Come on, here at TVRRoundup there's no letting Person of Interest die. I'm just gonna keep finding new things to talk about - even 15 months after its conclusion. And what I want to talk about today is a very specific scene in Person of Interest - the one that, for me, really cemented the tonal shift after Samaritan became part of the storyline.
There are contenders for this spot, of course. The initial revelation that Samaritan existed and a second machine could become operational - that's most certainly deserving for its introduction of the show's hidden endgame. Or the closing scene of season 3, right from Samaritan's activation through Root's voiceover as the team split up to go into hiding, to that final, eerie moment when Greer corrects Samaritan in suggesting it must give humanity instructions, rather than be led by humanity.
But it's not either of those scenes that I want to discuss.
Impressive though they are, those scenes are set-up for when the show would be ready to plug an operational Samaritan into the storyline; they do not actually show you the tonal shift, they prepare you for it.
Before we can check out the show-changing scene, however, it's important to revisit its brother, the following scene from the end of the pilot episode, in which Finch and Reese are walking through a park, and Finch is giving a brief and redacted explanation to Reese about the Machine and its function.
This pilot scene was a smart one, giving us just enough information about what was going on after an episode of mystery to draw us back in as an audience. But it has a brother scene - and that's what I want to discuss: this clip from three seasons later, episode 4x01 "Panopticon".
Forgive the limited quality.
I haven't discussed this scene from "Panopticon" before in any of my prior Person of Interest roundups, but - while not being one of the best scenes of the show (there are far too many in contention for that award, although I have whittled it to a top five if you visit my Best Of roundup) - it needs to be considered for its merits as the very moment we as an audience truly understood how the show had changed.
And it draws interesting comparisons with its brother scene from the pilot.
VISUALLY
The first thing to mention about these scenes is how they look. The pilot scene is packed full of stuff - houses, people, a tunnel, trees, gates - which not only adds a visual aid to Finch's explanation of the Machine's function, but shows how disconnected it is from the people around it. Gates, other obstructions and people all around - the Machine can't see everything. Whereas in "Panopticon", Greer and Garrison speak at a large, open area by a waterfront, which is almost completely devoid of Joe Public. Fewer visual obstructions show us how clearly Samaritan can see everything, which is reinforced by the dead space in the shots when Greer speaks to it.
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| Samaritan watches Greer and Garrison meet |
Equally, the ways that the two ASIs are involved in their scenes provide visual cues at to how the tide has turned. In the pilot, the Machine doesn't communicate with Finch or Reese, but a number of security camera shots of it watching and listening to people show us its perspective of the world: it's there, but it's hidden and it can't interact with humanity. In "Panopticon" we do see Samaritan's perspective, but we also watch it communicate openly with Greer. Not only does that achieve the more simplistic goal of reminding us Samaritan is a free, unshackled system, but this coupled with the dead space and the empty surroundings where the scene takes place just double down on showing us that Samaritan is everywhere and is much more powerful.
EPISODE POSITION
I also think there's some symbolism with regards to where each scene is positioned in their respective episodes. Finch and Reese speak at the end of the pilot, and, while this is simply a good choice to hold the audience's interest, it can be argued - in retrospect and in comparison to this scene in "Panopticon" - that Finch and Reese's discussion coming at the end of an episode admits that while the show may take a long and circuitous route to do what needs to be done, we will get answers in the end.
But Greer and Garrison's scene comes almost at the very beginning of the season 4 premiere. And what does that admit to the audience about our characters? Finch likes to keep his cards close to his chest, but will at least partly include Reese into what is going on when pushed; Greer shows from the get-go that the people he is dealing with - the government - will be getting no such transparency.
The only scene to precede this Greer/Garrison dialogue in "Panopticon" is the ruthless Samaritan agent Martine tracking down and murdering an investigative journalist - an immediate show of Samaritan's strength. And, if anything, this preceding scene makes Greer and Garrison's conversation even more impactful, as it follows a show of strength with a show of omnipotence - frightening capabilities of the new, more dangerous ASI.
PRIORITIES AND EXPLANATION
How much information is shared and the priorities of the characters in these two scenes is also important.
Garrison and Reese ask their respective partners some important questions - but even before we consider the differences in their responses it's not entirely accurate to refer to Greer and Finch as their "partners". Certainly, Finch is more friendly and open to Reese than Greer is to Garrison, treating Reese in part as an equal, or at least deserving of some answers; while he doesn't give him all the answers, he gives him - and the audience - enough.
But Greer is not so welcoming; he knows that with Samaritan's backing he has the upper hand over practically everyone, and as such treats Garrison with near to contempt. (This power disparity is no more obvious than in Garrison's semi-desperation to remind Greer of the foundation of plausible deniability upon which the government let Samaritan come into being, a foundation made unstable the very moment the government security feeds were relinquished. Finch sold his soul to the government when he gave them the Machine but, in seeking an alternative in Samaritan, the government became the endangered party trapped under the thumb of an entity even more powerful than them.) Worse, at the end of the conversation Greer's first instinct is to wonder whether Garrison's thirst for information makes him a threat that should be "eliminated"; Finch displays no such murderous inclinations towards Reese for his curiosity.
And, as I've already mentioned, the gulf between the information shared by Finch with Reese and that shared by Greer with Garrison is vast. But also, in the pilot Finch tells Reese - and the audience - that the Machine is everywhere. By the time Greer and Garrison meet, that doesn't need to be repeated about Samaritan: the visual cues help remind us of that fact. It's almost like a reset, too: we've spent three years learning about the Machine; now, we must learn from scratch the capabilities and motives of a second ASI.
Going back to the point about plausible deniability, however, there's an interesting parallel. The government, unseen in the pilot, remain as concerned about plausible deniability then as they are when adopting Samaritan as their new number-cruncher; regardless of whoever they're dealing with and the implications of that, the government's top priority never alters.
And there's also a quick point to be made about the characters' priorities: the show is born as one that has Finch and Reese protect Joe Public, so in the pilot they primarily focus on discussing the irrelevants whose numbers are sent to Finch; Greer and Garrison speak only of terrorist threats, of relevants. While that is a very simple point to make - obviously their focuses would be different - the focus on relevants in "Panopticon" does symbolise how much larger the storyline has become compared to its beginning point.
Final thoughts
I'll admit, when I decided to analyse these two scenes I intended only to make the point about how the clarity in the visual shots in the "Panopticon" scene give the audience a real sense that Samaritan is free and the show is therefore a different beast entirely, but it became a much deeper study of two incredible and comparable brother scenes.
It seems clear to me that these were two very well-thought-out scenes, that everything they required to depict the landscape of the show at these two points in time was carefully crafted and considered. And the above are all reasons why "Panopticon"'s meeting of Greer and Garrison is the moment that changed the entire show.
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