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I’m from the DC area and every time I go back, I am taken aback by the drivers on the Beltway and their reckless disregard for human life. But man, I never get guns pulled on me like our FBI friends did. Oh, wait -- let me do what this episode did and flash back within the episode.
So nearly all the series regulars have been compelled to come east to D.C. and testify about their flashforwards to the Senate Intelligence subcommittee. We also learn that -- as befitting a man of his obvious badassery -- FBI Boss Dude Courtney B. Vance is not above throwing an elbow during a game of one-on-one hoops with his pal, the President of the United States. He is also not above lobbying for more funding for his office, as obsessive agents like Mark don’t come cheap, by holding the president’s past against him. More on that below.
We learn that President Peter Coyote has taken time out of his busy schedule of narrating Ken Burns documentaries to push for these hearings, in part because anything beats sonorously extolling the virtues of America’s parks for approximately 3, 472 hours and in part because he wants to prove that his administration has learned from the lessons of Katrina and 9/11. One of the lessons President Coyote learned: He would do well to appoint FBI Boss Dude Courtney B. Vance as director of Homeland Security. The latter reminds him that Senator Joyce Clemente (D-Hell) would have an issue with this.
We find out that her issue with FBI Boss Dude Courtney B. Vance has something to do with him having ferried $250,000 to President Peter Coyote’s mistress so she would disappear and take her Coyote cub with her -- after all, as John Edwards can tell you, the American public does not take to its national politicians fathering children outside their marriage.
So Clemente takes it out on Mark. In an uncannily accurate touch, the politicians are remarkably good at grandstanding without contributing anything useful to a public record.
We also learn that Mark’s last tumble off the wagon was prompted by a trip to D.C. and a stint testifying before Congress. If it was anything like his dressing-down by Clemente, I don’t blame him one bit. And if that doesn’t do it, his coworkers doing karaoke to “Sister Christian” just might. Anyway, Mark admits to FBI Boss Dude Courtney B. Vance that his flashforward is sketchy because he was sloshed to the gills, and this really irks FBI Boss Dude Courtney B. Vance.
(Does it irk him enough to text Olivia that Mark was drinking in his flashforward? We don’t know. It could have also been Aaron.)
Back in Los Angeles, Agent Gough’s handed over 18 years’ worth of satellite imagery to Janis, courtesy of Mr. Cheeto Dust’s extracurricular incursion. Once Janis manages to tear herself away from her gorgeous new girlfriend, she pores through the images and finds those funky, mysterious towers in Somalia.
And then, we finally work around to the point where we came in again. As Mark’s calling Janis to give her the good news about the funding, the car gets broadsided by an SUV simply teeming with Asian assassins. Then the car is blown up. Don’t worry -- the boys are all okay, and they manage to dispatch their would-be killers. Janis is listening to all this on the phone in when she’s set upon by two Asian assassins. She manages to take them both out -- BECAUSE SHE IS THE BADDEST BADASS ON THIS SHOW -- but she’s also been shot. As she slips into unconsciousness, she recalls her flashforward.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!So the episode begins by telling us "On October 6, the planet blacked out for two minutes and seventeen seconds. The whole world saw the future." Really? I'm not sure we knew this -- prior episodes have been pretty stingy with the premise.
Then we spend the minute rehashing the last four episodes -- apparently, the people writing this show worry that the viewers have been blacking out for 2:17 intervals and are therefore missing all the character motivations that have been revealed thus far -- and then finally, we get to the new stuff. The FBI gang (dude division), is in Washington, D.C., where they're eschewing the striking sight of the Lincoln Memorial at night in favor of hanging out in a parking garage, and Mark is busy insisting to FBI Boss Dude Courtney B. Vance that "What details I do remember, I remember clearly." As do we all, Mark, what with having seen them approximately 50 times in the past four weeks.
"Fabulous. Now just keep your mouth shut. You tell anyone else about this, we are DOA," says FBI Boss Dude Courtney B. Vance (AKA "Weddick," which is how I'll refer to him from now on unless you send me a message imploring me to bring back the overlong title). Mark looks puzzled, but moves on. He calls Janis to tell her that "Well, the whole trip's been a bit of a disaster," but there is good news. We don't get to find out exactly what that is because Mark's expository dialogue is rudely interrupted by a shiny black Chevy Ginormica SUV plowing into his car.
The Ginormica disgorges a quartet of snappily-dressed Asian assassins, and Demetri and Agent Vreede do the slow-mo dive-and-dodge-the-bullet thing where they elude certain death. The FBI sedan blows up, and ... scene.
Zip! It's 39 hours earlier. After a sunny, throwaway shot of the Capitol building (dome under construction following some incident, quite possibly flashforward related), the camera zooms to the bowels of some federal building where Weddick is complaining that yes, he understands why he has to go testify in front of Congress, but he really doesn't see the need for the FBI gang (dude division) to be hanging around this dreary standpipe at zero-dark-thirty a.m. Vreede opines that "this whole thing is one big Chinese fire drill." Without interrupting his study of his shoes, Demetri protests, "hey!" Vreede asks, "Is that inappropriate for the workplace?" Demetri replies, "No, no, no, it's cool. I know how you old people are." The bonhomie is cut short by some dude in a suit asking for "Demetri Fordis Noh?" Demetri says, "What do you want me for? I didn't see anything. I told you in my affidavit, man." Ah, but the suit guy thinks Demetri might have been lying. (Interesting point, and one I hope is explored as a subplot: people lying about their flashforwards for fun and profit.)
As Demetri goes in for his lie-detector test, we see Mark fiddling with his shiny seven-year chip.
Cut to Mark verbally recounting his flashforward -- "I was alone. I didn't think there was anyone else in the building" -- and then, we see Vreede saying the same thing. The lie-detector operator -- whose pallor suggests that the only light source he's exposed to comes from the screen he's reading, and he is therefore a) vitamin-D deficient and b) perilously close to being called Agent Smeagol by his peers -- seems intrigued by this. But Mark and Vreede's flashforwards diverge: Mark's hanging in his office, while Vreede is headed for the security exit. Mark recounts seeing the creepy mask people while Vreede claims not to have seen anyone else. Agent Smeagol asks Mark, "Did you recognize the men?" "I did mention they were wearing masks, right?" Mark replies. (Good one, Benford.)
Later, Mark's calling Aaron, who's at the Benford residence to fix Mark's alarm system and provide unsolicited homilies regarding the perils of being away from his AA meetings. The scene's also handy because Mark exposits that Weddick's testifying before Congress and Mark's there to help Demetri with "document support" because he is the one who dragged the L.A. office into the Mosaic caper by virtue of his "I saw it, therefore it has to happen!" nattering in re: his flashforward.
Meanwhile, playing the gravediggers to Mark's Hamlet are Demetri and Vreede; Demetri is lugging a box of documents up the Capitol steps and explaining to Vreede that it's "evidence. Weddick thinks he'll need it for his Senate testimony. He's afraid they're gonna take away our funding, in which case Mosaic is dead in the water." Vreede changes the subject with "I've never seen Weddick with a stick so far up his ass." Well, that might be because your name isn't Mrs. Weddick and what happens in the bedroom stays there, nosy parker. Demetri replies, "[Weddick] hates D.C. He used to live here -- apparently, it left a bad taste in his mouth. If you ask me, he's a dude with something to prove."
And apparently, he's proving it on the basketball court, as Weddick happens to be waxing the boards with Peter Coyote. Once the game is done, there is some small talk about the hearings. Weddick is concerned, but Peter Coyote dismisses his worries with, "Relax. This is Congress masturbating to the sound of its own voice." So, things snapped back to normal after the flashforward? Is that the point here? Weddick reveals that he's worried about losing his funding, and makes a hard pitch for Mosaic. Peter Coyote further spoils Weddick's mood by revealing that "Clemente's chairing these hearings, remember?" After an awkward pause, Peter Coyote asks, "You didn't know that?" "You think I'd set foot in D.C. if I did? ... All right, I would have. Because this is that important, Dave!" Weddick says. Peter "Dave" Coyote laughs dismissively and says, "The trusty boy scout is funny, coming from you." Oh, game two is ON.
And now, time for us to fly 3000 miles to the west and watch Janis wipe the floor of her dojo with some random guy. A sultry brunette watches appreciatively. Once the match is over, Janis is back by the woman's side, which makes the subsequent "Hey, I know you kicked my ass and I find it really hot, so let's go out" exchange all the more cringeworthy. Janis shoots the guy down. After he leaves, we hear her say to her lady friend, "What a douche." Amusingly, the closed caption reads, "What a mangina."
Cut to Janis back in the office, apparently weathering the fallout of having mentioned an upcoming date, as some random female coworker is practically panting, "What's his name? More importantly, does he have a brother?" The girl talk is interrupted by Agent Gough, who is handing over a USB drive with 18 years' worth of satellite imagery from southern Somalia, courtesy of the CIA. Janis can't wait to start poring through it in order to find anything that relates to the crow die-off in 1991, or can substantiate the alleged mass loss of consciousness. Off goes Lady Extra to begin the data sifting.
Meanwhile, back in DC, the FBI gang (dude division) is waiting in the White House press room along with reporters and various other hangers-on. Weddick would like to know where Mark is. Demetri tells him that Mark's back at the hotel: "He said photo ops make him constipated." "Tell him to get in line," the unsympathetic Weddick replies. He does not add, "And consider adding more greens to the diet. Fiber is your friend!" On Demetri's other side, Vreede is gloating, "I wish my fifth-grade teacher could see me now. Always said I'd either end up dead or in prison." "There's still time, my friend," Demetri replies. (Hee.)
So we find out that Peter "Dave" Coyote is, in fact, the president. We cut to an unimpressed Weddick giving him the fisheye, but Peter "Dave" Coyote did not get to be commander-in-chief by cowering before wrathful glares, so he just carries on with his press conference, blithely throwing the Senate under the bus for closing the flashforward hearings, but conceding that maybe, national security issues will be discussed. The question is: "Three weeks since the blackout and there's still no centralized agency to deal with the consequences. What is your response to critics who say that your administration hasn't learned from 9/11 or Katrina?" If Peter "Dave" Coyote were a presidential smartass, he'd say that his response is that the critics are doing a heck of a job, Brownie. Alas, he's too distinguished, so it's all blah blah vague action-oriented statements, threat of cutting off funding, blah blah blah, capped with "When I finalize my vice-presidential choice, he or she will supervise these efforts." The last question rings out as President Peter "Dave" Coyote leaves the podium: "Why aren't you sharing what you saw in your flashforward, Mr. President?" And that's how we find out that "Like many other world leaders, I'm following a policy of not revealing what I saw. I'm thinking about the present, not the future. We have too much to do." We see his flashforward, though: Peter "Dave" Coyote is in bed, in lurid purple satin pajamas, with a sleeping woman to him. A secret service agent wakes him with "Sir, something terrible's happened."
Back in Los Angeles, we get an Aaron and Olivia scene that is, frankly, heavyhanded and boring: Olivia frets about Mark, Aaron holds forth on the nature of alcoholism, and the upshot is that Olivia is not dumb: she thinks Mark is beginning to distrust her based on her presumed future adultery, and she is beginning to distrust whether he can stay sober.
Zip! We're back in D.C. Weddick's been escorted into the Oval Office and he's saying to Peter "Dave" Coyote: "Let me guess. You remembered you owe me and you had a change of heart about helping me out." Peter "Dave" Coyote says patronizingly, "Stan, we're not on the campaign trail anymore. We're inside the Beltway. You have to be a little subtler about calling in our chits." Weddick reminds President Peter "Dave" Coyote that he's some 2800 miles to the west of the Beltway. Not for long, maybe. President Peter "Dave" Coyote says, "You're right about me helping you out, and you're right about me owing you one. But my plan is gonna bring you right back inside the Beltway. I always felt really bad that I couldn't bring you on board initially ... you know, the Chinese view chaos as opportunity, and the blackout gives me the chance to pay you back: Director of Homeland Security and member of my cabinet." Weddick is calm to the point of pre-comatose as he responds, "I'm pretty sure Clemente will block my appointment." President Peter "Dave" Coyote brushes aside that concern. Weddick is still not planning on printing up new business cards just yet.
Janis is on her date with her lady friend from karate, and her date has brought Janis to the restaurant where she works. How handy that must be! The list of professions where you can bring your date to the office for a fun night is dismayingly short. We find out that Janis isn't exactly out at work: "I work for the federal government, and they're not too big on trusting gays with guns." (The captioning reads "'Don't ask, don't tell' is still very much alive." Which is, you know, more accurate and just as shameful.) The date says, "Maybe six months from now, we'll all be more enlightened. In my flashforward, I'm here in the restaurant, but I have a wedding band on my finger." Cut to Janis laughing awkwardly, because really, who enjoys being rushed to the altar? The date recognizes this: "That was way too much information, especially for a first date." When she tries to change the subject -- "What did you see in your flashforward?" -- Janis deflects with a joke and then the rest of this scene degenerates into an L-Word outtake: Self-conscious dialogue (check), mention of the celebrities the characters would like to sleep with (check), dramatic and premature statements of commitment (check). Dear Flash Forward: Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas weren't the last word in witty lesbians. There are plenty in Hollywood. Please hire them to punch up your dialogue. Thank you.
day: now we're at the Senate hearing. We get a shot of Senator Clemente (D-Hell) and she is looking like she would rather be sponsoring a bill to make burning-at-the-stake part of federal employees' annual evaluations. One poor bureaucrat is carrying on about how her agency has eliminated the "maybe someone put a psychotropic in the global water supply" hypothesis, and her very expression seems to suggest that she only now realized how dumb that idea sounds when it's spoken aloud. A second agency head posits that aliens are responsible. A third (the CIA) blames the Chinese -- this is all a crafty scheme to bring down the American government and give the Chinese run of the planet.
Clemente then announces a short recess -- possibly so she can physically yank her eyeballs out of their rolled-up position -- and spikes it with a dart in Weddick's general direction: "He's heading up an interesting investigation that has diverged significantly from the methodology deployed by the rest of the bureau."
Cut to Weddick in an antechamber, bitching over the phone that "it's all Kabuki theatre. Now I remember what I hate about D.C." Mister, that isn't even in the top five reasons to hate D.C. -- where's the venom for the hideous, near-constant congested traffic? The terrible Redskins? The laughable Nationals? The ever-shrinking Washington Post? The tourons who don't know that it's "walk left, stand right" on the Metro? ANYWAY. Felicia counsels Weddick to "just remember who you are. Hold your head high -- you're a good man," but the pep talk is cut short by Clemente strolling on over to say hi. They have a loaded conversation:
Weddick: Joyce
Clemente: Senator, actually.
Weddick: Has anyone ever told you you're a sore loser, Joyce?
Clemente: Look who's talking. You're the one who got put out to pasture. Speaking of which, how do you sleep at night, knowing what you did with that woman? Does your wife know? If I could have proved what you did six years ago, I would be sitting behind the desk in the Oval Office right now.
Weddick: Well, if it makes you feel any better, I doubt you would have gotten a second term.
Clemente: "If you sit by the river long enough, you'll see the bodies of your enemies float by."
Weddick: Sun Tzu.
Clemente: Get ready to float, Stanford.
Weddick: You wanna go after me, you give it your best shot. But Mosaic --
Clemente: -- is a joke. Not everyone's visions are going to come true.
Weddick: Most people don't agree.
Clemente: Most people didn't see what I did. I saw myself as president in six months.
I love it. I truly do, because we know Weddick is a bad-ass, and so is Clemente. And who knows if she's lying? Or if she misinterpreted her flashforward? Whatever it means, IT IS ON. We all need to start bringing popcorn to our Thursday night TV hour. And you in the forums! Open a line on which one will come out on top.
Mark comes over right then, and helpfully says, "[I heard] enough to know I don't want to be the one in Joyce Clemente's gun sights."
And, oh ha ha ha, guess what happens in the very scene. Weddick is trying to sell his interesting investigation by pointing out that it's based on people's visions, and that the Mosaic collective will help the FBI construct a picture of what the world will look like on April 29, 2010. Clemente instantly leaps onto his back because Weddick didn't bother to get "prior approval or authorization." Weddick stolidly insists that it's gotten results, and Clemente makes an ad hominen attack with "I forgot -- you're an 'ends justify the means' kind of guy, no matter how questionable those means may be." You know, you can't really treat that like a crime in Congress unless you're willing to call out several of your coworkers. Weddick calmly replies that "the means merely means using the future we've seen to guide our investigation of the blackout ... One of our agents had a flashforward of himself investigating the cause of blackout. He remembers leads and investigatory paths that we won't have for another six months. Those leads have already lead to significant breaks in the case."
With the delivery of a woman who suggest that she's had it up to here with theories of dosed water supplies, sinister Chinese plotting, puckish aliens and now federal investigations that were foretold by the future, Clemente suggests that maybe, she should hear from the agent with the flashforward. Weddick protests that he's the deputy field director, which Clemente rolls right over, and adamantly insists he's the one who's leading the investigation. It's a valiant effort, but Mark will soon be up before the podium. All he needs is a bullseye on his chest. Weddick tells him, "Just tell the truth, Mark. It's gotten us this far."
Out on the west coast, we get confirmation that Janis's date went well enough; Maya comes out of Janis's bedroom and takes over breakfast-cooking duties for her. Janis protests that she's not totally useless -- "I can break down a Sig Sauer in 12 seconds" --
and there is some pre-commute canoodling, which is both sweet and impressive, as that implies Janis has enough of a handle on time-management to not have a morning rush out the door. Oh, wait, I wrote too soon: her alarm goes off and Janis dithers about how she can never set it right and oh, no wonder she's always late. She's off to the office, but tells Maya she's welcome to "eat food, rifle through my stuff. Just lock the door when you leave." Maya makes a tentative date for the two of them at the Merton gallery later that evening.
And now, Mark's testifying. He fills everyone in on what they know so far (Suspect Zero and his crazy friend, the crows dying ... you're all familiar with this), and second-banana senator asks, "You're investigating this because you had a vision you're investigating this?" Well, yes. Clemente would like to know "What led you to assume your investigation amounted to anything?" When Mark points out that his vision shows two people after him, presumably for what he will know, Clemente repeats incredulously, "Six months from now, masked gunmen are going to burst into your office in a secure federal building and try to kill you?" Mark steadfastly contends that's what he saw.
Janice rolls into the office, endures a bit of hazing over her date from Lady Extra and Agent Gough, then finds out that the satellite imagery has something very interesting: a set of towers, seemingly in the middle of nowhere.
Mark's grilling continues. Clemente shrewdly notes that Mark doesn't seem to have a very firm grasp on the details of his own flashforward -- odd, given the specificity others have demonstrated with theirs -- and hammers him for a while on this. We see Mark's flashforward (again) and it's finally clear why it's so blurry and disjointed: Mark is not only "drinking again," he is completely pickled. She concludes that it's sort of irresponsible to go ask for millions of dollars "based on somewhat murky flashforwards." And honestly, I am sure that Clemente's only going after Mark to damage Weddick, but if a little responsible financial oversight happens as a side effect, is that so bad? Anyway, Weddick is so furious at Clemente's dressing-down of Mark, he snarls, "How dare you?" and storms out.
The shot is of Vreede and Demetri flanking Mark as they walk down a hall. Weddick is still MIA. Vreede is sympathetic to Mark, but Demetri points out, "When you hear it laid out like that, it does sound kind of questionable. Like we consulted the psychic network for clues or something." Mark wryly thanks Demetri for his support, and Demetri insists that "It sounds nuts: dead birds, D. Gibbons, doll heads --" "China, that's starting to sound pretty good right now," Vreede interjects. Mark's like, "So it was a mistake to mention the dolls' heads," but before the others can razz him too much more about it, Janis calls with news of what she and the west coasters have found in the satellite footage. She shares it with him over some presumably speedy and secure network: in the five months prior to the 1991 blackout, a starfish-shaped cluster of towers went up in Wajid, Somalia. Very curious, eh? As Janis says, "It's the last thing I'd expect to see at a place that doesn't even have indoor plumbing." So the images are now headed to the FBI forensics department, and they'll also come in handy for putting on pressure to send an investigatory team into the area.
Weddick finally departs the Capitol at sunset -- no word on whether he's been reading the paper in the bathroom this whole time -- then pulls out his phone and tells Janis, "I need you to do something for me right away."
The Merton gallery. Janis comes in, Maya and she exchange embraces, and then Maya hands over a bag with something she picked up because it made her think of Janis. That something: one of those alarm clocks on wheels that rolls around the room and tells you to wake up. Awww! Cute! Then Maya keeps the relationship moving at the speed of light: "I Mosaic-ed you ... it's way better than Google stalking. I saw that five months from now, you'll be, you know, pregnant. And as talented as I may be in the bedroom -- " "Yeah, that'd be pretty impressive," Janis admits. "Maybe [the baby] is ours," Maya suggests. Not helping the situation any, she adds, "For what it's worth, I think you're going to be a great mom." That is not what Janis needed to hear. She tells Maya, "This isn't a me/you thing, this is a me thing, and I haven't even figured out what I'm going to do. You know what? I don't think I can do this right now? I'm sorry. Really sorry." Janis leaves the gallery. AS SHE SHOULD, because Maya seems like the type of person who spent all day writing "Mrs. Maya Hawk," "Maya and Janis Hawk," "M. Hawk" over and over. Or, if she's at work, maybe piping it as coulis on hapless diners' plates. AFTER ONE DATE. Run, Janis!
Back in DC, we see Weddick knocking on a townhouse door. A woman opens it with "Hello, Stan. It's been a while." He tells Renee hello, asks if he can come in, and then, when he sees a small, pajama-clad boy, says happily, "My man! Hello, my man!" He picks him up with a huge hug. GRAAAH! Weddick has a secret family!
And then, Weddick's back in the Oval Office, knocking back cognac with the president and referencing their shared history with "A long way from $2 beer night at Geno's." You know, if he's such a pal of the president's, you'd think Weddick would be like, "So! Guess what Clemente saw in her flashforward?" President Peter "Dave" Coyote admits, "My first term was a bitch. I could've used you then. I couldn't bring you in. But I can now." Weddick is not swayed by sweet talk of cabinet positions. He lays down a picture of Renee sitting on President Peter "Dave" Coyote's lap and says, "I'm not here about the job." President Peter "Dave" Coyote says bitterly, "So no more boy scout. How'd you find her?" Weddick points out, "I was the bagman who paid her a quarter of a million dollars to disappear. Only she didn't go far. She's living with the boy -- right here in Georgetown." Weddick adds that he found this out via Mosaic, and President Peter "Dave" Coyote gets a look on his face that suggests he'll make it disappear like Yahoo did Geocities. (For what it's worth, Renee Garrigos will be living in Puerto Rico six months hence.) President Peter "Dave" Coyote remarks casually, "You know what I liked about having you around, Stan? You weren't just comfortable in the mud. You enjoy being there." My, what smug talk from a man who evidently paid his mistress and mother of his child $250,000 to disappear. (But how relieved am I that this isn't Weddick's secret family?) (And how relieved should President Peter "Dave" Coyote be that Renee Garrigos is no Rielle Hunter?) Weddick says coolly, "Clemente is going to cut off the funding unless you stop her, so stop her. And the negative goes into the shredder." President Peter "Dave" Coyote points out that Weddick can only "play this card" once. The president is dumb: if Weddick is as dirty and ruthless as Clemente and Coyote seem to think, there's nothing stopping him from having Renee murdered and linking the hit to the president. A murdered mistress and a cover-up is a lot worse than a live, secret family. Anyway, Weddick's sure he wants to play his card: "Now's all I got." He lets himself off.
We see President Peter "Dave" Coyote look at the photo, then pick up the phone and tell someone on the other end, "I've got a problem I need you to take care of."
Cut to the "Moderne" bar, where Vreede is rocking the hell out of a karaoke version of "Sister Christian" -- oh, the time has come indeed! I will gladly be the only one to say, " ... Okay." Demetri is drunkenly cheering him on with, "Do it! Do it, old man!" Looking as though he's regretting every single minute he's ever spent sober, Mark grouses that he hates karaoke. He tells Demetri to maybe slow down the drinking, and Demetri tells him, "I've got five months to live. I think I'm entitled to blow off a little steam." Or take the harmony in "Sister Christian," which he actually does. They're motoring! Yeahhhhhhh, motoring!
We
ddick sits down and promptly gets into a fight with Mark. Benford's pissed because Weddick went storming out of the hearing, Weddick's pissed because Mark wasn't exactly a star witness. Weddick goes huffing off again, past Vreede and Demetri, who happily sing, "How does it fe-eeel?" as he storms by. (They've moved on to "Like a Rolling Stone.")
So Benford brings the fight to Weddick: "Why didn't you call for a recess? You could have spoken up!" Weddick not unreasonably asks, "And said what? There's a perfectly good explanation why you're having trouble remembering something the rest of us have lasered into our brains? See, this is my own damn fault: Clemente is just asking you questions I should have asked you weeks ago, but I didn't. Because I trusted you. And I went with this whole Mosaic thing in the first place because I believe in you, Mark." Mark deflects with, "And I've gotten you results," but it's a dodge, both men know it, and Mark finally has to admit that the reason he can't clearly remember his flashforward was because "I was loaded, okay!" Weddick looks terrified -- both at the revelation that one of his best agents will be poaching his own liver in hooch and at the realization that he's staked his ace card to a project based on the recollections of a future drunk. Mark blahblahs about how he never wants to drink again, but Weddick's shellshocked: "I put my entire career on the line based on your flashfoward, and now you're telling me you were impaired when you had it? I don't know what I'm doing anymore." (I really love Courtney B. Vance's performance here. Yes, Bambi Fiennes is doing a fine job as someone who's trapped in layers of self-loathing, but Courtney B. Vance is just devastating as someone who's just become horribly aware of how vulnerable he is.) Vreede and Demetri come in, asking if everything's okay, and Weddick shakily says, "Everything's fine. Why don't you buy yourselves a couple of rounds on me? It's celebration time." Vreede asks what they're celebrating, and Weddick says quietly, "I got us our funding." He drains his drink as Mark sits there looking remorseful. Boy, this is going to be a fun flight home: two hungover agents, one AD barely containing his simmering rage and Mark.
And then, Los Angeles. Olivia gets an anonymous text telling her that Mark was drinking in his flashforward. Is it Aaron or is it Weddick? Or did Demetri and Vreede hear Mark yell? I look forward to finding out who's dropped the dime.
And now, it's the capital, at night, where we came in. Mark is busy insisting to Weddick that "What details I do remember, I remember clearly." "Fabulous. Now just keep your mouth shut. You tell anyone else about this, we are DOA," Weddick replies. We get a new detail: President Peter "Dave" Coyote, AKA "President Segovia" just announced his VP nominee: Joyce Clemente. This is an evil-genius move (Weddick got his funding, but look who's giving it out), and I can't wait to see if Weddick uses Joyce's presumed flashforward against her or to influence the president. Weddick weighs on the deal with, "Everything's a tradeoff. This town's your ultimate 'can't get something for nothing' place."
Back in L.A., Janis is enduring one of the universe's little jokes -- a woman wheeling screaming baby in a stroller as Janis walks home. Her phone rings, and it's Mark, with the conversation we saw earlier. Then -- boom! The Chevy Gigantica hits the car, the Asian hit squad disembarks, the FBI gang (dude division) scrambles to escape their sedan before it's incinerated.
Janis hears all of this, but then she gets distracted as she's beset by two Asian assassins of her own. Janis handily takes out the first guy -- while in high heels, no less -- but the second one shoots her in the stomach and she drops on the ground to her groceries and that little rolling alarm clock. But before she passes out, she manages to shoot (and kill) the guy who plugged her.
We then cut back to D.C., "Like a Rolling Stone" kicks into high gear, and the FBI gang (angry dude division) unleashes leaden hell: "Dammit, we're not getting the deposit back on the rental car! Do you know how many forms we'd have to fill out?"
But here is the thing I'm curious about: Everyone is shooting because, presumably, they had flashforwards* and so they're confident today is not the day they're going to die. So what is the point? We didn't see any dead hitmen, so they all live to kill another day. I would have really liked to have seen one person die and for it to rattle everyone else as they realized that the future's not guaranteed.
Janis is down, eyes staring up at the sky as that little alarm clock does wheelies through a rapidly-expanding pool of her blood and chirps "It's time to get up." As she gasps in pain, she recalls her flashforward and the moment she learned the fetus is a girl. We zip to the flashforward, where Janis is struggling to compose herself. Back in the present, Janis is struggling to breathe.
Aaaaaand -- done. Will she survive? Will Maya use this as an excuse to re-enter Janis's life? Who dispatched the Pacific Rim Posse? Stay tuned.
(* Demetri excepted)
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