Person of Interest: Canon gripes.
I am the kind of person who goes to a James Bond movie and is then bothered by Bond getting his novelty gun to Shanghai on a commercial flight, and being immune to hypothermia. So it will not surprise you that I have my share of gripes concerning Person of Interest. They don't diminish my enjoyment of the show, at least not generally. But even so, they can be annoying and distracting... as well as amusing. :-) And I like to voice them!
Hence, here are some plot details that could really have used more thought.
About the dog.
Bear is meant to be an incredibly well-trained military dog, right? Yet somehow, his every action shows him to be the worst-trained military dog in existence. He almost always acts like a pet, not a working dog. He doesn't pay attention to his surroundings. He doesn't guard. He doesn't wait for orders. He barks and whines willy-nilly - not to signal anything, but just because. He leaps all over the place not just when "off-duty", but also when out and about. He steals food. He is eager to make friends with strangers, and doesn't wait to be told how to act in new situations.
And worst of all: When John first meets him, he obeys a command by John - a random stranger - over that of his current handler. Why? Oh, because the stranger knows the right command (and his current handler is a criminal dirtbag). Oh my god. Seriously. There is not enough headdesk in the world.
It doesn't surprise me that there is only one trainer who trains military dogs like this. That is because this trainer sucks beyond the telling of it.
Aside: About interesting parallels.
Since I originally wrote this, a comment to my last post has made me think of an additional facet of the Bear situation. Namely:
It's possible to construct a parallel between Bear's situation when John meets him, and John's own situation back when he was working for the CIA. Both are highly-trained, dangerous military creatures, regarded and used as disposable weapons by malevolent, brutal and neglectful masters. Both are not evil in themselves, but are merely being misused.
So I now read the scene in which John meets Bear as John recognizing a kind of kinship with the dog, and rescuing him from the situation by offering him the chance to follow a better, "proper" master, who knows and uses the right kind of commands. A chance which Bear takes, just as John takes the chance Harold offers him (though Harold arrives on the scene at a much later point than John does with Bear).
Maybe I am over-interpreting. But I do think it's a striking parallel.
Of course, it doesn't change the fact that Bear's behavior in that scene (and otherwise) is very much not that of a trained military dog, who would never have obeyed a random stranger over his handler.
About "Foe" (1x08) - the Stasi assassin ep.
I will not go into the standard foreign language troubles (which were actually comparatively mild). But what is up with the foreign intelligence operative who is not only totally incompetent, but also breaks into incoherent babbling in his mother tongue when put into a slightly stressful situation? Wow, kid, as covert and resilient as you are, I think you'd better consider a change of careers double-quick. Or are foreign secret agents simply meant to be generally incompetent?
Another detail that bothered me is that our experienced Stasi superspy, who is otherwise not incompetent at all, fills his secret graveyard cache with Ostmarks, the East German currency. So basically, in the event he found himself in the US and needed to quickly disappear without a trace, he intended to, errr… run into serious money and secrecy problems because his cash was both worthless outside of the Eastern Bloc *and* bound to attract immediate notice?
About "Masquerade" (2x03) - the bodyguard ep.
I am used to bodyguards being absolutely incompetent on TV and in movies. I'm still wondering whether this is because nobody ever bothers to read up on how bodyguards actually work, or whether the ridiculous fictional bodyguard procedures are just considered more photogenic. (Actual criminals must be so surprised when their wily "make a noise just around the corner to lure the bodyguard away from the door" or "dress up as a hotel employee" schemes fail dismally. But whyyy? It always works on TV!)
So, okay. I don't like it, but I'm used to it. But, show. Do not have John call a bodyguard out on a mistake every TV bodyguard always makes, forever and ever, amen (not clearing a location before the guarded person enters) - only for John himself to then go on to be just as lousy a bodyguard. Why no, turns out you cannot guard someone from halfway across a crowded club. Surprise! (And uhm, John, I notice you didn't clear the room in advance, either…)
Show, you can't have your (beef)cake and eat it, too. Either go with the illusion that TV bodyguarding is "good" bodyguarding, or break conventions and actually show good bodyguarding.
About "2пR" (2x11) - the genius high school coder ep.
The genius high school coder triple-books his afternoon by setting up a meet with a) drug dealers who want their money immediately or else and b) a teacher who turns out not to be a bad guy after all, all while c) planning to actually spend the time in question killing himself. John talks the kid out of c - which is good! All is well, right? Brilliant kid will not die, but go on to be brilliant some more. Yay!
Except for the angry drug dealers on the kid's trail. Did I miss this or does nobody actually seem to remember them and their wish to set an example? Looks like it's gonna be a rather short brilliant career for this brilliant kid and his brilliant compression algorithm.
I will refrain from going into the fight scenes and the body armor that evidently works like an invisible force field, also protecting head, neck and all other potentially endangered body parts. These things are like TV bodyguarding: narrative conventions that I try hard to just ignore. ;-)
So, what do you think about all of this? Have any gripes of your own?
Hence, here are some plot details that could really have used more thought.
About the dog.
Bear is meant to be an incredibly well-trained military dog, right? Yet somehow, his every action shows him to be the worst-trained military dog in existence. He almost always acts like a pet, not a working dog. He doesn't pay attention to his surroundings. He doesn't guard. He doesn't wait for orders. He barks and whines willy-nilly - not to signal anything, but just because. He leaps all over the place not just when "off-duty", but also when out and about. He steals food. He is eager to make friends with strangers, and doesn't wait to be told how to act in new situations.
And worst of all: When John first meets him, he obeys a command by John - a random stranger - over that of his current handler. Why? Oh, because the stranger knows the right command (and his current handler is a criminal dirtbag). Oh my god. Seriously. There is not enough headdesk in the world.
It doesn't surprise me that there is only one trainer who trains military dogs like this. That is because this trainer sucks beyond the telling of it.
Aside: About interesting parallels.
Since I originally wrote this, a comment to my last post has made me think of an additional facet of the Bear situation. Namely:
It's possible to construct a parallel between Bear's situation when John meets him, and John's own situation back when he was working for the CIA. Both are highly-trained, dangerous military creatures, regarded and used as disposable weapons by malevolent, brutal and neglectful masters. Both are not evil in themselves, but are merely being misused.
So I now read the scene in which John meets Bear as John recognizing a kind of kinship with the dog, and rescuing him from the situation by offering him the chance to follow a better, "proper" master, who knows and uses the right kind of commands. A chance which Bear takes, just as John takes the chance Harold offers him (though Harold arrives on the scene at a much later point than John does with Bear).
Maybe I am over-interpreting. But I do think it's a striking parallel.
Of course, it doesn't change the fact that Bear's behavior in that scene (and otherwise) is very much not that of a trained military dog, who would never have obeyed a random stranger over his handler.
About "Foe" (1x08) - the Stasi assassin ep.
I will not go into the standard foreign language troubles (which were actually comparatively mild). But what is up with the foreign intelligence operative who is not only totally incompetent, but also breaks into incoherent babbling in his mother tongue when put into a slightly stressful situation? Wow, kid, as covert and resilient as you are, I think you'd better consider a change of careers double-quick. Or are foreign secret agents simply meant to be generally incompetent?
Another detail that bothered me is that our experienced Stasi superspy, who is otherwise not incompetent at all, fills his secret graveyard cache with Ostmarks, the East German currency. So basically, in the event he found himself in the US and needed to quickly disappear without a trace, he intended to, errr… run into serious money and secrecy problems because his cash was both worthless outside of the Eastern Bloc *and* bound to attract immediate notice?
About "Masquerade" (2x03) - the bodyguard ep.
I am used to bodyguards being absolutely incompetent on TV and in movies. I'm still wondering whether this is because nobody ever bothers to read up on how bodyguards actually work, or whether the ridiculous fictional bodyguard procedures are just considered more photogenic. (Actual criminals must be so surprised when their wily "make a noise just around the corner to lure the bodyguard away from the door" or "dress up as a hotel employee" schemes fail dismally. But whyyy? It always works on TV!)
So, okay. I don't like it, but I'm used to it. But, show. Do not have John call a bodyguard out on a mistake every TV bodyguard always makes, forever and ever, amen (not clearing a location before the guarded person enters) - only for John himself to then go on to be just as lousy a bodyguard. Why no, turns out you cannot guard someone from halfway across a crowded club. Surprise! (And uhm, John, I notice you didn't clear the room in advance, either…)
Show, you can't have your (beef)cake and eat it, too. Either go with the illusion that TV bodyguarding is "good" bodyguarding, or break conventions and actually show good bodyguarding.
About "2пR" (2x11) - the genius high school coder ep.
The genius high school coder triple-books his afternoon by setting up a meet with a) drug dealers who want their money immediately or else and b) a teacher who turns out not to be a bad guy after all, all while c) planning to actually spend the time in question killing himself. John talks the kid out of c - which is good! All is well, right? Brilliant kid will not die, but go on to be brilliant some more. Yay!
Except for the angry drug dealers on the kid's trail. Did I miss this or does nobody actually seem to remember them and their wish to set an example? Looks like it's gonna be a rather short brilliant career for this brilliant kid and his brilliant compression algorithm.
I will refrain from going into the fight scenes and the body armor that evidently works like an invisible force field, also protecting head, neck and all other potentially endangered body parts. These things are like TV bodyguarding: narrative conventions that I try hard to just ignore. ;-)
So, what do you think about all of this? Have any gripes of your own?