By M. Giant
Michael goes to meet the Cayman Islands bank manager connected to the money that paid for his door bombing, but it doesn't go well; he comes at Michael with a couple of knives and ends up dead. Plus he wasn't the real bank manager in the first place, just an impostor who had himself smuggled into Miami and dropped off at a storage unit.
While Michael's trying to get that cleared up, he's approached by a Haitian dude seeking justice for the man who killed his daughter, now conveniently living in Miami under an assumed name. After initially turning down the job, Michael ends up approaching the bad guy by pretending to be someone whose job is protecting the fugitive's family. That way he gets into his house, but barely gets out alive again because he's busted. So Michael, Fi and Sam simply abduct the bad guy and ship him back home.
There's also a C-plot where Madeline rewires her car and helps the cops catch the burglars who stole the radio out of it, leaving Michael kind of blown away by his mom's self-sufficiency. Along with everyone else.
And this week's burn notice plot leaves off when Michael uses himself as bait at the storage unit to trap the guy who tried to kill him. Said guy gets away, but at least Michael knows who it is now: his old wrangler, Victor. Which would have been more of a surprise if Michael Shanks hadn't been listed in the opening credits.
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As Michael and Fi walk past some beach porn, he VOs, "Bribery is a lot more difficult than it sounds." It never sounded that easy to me, but let's let Michael finish: "There's no way to shop around, so you usually overpay for whatever information you're after. There's no money-back guarantee if the information's bad. And of course, the only thing that you know for sure is that you're handing your money to a thief and a liar." Which segues right into the usual method of early-episode exposition: Fi loudly whining about whatever Michael's doing at the moment so he can explain it to her, and, by extension, us, the viewer. Of course, you and I are smarter than Fi, so we can figure out for ourselves why Michael's prepared to give an envelope of cash to the banker who handled the money that financed Michael's assassination attempt. Which means we can probably gloss over part of this scene. It's not like we're going to find out how Michael got ten grand in the first place. "It's a tactical risk," he admits when she complains about his going in alone and unarmed. "I was warned not to meet you the first time," he reminds her. Yes, after I spent weeks of research and far too much of my own money developing a machine that would take me into the television and back in time. Obviously, it didn't work. "Yeah, I almost blew off your hand with a block of C-4," she recalls. "And I made a friend," he grins. "Maybe I'll make another one." Careful what you wish for.
He leaves Fi behind to walk into a multi-story parking garage, which is nearly empty except for a few parked cars and a nervous-looking guy standing by the railing wearing a suit and holding a manila folder. "Gustavo!" Michael calls to him, and the subtitles confirm that this is indeed "Gustavo -- Cayman Islands Bank Manager." He's a little young for the job. And he seems to be getting cold feet, telling Michael that he had second thoughts all through the flight. "You came here because I'm giving you a lot of money for a little information," Michael reminds him. "I just want a name, a few numbers, and you're back on a plane." Gustavo wants to know how Michael found him in the first place. "I have friends," Michael says, but Gustavo is still asking questions. So Michael realizes that this might not be Gustavo at all, and shows us how to check. "Change details that the other person would know," he VOs, and tells Gustavo, "We talked about this on the phone. I'm giving you...eight thousand dollars for a file. Part of what that money buys is privacy." Despite how obviously Michael telegraphs the fact that he's lying about the amount, Gustavo doesn't dispute it, and Michael gives him that scary smile from behind his sunglasses as he says the deal was for ten thousand. "And we never talked on the phone." Okay, he got me on that one. "You want to tell me who you are?" Gustafaux finally smiles for the first time, says, "I can explain," and reveals the knife he's been holding behind that folder. Michael's a little slow today, because Gustafaux manages to slash Michael's long-suffering left arm before Michael grabs Gustafaux's right and twists it, causing him to drop the knife. But Gustafaux also has a blade in the left hand, and Michael has to kick Gustafaux pretty hard to keep it away from him. The problem occurs when Gustafaux staggers backward towards the railing. "No!" Michael cries, seeing what's about to happen. He lunges forward, but it's too late; he's still repeating, "No! No! No!" right up until Gustafaux hits the pavement several stories below. Michael needs a moment; he's looking down at a dead dude, wearing a bloody shirt, and holding two sharp knives in his hands. And when he turns around to look at the manila folder Gustafaux dropped, he sees the pages blowing away. Blank pages. Michael returns to Fi's car, empty-handed and with another ruined shirt. "He didn't want to make friends," Michael understates as the Saab pulls away. Oh, and way to let Michael down, subtitles.
Later, Michael's back at the loft, having bandaged up the arm and fooling around with one of Gustafaux's knives, like he's trying to figure out how to stab himself in the left arm with his left hand. Seems like a good use of his time. Just then Sam enters with a fish. Seriously, it's a big honking fish, fresh out of the Caribbean. Apparently Sam's been out on a police buddy's fishing boat. Michael asks if Sam got anything else, and Sam does have some info: "Seems like the real Gustavo was found dead in a bar. I guess that's what you get if you run payroll for an assassin." He asks what to do with the fish, and Michael tells him to park it in the sink. "I figured you could use the protein," Sam says, as though Michael isn't perfectly happy subsisting on yogurt. Sam wasn't able to learn anything about Gustafaux, which means he was probably smuggled into the country. That sounds like an easy way to rule out all other possibilities. Michael says that's more Fi's department, and he just happens to be off to meet her for lunch at Carlito's right now. "Bring the fish," he says for some reason. "Maybe they'll cook it for you." Indeed, that fish might be big enough to offset as much as 5% of Sam's beer tab.
While coming down the stairs to the courtyard, they're met by Clarence Williams III, rocking a Haitian accent in place of his old <>Mod Squad afro as he introduces himself as Claude Laurent. He's heard about Michael and wants his help with something. "Several years ago, my daughter Veronique was murdered in Haiti. I am here to bring the man who killed her to justice." Claude has already lost Michael, since it's not like he can go to Haiti. He can't leave Miami because of the burn notice, never mind the nonexistent location budget for basic cable. But Claude persists, showing Michael a Miami scenester magazine with a photo of a man who he claims is Jean-Pierre Duman, living under an assumed name. He's also got a laminated letter from the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, which he wants to use to bring Duman back to Haiti. "Uh, Mr. Laurent, this is not going to work in an American court," Sam interjects. "Who is this man with the fish?" Claude asks Michael. Michael responds, "The man with the fish is right. You don't even have proof of Duman's identity." As Claude sputters, Michael tells him, "I'm sure Veronique would want you to go home and live out the rest of your life remembering--" Claude angrily interrupts, saying that Michael doesn't know his daughter. "You do not deserve to speak her name. They said you were an honorable man. They lied." Claude leaves, having succeeded in bringing the room down. Really, Michael, do you want to work with a drama queen like that anyway?
But at the restaurant, Michael's conscience is clearly bothering him, and so is the way Sam's looking at him. Sam just casually goes on for a while about some of the horrors he's heard about from Haitian prisons. Michael sips his beer. Which is a sign that something's amiss with him right there. For Michael, indulging in an actual beer is the equivalent of a lost weekend. Sam keeps pushing until Michael asks if Sam wants him to check it out. Of course, Sam has already made some calls from the bathroom (I don't want to think about how he dialed) and learned about some of Duman's hangouts. Just then Michael's own cell phone rings. "I need you to come over! There's been a break-in!" Madeline says his ear, using her usual phone voice, i.e., one of abject panic. Michael, sucker that he is, promises to be right there.
Somehow, he's still dumb enough to be surprised when he finds out that the "break-in" was to Madeline's car, which he didn't even know she still owned. "They took the tape deck, Michael!" she complains. Now how is she supposed to listen to her 8-tracks? She's got a plan, though; she was thinking they could work on it together, as like a mother-son project. "They're having break-ins all over the neighborhood. There's a real crime spree. And I thought that the two of us could look into it together." Michael offers to just get her a new stereo instead. When he continues to be uninterested in forming Westen & Westen Neighborhood Investigations, she asks him for a ride to the store, since the car won't start now. "Blame your father," she says. "He installed the radio. He wired the damn thing to the ignition." Michael looks at the tangled mass of wires spilling out from under the dash and bangs his head wearily against the steering wheel, considering all the ways his father continues to suck from beyond the grave.
At night, Michael and Sam are dressed up in suits and doing a little clubbing, watching Duman and his harem from a distance. Michael VOs, "Mass murderers come in many shapes and sizes, but they tend to drink the same brand of champagne." Oddly enough, we don't get to see what that brand is. Way to leave product-placement dollars on the table, show. [I'm sure any number of champagne bottlers would have liked to see a mass murderer drinking their product. Also, their criminal clientele would start avoiding it like the plague. - Z] While Michael watches the party, Sam provides some exposition on Duman: his father was a corrupt regional governor in Haiti, who died a few years ago. "Party boy there ran the local prison. Anybody complained, they went there. Lucky ones were just executed." Thanks for clarifying that Duman was in charge of only political prisoners, show; I'd hate to see things drifting into a moral gray area. Finally the subtitles remember their job, and come up with "Jean-Pierre Duman -- Thief." And then they amend that to "Thief/Killer," then "Thief/Killer/Fugitive." You're just throwing anything up against the wall right now because you weren't paying attention, aren't you, subtitles? Sam continues that the Dumans disappeared after the election, "With most of the island's GNP." He goes on to say that Duman is now living under the name of Luc Renard. "He chases skirts, throws parties at his place on Star Island." Sam is confident they can prove he's really Duman. "We just gotta get into his place." Michael wonders how that works, since they're talking about a rich guy who's probably very motivated to keep nosy people out. "Nothing worth doing is easy, and nobody loves easy more than me, but it's true," Sam says, whatever that means. Cut him off, Michael. Instead, he dials his cell phone. "Fiona, feel like coming to a party?" he says into it. This scene would probably be more entertaining if Sam were still toting that fish around, but we'll never get to see it again, I fear.
Later, Michael VOs about how people love to hear their native language. That's certainly true of me, which may be part of why I get so annoyed whenever Fiona talks. "Even the most security-conscious person often lets his guard down when he hears someone who speaks his language. If that someone happens to be in a designer dress, so much the better." Cue Fi, trying to get into the VIP area of the club where Duman is lounging with his honeys, and throwing a fit in French when Duman's bodyguards block her path. "Are these your idiots?" she calls to Duman in subtitled French. He answers in kind, "Yes, they are my idiots." "Tell them to go away," Fi Frenches. "Only if your idiots go away first," Duman replies, causing me to notice the two frat boys who are flanking Fi. She cuts them loose, telling them she'll see them later. "Nooo. No, you won't," Duman smarms. Now that they've switched to French-accented English for some reason, he flirts with her, pours her a drink, and introduces himself as Luc Renard. "Claire Neville," she responds. "Come! Party at my house," Duman announces abruptly, I guess because the very sight of Fi is enough to put him off clubbing for the rest of the night.
So things move to a big mansion, where amid all the crowds of revelers, Fi meets up with Duman again. She asks if he bought the place himself or if it's his family's, and rather than "talking business" he decides to take her on a tour. Upstairs, he tries to directs her attention away from his office by selling her the line, "I have the biggest bathtub in Miami." Fi suggests inviting a couple of friends along, and he goes to collect some. While he's gone, she saunters into his office, dialing Michael's cell phone to tell him what she's doing, which is not finding much. Michael, sitting outside in the Charger with Sam, tells her to get out, but she wants to stick around just long enough to plant a bug on the underside of Duman's desk. Just then, the party is interrupted by the sound of a crazy with a megaphone. Yes, it's Claude, standing on the roof of his rental car outside the gates and hollering, "This is the house of Jean-Pierre Duman! He murdered my daughter!" Fi steps out onto the balcony, where she can see both Claude and the front door, as Duman and about four of his goons come out, looking pretty irritated. And irritated in a lethally-armed sort of way. She tells Michael, "You have thirty seconds to get here before Duman kills a member of the Laurent family." Michael hangs up and tells Sam with a weary sigh, "You're driving my car back," as he gets out. He runs up to Claude's car and tells him to get in now. As the gate opens, revealing Duman's goons, Michael hits the headlight switch, blinding their night-adjusted eyes. He j-turns out of there while Duman's men start shooting. Luckily, they seem to be aiming at the spots in front of their eyes. Those spots will never disrespect them again.
Back at the loft, Claude asks Michael why he changed his mind. "He's an honorable man, just like they told you," Sam brags. "He's just a little slow sometimes." Claude asks what's , and Michael tells him to go back to Haiti and they'll take it from there. Claude stubbornly says he isn't leaving, and asks how they're planning to get Duman. "By getting him to give us evidence proving who he is," Michael explains. "You need to go home. It's better for everyone. You understand?" Claude says he understands. But he doesn't say he's going home. You'd think Michael would notice that.
At breakfast with Sam and Michael the morning, Fi is telling them about the trouble she's been having looking into who smuggled Gustafaux into the country. "The Miami gun smugglers and the Miami people smugglers? They don't get along. And I've always been more of a gun person." That leaves an opening big enough to drive a truck through, which Sam promptly does: "Sure as hell not a people person," he cracks. They're about to start fighting again, until Michael separates them by telling them to keep looking and miming a little DMZ between them with his hand. Fi takes off to continue her search. With the tension at the table thus removed, Sam tells Michael he's found something on Duman, which is that their prisons in Haiti were built by a multinational company called Flintridge Industries. "FBI's been nosing around them for years," he adds as Michael looks through the folder. Making a reference to early Season One, Michael asks, "You still in touch with those FBI agents that were on the Follow-Michael-Westen-around-Miami beat?" Sam says they didn't exactly part amicably. "Well, I think it's time to mend some fences, Sam," Michael says.
Cut to those two agents, on stakeout somewhere in the suburbs looking bored out of their curly-haired and oversprayed gourds, respectively. In fact, the Latino agent in the shotgun seat is fast asleep. Michael VOs, "If you've spent time working for the government, you understand that it's a game with its own rules. If you want to make the government work for you, you have to understand how the game is played." As an old woman in a housedress and pink headscarf comes out of the house across the street to check her mail, the VO continues: "An FBI agent might hate you, but if working with you gets him out of an assignment he hates even more, you've got yourself a partner." With that, Sam suddenly Axel Foleys right into the back seat of their car, startling Agent Latino awake and causing Agent Aqua Net to spill his coffee on himself. Sam mocks them a bit about the old lady they're watching. "What is she, like, 80? Did she steal somebody's dentures?" Agent Latino says this is a racketeering case, and they're after the biggest drug-smuggling family in South Florida. "Is she the boss?" Sam asks in a whisper of mock awe. "Boss's grandmother," Agent Latino admits. Sam messes with them a bit more, and then holds up the manila folder he brought with him as a peace offering, saying it's "a case you can take back to your office and be proud of." "This more crap like the stuff you gave us on Westen?" Agent Aqua Net asks bitterly. Sam insists he never lied to them. "Well, sure, I forgot some stuff," he says. He teases them with a little info about Duman, but when Agent Aqua Net isn't interested, Sam sweetens the pot. "I'll give you a time and a place. Watch out for granny." His work done here, Sam takes off.
Duman is having lunch at a restaurant with some women, who don't seem to mind that he's only making out with one of them. While this is going on, Michael VOs, "Being a fugitive takes work. When you're being hunted, hiding isn't something you can do effectively without help. So the best way to catch a fugitive isn't to approach him as one of the people hunting him down, it's to approach him as one of the people who can help him stay on the run." With that, Michael enters the restaurant wearing a light-gray suit, a lavender tie, and a conservative side-part. He sits down and asks the ladies to leave. "I have a very important meeting with Mr. Duman now." Nobody moves as Duman asks Michael who he is. "My name is Owen Matthews," Michael says, again not bothering with a character voice. "But the more important question is, who are you? If you don't want to have a very public, very uncomfortable conversation on that topic right now, I'd ask these ladies to leave." Duman dismisses them all with a suave wave of his hand, which never works for me. Once they've left, Duman angrily asks Michael what he wants. Michael hands Duman the Flintridge Industries folder and says, "When I find Jean-Pierre Duman sitting in a restaurant with FBI agents outside, it is my obligation to sit down." Sure enough, Agents Latino and Aqua Net are parked right outside in the drop-off spot, staring in and looking more curious than irritated at being used as props in one of Michael Westen's cons. Duman insists that his name is Luc Renard. Michel tells him, "It doesn't matter what I think. It matters what they think, because they're the ones following you. They're the ones who will be asking you questions." Duman starts to get up, but Michael grabs his arm, that same move that nearly got his own arm twisted off in Hitch. He claims that he works for some ex-Flintridge Industries employees who used to do business with the Duman family, and who don't want to end up in jail because Jean-Pierre Duman got careless and ended up nabbed in Miami. "I am here to help you, Jean-Pierre," he insists. He says he's been hired to redirect the trail that leads back to Haiti. Duman just tells Michael to let go. Having done what he can, Michael slips Duman a business card and tells him, "Call me." Duman watches him go, and then spares another glance for the FBI agents now staring in at him, as obviously and as incuriously as ever. Hard to believe those two never busted Michael.
Sam walks into Madeline's garage to find her busy untangling the wiring of her car. "Mike said you needed some help with your ignition," he offers. Madeline says she's on it. "You ever had your car broken into?" she asks. "No, mostly just broken," he answers, accurately enough. She shares some of the crime research she's been doing, and Sam irritates her further by pretending to be impressed. Frustrated with how long her project is taking, she says, "I have a partner stretching class in half an hour. Can you give me a ride?" Sam agrees to do that, and ends up getting roped into being her partner, and her ride back. Seems like Michael could have warned Sam about that.
Later, at the loft, Sam gingerly carries his sore ass over to a chair, admitting to Michael, "This body was not built for the hip adductor stretch." And then he puts a cold beer between his legs, claiming he needs to ice his swollen bursa sack. I think Sam might have his sacks mixed up. When Sam suggests that Michael help Madeline with the car, and Michael goes from grossed-out to avoidant, hiding behind a facepalm until the walkie-talkie on the table to him goes talkie. It's attached to the bug Fi planted in Duman's office, and they can now hear him yelling at his security people for letting the FBI get on his trail. One of them responds that they looked into the guy with the megaphone, pulled his plates, and traced him to the Golden Sunset Motel, where he's currently staying. We don't hear him explain how he was able to read license plates while being blinded by the car's headlights. Duman wants to go there now and take care of it. "Mike, Claude didn't leave Miami," Sam obviouses, and they get up to rush over before Duman gets there. Sam's still not moving too quickly, but at least the duct tape on Michael's chair didn't make him stick to it.
One Charger ride later, Michael and Sam arrive at the motel just in time to see Duman and his four guys climbing out of an SUV. Sam pumps his shotgun all hardcore, but Michael tells him to hang back. Sam doesn't think that's such a good idea for when the shooting starts. "I'm gonna see if I can keep the shooting from starting," Michael says, and gets out to meet Duman and his men. This should go well.
He intercepts them as they're about to enter the courtyard, saying, "Tell me you guys aren't this stupid." Disappointingly, they do not. Instead, Duman asks what he's doing there, and Michael says he's there because one of the motel's guests is "pretty pissed at the Duman family and causing problems for my client." And then he turns the question around on Duman. "Last we spoke, you hadn't even heard of the Duman family." He continues trying to talk Duman down, Duman continues trying to push past him, and finally Michael whips out a gun and points it at Duman's face. Surprisingly, instead of calming everyone down, this causes four other guns on Duman's side to come out a second later. "Aw, Mike," Sam groans frustratedly from the Charger. With his gun in Duman's face, Michael says he can't let Duman kill Claude, thus attracting attention from the FBI and the media. Duman asks Michael how he can change the past, and Michael gives a little speech about how he can take all the records connecting him to Haiti, "clean it, and hand you back a whole new you. A Jean-Pierre Duman who never has to hide again. Now choose. I can change your story --" he cocks the gun -- "or end it." I wouldn't think that pointing a gun at someone is necessarily the best way to win his trust, but Michael's the expert. Duman picks the former option, telling Michael to come to his house tomorrow. Duman and his men leave, so everyone can lower their weapons and take a deep breath. Sam heaves the deepest sigh of all; he nearly had to get out of the car for a second there.
Back at the loft, Michael is taking Claude to task for not leaving town like he said he would. Claude corrects Michael: he only said he understood. Well, Michael's a spy, not a lawyer. "You think your daughter wants you to get yourself killed?" Sam asks Claude. Claude says he's heard that before, when he wanted to go to the prisons and the newspapers. "I failed her before," he says. "I will not fail her again." Sam says it wasn't his fault, and he wails, "I was a coward!" He vows not to leave until Jean-Pierre Duman is returned to Haiti. As he turns to get ready to leave, Michael VOs, "Working covert ops, you learn to exploit weakness. You manipulate greed, fear, pride, to make people do what you want. But when you're dealing with true believers, those weaknesses aren't there. All you can do is help or get out of the way." I know which one I'd pick, but Michael stops Claude at the door and tells him it's not safe at the motel, and he should stay at the loft. Sam nods his approval. You know that saying about fish and unexpected houseguests? Kind of curious how Michael ended up with both in this episode.
Now Fi is on stakeout in her Saab, and calling Michael to tell him that she's found the guy who brought Gustafaux into the country. "I found where he keeps his boat, and he just arrived." This is "Gary -- Human Smuggler," according to the subtitles. Michael tells Fi to go easy on him. "You're breaking up," she lies, hanging up and tossing the phone away. As she drives up and gets out to approach Gary, Michael VOs about how spies are usually better off remaining unknown. "However, there are certain advantages to being known. A reputation can be a powerful tool." And it looks like Fi's using hers on Gary, who's suddenly in kind of a hurry to leave again. She introduces herself, but he's way ahead of her: "You shot up Paco's boat and you set fire to that guy's place up in Boca." I could probably look up the episode or episodes when those things happened, but my Fi-related mental block is preventing me from finding it. Fi acts all non-threateningly threatening, which is how she finds out what she needs to know about Gustafaux from Gary: he came from the Caymans, paid cash, and had Gary drop him off at a storage unit. "You wouldn't happen to have the address of that storage unit, would you, Gary?" she asks pleasantly. And the scene ends right there, because writers on this show don't like to make up street addresses if they don't have to.
Now Michael's in Madeline's garage, asking after his dad's power sander. Madeline's not fooled; she knows Michael's sander is better, and figures he's there to check up on how she's doing with her rewiring project. "I've seen guided missiles with simpler circuitry," Michael says, and offers to help, but Madeline declines and asks about Sam. "Your stretching class nearly killed him," Michael accuses. "What doesn't kill him will make him stronger," she says through a cloud of cigarette smoke, which Michael doesn't think counts. She invites him to join her while she goes to the police station to look at mug shots, but he begs off. "Michael, what is so important you couldn't do that with me?" she bitches. So Michael answers, "I'm helping a man find justice for his murdered daughter." Amazingly, Madeline seems to think that's an acceptable excuse. Clearly she's growing.
Back at the loft, Fi tells Michael that she found Gustafaux's drop-off spot without having to put the hurt on anyone. "My reputation precedes me, apparently," she Irishes vaguely. As she helps straighten his tie, he instructs her to call the storage facility and tell them that Gustafaux has died, and she's going to be checking on it after hours. Which I'm sure they'll be thrilled to hear.
A suited Michael walks in through the open gate to Duman's courtyard, taking in all the statues and fountains as he VOs about how hard it is for some people to let go of their past. "The same guy who will burn a village to the ground without a thought often won't throw away an old necktie because it reminds him of his high school graduation. If you know what you're doing, you can hang him with that necktie." Which is the first sign of trouble, as Michael is shown into the house; Duman doesn't seem to own any neckties that we've seen.
Inside Duman's office, Duman asks Michael how this works, and Michael explains that Duman simply hands over all his old records, and then Michael gives him new records. As he's explaining this, Sam is sitting outside in the Charger, listening in on the walkie-talkie attached to the bug Fi planted. Instead of being suspicious about the dude who wants to see all of the paperwork tying him to his crimes in Haiti, Duman pulls out a briefcase containing the mother lode: yellowed documents from back home. "My father wanted to burn them," Duman says, "But I thought perhaps one day..." Michael says that was the right move, and offers to take them with him so he can start cleaning. "But first, my father would like to speak to you," Duman says, snapping the case shut. Michael's rather surprised to hear that, as Sam moans out in the car, "Oh, no, Daddy's still alive." Way to do your homework, Sam. Duman explains that they buried someone else in his father's place. And now he's in the room, having brought along a small army of bodyguards Without which he'd still be pretty scary. "So this is the man who can change the past," he rumbles, staring right through Michael. Michael just nods and smiles, trying not to look as fucked as he feels right now. Daddy's done a little due diligence, and he asks why the people he called at Flintridge Industries don't know any Owen Matthews. Michael breezily says it sounds like a misunderstanding that he can quickly clear up. "Who did you talk to? Sam? Because Sam is who I talk to." As he offers to get him on the phone, he keeps babbling, "You know Sam, he's got the big office with the big windows? South side of the building, with the glass doors, You know, where you can walk right out onto the balcony." Huh, that sounds a lot like Duman's office, where Michael is now. Sam's getting the message loud and clear, as he steps out of the Charger with his shotgun and aims it at the window. Michael is standing right by that window as Daddy gets angrier and scarier. I think there might be a flaw in Michael's plan that I can't quite put my finger on.
Duman tries to intervene on Michael's behalf -- and his own -- but Michael knows that's not going to help, because Duman pere is nowhere near as dim as Duman fils. Michael VOs about the only thing that's on his side right now: "It takes a lot longer to pull a gun than most people think it does -- almost five seconds on average to draw and line up a shot. Whether this is good news or bad news depends on what side of the gun you're on." And during one of those five seconds while one of Daddy's men reaches for his weapon, Sam fires his own, shattering the office window and, instead of shooting Michael, providing him with an escape route while everyone else dives for cover. Michel drops from the balcony to the garden, and makes a run for it. A guy tries to intercept him in the yard, so Michael holds his hands up all peaceful while running up to him, then sucker-punches him to the ground as soon as he's in range. Meanwhile, Daddy's men are shooting at both Michael and Sam, the latter of whom provides covering fire from a handgun until Michael can jump in the open window of the Charger and they can drive off. Of course, once they're in the car they're completely safe. What are the chances Duman would have ended up living on a street that makes all cars that drive on it bulletproof?
Back at the loft once again with Claude and his team, Michael reports the bad news about the papers. "They'll have burned them by now." Claude asks if that means they're done, but Michael isn't. "The papers were just a way to get him to Haiti," he says. "I assume there are people who can identify him there without papers?" Claude confirms this, and Michael asks Fi if she can get Duman away from his bodyguards. "Oui," she says from where she's doing her nails on the bed. Michael asks Sam if he can get a truck. "I'll get us a convoy," Sam exaggerates. And now we begin the part of the show where Michael does what he should have done in the first place.
In the alley behind Michael's loft, he and Sam go to work on a panel truck as he VOs, "When you're abducting someone, transportation usually isn't the issue. There's no challenge to driving a truck with someone hidden in the back." Michael's cutting slots in the trailer's roof and removing the support beams as he goes on that the tricky part is getting them in the truck. "You can walk them in, drag them in, or let gravity do the work and drop them in." I see where this is going. Michael and Sam load up the back of the truck with cardboard boxes and a mattress. "I just hope it's not too comfortable," Sam says. I've ridden in worse, but not to Haiti.
Sam meets the FBI agents at Carlito's with a jaunty, "My guys in ties!" Agent Latino liked the information Sam gave them on Duman, but Agent Aqua Net says they can't do much without proof of who he is. "But unofficially, what'd you have in mind?" asks Agent Aqua Net. Sam gives them a big grin. Isn't it nice when everyone gets along?
Fi goes and finds Duman pouting at a bar, acting like she just ran into him by chance. She tries to chat him up in some phonetically-learned French, and "notices" that he seems kind of bummed out. Her fake sympathy gets to him because, as Michael VOs, "Spend time with corrupt, homicidal third-world political figures, and you hear a lot of self-pity." So Fi invites Duman to her hotel for a massage, and he accepts. Michael's VO adds, "Killers by and large are whiny losers." Wow, Michael's VO, are we suddenly jealous about Fi doing...what Fi does? "But that doesn't make them any less dangerous," the VO finishes. Uh, okay, then.
At the hotel suite, a bathrobed Duman locks his men out in the hallway and says he doesn't want to be disturbed. Fi has him lie face-down on the bed and close his eyes. As she exposes his shoulders, Michael's VO tells us about the sedatives found in OTC allergy meds. "In the right dosage, they cause a pleasant drowsiness. In the wrong dosage, they cause dizziness, hallucinations, and unconsciousness." Fi opens a little wooden box and pulls out a syringe with what is clearly the wrong dosage, if not several wrong dosages. She sticks an unsuspecting Duman in the back with it. He bucks and yells, making just enough noise to alert the guards outside before he's out cold. Fi goes out to the balcony and calls up to Michael, who lowers a rope ladder from the balcony above so he can climb down. Then he picks up Duman in a fireman's carry and hauls him to the balcony railing, tossing him over. The modified truck is parked in the alley three or four floors below, and Duman crashes through the weakened roof, just as planned. Sam gets in the truck and drives it away while Michael and Fi climb the rope ladder and pull it up, so that by the time the guards have broken in, there's nobody there. See what I mean about how this should have been Michael's first course of action? Sometimes I think he just likes to make things more difficult for himself.
Later, at the loft, Michael and Sam stuff a bound -- but still bathrobed --Duman in the Saab's trunk as he tries to scream through the duct tape over his mouth. "You're gonna be hoarse for your trial," Sam warns. "I guess you can't change the past," Michael adds smugly, and slams the lid on him. Michael tells Claude that Sam has a friend with a boat who will bring them both back to Haiti, although he fails to warn Claude that he might well end up walking back into his house schlepping a very large fish. Claude's satisfied now, and tells Michael his daughter would have liked him. "She was very brave." "Like her father," Michael says. Claude gets in the car and Sam drives off with his two Haitian passengers, naturally before anybody brings up the subject of doing something crazy like paying Michael. [Claude offered him money in the beginning -- maybe Michael kept it? ...Nah, probably not. - Z]
Michael then heads over to Madeline's house with his toolbox to help her out with the car. "I did it!" she crows. Michael can't believe it, but Madeline shows Michael some old wiring diagrams from her late husband's papers and tells him how she put everything back. "I don't know what to say," Michael says, examining the diagram. Even his voice-over doesn't have anything to add right now. Madeline has more good news: the burglars were caught, thanks to her recognizing them coming out of a neighbor's house and calling the police. Michael's just too impressed to speak as Madeline guesses that Frank wired the car like that so they would always need him. "Be more useful, you know? Part of the family. So did you catch yours?" Michael snaps out of his reverie and says he did. "Good for you, sweetheart," Madeline says proudly. Michael's wearing the bittersweet expression of a man who's realizing that his mom is growing up.
Sam once again returns to Carlito's to meet his two Fed acquaintances, whose entire part in the plan was apparently to make sure the Coast Guard stayed clear of the boat carrying Claude and Duman to Haiti. Sam gives them a little gift in return: a list of people who took kickbacks from the Dumans back in the day, provided by Jean-Pierre himself. It might even help them nab Duman, Senior. The agents say that's not exactly regulation, but they'll find a use for it. So now that they're all friends, Sam happily starts running up a federal drinks tab. The agents don't protest, but I think the fact that Sam is ordering mojitos instead of domestic beer might be pushing it a bit.
Nighttime at the loft. Michael and Fi are locking and loading as they prepare to leave for the storage place. Fi is, as usual, not on board with Michael's plan, which she describes as, "You using yourself as bait to see if whoever sent Gustavo after you takes another crack." It wasn't actually Gustavo, Fi. Try to keep up. Michael says that's what he would do. Does he not realize that whoever is after him probably knows what Michael will do, and so will want to avoid doing what Michael would predict? And shouldn't Michael try to anticipate that by doing something unpredictable? But of course anyone who knows Michael knows he would do something unpredictable. Clearly I cannot choose the wine in front of you, is what I'm saying. Anyway, Fi peers through the scope of a sniper rifle that dwarfs her, and imagines taking a shot at whoever's after Michael. "I need him alive," he admonishes, and they move out. But not before Fi murmurs, "I need you alive." Aw. Don't worry, Fi; if the show wouldn't kill you off when it had a chance, I think Michael's going to be okay.
At the storage facility, Michael crouches near one of the garage structures while across the way, Fi scans the roof with night-vision binoculars and comes up empty. Michael VOs, "If you suspect you're walking into an ambush, searching for where the bad guys are hidden is probably going to get you killed. Unless you get lucky and find them in the first place you look, you're dead." So Michael fires a flare into the air. "If you can manage it," he continues, "the best move is to make it impossible to hide." Sure enough, the flare reveals a figure practically right above Michael, who stands up and throws down a rifle before making a run for it. "He's on the move, Michael," Fi says as she watches through the scope. That's kind of an unhelpful remark, but somehow Michael guesses which direction that means, and runs along beneath his would-be killer. The sniper rolls off the roof to the ground, and Michael's closing in, but then the dude totally scrambles up the front of one of the buildings, pulling himself up by an air vent. It's a move so impressive that Michael can't duplicate it, but at least now he's got his quarry treed, right? As he follows along below, he explains what you need to do in a foot chase: "The trick is to stay in visual contact with whoever you're pursuing until they run out of gas." The guy makes another leap down to an air conditioning unit, and then to another roof. And then? Over the fence. His face is invisible during all this, giving us plenty of time to recall that Michael Shanks was listed in the opening credits. Michael's VO admits, "Of course, visual contact doesn't do you much good if you're separated by a 12-foot-high, razor-wire-topped fence." Michael watches helplessly as the man springs down onto a parked pickup truck, and thence to the ground and to a parked car. Before hopping in, he turns to face Michael. And sure enough, it's his old wrangler, Victor. But the subtitles simply identify him as "Victor -- Guy Who Tried to Kill Michael." Those subtitles are so totally phoning it in this week. Victor smirks and calls out, "You should change your workout, Michael. You're not doing enough cardio." Michael tells him to wait, but Victor just flips him a salute and drives off. Finally, Fi runs up to Michael and asks whether he saw him. "Yeah, turns out we've met before," Michael answers. The end.
Well, this raises a few interesting questions. Like, is Victor no longer on Carla's payroll? Is he now working for yet another shadowy organization? How will Carla react when she finds out who the killer is? And if and when Carla ever comes back, will the show be able to afford to pay both Tricia Helfer and the writers in the same episode?
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M. Giant is a Minneapolis-based writer with a wife, a son, and a number of cats that seems to have settled at around two. Learn waaaay too much about him at Velcrometer, or just e-mail him at M.Giant[at]gmail.com.