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gentle exhortation to further action
It is 6 degrees F. outside, which makes getting up to do things not the most pleasant thought, but I've managed to zip through quite a few tasks this week (at the standing-up desk, mostly - which is in the coldest room) so feel justified in being almost through Foxglove Summer and having watched POI 4.11 "If - Then - Else" twice.
And wow, what a stunning episode. Structurally brilliant (if not unpredictable - lots of people guessed the format based on the previews and the title) and a perfect exhibition of the show's combination of action and emotional punch (emotional knockout, even), with Finch-voiced moral lesson to boot (and having just published a book full of chess metaphors I am not at all prejudiced, but I thought it was beautifully done). I have been spending more time on Tumblr than I should looking at the ideas and beautiful gifs posted (though not much discussion - still not a good place for that).
It's one of those episodes where minor plot quibbles don't bother me much even if I notice them, though WTF why is there an override button across the room, I suppose for vague security purposes as well as convenience for self-sacrifice? Also, in all the scenarios after they break out of the lunch room Root kicks guns aside (not always into the same place, which was interesting) but no one picks them up, I don't think - you'd think the extra bullets would have been useful. But I liked all the details of difference between the scenarios, and though Harold stopping to admire the Degas was perhaps a bit too him (and… why was it there?), I loved the "what good is it saving the world if we can't enjoy it?" message switching voices from Harold to Root in the real action. Also, the Machine ships Fusco/Root, ha ha.
I am a big sucker for the flashbacks on this show, especially those involving Harold teaching the Machine. And technically I suppose all (or most - the really old ones are problematic) of the flashbacks are Machine flashbacks, but nevertheless we label them with characters' names, thinking of them as memories. These ones really were Machine flashbacks - her own memories of learning lessons and consideration of what to do with them. Evidence that she does have, in her machine-like way, a conscience or a moral foundation. Which Samaritan does not. So that was great, and the chess was great, and the trial scenarios were wonderful, especially the speeded-up one with placeholder dialogue - which, aside from being funny, shows that the Machine has near-human powers of observation and synthesis, one might almost say a sense of humor. And is amusing herself. Possibly as distraction from the awfulness of the situation.
I'm wondering if she told Root about the tiny chance of asset survival. It's also interesting to look at Martine's almost robotic behavior as contrast to all the humanity shown by Team Machine (and the Machine's apparent understanding of it) - Martine may be enjoying herself in obedience to Greer's exhortation, but she doesn't show it. Lambert does a bit. (And ha, it's fun to watch Julian Ovenden in that part, after last seeing him as baby-face Andrew Foyle.)
Anyway, so many wonderful pieces to this episode, and they got the pacing just right despite all the repetition, or maybe because of it - a simple scenario, in the end, and I didn't miss any of it even on first viewing. I loved everyone, but of course especially Shaw, who does the protecting and paid what may turn out to be the ultimate price because of it. And Root, oh my God. Especially in that "it's enough" scenario where she steps out into the hail of bullets. All of them are willing to sacrifice for the team, for humanity, and for the ones they especially love, even Harold with his low-key warning to Root before he's shot. Fusco is an interesting partial exception - not that he wouldn't go down to protect the others, but we never see him do it in the scenarios (it's implied in the first, but not shown), and he's undamaged at the end - but not uncompromised. I'm wondering if the opening credits, next time, will show him as a threat to Samaritan. They certainly know about him now, and know that he knows much more than he did; I think Harold's going to have to fill him in even more to protect him. (I'm not worried about John, at least in the sense of recovering from being shot. He'll be fine. He will not be fine about Shaw, but it won't be a repeat of last season. They are all going to need to work together to calm Root down.)
ETA: The worst thing about the scenarios is that they're all likely outcomes of future crises, because the Machine knows her operatives that well, both their capabilities and their weak points. Root would indeed prefer to sacrifice herself knowing that Shaw cared at least a little bit (the repeat, in real time, of her "can't a couple of gals" line was chilling), and in fact they'll be hard-pressed to stop her from doing it now. Harold would not react fast enough in a crisis. John would be self-sacrificing and protective to a fault, when in fact it would have been better to keep Fusco with him to hold off the goons. It's all so true.
And there's a longer essay I could try to write when there's time, about character deaths and especially Carter vs. Shaw, why this one worked for me and the other one didn't. Of course Shaw may well not be dead, and I hope she turns up again - there are all sorts of reasons for Samaritan's operatives to keep her alive, and all sorts of ways she could be useful later on - but it looks like it won't be for a while. Congrats to Shahi on the twins, yay!
Also, aha, the kiss. It's great to watch that happen and then imagine Tumblr exploding. It was great, although the angle and the interfering hair were odd, but awkward passion works for me so very well, and I'm so happy they did it. (The parallels with Reese/Carter are for the essay I could write.)
In conclusion, fantastic episode. And now I have to wake up the kid and make sure he finishes packing - we drive to Allentown today, how much fun in this weather.
And wow, what a stunning episode. Structurally brilliant (if not unpredictable - lots of people guessed the format based on the previews and the title) and a perfect exhibition of the show's combination of action and emotional punch (emotional knockout, even), with Finch-voiced moral lesson to boot (and having just published a book full of chess metaphors I am not at all prejudiced, but I thought it was beautifully done). I have been spending more time on Tumblr than I should looking at the ideas and beautiful gifs posted (though not much discussion - still not a good place for that).
It's one of those episodes where minor plot quibbles don't bother me much even if I notice them, though WTF why is there an override button across the room, I suppose for vague security purposes as well as convenience for self-sacrifice? Also, in all the scenarios after they break out of the lunch room Root kicks guns aside (not always into the same place, which was interesting) but no one picks them up, I don't think - you'd think the extra bullets would have been useful. But I liked all the details of difference between the scenarios, and though Harold stopping to admire the Degas was perhaps a bit too him (and… why was it there?), I loved the "what good is it saving the world if we can't enjoy it?" message switching voices from Harold to Root in the real action. Also, the Machine ships Fusco/Root, ha ha.
I am a big sucker for the flashbacks on this show, especially those involving Harold teaching the Machine. And technically I suppose all (or most - the really old ones are problematic) of the flashbacks are Machine flashbacks, but nevertheless we label them with characters' names, thinking of them as memories. These ones really were Machine flashbacks - her own memories of learning lessons and consideration of what to do with them. Evidence that she does have, in her machine-like way, a conscience or a moral foundation. Which Samaritan does not. So that was great, and the chess was great, and the trial scenarios were wonderful, especially the speeded-up one with placeholder dialogue - which, aside from being funny, shows that the Machine has near-human powers of observation and synthesis, one might almost say a sense of humor. And is amusing herself. Possibly as distraction from the awfulness of the situation.
I'm wondering if she told Root about the tiny chance of asset survival. It's also interesting to look at Martine's almost robotic behavior as contrast to all the humanity shown by Team Machine (and the Machine's apparent understanding of it) - Martine may be enjoying herself in obedience to Greer's exhortation, but she doesn't show it. Lambert does a bit. (And ha, it's fun to watch Julian Ovenden in that part, after last seeing him as baby-face Andrew Foyle.)
Anyway, so many wonderful pieces to this episode, and they got the pacing just right despite all the repetition, or maybe because of it - a simple scenario, in the end, and I didn't miss any of it even on first viewing. I loved everyone, but of course especially Shaw, who does the protecting and paid what may turn out to be the ultimate price because of it. And Root, oh my God. Especially in that "it's enough" scenario where she steps out into the hail of bullets. All of them are willing to sacrifice for the team, for humanity, and for the ones they especially love, even Harold with his low-key warning to Root before he's shot. Fusco is an interesting partial exception - not that he wouldn't go down to protect the others, but we never see him do it in the scenarios (it's implied in the first, but not shown), and he's undamaged at the end - but not uncompromised. I'm wondering if the opening credits, next time, will show him as a threat to Samaritan. They certainly know about him now, and know that he knows much more than he did; I think Harold's going to have to fill him in even more to protect him. (I'm not worried about John, at least in the sense of recovering from being shot. He'll be fine. He will not be fine about Shaw, but it won't be a repeat of last season. They are all going to need to work together to calm Root down.)
ETA: The worst thing about the scenarios is that they're all likely outcomes of future crises, because the Machine knows her operatives that well, both their capabilities and their weak points. Root would indeed prefer to sacrifice herself knowing that Shaw cared at least a little bit (the repeat, in real time, of her "can't a couple of gals" line was chilling), and in fact they'll be hard-pressed to stop her from doing it now. Harold would not react fast enough in a crisis. John would be self-sacrificing and protective to a fault, when in fact it would have been better to keep Fusco with him to hold off the goons. It's all so true.
And there's a longer essay I could try to write when there's time, about character deaths and especially Carter vs. Shaw, why this one worked for me and the other one didn't. Of course Shaw may well not be dead, and I hope she turns up again - there are all sorts of reasons for Samaritan's operatives to keep her alive, and all sorts of ways she could be useful later on - but it looks like it won't be for a while. Congrats to Shahi on the twins, yay!
Also, aha, the kiss. It's great to watch that happen and then imagine Tumblr exploding. It was great, although the angle and the interfering hair were odd, but awkward passion works for me so very well, and I'm so happy they did it. (The parallels with Reese/Carter are for the essay I could write.)
In conclusion, fantastic episode. And now I have to wake up the kid and make sure he finishes packing - we drive to Allentown today, how much fun in this weather.
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I loved the "what good is it saving the world if we can't enjoy it?" message switching voices from Harold to Root in the real action
I was wondering if the Machine told Root to say that, repeating something it thinks Harold would say, on top of doing something for him specifically. Also, Root's reaction to his death in the first simulation: since the Machine sees her as its interface, would it predict her reaction to Harold's death in a way that's at least partly influenced by its own reaction?
Loved the interaction between Harold and the Machine in the flashbacks, and I still don't know how Harold went from teaching the Machine like a child, having real conversations, to cutting off its memories (which I assume must have happened after) and not interacting with it at all anymore. There must be something
the writers haven't made upwe haven't seen yet.a moral foundation
Yeah, those flashbacks were called 'reviewing precepts'. Which is interesting, because it's not something Harold wrote into the code, but something he told. Very different, and yet, the Machine still takes it as a deciding rule. (Not only that, it predicts his current responses in a similar way and acts accordingly: see the painting.)
But on second thought, they didn't go down the hard route: both simulations the Machine rejected were utter failures anyway, it didn't really have to make the 'sacrifice a chess piece for a desired outcome' decision. During the second one it looked like sacrificing John might be okay, because it stopped only when Root was killed as well, but that might be reading too much into it. The way the flashbacks were paired with the simulations certainly suggested that the ultimate decision was based on Harold's words of not sacrificing people for strategy (see also the Bob/Alice scenario in 'Prophets') but, well, it was the only possibly successful one anyway.
What I'm not entirely sure about is the sense of humour you mention. I mean, the abstract dialogue made sense, the Fusco/Root kiss less so, and, in my probably rather unpopular opinion, that bit went too far in breaking the fourth wall. There are shows where it fits tonally, but in this one I found it really jarring, although I see why they did it.
They certainly know about him now, and know that he knows much more than he did
Ha, we'll see how that goes. I recently rewatched the end of last season and it occurred to me that Fusco is right there on the bridge with them during the Grace exchange, he is seen by many of Decima's operatives - and yet, no consequences.
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I'm not sure how simultaneous John's and Root's deaths were in the second scenario, but it was a double failure because John couldn't hold off the goons long enough to complete the hacking (his hero complex failing him). Harold's death in the first scenario was a similar double failure, but I can see the "sentiment" or whatever you want to call it in Machine terms creeping in there. It struck me even on first viewing that Root shouldn't have had time to cradle Harold's dying body and look pitiful; she should have been shot immediately, and perhaps the Machine altered the scenario to prevent that, or imagined that the world would stop to mourn Harold with her.
It might have been better writing if Harold had succeeded in the hack before being shot, and John and Fusco had managed to escape, and then the Machine had to decide if that was an acceptable outcome. Or the reverse, in the second scenario, although losing John and Fusco is not as painful from a Machine standpoint. But obviously there were real-world actor-related concerns, and Shaw had to be the piece sacrificed. I'm not sure there was a chess piece analogy working there, aside from Harold being the king - I've seen the suggestion that Root was the queen and Shaw the knight, but does the chess player really identify with the most powerful piece? In any case, if the Machine is following Harold's precept that life isn't a chess game, then there shouldn't be an analogy anyway. And Shaw's death or capture isn't a Machine-predicted sacrifice, but a totally unexpected outcome of a scenario where none of the assets had much of a chance.
And heh, I'm going to stick with the sense of humor - the abstract dialogue may have been sensible in the context of speeding up thinking, but there was no reason to make it so pointedly on target except for amusement's sake. But again, that's being overly Watsonian. I am still waiting for the writers to make the Machine's reactions completely consistent with its programming and education, and I doubt that's going to happen.
Thanks for playing!
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Yeah, that's why I started thinking about it in the first place. It didn't really feel like 'just Root' to me.
And I agree that the scenario that played out wasn't a Machine-predicted sacrifice or a chess-piece analogy, but we still don't know if the Machine would have taken that route or followed Harold's 'life is not a chess game' verdict. The way the scenarios were set up keeps it ambiguous, because the Machine didn't have to decide on a moral basis, it could keep the decision on a probability of success basis.