Is it me, or was that a very different sort of episode than the previous three? I liked it, but it felt very light on the conspiracy, heavier on establishing character and place. I wonder whether it would’ve been better to put the bulk of what happens in episode 4 earlier in the season? Bygones.
Of the conspiracy story, we do learn a few things, mostly surrounding the seven names that Will had asked his CIA friend Daniel to look up:
1. Two more names: Donald Bloom and C.M. Haddix, the latter of which could be a pseudonym, since he writes Tom Clancy-like mass market spy novels (I thought that was funny).
2. All of the people on the list were CIA, and had worked in the Middle East division in the 1980s.
3. One name was untraceable. Curious that this bit of information comes on the heels of Will meeting an old friend of Spangler who never uses his real name.
4. Three are dead — one of cancer, two in the line of duty (if I’m interpreting “stars on the wall at Langley” correctly, and I think I am).
5. Miles calls Bloom a slippery character, gives Will a copy of Bloom’s driver’s license (his address is in Arlington, VA — the things you notice in HD!) and says he flew into JFK a couple days ago.
Meanwhile, Katherine Rhumor is moping around her husband’s secret townhouse when the box of his belongings arrives, and underneath his bloody bathrobe she finds his cell phone, which still has two voice mail messages he never listened to. One is from her; the other from James Wheeler: “If you keep this up, you know what’s going to happen.”
THEN Katherine finds a menu for a nearby Chinese restaurant, visits it, and finds out that an order was delivered to the townhouse less than a month ago and paid for by James Wheeler. Dun dun DUNNNNN! Now she knows James lied to her when he said he didn’t know about the townhouse.
All this was interesting and forward moving, yes, but the real meat of the show was with Will’s team, tasked with assessing the risks in taking out an al-Qaeda leader. What I loved about this was how their intel-gathering and analysis was interspersed with Will’s trip to D.C. with Spangler to lobby for NSC support. I will admit that my comprehension of where API stands in relation to the CIA, et al. is foggy — I believe API is an independent intelligence agency, and what Spangler was lobbying for wasn’t government funding but assurances that they could continue to work outside the purview of Congress, that they wouldn’t be subject to the same oversight as the CIA would be. I think?
But my point here is that the thrust of Spangler’s argument was that API represents total objectivity — they simply analyze the data without feeling the pressures of an established relationship — they’re not going to write an assessment based on what they think the NSC wants to hear. (BTW, Spangler’s tie speech was inspired. Loved it. “We have no sartorial history” is a great line.) But it’s all the more compelling because Will’s team is actively demonstrating that such objectivity weighs heavily on the analysts responsible for interpreting intel in terms of whether one life is worth risking 300 other lives, especially children’s lives. It’s a moral question, but morals can’t enter into their assessment. I was pleased and fascinated by this philosophical turn.
Other observations:
* What was the deal with Will and his flirty/not-flirty lady neighbor? Are we supposed to think that someone else is spying on him, or are we supposed to think that HE thinks someone else is spying on him?
* OF COURSE Will drinks French press coffee. (Don’t ask me to explain that. But you know what I mean, right?)
* I’m so conditioned now to seek out clues in everything that I couldn’t help notice the flower stand behind Will at Grand Central Station called “DAHLIA.” Common crossword puzzle answer; the dahlia is Mexico’s national flower. What does it mean? WHAT DOES IT MEAN? (Minor potential quibble: that IS Grand Central, isn’t it? But I don’t think the Acela train to DC goes through there.)
* I liked that the briefcase subplot worked on a couple levels. Outside the conspiracy angle, it’s a nice mentoring moment, Spangler advising Will to get a more professional-looking briefcase, one that doesn’t advertise itself as trendy or expensive or one that has spring-lock clasps — Spangler is a man who knows his briefcases. And the follow-through when Spangler gives Will a briefcase that looks identical to Spangler’s own briefcase — again, nice mentoring moment, a generous gift to one’s protege.
Except you just KNOW that briefcase is bugged or has some sort of GPS chip in it.
Or maybe not. Sometimes a briefcase is just a briefcase. And darn it, I’m starting to rather like Truxton Spangler.
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