understandably annoyed.  Cam, to her credit, is sensitive about this, while Angela, not to her credit, thinks Bones just has to accept that these things happen.  And Booth's opinion is much like Angela's.   I know - that's the pc thing to do.  I know an editor of a magazine who withdrew himself from an award competition, because he had already won so many times.   But what's the logic of that?  Give the award to second-best person?   In the end, it all works out sort of ok in this episode, and there's a good laugh involved, but I would have preferred a resolution in which Bones got the award, period.

Because genius such as the kind Bones possesses deserves to be recognized always and not drunk away in a toast to collegiality.   Hmm, did Bertrand Russell or the ancient Greeks have a theory about that?

See also Bones 9.1: The Sweet Misery of Love ... Bones 9.2: Bobcat, Identity Theft, and Sweets ... Bones 9.3 and NCIS 11.2: Sweets and Ziva ... Bones 9.4: Metaphysics of Death in a Television Series ... Bones 9.5: Val and Deep Blue ... Bones 9.6: The Wedding ... Bones 9.7: Watch Out, Buenos Aires ...Bones 9.8: The Bug in the Neck ... Bones 9.9: Friday Night Bones in the Courtroom ... Bones 9.10: Horse Pucky ... Bones 9.11: Angels in Equations ... Bones 9.12: Fingernails ... Bones 9.13: Meets Nashville, and Wendell

And see also Bones 8.1: Walk Like an Egyptian ... Bones 8.2 of Contention ... Bones 8.3: Not Rotting Behind a Desk  ... Bones 8.4: Slashing Tiger and Donald Trump ... Bones 8.5: Applesauce on Election Eve ... Bones 8.6: Election Day ... Bones 8.7: Dollops in the Sky with Diamonds ...Bones 8.8: The Talking Remains ... Bones 8.9: I Am A Camera ... Bones 8.10-11: Double Bones ...Bones 8.12: Face of Enigmatic Evil ... Bones 8.13: Two for the Price of One ... Bones 8.14: Real Life ... Bones 8.15: The Magic Bullet and the Be-Spontaneous Paradox ... Bones 8.16: Bitter-Sweet Sweets and Honest Finn ... Bones 8.17: "Not Time Share, Time Travel" ... Bones 8.18: Couples ... Bones 8.19: The Head in the Toilet ... Bones 8.20: On Camera ... Bones 8.21: Christine, Hot Sauce, and the Judge ... Bones 8.22: Musical-Chair Parents ... Bones 8.23: The Bluff ... Bones Season 8 Finale: Can't Buy the Last Few Minutes

And see also Bones 7.1: Almost Home Sweet Home ... Bones 7.2: The New Kid and the Fluke ...Bones 7.3: Lance Bond and Prince Charmington ... Bones 7.4: The Tush on the Xerox ... Bones 7.5: Sexy Vehicle ... Bones 7.6: The Reassembler ... Bones 7.7: Baby! ... Bones 7.8: Parents ...Bones 7.9: Tabitha's Salon ... Bones 7.10: Mobile ... Bones 7.11: Truffles and Max ... Bones 7.12: The Corpse is Hanson ... Bones Season 7 Finale: Suspect Bones

And see also Bones 6.1: The Linchpin ... Bones 6.2: Hannah and her Prospects ... Bones 6.3 at the Jersey Shore, Yo, and Plymouth Rock ... Bones 6.4 Sans Hannah ... Bones 6.5: Shot and Pretty ... Bones 6.6: Accidental Relations ... Bones 6.7:  Newman and "Death by Chocolate" ...Bones 6.8: Melted Bones ... Bones 6.9: Adelbert Ames, Jr. ... Bones 6.10: Reflections ... Bones 6.11: The End and the Beginning of a Mystery ... Bones 6.12 Meets Big Love ... Bones 6.13: The Marrying Kind ... Bones 6.14: Bones' Acting Ability ... Bones 6.15: "Lunch for the Palin Family" ...Bones 6.16: Stuck in an Elevator, Stuck in Times ... Bones 6.17: The 8th Pair of Feet ... Bones 6.18: The Wile E. Chupacabra ... Bones 6.19 Test Runs The Finder ... Bones 6.20: This Very Statement is a Lie ... Bones 6.21: Sensitive Bones ... Bones 6.22: Phoenix Love ... Bones Season 6 Finale: Beautiful

And see also Bones: Hilarity and Crime and Bones is Back For Season 5: What Is Love? and 5.2: Anonymous Donors and Pipes and 5.3: Bones in Amish Country and 5.4: Bones Meets Peyton Place and Desperate Housewives and Ancient Bones 5.5 and Bones 5.6: A Chicken in Every Viewer's Pot and Psychological Bones 5.7 and Bones 5.8: Booth's "Pops" and Bones 5.9 Meets Avatar and Videogamers ... Bad Santa, Heart-Warming Bones 5.10 ... Bones 5.11: Of UFOs, Bloggers, and Triangles ... Bones 5.12: A Famous Skeleton and Angela's Baby ... Love with Teeth on Bones 5.13 ... Faith vs. Science vs. Psychology in Bones 5.14 ... Page 187 in Bones 5.15 ...Bones 100: Two Deep Kisses and One Wild Relationship ... Bones 5.17: The Deadly Stars ...Bones Under Water in 5.18 ... Bones 5.19: Ergo Together ...  Bones 5.20: Ergo Together ... Bones 5.21: The Rarity of Happy Endings ... Bones Season 5 Finale: Eye and Evolution




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Banshee 2.4: Sneak Preview Review

Continuing with my sneak preview reviews of Banshee - this time, episode 2.4, set to air January 31, 2014 - courtesy of a screener disk provided by Starpulse. As always, these reviews will deal in generalities and avoid specific spoilers.

Among the highlights of Banshee 2.4, which in general was a great episode as far as plot development and keen phrases from characters:

The murderer of the Kinaho girl is identified and brought to justice, by more than one hand.One of the best outfits for Job, who delivers some of his best lines, too.Young Hood gets some good advice, and some good loving, too.A major character is leaving - though you never know the future - and leaves in a memorable way, in addition to a brief intersection with Job, which come to think of it is symbolically memorable, too.An even more major character returns.  You'll be able to easily guess who that is.As has been the case all season, there's continued important development of Amish-Kinaho relations, and Proctor continues for my money to be one of the most interesting and charismatic characters on all of television.   I can't say the same for the Banshee police force, though, who continue to be a little behind the eight ball.   It's understandable that Hood of course is not versed in proper police procedure, and Deputy Brock does what he can, but there's a dumb police move in Banshee 2.4 which, although it sets up important and dangerous plot possibilities which are always welcome, shouldn't have occurred in the first place.


And I'll be back here between January 31st and February 7th with my sneak preview review of episode 2.5.
See also Banshee Season 2 Premiere: Sneak Preview Review ... Banshee 2.2: Sneak Preview Review ... Banshee 2.3 Sneak Preview Review


Like crime stories that involve the Amish? Try The Silk Code

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Revolution 2.12: Eugenics and Lubbock

A fine double-barreled Revolution 2.12 tonight, with stories booming out West and back East.

Out West we have the targeted typhoid outbreak, meaning the Patriots are using it to eliminate undesirables - the physically weak - from the population.  If we needed any more evidence that the khaki-suited Patriots are really American Nazis, working either for themselves or whatever other power, this is it.   Best of part of this story is seeing Monroe's son step up to a major role in getting the cure, which he doesn't quite get - yet - but shows some smarts and bravery in the attempt so far.

Meanwhile, back East, we get the best Tom and wife Julia story we've seen so far, including Tom and Julia taking matters into their own hands to save their starving son just two years after the blackout in a strong backstory.  Best part of that is Julia's telling Tom he has to use his advantage - his smarts not just his physical strength - in enabling their family to survive.

Back in the present, though, Tom and Julia seem to have been outwitted by Patriots, with both of them taken into custody and separated by the end of the episode.  I don't believe for a second that Jason has been killed - he's too good a card for the Patriots to hold - but Tom and Julia look like they're in desperate straits.

How will they get out of this?  Well, we see Tom out West and smiling in the coming attractions, which means not only that he broke free but Julia and Jason are alive - otherwise he wouldn't be smiling, right?  And how did that happen?  The nanites have beckoned and coerced Aaron to go to Lubbock, Texas - presumably not to see Buddy Holly - and that must have something to do with this.  Looking forward to next week.

See also Revolution 2.1: "The Last Surviving Friend" ... Revolution 2.2: Reanimation ... Revolution 2.4: Nanites and ... Maybe Aliens? ... Revolution 2.7: Firestarter Aaron vs. the Creepster ... Revolution 2.9: The Boy and the Attitude ... Revolution 2.10: Mexico and More ... Revolution 2.11: Captives and Nanites

And see also Revolution: Preview Review  ... Revolution 1.2: Fast Changes ... Revolution 1.14: Nanites and Jack Bauer ... Revolution 1.15: Major Tom and More 24 ... Revolution 1.16: Feeling a Little Like the Hatch in Lost ... Revolution 1.17: Even Better Nanites ... Revolution 1.18: Whodunnit? ... Revolution 1.19: Cheney's Bunker ... Revolution Season 1 Finale: Good Pivot




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Intelligence 1.3: Edward Snowden and 24

A good Intelligence 1.3 last night, in which the targeted character is a woman who wants to defect to the Chinese and give them a hard drive with all kinds of US intelligence secrets.   Sound familiar?  Well, the character is transparently based on Edward Snowden, who went to China and wound up in Russia with a boatload of all kind of confidential information.

The Snowden story is still in hot dispute.  Some consider him a traitor, and would lock him up if not bring him up on treason charges if the U.S. ever got its hands on him.  Others consider him a hero, seeing as how he revealed that our NSA is spying on us, in some part illegally, as it amasses "meta-data" collecting the numbers and times of every phone call we make, etc.  Given that Daniel Ellsberg is correctly regarded as a hero for his release of the Pentagon Papers, which showed the lies upon which our involvement in the Vietnam War was predicated, I tend to put Snowden on the positive side of the ledger.

Not so in Intelligence 1.3, in which his surrogate character - played by Annie Wersching, aka Renee Walker of 24 - is at best portrayed as a confused woman, and subject to all the criticism leveled against Snowden, such as why didn't he stay and face the music in the U.S. (as did Ellsberg), and the irony of defecting to a country that has such low respect for freedom of expression.   (See my Fraudulent Hunt for Snowden for my views on that.)  But it was great to see Wersching back on television - she's had brief stints in the new Dallas and Revolution - and makes me wish she'd be in the new 24 due on TV in May, which she can't unless 24 pulls another Tony.

But back to Intelligence - the game changer is the follow-though of an ominous flicker at the end of the first episode:  Mei Chen is at large, and her chip is a slightly improved over Gabriel's - since it's newer - which opens up a good plot facet.   In episode 1.3, the collective intelligence of our team, especially Gabriel's insight, is enough to get the better of Mei, but this will not necessarily be the case in the future.

Good continuing story, and I'm looking forward to more.

See also Intelligence Debuts ... Intelligence 1.2: Lightning Changes




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The Blacklist 1.12: DNA Meister

A close to science fictional Blacklist 1.12 tonight - which in my book is always a plus - as Lizzie and the team hunt "the alchemist," a guy who makes people disappear by putting their DNA and other biological evidence into the bodies of people he's murdered.  The FBI etc then think the people with the original DNA are dead.   This is in effect a witness protection program par excellence - except the protected are criminals that the police very much want to capture.  I'd say this is one of the best story set-ups thus far on The Blacklist, so good it could have been the basis of a movie, and maybe someday will be.

It also makes quite an episode on The Blacklist, which is good in other ways.  First - or last - we have the revelation at the end of episode of Meera as the FBI mole.  This was pretty obvious for a while, but it's good to see it out in the open - or, at very least, in Red's huge bank of knowledge.

And we also have another nail in the coffin of Lizzie and Tom's marriage.  It's an impossible marriage, can't work, and would be that way even if Red liked Tom.   Lizzie is way too committed to her work - which she should be - for a marriage with Tom, who, though he gives lip service to understanding the importance of Lizzie's work and her need to do it, doesn't really care too much about that at all.   His having an affair with the presumptuous photographer is almost a relief, even if he gets cold feet at the last minute, which is also a possibility.

But if Lizzie and Tom can't work, whom will she have?  I'm betting Ressler, even if he does seem to be getting back with his girlfriend.  And as far Tom - I'm still thinking, in fact more than ever, that before this series is over, he'll wind up on Red's blacklist himself.

See also The Blacklist Debuts: Alias Meets Jay Z ... The Blacklist 1.2: Mysteries ... The Blacklist 1.3: Construction Site Heights ... The Blacklist 1.6: Truth and Enigma ... The Blacklist 1.7: Natural Immunity ... The Blacklist 1.8: The Father and the Husband ... The Blacklist 1.9: Field Transfusion ... The Blacklist 1.10: Those Words ... The Blacklist 1.11: Red's Retribution




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The Following Is Back for Its Second Season

Season 2 of The Following premiered tonight.   It's been advertised as even more graphic and brutal than the first season - a little hard to imagine, especially for a series shown on the still suppressed networks in comparison to cable - but in some ways it was.  Not just because of the slash killing of five on the NYC subway by two guys wearing Joe Carroll masks, but even more because of the slow dancing by one of the Following with an actress he recently killed, clad now in a black bikini.  Scenes like this indeed put The Following in a class of its own, going further than, say, Dexter in being psychologically unnerving.

Speaking of Dexter, the actor who played Dexter's apprentice Zach Hamilton in its final season - Sam Underwood - plays a killer who has become Ryan Hardy's problem in duplicate on The Following.   One of the twins does the dance with the limp bikini, and together they promise a wave on horror in the weeks ahead. Emma, one of the most intelligent and disconcerting psychos from the first season, is back, too.  And by the end of the premiere, it's established that Joe is, too.

On the side of the angels aka law enforcement most of the time, Mike is back, and Ryan's niece is introduced as an NYPD intel expert.  James McDaniel - who played one of my favorite characters on NYPD Blue - is back with the police, and it's good to see him in a more commanding role than he had in the short-lived Detroit 1-8-7.

The gist of the plot so far is that Ryan is resisting requests to help the formal police investigation of the subway and bikini killings, because - as we shortly learn - he and his niece are secretly investigating Joe on their own.   I at first thought Ryan was doing this to protect Mike from further harm - feeling guilty about the death of Debra last season - but if that's what's motivating him, why would he let his niece get involved?  And the meaning of Ryan putting on the Joe Carroll mask at the end is, what, not that Ryan is willing to kill an innocent to get Joe, but that he's certainly up for infiltrating the Following to get at Joe.

Otherwise, it's worthy noting that Claire presumably died of the injuries she sustained in the season one finale - but, as I always say, it's "presumably" because unless you see a head point blank blown to bits on television, there's always a chance that the person you think was killed, or have told was killed, is still alive.  After all, this is exactly what happened with Joe ...

See also The Following Begins ... The Following 1.2: Joe, Poe, and the Plan ... The Following 1.3: Bug in the Sun ... The Following 1.4: Off the Leash ... The Following 1.5:  The Lawyer and the Swap ... The Following 1.7: At Large ... 



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Bones 9.13: Meets Nashville, and Wendell

An unusually powerful Bones 9.13 tonight  - with barely a drop of humor (Booth's mention of "My Sharona" as an example of a lyric with a woman's name would be the most memorable) - and a secondary story so serious and memorable that it became, in effect, the primary story.

The primary story on Bones is usually the case.  Tonight it concerned the murder of a musician vastly more famous in the Philippines than he was in his own United States.  If this fame twilight zone sounds familiar, that's because it's actually the true story of Sixto Rodriguez, more famous than Elvis in South Africa, with an album selling more copies there than Abbey Road, and all but unknown here in his native Detroit.   In other words, much like the story in Bones, except Sixto fortunately wasn't murdered.

Bones did add a nice element to this real-life fable, though, with Sweets offering a kind of pop psychoanalysis of the recording artist, based on his lyrics and music.   While it doesn't quite put the finger on the killer, this Bones-meets-Nashville strategy does lead to a diverting romp through true love and the seamy side of the record business, which some would say is pretty seamy all of the time.

But this case proved to be secondary tonight to a heart-rending story about Wendell.   He comes to work with a broken arm from a game of hockey - an arm which broke, Bones realizes, because Wendell has a rare and deadly kind of bone cancer.

Booth and Bones have never been better as they try to counsel Wendell, and Booth in particular gives a talk from the soul about why life is worth fighting for that would move a stone to tears.  These kinds of episodes have always been one of the greatest strengths of Bones - catch you up, when you least expect it, with a story that grabs your heart, gives it a good wringing, and leaves you gazing at the screen with vision blurred.

See also Bones 9.1: The Sweet Misery of Love ... Bones 9.2: Bobcat, Identity Theft, and Sweets ... Bones 9.3 and NCIS 11.2: Sweets and Ziva ... Bones 9.4: Metaphysics of Death in a Television Series ... Bones 9.5: Val and Deep Blue ... Bones 9.6: The Wedding ... Bones 9.7: Watch Out, Buenos Aires ...Bones 9.8: The Bug in the Neck ... Bones 9.9: Friday Night Bones in the Courtroom ... Bones 9.10: Horse Pucky ... Bones 9.11: Angels in Equations ... Bones 9.12: Fingernails

And see also Bones 8.1: Walk Like an Egyptian ... Bones 8.2 of Contention ... Bones 8.3: Not Rotting Behind a Desk  ... Bones 8.4: Slashing Tiger and Donald Trump ... Bones 8.5: Applesauce on Election Eve ... Bones 8.6: Election Day ... Bones 8.7: Dollops in the Sky with Diamonds ...Bones 8.8: The Talking Remains ... Bones 8.9: I Am A Camera ... Bones 8.10-11: Double Bones ...Bones 8.12: Face of Enigmatic Evil ... Bones 8.13: Two for the Price of One ... Bones 8.14: Real Life ... Bones 8.15: The Magic Bullet and the Be-Spontaneous Paradox ... Bones 8.16: Bitter-Sweet Sweets and Honest Finn ... Bones 8.17: "Not Time Share, Time Travel" ... Bones 8.18: Couples ... Bones 8.19: The Head in the Toilet ... Bones 8.20: On Camera ... Bones 8.21: Christine, Hot Sauce, and the Judge ... Bones 8.22: Musical-Chair Parents ... Bones 8.23: The Bluff ... Bones Season 8 Finale: Can't Buy the Last Few Minutes

And see also Bones 7.1: Almost Home Sweet Home ... Bones 7.2: The New Kid and the Fluke ...Bones 7.3: Lance Bond and Prince Charmington ... Bones 7.4: The Tush on the Xerox ... Bones 7.5: Sexy Vehicle ... Bones 7.6: The Reassembler ... Bones 7.7: Baby! ... Bones 7.8: Parents ...Bones 7.9: Tabitha's Salon ... Bones 7.10: Mobile ... Bones 7.11: Truffles and Max ... Bones 7.12: The Corpse is Hanson ... Bones Season 7 Finale: Suspect Bones

And see also Bones 6.1: The Linchpin ... Bones 6.2: Hannah and her Prospects ... Bones 6.3 at the Jersey Shore, Yo, and Plymouth Rock ... Bones 6.4 Sans Hannah ... Bones 6.5: Shot and Pretty ... Bones 6.6: Accidental Relations ... Bones 6.7:  Newman and "Death by Chocolate" ...Bones 6.8: Melted Bones ... Bones 6.9: Adelbert Ames, Jr. ... Bones 6.10: Reflections ... Bones 6.11: The End and the Beginning of a Mystery ... Bones 6.12 Meets Big Love ... Bones 6.13: The Marrying Kind ... Bones 6.14: Bones' Acting Ability ... Bones 6.15: "Lunch for the Palin Family" ...Bones 6.16: Stuck in an Elevator, Stuck in Times ... Bones 6.17: The 8th Pair of Feet ... Bones 6.18: The Wile E. Chupacabra ... Bones 6.19 Test Runs The Finder ... Bones 6.20: This Very Statement is a Lie ... Bones 6.21: Sensitive Bones ... Bones 6.22: Phoenix Love ... Bones Season 6 Finale: Beautiful

And see also Bones: Hilarity and Crime and Bones is Back For Season 5: What Is Love? and 5.2: Anonymous Donors and Pipes and 5.3: Bones in Amish Country and 5.4: Bones Meets Peyton Place and Desperate Housewives and Ancient Bones 5.5 and Bones 5.6: A Chicken in Every Viewer's Pot and Psychological Bones 5.7 and Bones 5.8: Booth's "Pops" and Bones 5.9 Meets Avatar and Videogamers ... Bad Santa, Heart-Warming Bones 5.10 ... Bones 5.11: Of UFOs, Bloggers, and Triangles ... Bones 5.12: A Famous Skeleton and Angela's Baby ... Love with Teeth on Bones 5.13 ... Faith vs. Science vs. Psychology in Bones 5.14 ... Page 187 in Bones 5.15 ...Bones 100: Two Deep Kisses and One Wild Relationship ... Bones 5.17: The Deadly Stars ...Bones Under Water in 5.18 ... Bones 5.19: Ergo Together ...  Bones 5.20: Ergo Together ... Bones 5.21: The Rarity of Happy Endings ... Bones Season 5 Finale: Eye and Evolution




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Banshee 2.3: Sneak Preview Review

Continuing with my sneak preview reviews of Banshee - this time, episode 2.3, set to air January 24, 2014 - courtesy of a screener disk provided by Starpulse.  As always, these reviews will deal in generalities and avoid specific spoilers.

Among the highlights of Banshee 2.3:

The action picks up - if that's possible, given the intense action including beatings in every episode of Banshee - but episode 2.3 has a flat-out brutal murder, and thus sets in motion something of a classic whodunnit.   Suspects abound.The conflict between the Indians (Alex) and Amish (Proctor) picks up.  And, in fact, this is one of the best Amish episodes we've seen in a while, and maybe in the entire series.Come to think about it, it's one of the best Kinaho tribe episodes, too.Hood gets the worst unexpected jolt in the series thus far regarding the maintenance of his false identity.But Hood also gets yet more good loving.Getting back to the Amish, the situation of Banshee in an Amish community has to some extent been an untapped resource in the story.   Proctor is of course a major character, and one my favorites - as is Rebecca - but their Amish background is just that, background, and certainly in Proctor's case he could be just another mob boss with a strong code of ethics.   In episode 2.3, we finally get significant focus on the Amish community, because it figures so centrally in the murder.
The set-up of a town with an Amish as well as  native American population may seem a little much in the abstract - are there any towns in reality which actually have this duality? - but the double barrel works well in Banshee, and provides a compelling foundation for the tension and violence that erupts in every episode.   I like these stories a little better than the neo-Nazis and even more than the Rabbit story which played such a central role in the first season and will no doubt return in the second.  But, so far, I'm enjoying the second season of Banshee even more than the first, which is saying a lot, since the first was outstanding.
And I'll be back here between January 24 and 31st with my sneak preview review of episode 2.4

See also Banshee Season 2 Premiere: Sneak Preview Review ... Banshee 2.2: Sneak Preview Review


Like crime stories that involve the Amish? Try The Silk Code

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Revolution 2.11: Captives and Nanites

Revolution 2.11 continued the quintuplet set of parallel stories it sprouted last week, and which are now beginning to converge.

Three of the four involved captives.  Miles and Monroe are captives in Mexico, where the people are singing "Born to be Wild".   Charlie and grandpa get taken into custody by the Patriots, as Charlie tries to do her best for grandpa on a foolish mission to save an old friend, who, unbeknownst to Grandpa Gene, is already dead.   And back East, Jason gets himself taken into custody, presumably because he broke into his mother's new man's room, he being Chief of Staff to the President of the reconstituted United States.

The reason Jason did this has to do with one of the unifying roots of the four stories: the Patriots are implementing the beginnings of some kind of germ warfare to cement their hold in the new United States. That's what killed Gene's old friend.  Presumably the Patriots will give the vaccine to themselves and their loyalists, and wipe everyone else out.  This will be the scene in Texas - the Patriots ready to strike -  that Miles, Rachel, and Monroe, now joined by his son, will be returning to.   The Mexican thread, which gave us some good scenes with Monroe and his son Connor, should now fade into the past.

The standalone thread entails Aaron reunited with his wife, and learning much more about the nanites. As Grace explains, there are more nanites now loose on this planet than neurons in our brain.   They've begun to band together, to the point where they constitute a mind of its own, which, as Grace suggests, makes them equivalent to ... God.

It's a nice science fictional move, and it will be interesting to see if this new uber-Mind has an opinion about the Patriots.

See also Revolution 2.1: "The Last Surviving Friend" ... Revolution 2.2: Reanimation ... Revolution 2.4: Nanites and ... Maybe Aliens? ... Revolution 2.7: Firestarter Aaron vs. the Creepster ... Revolution 2.9: The Boy and the Attitude ... Revolution 2.10: Mexico and More

And see also Revolution: Preview Review  ... Revolution 1.2: Fast Changes ... Revolution 1.14: Nanites and Jack Bauer ... Revolution 1.15: Major Tom and More 24 ... Revolution 1.16: Feeling a Little Like the Hatch in Lost ... Revolution 1.17: Even Better Nanites ... Revolution 1.18: Whodunnit? ... Revolution 1.19: Cheney's Bunker ... Revolution Season 1 Finale: Good Pivot




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Intelligence 1.2: Lightning Change

Well, Intelligence lost no time showing us what kind of series it will be, changing its basic setup in a profound and riveting way in just its second episode, on Monday.

The setup of the series, brought forth in the first episode and developed through most of the second, is that Gabriel is looking for his wife Amelia, who never came back from a mission years ago.  He's convinced she's not only alive, but still working for the good guys, i.e., our side.   In another television age, such a scenario might have continued for more than one season, with the viewers being doled out just an episode or two per year that slowly moved the story forward.

In the case of Intelligence, the scenario didn't survive the second episode.   By the time Monday night's hour was over, Gabriel is reunited with Amelia, who is moments later apparently killed (I say "apparently" because unless you see the head literally blown off, you never know in television drama). She's also revealed as working with the terrorists, but then, in a final twist, Lilian discovers that she was trying to help our side - or maybe just wanted to see Gabriel one more time - and Lillian will apparently keep this information from Gabriel, presumably because she doesn't want him distracted.

This is a lot of television plot development for one episode, and Intelligence does it well.  Not only is it fun to see Josh Holloway (Gabriel) and Zuleikha Robinson (Amelia) back on the screen together after Lost, but the scene with Gabriel, Amelia, and Riley in the hospital room, with Riley taking decisive action, was an outstanding little piece of stunning television in itself.

Intelligence, like the new television of Almost Human and Person of Interest, brings us into its world with a preface explaining what the series is about at the beginning of each episode.   But if the lightning speed of the Amelia arc is any indication, Intelligence may be in a class of its own.

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