Saturday, March 29, 2014

NBC Crisis Episode 1 Recap: If You Are Watching This, I am Dead - Airdate 3-23-14


If you missed the official first episode after the series premiere, here's the recap. The premise of the show is starting to unravel, but we still don't know the reasons for anything. Read on:
                                                                                                                       Recap by Diane Hunstein

(Finley) Lance Gross saved a student in the series premiere. Turns out
the boy is quite a know-it-all.
The show opens with Meg Fitch and her attorney at a table filled with piles of cash. Meg is complying with the demands of the hostage takers, with the hope that they return her daughter Amber.  Meg’s attorney advises her to disclose the deal to the FBI, but she does not agree.  Finley and Anton are debriefed by the FBI, and  Agent Dunn seems skeptical of Finley’s account of the abduction.  Gibson calls the Pakistani Ambassador, asking “what will you do
for your child, how far will you go?” This sets the stage for the second episode of Crisis.z Back at FBI headquarters, Finley has a flashback to the abduction and the words spoken to him by one of the hostage takers, “worst first day ever.”  Next we are in the kidnappers’ control room, where it is becoming more apparent that Agent Hurst is not a willing participant.  Gibson is ordering him to copy the notebook, so it looks like Hurst orchestrated the abduction.  Gibson tells Hurst that he will be admired.  In the meantime, Dunn is conducting an interview with Hurst’s wife.  Mrs. Hurst says that her husband took their daughter, Tory, somewhere and she does not know her whereabouts.  Dunn and Finley are paired up to investigate a finding on Hurst’s car.  At the mansion, the teacher and students are given a newspaper filled with articles about the abduction.  The students are upset that Amber is the only one to have had her picture taken with the newspaper.  The Pakistani Ambassador and his wife get a horrifying phone call, asking if they would kill another in exchange for their child’s safety.



Will Marie Wirth (Martha Byrne) push the button?
While travelling to investigate a lead, Dunn admits to Finley that she does not believe he was in on the sinister plan.  However, she does not think he is good at his job since he lost all those kids, and it is clear that he will have to prove his capabilities.  And why didn’t Hurst kill Finley, they wonder.  At the mansion, the students are shown in various stages of distress – Charlene is freaking out about missing her Julliard audition, Luke is being a jerk to everyone and Beth Ann is despondent.  The abductors remove the Ambassador’s son from the main gathering room.  Dunn and Finley discover Hurst’s missing partner, Valens, tied up in a motel room. 


A drone passes overhead at the mansion, and the students are instructed to lie on the floor and remain silent.  Later, this causes Beth Ann and Ian, who don’t have wealthy families, to hatch a plan to scream the next time a drone flies by.   The Ambassador and his wife are directed to a park bench, where a small package is awaiting their pickup.  They are told to bring it to the embassy, unopened.  They have chosen not to disclose anything to the FBI, just like Meg Fitch.  In the meantime, Valens is insisting that Hurst has nothing to do with the kidnapping.  In the kidnappers’ control room, Hurst asks Gibson if he can see his daughter.  Gibson is annoyed that Hurst is challenging him about wanting to win his daughter Beth Ann back and get a “father of the year mug.”  Hurst is sent to “the hole.”  Meg delivers $20 million in cash and her car to a man in a parking garage.  She is instructed to the trunk of a waiting car, only to find an envelope containing a picture of Amber holding the newspaper.  She calls her sister, Agent Dunn, admitting that she screwed up badly and needs help.

The next scene opens with Meg and Dunn walking outside FBI headquarters.  Dunn is clearly annoyed with her sister because she took matters into her own hands and did not inform the FBI about the ransom.  She asks if there was anything else given to her beside the picture and Meg says no.  Meg realizes that she just paid for whatever the kidnappers will do next.  At the mansion, the President’s son Kyle tries to smooth things over with Beth Ann on behalf of his friend Luke.   Eventually, Kyle says he noticed that Beth Ann has issues with her dad, and he admits that he has the same.  Meanwhile, at FBI headquarters,  with the help of a map and an interview with Valens, Finley realizes that Hurst spent one hour of personal time on the day of the abduction near the Pakistani embassy.  Anton confirms that one of the students, Aziz, is the Ambassador’s son.  Finley and Dunn head to the embassy.

During the meeting between the Ambassador, Finley and Dunn, it quickly becomes clear to the Agents that something is amiss.  Dunn recognizes the look on the Ambassador’s face – it is the look of a parent being forced to do something for his child.  The Ambassador breaks down, and asks for help.  He is being asked to kill his intelligence officer in order to obtain his keycard.  The Agents set up a plan to temporarily disable the officer, and proceed to a basement area with the keycard.  The Ambassador has no knowledge of the area or what it may contain.  The Agents discover two injured Army Rangers on stretchers and a walkie talkie.  At FBI headquarters, the signal from Kyle’s GPS chip (which had been removed by the kidnappers) comes online.  It is tracked to the Pakistani embassy, and the FBI sends a squad of agents.  At the mansion, Beth Ann and Ian start yelling when they hear a drone, but it turns out that they are tricked by a recording of a drone.  Koz, one of the kidnappers, refers to them as troublemakers and asks Gibson if they are “still going through with it.”  Gibson says yes, and we see Beth Ann and Ian being harshly slapped across their faces for their transgression. 

Gibson wants credit for leading the FBI to the Rangers.  He wants to look like a hero, especially since no one else was looking for the soldiers.  The soldiers are being placed into an ambulance under FBI supervision.  It is revealed that Kyle’s GPS tracker was in the unopened box on the Ambassador’s desk.  Gibson orders the FBI communications to be taken down so they can extract the soldiers.  Dunn and Finley are questioning the ambulance drivers, and Finley becomes suspicious.  He realizes it is the same kidnapper who made the “worst first day ever” comment to him.  In a lightning fast shootout, Dunn and Finley kill both ambulance drivers, and Finley regains Dunn’s respect. 

Gibson orders Aziz killed, but then immediately recants, realizing that the parents did as he requested and it was his own operation that failed.  Gibson orders the next parent to be called, and says they will keep going until he is shaking hands with the President in the Rose Garden. He comments that the soldiers were being kept alive and that must indicate “the last program is still operational, there’s more proof out there.”  He orders the troublemakers (Beth Ann and Ian) to be taken upstairs.  From information on the walkie talkie, the FBI determines that the basement was a CIA blacksite, which raises several questions.  Another GPS tracker comes online, only to be discovered on the back of Amber’s picture, which is sitting on Dunn’s desk.  Meg watches Aziz being reunited with his mother on television. 

Gibson calls Meg, and she questions why the Ambassador got his child back and she did not.  Gibson tells her that she is not like the others, and that they are just getting started.  Meg shows her husband, Noah, a note that was in the envelope with Amber’s picture.  The note said to make sure the picture got into the FBI.  Meg admits that she lied to her sister, but didn’t get Amber back.  Gibson returns to the kids in the mansion’s common room, then heads upstairs to his daughter’s location.  He has a flashback about the locks being changed in his house and his daughter refusing to open the door.  He then opens the door to the room and is greeted with a hug from his scared and worried daughter.  Gibson’s motivations seem to include looking like a hero to his country and winning the admiration of his daughter. 

Stay tuned for next week!