Episode Report Card Sobell: B+ | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Half In The Bag
By Sobell | Season 4 | Episode 2 | Aired on 09.01.2008
And now, Lincoln recaps what the situation is for the benefit of those of us with really short attention spans: "The housekeeper saw the device while she was leaving the house. She disappeared back inside the house for fifteen seconds." "So we know wherever it is, it's close to the door?" Dr. Sara asks. They'll go on that assumption, yes. Mahone and Sucre outline the challenges of getting into the Tuxhorne estate with its state-of-the-art security. Bellick astutely -- and glumly -- notes, "It's getting pretty clear why they hired a bunch of cons to do this job. It's not because they wanted it off the books. It's because we're expendable. Who's going to care if a bunch of crooks wind up dead?" Everyone wanders off, leaving Michael alone with Linc at the big table. He says to Linc, "That quote from the Odyssey... I can't shake that line: all that avails is flight. What if flight is our only option, Linc? What if our father, after everything he discovered about the One World Conspiracy, what if that's what he finally realized?" Linc replies, "The one thing I remember most about Dad was the back of his head, always walking out the front door. Always running from something -- Mom, us, himself. But the one thing he never ran away from was his belief that the One World Conspiracy needed to be taken down. And we've got an opportunity to do that." Now that Linc's addressed that complaint, Michael's got a new one. He gestures around at everyone and says, "This is our fight, not theirs." Lincoln points out, "This isn't Fox River. These guys chose to be here. Remember that. They've got a choice."
We cut to a montage of Michael using his big brain to scheme well into the night, and then we see two vehicles pulling out of HQ in the cool half-light of early morning. Linc and Sucre hop out of the SUV and begin scaling a fence near the Tuxhorne mansion. Dr. Sara drives on in a sedan, stopping only long enough to disgorge Michael and Mahone. They also lurk in some bushes.
And then it's caper time: Sucre and Linc somehow manage to get right up next to the house. Ah! It's not the Tuxhorne house but the place next door. Linc jimmies a side door open and sets off the alarm. The security agents go scampering along, which leaves the other side door comparatively uncovered, so Michael and Mahone head toward that. When Stuart clomps downstairs, he turns off his alarm so he can go outside and see what's going on. Michael and Mahone just waltz on inside. Mahone's quick surveillance of the place is derailed when he sees a framed photo of a little Tuxhorne and his hallucinations rear their head again. This time, he sees the photo of his son (the one that got waterlogged in last season's finale) and just keeps staring. It's up to Michael to collar Charybdis and snap Mahone out of it so the two of them can flee undetected. Everyone manages to get picked up before the security team can catch a bead on them. Caper pulled off!