We open with a John Doe Montage. Where did he come from? He woke up on an island off the coast of Seattle. Sars would happy to know that we do, in fact, see Doe's bare naked butt in all its glory. ["I missed the episode! KHAAAAAN!" -- Sars] Doe's talking in the first person about the things he didn't understand: how he knows everything; why he's been branded with a Sign; and why he's colour-blind. The woman with the blue scarf waves frantically. He says poignantly, "My name is John Doe."
Hospital. Dr. Nasty puts an x-ray of Doe's cranium on the special light box. "Perfect!" He snickers. "Or should I say it's perfect again." Both Dr. Nasty and Doe stare at the image. "We've done every test three times and they all confirm that you're in tip-top condition." Doe replies, "I don't understand." Dr. Condescension snorts, "Of course not. Electro-cardiograms, electro-encephalograms, and angiographies are obviously beyond the comprehension of a layman." Jackass. He needs to learn a little bedside manner from Dr. Carter. The doctor starts to walk away as Doe protests, "No. I understand them, I just don't understand why they don't show anything." Dr. Billy-Goat Gruff snaps, "I think we've answered that question three times over. You're perfectly healthy -- physically." Doe follows the doctor as he whips through some charts, desperately trying to get away from an abundantly healthy patient. He walks around the doctor and says, "So." Pause, so he can open his unbuttoned shirt to reveal the Sign. "What about this." You know what's cool -- I'm sure that wardrobe keeps all of Dominic's shirts unbuttoned just in case he needs to fondle, examine, illustrate, or show-and-tell his Sign. Every single shirt he wears, the top two buttons are always undone. In Seavouver. In October. He doesn't wear a scarf. His Sign must get cold. Dr. "I Wish I Were On MDs Instead Of This Damn Show" Goldbummer explains, "Birthmark?" Pause. Then he adds that it could be some other obscure skin problem. Doe scrunches up his eyebrows, and then goes on to explain in medical terminology that it can't possibly be either of the doctor's suggestions. You need two dictionaries, one thesaurus, one medical dictionary, and a full-time fact-checker to recap this show sometimes. Doe rants, "And if I'm in such perfect health, why am I colour-blind?" Doe-O-Vision. The doctor says half-heartedly, "Well, photo-receptors can degrade with age, Mr. Doe." Doe replies, "No! It's beyond a simple case of cone degeneration. I mean sometimes, I can see in perfect colour. I mean, how can that be?" Dr. Huffinpuff says slowly, "Sir." He puts his hand on the nurse's counter. "Have you considered the possibility that you're suffering from an emotional problem?" Doe looks down at his feet. "Now, if you'll excuse me." I can't believe a) the doctor discussed the results of Doe's test in the middle of the ER, and b) that they're carrying on this kind of a conversation -- a private, medical conversation -- in the middle of the waiting room. Doe has a funny way of being concerned that the world find out about his secrets.
Anyway. Doe doesn't let the doctor leave. "What about my amnesia?" Dr. "Just Stop Wasting My Time" McRush writes something down on a chart. He says, "In all likelihood, it's just an hysterical reaction." John: "I'm not hysterical. There's something different about me." Dr. McSnottypants blurts, "I'm certainly not going to argue that point." And then he books. While the patient is still trying to talk to him. Doe-O-Vision notices a kid grabbing his abdomen and wincing in pain. He asks the kid where it hurts. After seeing where the child points, he asks the mother: "Has he been nauseous, low-grade fever, bathroom a lot?" Mom nods. Doe grabs a passing male nurse and says, "There's a good chance this boy has acute appendicitis and he need to see a doctor before his appendix erupts." The nurse nods his head, then runs off to get a real doctor. Why does he listen to Doe? John's actions start a flurry in the ER waiting room. He diagnoses a man, and then tells him to get a chest x-ray. A fake Seacouver skateboarder walks over to Doe and says, "Hey, dude -- my shoulder's totally dislocated." The ENTIRE staff of the ER watches as John Doe treats three of their patients without being a doctor, nurse, nurse's aid, emergency medical technician, or hell, even a pharmaceutical representative. Anyway. Ouch. Doe puts the guy's shoulder back into place. Dr. Pissypants comes running back out, I guess because he's the only guy in this episode who isn't actually an extra, and says, "Excuse me! What are you doing?" Doe stutters, "I really need your help--" Dr. Buttnut says, "No. I want you out of here before I call security." Then he hands Doe a card for a psychiatrist. As the doctor walks away, Doe screams, "Been there. Done that. Don't you get it? I don't know my own name!" Then he flips off the doctor before he leaves the hospital. Okay, he doesn't flip off the doctor, but he does fling the card aside with reckless abandon and heedless disrespect for potential paper cuts.
Seacouver Beach. Some young punks drive ATVs over the sandy beach. They zoom along until they see something in the ocean. X-Treme Dude #1 says, "Hey. Whoa. Hold on. Look out there." X-Treme Dude #2 says, "Hey what's that check it out?" All three X-Treme Dudes stop in front of another naked man who has washed up on the beach. Is Seacouver having an epidemic? Are amnesiacs all the rage? Any. Way. The conversations between the Dudes are totally dubbed up until this point. How do I know this? Well, it's simple, really -- between their helmets and the sound of the engines, there's no way they would have heard each other; they simply would have signaled to one another if they wanted to stop. The Dudes jump off their ATVs and splash into the ocean to retrieve the naked guy. More fake, dubbed dialogue. The Dudes grunt and groan as they drag the poor naked guy out of the ocean and up on the beach. Finally, they pull off their freaking helmets so that a) we can see their faces and b) they can have a real conversation. They roll the naked guy over, and X-Treme Dude #2 says, "He's alive." John Doe 2 starts stuttering. X-Treme Dude #3 says, "Poor guy's wasted." X-Treme Dude #1 tells JD2 that he's going to be just fine. X-Treme Dude #2 asks, "What's your name?" All three X-Treme Dudes look at each other in a kind of scared, kind of perplexed way. JD2 looks up into the sky, shivers, and mutters, "I don't know."
John Doe HQ. John comes in, carrying his coat and dragging his tail. Karen greets him: "Hey boss-man. I got your calls." Doe doesn't answer. Karen keeps talking: "You can get 133 cable channels for $59.95 a month, including some choice porn." Because even geniuses have needs. "And the air conditioning guy can be here between two and five." Doe mutters, "I can fix it myself." She hands him some messages. Doe looks at them and asks why she's drawn a doe on every single one. Karen: "Your new logo! Get it?" First the eyes, now the deer -- um, why does he need a logo? He doesn't have a company. He's just trying to found out his identity. It's not like this quest benefits too many other people besides Doe. And not to be the only one to point out the glaringly obvious, but the Sign is already emblazoned on his chest -- isn't that enough logo for everyone? Karen reports on the actual filing work she did today. I fall dead with shock. Blah inane conversation about Arkansas, blah he's not from there, blah she won't let him be from Arkansas, blah inane trivia about Arkansas. Then, from the depths of the Not-So-Secret Lair, the computer beeps. Karen follows John into the room and asks, "What's it found?" John: "Me. It searches missing persons databases across the country for my stats." Both of them stare into the screen. Karen reads: "Six feet, 185, found floating in the ocean, naked, amnesia -- cosmic! They did find you." Maybe in Tom Cruise's reality, Dominic Purcell is six feet tall. That's right -- he is television tall. In real life, well, we all know the camera adds inches, and part of Doe's magic is believing he can control where the inches end up. Heh. John reads further: "No, wait. It's somebody else. They rescued him today." Karen, of course, jumps to wild conclusions: "Maybe he's your twin brother!" Doe swallows. "I don't know. But I'm going to find out." Karen stares into the screen after her boss leaves and cracks, "Two John Does. God help us." As long as this guy doesn't star in a spin-off, we're okay with two John Does. It's kind of a neat mystery. Ouch! No need to hit me, I was just being honest. This episode isn't so bad so far, excluding the Karen factor.
Seacouver Hospital. Doe shuffles down the corridor and grabs a white lab coat off a laundry/supply shelf. Okay. They don't keep the white coats on those shelves, because any old Doe could just come along, grab one, and start impersonating a doctor, but whatever -- the script says incognito, and incognito it is. Doe looks furtively around before going into JD2's room. Machines are beeping. JD2 is unconscious. Doe scopes his chart. A nurse walks in just as Doe reaches out his hand to fondle the guy's hair. Don't know why the hair, but whatever, let's just go with it. She asks him what he's doing fondling JD2. Well, she just asks him what he's doing there, but the fondling part is so much more interesting. Doe makes up some cockamamie story about being the Elect-Med technician on call. Then he says, "I'm trying to see if you've caused any damage?" See, we all now know the real fun behind being a genius: you get to lie, and sound really good at it. Doe gets all technical on the nurse, blabbing on about the EKG machine, incorrect readings, and fancy ways JD2 could die. The nurse stammers, "I just checked --" Doe: "Not well enough. Now let me try and fix this and I'll decide whether or not to report you to the professional oversight committee." Doe bends over JD2 and starts running his hands all over the man's naked chest. Um, wouldn't they have given him a freaking gown? And dude, you can check for Signs just as well by using your eyes; you might be colour-blind but that doesn't make you unable to see a Sign. Poor JD2 wakes up because some weirdo genius is running his hands Oz-style all over his body, only he doesn't seem to care. He grabs Doe's shirt, opens it up to see the brand, and says, "You! They got you too!" Then, of course, JD2 goes into some form of cardiac arrest, and instead of, oh, I don't know, running and getting a doctor or something, Doe just stands there as the guy has a seizure and screams, "Who are they? Who got me?" Pillow thrashing. Machines beep uncontrollably. Thankfully, the nurse has some common sense. She went and got a couple of security officers. They haul John away, even though he screams about needing to stay.
Seacouver Cop Shop. Captain Jamie holds a mean file in her hand. She grabs it hard, waves it around, and then uses it as punishment. She walks at a good clip as she says, "If your suspect did it, how come the husband says he saw him in Tacoma at the time of the murder?" Detective Kerrigan trails behind, murmuring, "That's the question of the hour." Captain Jamie has "curt" down pat. "Hit the pavement and give me a reason to keep this guy in lockup, Kerrigan. The DA's giving me until lunch." Ouch. She's as hot as an Alabama firecracker. Jamie walks by the desks for the beat cops and other detectives and notices a poor John Doe sitting quietly, waiting his turn. She stops. "Tell me I didn't just see what I think I saw." Beat. Cop McBurly says, "Lieutenant?" And then holds up what I'm assuming is an arrest report. John Doe shows her the handcuffs. He smile-pouts at her, actually looking pretty darn cute. Jamie says, "If it isn't one thing, it's another with you. What's this all about?" Beat Cop McBurly replies: "I popped him for trespassing and impersonating a medical professional at Vickers. He says he knows you." Captain Jamie responds, "I don't know him." Heh. Doe: "Lieutenant Avery!" Jamie replies, "Well, I don't, do I, tell me one thing I know about you." Um, he helped you solve countless murders, and pretty much saved your ass on more than one occasion. Wow, someone woke up on the wrong side of the bed. This kind of attitude is usually reserved for that really high-strung vice-principal on Boston Public. The comparisons between Captain Jamie and Scully are sort of striking, too -- in the wardrobe, haircut, both wear crosses and have bad attitudes kind of way.
Doe stutters, moves his cuffed hands around, and replies, "I'm as charming as can be?" Captain Jamie rolls her eyes, unimpressed with that response, and says, "Yeah. What'd you get yourself into this time?" Doe stands up and walks toward her: "I need to see a case file. That unidentified man that was on the beach." Jamie tells McBurly that she'll take it from here, then turns to Doe: "Why?" John says he might know him, or JD2 might know Doe. Jamie snaps, "Which is it?" Doe begs, "Please. Just five minutes." Captain Jamie's not impressed. "Not good enough. Tina, come back and process this guy." Doe: "Jamie, come on, we've been through a lot." Jamie: "Which is exactly why I'm sick of the International Man Of Mystery routine, and it's 'Lieutenant Avery.'" Jamie struts off on her high horse. For her, it's a white horse to match her crisp white blouse, which must be tucked in way too tight because something is certainly jamming up her ass. John Doe turns around to address Det. Kerrigan: "News footage showed a sailfish tattoo on your suspect's left forearm. Your case, Kerrigan? Oil platform roughnecks give them to each other." Kerrigan's hooked. "I'd start a background search in Morgan City, Louisiana. Ground zero for off-shore oil drilling." Doe's waving his handcuffed hands all around, but the magic isn't working. At least we know he's not a magician, on top of everything else. Kerrigan shrugs his shoulders and asks, "Are you one of these tarot-card types?" Which is a silly thing to say, and kind of ignorant considering that tarot cards interpret the future, and only after you ask really specific questions, while Doe's pretty much just stating facts. John responds, correctly, that no, he's not a psychic; he just reads the papers and makes deductions. Kerrigan raises his eyebrows and turns back to his desk. Jamie comes out of her office and gives Doe a look. Aw, she gives in: "Fine. I'll see what we can dig up." He holds out his wrists like an expectant child. Jamie grins and says, "Beggars can't be choosers. Besides, I kind of like you under lock and key." Kinky. Doe hangs his head in shame, or perhaps frustration -- it could go either way.
John Doe HQ. Karen has brought in Indian Food. Right now, it's five in the morning and I can't sleep, so for some reason, even the sound of that food is making my mouth water, and I'm a vegetarian. She opens the packages of chicken vindaloo and chicken masala. They're in the Control Room. Karen asks if he's found anything. Doe examines the police file. He notes, "The case file said that he washed up on Carson Beach." Computer brain starts whirring. Blah algorithms, blah wind speed, blah tidal flow, blah reduced motion blah blah blah smart-cakes. In short, JD2 floated into Seacouver from Horseshoe Island. John circles the island on the wall map of his life and notes, "Maybe we're linked somehow?" Karen: "Whoa. Are you tripping me? Are you sure?" I think they've made Karen the dumbest human being in Seacouver -- hell, in all of Television Land USA/Canada -- just so that John Doe will look smarter. Kind of the intelligence equivalent of when they shoot the short leading men on blocks so they look like they're of normal height. John opens the fridge and does some more calculating in his head about where JD2 came from. Karen says (which actually makes sense) that if even one of his numbers is off, JD2 could have floated in from Alaska. Oh, wait, the guy was naked -- totally naked, absolutely buck-naked, naked as a jaybird, as naked as the day he came into the world -- so floating in from Alaska would mean he'd have died from exposure far before he ended up in Seacouver. Karen's so dumb.
John grabs a beer from the fridge and says, "He looked at the scar on my neck and said 'they got to you too.' I mean, who are 'they' and what did they do to him, to us?" Karen looks pensive -- oh no, just vacant, my bad. John continues, "How did we escape?" Karen: "This is getting a little DefCon 5 for me. Maybe we should close the blinds." Um, doesn't DefCon 5 mean normal readiness during peacetime? ["Yes. Shut up, Karen." -- Sars] John ignores Karen's paranoia and carries on with his whole I-am-Sam-Sam-I-am dialogue. All this time he thought he bumped his head, but what if others are involved, and they're out there looking for him, and any other JDs that might show up this season? Karen peers out the window like Michelle Pfeiffer in What Lies Beneath. She grabs the curtain, whips around, and whisper-screams, "Ohmigod! There's some scary guy down there." Doe was about to take a sip of beer, and Karen's spazz made him pause with a mouthful of suds. Heh. Beer. Heh. She whips back around to look through the window again. Then she giggles. "Oops! My bad. It's just Colin." I'm sorry. This girl is not just an idiot -- she's an idiot who would have trouble plugging in a toaster. "My ride's here. I'm cruising. I've got a big date with my boy at the show docks." She taps John on the shoulder. "Don't obsess! This could all just be some parallel universe coincidence." Pause. "Okay?" She waits for John to respond. I'm waiting for someone to club her with a smart stick. No, wait, I'd rather the girls from Charmed make a guest appearance and cast a spell to shut her up, and then never come back again. So Karen has to write notes. Oh, wait, that would be worse -- I'll bet she dots her letter "i"s with hearts and writes a peace sign after every sentence, and that would be so much worse. Off she goes to hang out with Non-Colin.
Introspective sequence. Flash to Horseshoe Island. Flash through the ocean. Listen to John Doe's soothing voice as he asks philosophically, "Who are you?" Cut to a whirling shot of JD2. "Who are we?" Okay. Everyone? Everyone! Listen up now; it's time to pause so we can ponder the Meaning of Life. Class! Are you listening? No? Oh, right -- shut up, John Doe! We get that you want to know "who" you are -- both literally and figuratively -- but must everything that happens in Seacouver be connected to you and your Identity Quest?
Hospital. Oh. My. Gosh. John Doe whips back the curtain to reveal that JD2 is missing. There's black-and-white blood all of the sheets, the pillows are all tossed about, and the bed -- it's empty!
Hospital. Jamie and Frank, plus the rest of their crime-scene team, are there. Frank is wearing gloves and instructing a technician to get a sample of blood from the pillow that was left behind. Jamie storms in. Oh, she's pissed. She snaps, "Give the guy an inch, guy breaks into a patient's room once, guess he figures I want to see him do it all over again." John insists that he had nothing to do with JD2's disappearance. Frank quips, "Are you saying that it's just a coincidence that as soon as you stuck your nose in, this guy walked into another dimension?" John uses his forensic know-how to stop the pot of hot water he's boiling in for a moment. "He didn't walk. He was carried by two people." John-O-Vision spots a wet patch on the floor. He sticks his finger in it. Mr. Forensics says, "Whoa! Easy, Sherlock." John tastes the stuff on the floor. Now, how many people -- geniuses, in fact -- do you know who would go licking up stuff that fell on a hospital floor? Ew. Ew. Ew. Ew. Ew. John says, "Saline solution from his IV line." He and Mr. Forensics deduct, from the weight of the saline and the size of the little puddle, that JD2's arm was dangling. Do we care? Do we need to know that his arm dangled when they carried him away? I'd like this show a whole lot better if entire conversations weren't contrived just to prove to the audience that John's a genius. We get it. He's got a super-brain. Now, let the conversations come a lot more naturally, because I'm sick of recapping the stunned looks on Frank and Jamie's faces every time John does something "amazing." Right. Sorry. Rant over, I promise.
Jamie says, "The question is who -- better yet, why." John: "My thoughts exactly." Ah, they're in tandem. It's "blue" love -- instead of Cupid's arrows, the two get shot by rubber bullets, straight to the heart. Captain Jamie looks a bit skittish. She says, "Keep me updated, Frank. I've got to get out of here." John steps into the room and says, "Magic trick, Frank -- how do you get a body out without the audience noticing?" John leaves Frank to ponder that as he sees Jamie just sort of hanging out in the stairwell, looking nauseous. John asks, "Are you okay?" She turns back to him and replies, "Yeah. Fine." He insists, "You know, you're not fine." Jamie turns to head down the stairs, and with her back turned to him, she replies, "You know, I've got to go." John keeps talking: "I'm claustrophobic, colour-blind, like spicy hot dogs and hate tequila." John sits on the upper stairwell. The handrail blocks their love. He continues, "And sometimes I do the stock market for fun. There. Something you know about me. Your turn." A guitar strums in honour of their love. Captain Jamie warms up for an instant: "I'm not too fond of hospitals, there." Doe looks pleased with himself, so he tosses in a little factoid, you know, for the warm, bonding nature of knowledge. "You know, 22.2 percent of the population is afraid of the doctor." Wow. He sucks at comforting. Their love is starting to suffer. Captain Jamie: "I'm not afraid of doctors." John blabs, "Nosocomephobia: anxious, irrational fear of hospitals --" Their love begins to wane. Captain Jamie snaps, "Do you ever stop?" He looks hurt. She looks sorry for snapping, and before she rushes off down the stairs, she says, "Just forget it, there are some things that you obviously don't know." Now, if this were the WB, Doe would run after her, get caught in the rain, kiss her, and never want to find out his identity again -- he'd be happy in love for about five minutes, and then they'd fight, break up, and he'd be back on his Identity Quest, only this time in a different city. John sits on the stairwell and contemplates the fact that he can't add Captain Jamie to that "friend" list just yet.
Hospital Room. Frank explores some scratch marks on the floor. Then he notices the discolouration in the floor and says, "This cabinet was moved recently. Where's that?" The nurse says, "Overflow -- down the hall." Man, they hire a lot of nurses for this show. Frank gets up, and they walk down the hall to discover, of course, that the cabinet is missing. Frank looks back down toward the room. You can see the light bulbs just flashing and flashing and flashing.
Police Station. Little Ms. Technical is there with Frank, who is eating a potato chip for some reason, and John Doe. They are examining the security tapes from the hospital parking lot. You know on C.S.I. or even Law & Order where they have all kind of different technicians who each have a specialty? Yeah, that doesn't exist on John Doe. They've got one. Ms. Tech. That's it. She does everything from examine security tapes to look up DMV records. She multitasks. I suppose the Seacouver Police Department is experiencing some cutbacks. Right. The tape. Apparently, they can almost "see through metal," much to the chagrin of Frank. Ms. Tech says, "Ever heard of T-Rays?" Only if you've heard of Greased Lightning. Cars whiz by on the tape. John explains, "It's terra-hertz, electro-magnetic pulse imaging." The lasers can see freaky stuff. They mark the time the car or truck heads into the hospital and the weight of the vehicle's center axis. From this, they can deduce which load might have been heavier when it left the hospital, perhaps carrying a body in a cabinet. They come across a Ford E350 Super Duty. Frank knows the type of car. John knows the weight of the suspension -- it's heavier, and probably carrying JD2. Frank says, "Push in on that license plate." Ms. Tech does, and it comes up Washington A. I hope no one really owns that plate. Frank continues, "Get an address on those plates!"
John and Frank are in a trailer park. They stop the car, and both comment on the oddity of such a fancy-ass car belonging to someone living in this kind of squalor. Frank asks, "Are you sure this is it?" John: "Two-time felon Ray Brunellas, problem is, he's blind." Frank: "Now how many blind drivers do you know?" My guess? That's a rhetorical question. A neighbour drives up and sees the two men. She gets out of her car as Frank quips, "God. There's got to be a tornado looking for this dump." Because it's not his mandate to protect all citizens or anything. True, the neighbour looks nasty. She reaches in, grabs some groceries from her car, and notes, "If you're after Brunellas, he's long gone." Frank heads over to her, and she adds, "A good month or more." She closes her car door and starts over to her own trailer. Frank follows her. Today, he's Persistent Cop. Frank: "Oh, just drove his house off into the sunset." No, he's Sarcastic Cop. "Did he leave a new forwarding address?" Nasty Neighbour says, "He's the kind of guy they invented 'good' riddance for." Wow, between that and the "The Big Mistake" crack from last episode, it's my fear that the platitudes will never end. I'm in platitude hell, and no one's going to kill me like they kill Kenny. Frank's not buying her story, and both he and Doe eye the trailer suspiciously. She half-heartedly apologizes, then rushes into her house. Frank: "Fat, blind men just don't disappear into thin air." How did he know Brunellas was fat?
Doe-Interna-Vision: "Curiosity." Someone stares at Frank and John as they consider the trailer. "It's always dangerous to the cat."
Back outside, Frank says, "Now you're the suspension expert. That thing a little low on its springs?" John and Frank decide to enter the trailer. They don't have a warrant. In fact, I don't even think they knock.
Inside, Ray types on a computer keyboard especially made for the sight-impaired. He hears someone come in, and calls, "Who's there?" Nasty Neighbour stands just beside him. Frank responds, "Your friendly neighbourhood police department." Only they don't have a warrant, and Doe's not even a cop. Well, Frank was right; Brunellas is obese. Ray snaps, "Ah, you moronic wench! Get the hell out of here you pigs." Frank strolls right into the man's living room: "Ah, we could do that, but you'd have to come with us." Pause. "Could be a while, Ray, might miss dessert." Not only are they illegally in the man's house, but Frank's insulting him in a royally offensive way. I'll give John Doe props for one thing: they hired an actor who is actually blind. None of this Val Kilmer/Mira Sorvino Hollywood-blind act. We'll cling to this slight bit of reality throughout this episode. Okay? Okay. Now, let's get back to business. Ray: "What? What do you want?" Doe: "Why is a truck registered in your name?" Ray: "Hell if I know?" What about the hospital kidnapping? You know, for not being a cop, John sure knows how to interrogate a poor guy. Ray stutters, "I don't know anybody who would do anything like that!" The "moronic wench" says, "Why don't you just leave him alone? He's just a businessman trying to make do." Hell, I'd love to work in a wife-beater; I might scare people, but at least I'd be comfortable like Ray. Frank: "Oh yeah, same kind of work that got you a nickel up at Arborville, right?" Ray protests. He does online work for charities. He's legit.
John walks forward toward the man and his keyboard: "Nice rig!" Then he starts reading Braille. You heard me. Apparently, you lose your memory, and then you can communicate with the blind. John says, "What charities are after adult males, ages twenty to thirty, no medical history, no deformities, blood type AB negative." Ray snaps off his computer with the wicked-switch under his desk, only John's reading from a print-out -- it doesn't magically disappear once the computer shuts down. Doe explodes. He goes for Ray's neck, screaming, "Where'd they take him, where'd they take him!" Frank hauls him off the poor man, and as they leave the house, Ray tells them to get a warrant if they ever want to come back. Wow. That was productive. Or not.
Outside. Frank and Doe walk toward the car. The cop tells the non-cop that he needs to go back to "charm" school. Doe explains that Ray's computer was running a "parallel special orientation search." Frank: "Can you just talk in English for once?" Doe: "He knows something." Frank: "Then we'll get it out of him legally." They take off in the cop car. Only wait! The mysterious black car follows them!
John Doe HQ. Doe tap-taps away on his computer. We're privy to Doe-Interna-Vision. "Who are you, blind man?" Doe focuses. Brunellas's mug shot pops up on his screen. "Who do you work for? Why was that car in your name? Are you some kind of patsy for your bosses?" Flash back to Brunellas's trailer. Oh, his girlfriend's last name is Chips -- who do you think has been watching too much television? That's right -- writers, I'm looking in your direction.
Cop Shop. Frank gives Captain Jamie the lowdown. She's getting coffee, like a good female cop boss does. He tells her about Ray Brunellas. Man, that's three times now -- once at the trailer park, once via Doe-Interna-Vision, and once by Frank. How many times can we go over this? Frank adds that Brunellas is "blind as a bat and fat as an Albert." These people are obese-a-phobic. At least Frank is; he keeps bringing it up over and over. Jamie: "How does a blind man abduct a patient from his hospital bed and then drive him away." Hey. You. Yeah, we get it -- loud and clear. Our wires aren't crossed. We can see, hear, taste, smell, and feel through the fog. The blind guy, yeah -- he didn't do it. Yeah. We got that -- the first time you mentioned that he was blind. Frank responds, "The question of the hour. We're guessing that Brunellas just owned the truck, and didn't do the kidnapping himself." Captain Jamie: "Ah." Pause. "So he's got a partner." Frank: "Exactly. But partner in what is the question." Here's a clue. It's not fundraising. Frank explains to Jamie that Ray's computer was searching for men in their twenties with no medical problems. She chews on a plastic stir stick. I'm dizzy. The camera keeps spinning around the two of them. Frank: "Potential canvass?" Jamie: "Canvass for what?" Frank: "We're working on it." Well, she offers no insight. That part of the scene was pointless. They start walking. Frank says, "Doe thinks he can find a connection." Captain Jamie takes a sip of her coffee and whines, "Oh. Great." Frank asks, "What?" Jamie: "Oh. Nothing. He's just on my list right now, as opposed to --" Jamie gives him a coffee-stained stink-eye. He takes that as his cue. Right. That part of the scene had no point either.
John Doe HQ. John's busy doing his figures. Blah where'd JD2 come from blah degrees blah. He gives up for a moment and walks over to his kitchen counter. Karen's left him a puzzle. He completes it in record time. All the while, Doe-Interna-Vision blathers on about JD2, where did they take him, why did they "steal" him from the hospital. He turns on the television. It's a foreign-language show -- like a lesson on tape, only it's on air. John knows the exact translation. Which is good, because I don't even know what language they're speaking. He turns on the radio. A woman's voice says, "Can you identify this piece of music?" Doe does. More language. More Doe-Interna-Vision: "What's a blind man going to do with a man from the hospital." He turns on a second television in his kitchen, and decides to follow along with the cooking show while taking the language lesson and reciting musical identifications at the same time. Wow. He's a genius. Minutes later, pots are bubbling, the music is still going, and Jeopardy is on another television. Doe knows all the answers. He flies around the kitchen. He's like the Iron Chef, the Galloping Gourmet, and Cliff Claven all rolled into one. The soup he's making goes in the food processor. He yells more musical answers. He beats everyone on Jeopardy. Doe has a bit of an overload; even geniuses have their breaking point. He loses track of the question, doesn't know the answers, and boils over just about every pot in his kitchen. Then the phone rings. Doe says, "Hello." Pause. "I'll be right there."
Trailer Town. He drives his fancy Austin Powers-esque convertible past the flashing lights, parks, and runs into the house. Captain Jamie's there. "Looks like Ray's found himself another problem." John: "What happened?" Well, from the looks of things, a bloodbath; both Ray and his friend Mrs. Chips are dead. Oh, and the killer? Yeah, he cut out Ray's tongue, and left it lying on the floor beside him. Ew.
Commercials.
The "Cop" Triumvirate examines the crime scene. Frank quips, "At least, we know what happened to Jack Sprat and his wife." Again with the weight-related non-jokes. John observes that the tongue looks like a variation of the Colombian necktie. Frank: "What?" He snaps his white glove. "The only [thing] I connect with Brunellas is Haagen-Dazs." I'm so far beyond offended that I might even sympathize with David E. Kelley getting his show yanked. Naw. That still makes me giddy. He had a "thing" about "fat" people too. Captain Jamie says, "The message is the same. Open your mouth, you pay the price." Frank: "Message for who?" Doe: "Me." Because all of Seacouver rotates on his axis. Yawn. Frank says, "Here we go." For once, he echoes my sentiments exactly. John wants them to seal up every door. Jamie wants to know what the murder has to do with Doe. Doe reminds her that the world is his oyster. No, really he says that he thinks he's connected to the guy they dragged out of the Pacific. Why? Because they were both naked? Because they're both named John Doe? Really. He's got to get a grip. Jamie takes the challenge. She questions his egocentrism: "So this is some kind of conspiracy? No offense but we see kidnappings and murders every day. Things are not ever as complicated as you think." Sing it loud, sister. Doe insists that this is different. Frank: "Okay. Back to reality for a minute." Blah Brunellas, blah hospital archives, blah confidential material. "Do you think we've got another pharmaceutical drug ring on our hands?" Captain Jamie concurs: "Gray-market mafia, certainly capable of this -- let's knock on some doors, and see what they say."
They leave Doe behind. He's not a crime-scene investigator. And I know I keep harping on this, but he's not a cop either. That doesn't stop him from collecting evidence -- that's right. He spots a boot print with a paint chip embedded in its grooves, and promptly pulls said chip out of said boot print, ignoring Jamie when she tells him to leave it alone. He snaps, "Did I do something to piss you off?" She snaps back, "You are not the only guy with a brain around here!" Doe-tuition: "This is because of what I said at the hospital." Oh, he's quick! Jamie says, "Excuse me? No." Blah captain blah they'll get in trouble blah. Doe defends himself by stating, emphatically, that he needs to know what happened to Brunellas, and to him. Then Jamie screams, "You are way too invested here." She turns to a beat cop. "Will you get him out of here?" Doe goes. She screams, "And I'll need a report before shift change!" Okay. Why did they call him in the first place if they didn't want him to play Doe and do all his Doe-type things?
Doe's Speed Vision. He drives past the mysterious car parked near Digger's restaurant, just outside his house, and mysterious music plays. The car speeds off! Doe catches a glimpse of the man in the back of the car. He looks mysterious. Then Doe goes home.
John Doe HQ. A single eye, not unlike the ones Karen was painting on the walls last week (ahhh!), peers through a microscope. John examines the paint chip, because the lab at the police station just wouldn't have done a good enough job. Earth to John Doe! Oh, wait -- he might be an alien. Anyway. For the eight millionth time: You. Are. Not. A. Cop. Captain Jamie, just give him a honorary badge already. But then that would give him license to do all this stuff and sort of take away his edge. Right. Recapping. Karen, the triple threat of dumb, dumber, and dumbest, cleans up Doe's mess from last night. She asks, "What is it?" He answers, "Paint chip." She replies, "And you're obsessed with this why?" She scrubs a pot. The blood is only on the bottom; the top was clean, and the bloodstain would have pulled it off. Karen snits, "You need a maid. I had no idea this was part of the job description." Isn't she his assistant? Doesn't she bring him food all the time? Wouldn't that mean she might, once in a while, have to clean up some dishes?
According to John's brain-cyclopedia, the paint is lead based, dating it pre-1972, the year Congress passed The Lead-Base Paint Poisoning Prevention Act. Karen: "You should go on the road!" And here we go with the mind-numbing suggestions again. "'Stump John Doe' -- you could bag some serious coin." Because the stock market is treating him so unkindly, he needs to start a freak show. Come on, John's no Bubble Boy -- why would anyone want him in their freak show? Plus, it's kind of boring to hear someone drone on about facts all the time. Any. Way. I really wish that every comment of Karen's didn't send me into a five-page tirade against the writers of this show. It certainly would save me some time, because I feel like I've been recapping this episode forever. Where were we? Oh yeah, the paint chip, the newest in a long line of clues to John Doe's existence. It's like he's trapped in Groundhog Day, only instead of Bill Murray, he's some strange mixture of Sherlock Holmes, Inspector Abberline, and Angela Lansbury. Doe examines some graphs on his laptop. From the different percentages of blue, black, white, and yellow in the paint, he finds that it's Snoquaimie White. From there, he recites, "Last sold July 12, 1941, to contractors for exclusively big industrial projects." Karen examines a pot, walks to the garbage pan, and says, "Screw it -- you can afford non-stick pans." They have yet another Karen-really-cares-about-John conversation. A: Have you been getting enough sleep lately? B: Do you know fish sleep with their eyes open? A: Ohmigod, why do I even bother? John says, "Karen. I've got to get to the bottom of this. No sleep, no rest. Whatever it takes, I've got to find the man who washed up on the beach." She asks him to be careful, and he says he'll take his chances. From the paint chip, he found a probable match, one Warnkes Department store, closed in 1948, with no subsequent permit filings. Karen: "Cool. To the Batmobile, Robin."
The International Man Of Mystery car pulls up to the abandoned department store. John breaks into the old building and starts looking around with a flashlight. Water drips, and for a second, he's totally freaked out because he sees a mirror or something and dances the flashlight all over the place. Kind of ironic that a man who doesn't even know who he is seems scared to death of his own shadow. Anyway. The place is John Doe's version of a fun house, not haunted, but with lots of clues, and lights drawing him forward. Doe slams a fire extinguisher through a boarded-up door, grabs his flashlight, and goes inside. There's a mattress! Then slam! Someone locks him inside. Immediately, he slams against the door with the fire extinguisher. When that doesn't work, he sees an old rag, breaks off the top of the extinguisher, lights the rags on fire, tosses the extinguisher on the fire, then hides behind a strategically placed table for protection. Bam! Well, he got the door open. I think they should call him John MacGyver instead of John Doe.
Once he's outside, the Mystery Man reveals himself, he's got a French accent -- how intriguing. Yawn. He comments on John's quick-thinking escape, "Very ingenious, yes." John: "Where's the man from the hospital?" Mr. French: "Like a curious cat, so persistent in your truth." Say it with me, people: curiosity killed the cat. Yes, you know what -- we get that too. Doe says, "Who are you?" I half expect the man to say, "I'm Cigarette-Smoking Man's French Canadian cousin," but he replies, "I'm a doctor." Mr. French continues, "Or I used to be." John: "Why have you been following me?" His adversary responds, "Who's been following who, John Doe?" Pause for introspection. "John Doe. I do love that name." Blah John Doe, blah his Identity Quest, blah French mockery blah. John slams Mr. French against the wall and says, "Enough! Tell me what the hell is going on." Mr. French whisper-screams, "I am healer. I give life where there was none to be left." Mr. French won't give it up; he's keeping his reasons well under wraps. John: "Why me? What does it all have to do with me?" Mr. French: "That's the question of the hour. I certainly didn't encourage you to keep knocking on the closed doors. We warned you. That poor Brunellas." Pause. "Another dead employee." Mr. French turns around -- man, he's even got a goatee! This makes him what, Stereotype #6: The Foreign Man With A Host Of Clues Who's Really The Bad Guy? Lots of these characters show up in Mission Impossible, or even any James Bond movie.
Mr. French: "You're so desperate to know what I've been up to. Tell me. What are you willing to give me in order to find out?" John: "That's the problem! I don't have anything to give up. Somebody took it all away from me." Ah, Doe-Angst-O-Whine. Mr. French: "Well, then your answer is in here." He holds up a hypodermic needle filled with a drug of some sort. Then he blabs on about how JD2 was there, and he took it all, every last bit. John: "You're out of your mind." Mr. French: "To find the truth, you'll have to experience it yourself." A drop dangles on the edge of the needle. Don't go, Alice! This won't be Wonderland. I guarantee you. Mr. French says, "Your choice. The door or --" He holds up the needle. John considers his options, which, of course, include a flashback to when he was found, when the fishing boat brought him in, the metal in his chest. He says, "No. No." And walks away from Mr. French. But he comes back, grabs the drug vial from Mr. French's bag, and says, "Thiopental [solution]. It's a general anesthetic." Mr. French: "Consider it a liquid blindfold for the trip." Doe: "Trip, what trip?" Mr. French: "The one you've been chasing." They stare at each other for a bit, Mr. French says, "So be it!" Pause. "Au revoir." And walks away, holding the needle in his hand, sort of contemplating the needle. John says, "Wait!" Then he walks forward and holds out his arm. Damn! Don't do it, Doe; don't go down that rabbit hole.
Pacific Ocean. A boat takes them further out in the ocean. On the boat, we see John's eye as he wakes up from the anesthetic. His vision is blurry, but we can determine that there's some sort of operating theatre on the boat, and that they are prepping Doe for surgery. He mumbles, "Who are you?" No one answers, but they keep spreading iodine on his chest. Doe: "What are you doing?" A very old man lies, sedated, beside Doe. Our hero rips out his intravenous, spraying the saline everywhere, and it explodes all over the place. John grabs his shirt, and although he's heavily sedated, he manages to get out of there. He stumbles down some stairs and heads for the captain's control room. He grabs a flashlight, knocks the guy out, and sends a message via the ship's navigational systems to Ms. Tech, back in Seacouver. A read dot beeps on her screen. She says, "What the? Doe, what are you doing in the ocean?" A helicopter flies over the Pacific. On board the boat, Doe tries to hide from the organ-stealing hacks upstairs. He stumbles through the engine room, and comes across their morgue. There are all kinds of John Does in wrapped in plastic, with various parts of their bodies missing -- and then John finds JD2, dead, with a gash in his chest where they took out his heart. He says, "Oh, no. You from the hospital, they got you too." Someone with a gun finds Doe and brings him back the OR. Mr. French taunts him as they prepare to inject him with more anesthetic. John's head bobs back and forth as he tries to protest being killed by this maniac. Mr. French: "You're going to help this man." John: "What are you talking about, 'help'?" Mr. French: "There are desperately sick people in this world who need my help." Someone puts Doe's arms in restraints. "People of value, Mr. Doe. You're going to give him your heart." Doe: "Heart? What?" Just then, Frank busts in -- on the ship, floating in the Pacific, without a word of warning. Actually, it's not just Frank; it's Captain Jamie, too. Frank says, "The hell he is!" Jamie screams, "Freeze!" as she jams her gun down the back of someone's neck. Frank to Mr. French: "Move away from him." French thinks about this for a minute, and then puts the needle onto John's neck. "We need to discuss the terms of withdrawal!" Frank fires. There's a scuffle, and then John's got Mr. French by the neck. Frank insists, "End of discussion." Whew. That was a harrowing ordeal. See! See what your curiosity gets you, John? We didn't mind that too much, though, because Dominic Purcell looks hot with his shirt off. We can manage an ordeal if there's a little tasty in it for us too.
Later, Frank walks toward Doe, mumbling, "Killing some to keep others alive. Makes me sick." The police remove all the bodies. Jamie tells Doe he's lucky, because he could have been in there with them. The three of them bond for a minute. They're all glad Doe's alive.
Seacouver. Frank: "Eminent transplant surgeon Dr. Alistair Dormand." Like all good insane enemies, he's got a past -- his wife died while waiting for a transplant. Then Mr. French became a heroin addict who started selling body parts to make a living. Frank: "We tossed the ship and found the names of most of the victims. Your guy's been in and out of homeless shelters for eight years." Then Frank wants to know why Doe still needs to talk to Mr. French. Doe: "Answers." Blah he could have been on that boat, blah just before he was found the first time blah. Only guess what? Oh, come on -- you can guess! That's right. Mr. French has killed himself, slit his wrists with the glass in his eyeglasses.
Morgue. JD2's father identifies the body as Doe watches through a window in the door. The old man walks out and sees Doe there. He says, "Yes. It's my son. He'd been out of touch for seven, eight years now. My wife. She would have given anything to have seen him one more time before she passed." Doe's very quiet. JD2's pop asks, "And you knew Scott how again?" John says, "We worked at the same factory." This brightens up JD2's dad. "We thought he lost his way, drugs, and the like. I just wonder if you knew why he felt he couldn't come home?" John: "Sometimes. The past is hard to forget." Then the dad says that Doe reminds him of his son, around the eyes. Honestly, the cheese factor is a bit much, but this scene is really sweet, and kind of tender. JD2's dad apologizes, but before he walks away, John says, "He wanted you to know that he made something of his life." The dad thanks him and walks away. Jamie comes up and tells John, "That was nice." John: "It's hard. Not knowing." Jamie: "What, like you not knowing who you are?" John flirts, "What are you doing in a hospital? I thought you hated them." Jamie: "Baby steps. Trying to clear up that nasty nosocomephobia you diagnosed me with." John starts to intellectualize, but then stops and says, "I'm sorry. I was just trying to help." Jamie lets out some skeletons: she lost someone recently, and spent a fair share of long nights at the hospital. Yawn. Like we didn't see that coming. Then Jamie tells him that he tries too hard, and she doesn't want him to get himself killed. Doe says that it was worth it, to maybe find out who he once was. Jamie: "Has it occurred to you that not every case is about you?" John asks: "Who was your childhood best friend? What was your mother's maiden name? Your father, what did he give you for your 16th birthday?" Blah rock, blah searching, blah hint, blah Identity Quest, blah bonding blah. In the end, John tells Jamie that he'd really like some baggage, because everyone has some. I have plenty; he's totally welcome to it. Jamie says the two of them are square. John says fine. And then he leaves and walks down the blue-lit, dark, deep morgue hallway into the rest of his life.
week: The lovely, talented, and now happily married Kim returns! Congratulations, and thanks for letting me fill in -- I think I'm kind of hooked on the show now (but don't tell anyone).