Episode Report Card Sobell: B+ | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Half In The Bag
By Sobell | Season 4 | Episode 2 | Aired on 09.01.2008
In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close.Team Scylla goes through job orientation with Don Self and meets this season's likely-to-be-dead-by-the-end-of-May character, Roland. He's an identity thief, so he is, in theory, well-versed in navigating official databases.
The first caper the team has to pull off: find the driver who was ferrying the exec that guards Scylla. Mahone breaks out his powers of observation to help the team determine exactly what sort of guy they're looking for. Within minutes, Roland's pulled records for guys who are ex-military, between 45-55 years old, and pulling down six figures in a private security gig. Mahone fingers the guy, and everyone realizes that swiping a data card from a heavily guarded compound might be tricky. Roland then suggests they use his superduper handheld thingy, which allegedly sucks up all data within a reasonably large radius. You know that somewhere, some aspiring black hat hacker is crying with envy that they're not in government custody following the successful deployment of their massive data-thieving handheld.
Actually, in the episode, Roland's crying in shame because his little gizmo's not working either. At least, it doesn't work on the first go-round, which involves Sucre hitting the car that ferries the Scylla-keeper. So plan B swings into action: Dr. Sara will get the superduper hand thingy into a housekeeper's purse, and the housekeeper will ferry it into the giant mansion where Scylla is kept. Dr. Sara makes the drop, Michael cons the housekeeper into wandering around the house until they can find the signal, and then they download the data. But when Mahone and Bellick lift the housekeeper's purse in order to retrieve the superduper handheld thingy, it's nowhere to be found.
The guys quickly conclude that the housekeeper must have assumed the superduper handheld thingy was her boss's and that it's inside the giant mansion. So Linc decrees that they'll have to go in and get it. Since he and the rest of the gang (ex-Roland) have ample experience breaking into places, it all goes as planned.
Once they get back to the Team Scylla HQ, it turns out they don't have data so much as they have a giant collection of random numbers and letters. Of course. Michael and Sara quickly realize Scylla isn't one card, it's six cards. ["Thanks to Homer for writing the Odyssey so that it could be reference on this show." -- Angel]
Also -- the "I will believe you're dead when I see a body" philosophy pays off: it turns out Gretchen's alive and not-so-well as a tortured prisoner of the One World Conspiracy. Oh lord, it's still too early in the season to get exercised over all the usual Can-they-maybe-not-torture-ONE-lady-on-this-show complaints.
Meanwhile, T-Bag chews a lot of desert scenery in his blood feud quest for Michael. He also chews his former traveling companion. That's right -- T-Bag ends up in the desert thanks to some untrustworthy coyotes, and after his traveling companion dies in a freak accident, T-Bag roasts and eats him. Is there some way that you haven't violated the laws of God and man, T-Bag? Are you planning necrophilia for November sweeps, or will that have to wait until May? Anyway, T-Bag makes it out of the desert and to San Diego, and uses the bird book to find a locker where Whistler had stashed a new fake ID, keys to a safehouse and other miscellaneous things that'll be useful to your man on the run.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!The episode begins with Agent Blots Out the Sun calling General Von Baldy and letting him know that "there's been a complication. Burrows and Scofield have been transferred to --" "I read the report," Von Baldy snipes. We find out that Agent Blots Out the Sun is under the impression that the boys are in a federal penitentiary, and he's made it his mission to find out which one. General Von Baldy orders, "No more updates. Call me when they're dead." Let's hope he doesn't decide to hang out by the phone -- knowing Michael and Lincoln's knack for staying alive, he'll be sitting there a while.
Meanwhile, Team Scylla has landed in Los Angeles and are strolling off the plane all calm and refreshed. (As someone who is writing this recap whilst winging across the country, I can only hope to exit the plane looking as cool and collected as Dr. Sara does.) Don Self says, "People who have escaped from not one but two penitentiaries are considered something of a flight risk. So we need to know where you are and what you're doing at all times. These are GPS ankle monitors. Now step up, take one, and put it on." Lincoln objects. Don Self smacks him down with, "Let's make this clear. I'm your ally, but more importantly, I'm your boss, which means if this fails, it's my ass on the line as much, if not more, than yours. So from this point on, if I ask you to do something, you do it. If I ask you to say something, you say it. If I ask you to put on a monitor, you put on a monitor." Mahone -- who looks so bad, it's as if he rode in coach, in the middle seat, forgot to bring food on board and lost his luggage -- strides forward to take the first monitor. Michael quickly follows suit with the second. The next shot is of Lincoln affixing the monitor over his sock-clad ankle. Please don't tell me he's inadvertently doomed himself to wearing the same pair of socks all season. There's a way to get socks on and off underneath the collar, right?
Team Scylla is escorted to what looks to be San Pedro, the port right by Long Beach. Oooh, I hope they have time to go whale-watching while they're there. Don Self continues to explain, "As far as the general public is concerned, you're being detained in a supermax facility somewhere in the United States. So avoiding messy explanations and staying off the One World Conspiracy's radar... you need to keep your head down and your eyes open. You're provided cell phones, toiletries and clothing -- all the basic necessities to get you up and running." The team enters a warehouse-type facility and a nervous-looking Asian guy asks, "You... you patted these guys down before you let them in, because I can't afford to be getting shanked..." Linc only scares the guy further by angrily bellowing, "Who's this?" Meet Roland Glenn, this season's best bet for meeting a grisly and/or stupid death by the end of May 2009. Don Self mentions that Roland's part of Team Scylla whether they like it or not, and Roland's got a similar deal owing to his computer-related crimes. Michael asks, "What about step two -- the break-in?" and Don dismisses this with "You let me worry about step two. You work on finding Scylla."