Person of Interest, Season 4

Previously, of the dramas I watch, "Person of Interest" was my least favorite. That's not an insult, because it was still one of the dramas I watched. I would sometimes procrastinate watching it.

Let me back up. With the comedies and game shows, my family and I watch them together, so the viewing schedule is based on that, but we usually watch things pretty quickly. With the dramas, it's not just when I have time, but when I have the television to myself, because no one else likes my shows. (They're wrong, but it's not a battle worth fighting.)

"White Collar" aired on a completely different schedule, so keeping caught up was usually easy. When new episodes for the other three started at once, I was really busy. I let myself get eight episodes behind on POI, whereas with "Grimm" I would usually watch within 24 hours of the original airing. "Once Upon A Time" fell somewhere in between.

POI was less relaxing. I enjoyed the episodes and found them interesting, but I could wait to watch it. Sometimes I would think about dropping it, and that never sounded desirable, but I would think about the difference.

I have generally preferred fantasy to science fiction in the past (I read mainly non-fiction now). While the other two shows were (in different ways) directly inspired by fairy tales, POI is very much technology-driven. I thought that could be a factor.

I also thought the violence could be a factor. It has a lot more fighting and gun play than the other shows, and more deaths of people you care about. I think you can reasonably say that it's a darker show in general, and that has been getting worse since Samaritan went live. They are losing more numbers. The guy in Search and Destroy sort of sought it out through the way his arrogance in his need to know more overpowered everything else, but the programmer who got involved with the Nautilus contest fled and hid and tried to get Control to listen and none of it was enough.

Actually, that's another possible reason for my liking the show less there. There was always some bigger plot going on, and they kept getting bigger. HR seemed like a really big problem, but what Decima has wrought is much worse. I generally prefer things on a smaller and more relatable scale.

That would mean I should be getting more fed up with the show, but I am liking it better. After the last episode I think I understand why. The characters have become more human. Maybe they've had to in light of Samaritan's inhumanity.

I see their relationships mattering more to them. The grief over Shaw's loss has been a part of it. Root planned on murdering an innocent woman because she believed it was the only way to prevent Harold's death. That sounds horrible, and if the woman had died it would have backfired, but that is growth for Root. It took her a while to learn to value human life, so it seemed like a setback, but it was something different. And of course we have seen some flashbacks of Finch programming and teaching the Machine to value an individual, and to value life. Those have all been significant, but it was the April 14th episode that really drove everything home.

John opened a cold case that had last been worked by Carter, and we thought we were seeing flashbacks. Well, some if it was a flashback, but it was also a hallucination that John was  having after being shot.

Carter's death mattered when it happened. John went off the rails, and Fusco got on the wagon. Elias arranged the death of her murderer. Everyone was hurt, but had moved on.

It had come back a little. When firing his gun too often led to John seeing a psychiatrist, one of the first things he really opened up about was not being able to save Joss, and how that drove him now.

The thing that hit me the most was John's realization in the car that he had never opened up to her. He had a friend that he could share things with, but he didn't share. I know he had felt her loss deeply before, but it hit him in a new way then.

It also reminded me that in her death Carter took down HR. She nearly failed, because she had been working alone, but her friends constantly telling her that she didn't have to do it alone finally sunk in. She let them know where she was going, and they came, and they worked together long enough to put the bad guys away, except for the one who shot her.

The group's feelings for each other are getting deeper. There is pain in that with all the danger they face. You see it in little things, like John wanting Finch to learn how to shoot. Each one is aware that this could get them killed, and they've made peace with that, but not with leaving the others behind.

That seems like a vulnerability, but it makes me care more. Everything matters more.

That is why their hold is so much deeper on me now.