Numb3rs 5.02

[owl]

I'm having a bit of difficulty believing that there's so little Charlie can work on without clearance. Surely the entire post-graduate academic community doesn't have to be cleared by the FBI?

Of course, if he were a pure mathematician, he'd just go off and invent some new field of arcane maths. Hey, Charlie, there's always P vs NP.

I LOVED all the scenes with David and Colby interaction, and them ganging up on Nikki. Loved the whole 'new guy' nickname thing, and the pre-therapy and post-therapy Don line. I love David and Colby snark, and I missed it last episode.

And the n00b stories were good. A bit more Don backstory too. I loved the image of baby!Agent Eppes having his (cute :)) ass handed to him.

I'm not sure what to make of the Further Eppes Adventures in throwing the rulebook out the window. I kind of miss straight-arrow Don from the early seasons. On the other hand, Don's grin after Charlie throws 'Would you let the rules stop you?' at him is completely adorable. And does Charlie ever know the way to wind his big brother round his little finger. We get told that Charlie can't say no to Don, but I don't see Don saying no to Charlie very much either.

I don't think Charlie's exactly stepping onto Don's slippery slope; I think Charlie has never cared much for the rules if there's something he considers more important (math or people :) ). I also don't think that Charlie was consciously manipulating Don; most youngest kids are experts at making their families do what they want. I think Charlie's lack of social skills might have hampered him in his spoiled-baby potential :) But he has the knack of persuading people to see things his way, when it's something he feels passionately about.

On the other hand, this is a stupid situation; like Don said last week, Charlie's not a threat. It's not the same as last season when Don was going along with Sanjrani being a terrorist, or trying to hold the guy in Black Swan when he had no grounds to, or letting Ian do whatever he did to Buck Winters. The thing about Don is that he was originally set up as rules-bounded and justice-oriented, in contrast to Charlie the lateral thinker and Alan the ex-hippie. The new 'people before principles' attitude (to quote Cordelia Naismith Vorkosigan, although I always had a bit of a problem with it, because that is itself a principle! Perhaps 'people before protocols, then) could be a result of his family rubbing off on him, but you'd think it would have been more likely to happen when he was still a kid. It's hard to see something that fundamental to a person's character changing that much when he's in his thirties. The infringing of civil liberties, and the torture or whatever, sadly could be Don losing his native integrity in the current state of society and law enforcement. But both together is just confusing to me.

On the gripping hand, I have no objection whatsoever to Don being forced to take a good hard look at what lines he's been crossing, and what he's going to do about it. It was past time he caught some consequences. I suspect that that 85% solve rate has a lot to do with why he hasn't yet. Also, seeing that he's that good, why has he never been promoted in the course of the series? Can he get promoted and stay a field agent? He could have turned down a promotion. I don't think he'd want to drive a desk all day. He ran the office in Albuquerque, so he knows what it's like. But he has to have a string of reprimands by now. Perhaps the question should be, how did he manage to get promoted as far as he did in Albuquerque??

I liked the scenes with Magowan, and I definitely think there's more going on there than Charlie. I think he's just the last straw. Some backstory there, I think. And I loved Don going "You want to come after me, fine, but leave my brother out of it." That really gets to Don, people using Charlie to hurt him.

I note that Don's attitude to the rules doesn't extend to his subordinates, or to stupid risks that could get your head blown off. Shouty!Don FTW, Nikki had it coming. Her sadface after Don ripped her head off was pretty endearing, though. I'm starting to like her, although I still miss Megan. But it looks like the new team is finding a rapport, with Nikki in little sister position rather than Megan's big sister one. It'll be interesting to see her interact more with Charlie, because he's so used to being the baby of the team. He has shared it with Amita in the past, but that's different; she's part of his world, and she understands him, whereas Nikki is there by right.

David and Colby were great this week, together and ganging up on Nikki. Arguing about the driving, pre-therapy and post-therapy Don, "you gave her our distress word?". LOL.

Oh, another thing I liked was Don lifting the sheet so he could see the dead woman's face. It reminded me of him touching Rachel Abbot's face away back in the pilot. Continuity and compassionate Don, gotta love it. There were a couple of other references to earlier episodes: gung-ho Colby, and David's posting to Tel Aviv.

And Colby saying "We didn't get her home" was another good moment. Remember when Colby was an idiot at the beginning? I didn't like him at all, but now I do. Gives me hope I'll learn to love Nikki too. There's an interesting pattern here: it took two new regulars to replace Terry, and now we have two regulars to replace Megan. (Yeah, I know Liz was there before, but as a guest). If this keeps up, they'd better not lose anyone else, or they'll break the budget, lol.

Maths was interesting, and I loved the scene where Larry completely fails to convey his epiphany to the Feds and has to be translated by Amita.

Oh, and I loved the scene with Charlie and Amita at the end. Poor Charlie, he was so sad when he said "I never thought I'd miss it so much", it broke me a little. Being left out is something that's always going to be touchy for him, I think. When he paused before saying "when I stayed home sick from school", I was sure he was going to say something like "when Don went off with his friends without me". He didn't even like school!
And I LOLed when Amita pointed out that he hated every minute of writing the book :) Charlie, listen to Amita: no more books! Unless they're textbooks, not popular science. One thing I noticed about that scene: everyone else, even Don, gets the game face. It's starting to slip a bit, but Charlie's still trying. Amita gets all his vulnerabilities exposed without question. *aw*

I am amused to note that even when Charlie's wearing suits, the shirt is still untucked and the jacket unbuttoned. Geek :) And Don with the good hair. It appeared to be combed this week, too, which should appease the people who were up in arms last week. But still with the stubborn curls. They look really like brothers with the haircuts they have at the minute.

Comments

[rodlox.livejournal.com]

>On the gripping hand,
ah, young Motie! :)

as soon as I finish these Highlander/NCIS fics, I'm going to have a NUMB3RS marathon.

[owl]

Well, I realised that I'd written "on the other hand" twice, so really I had no alternative :)

A reading, writing or watching marathon?

[rodlox.livejournal.com]

well, you know what the one octopus said to the other octopus. ;)

all of the current season...so mostly watching.

[owl]

Have fun! I think you will; it's been very good so far this season.