The Crossing may have shattered your heart to pieces, and that’s unfair. Fortunately The Devil’s Share comes in strong, and dark, and ready to avenge my dearly departed queen of my heart.
I have watched the whole show before, so SPOILERS MIGHT HAPPEN. Big spoilers will be blanked out but references and irrelevant spoilers are going to be out in the open.
The show begins with a cold open, with a heart monitor hooked onto John after Simmons shoots him non-lethally but still, pretty good. The now iconic first few chords of Hurt by Johnny Cash start playing.
I mention the song because the score of this show is something I’ve gushed about before and will continue to do so, but also because I have heard this song cover on many shows. And none absolutely rip through my entire body like it does here.
As the lyrics start, we are shown Joss’ funeral, with Finch and Shaw in the background, and Shaw leaving early. Then it takes us to a shot of every newspaper cover with Simmons’ face on it, as the most wanted guy in New York. And soon enough, of course, Harold gets his number.
As the song starts picking up, we are transported to a bar, where a head is suddenly smashed against the counter by, well, Shaw, of course, who makes me cry as we see her holding Simmons’ photo with the same fist that repeatedly punches a dude (who probably knows something about him), her face angrier than we have ever seen her, blood splattering all over.
The song still playing, Simmons gets a fake Canadian passport from some dudes. Next thing we know, a large truck crashes right onto the fake ID dudes, and we see John interrogating the dude who’s inside the car which is now on fire and he is bleeding badly.
So of course Simmons number came up, because our beautiful babies, the great Mayhem Twins, are on a rampage that will sure lead to his head on a pike. Hell, I want his head, and I am fully aware that he is fictional.
What an excellent start to a very dark episode that has earned its right to be grim and rogue and vengeful
[2010] Harold is at a psychologist’s office, using a wheelchair. So, shortly after Nathan died. He wants to talk about grief, and wonders if it has a purpose. He is feeling some clarity, feels like doing something radical. He feels like Nathan’s death is his fault, which the shrink assures him isn’t true.
Harold: Does survivor’s guilt pass when everything that has happened has in fact been your fault?
Root once agains offers to help, because John is still in trouble, and she can help. She also warns Harold that whatever the Machine was trying to prepare Root for, it’s coming. So this is great, because they don’t have enough problems as it is.
Meanwhile, Finch and Fusco are where John t-boned the car with the sleazy ID guys. They also want to find Simmons, but in legal, proper ways. Psht, now is not the time for proper.
They go find the forger in charge of those fake IDs, and find him with broken legs and hanging by his arms to the ceiling, with Shaw questioning him. Finch reminds Shaw that regardless of the morality of wanting to kill Simmons or not, John’s injuries are pretty bad, so they gotta find him. They figure, of course, the best way to do that would be to find the asshole themselves. The forger tells them the only one who knows where Simmons is headed is Quinn, who the feds have holed up somewhere, no idea where. Quinn has a lawyer, though, so that’s their next lead.
They get to the lawyer and somebody used his face as an ashtray and then shot him. John? Nah, that’s too much drama for him. They see through a security camera that it was the Russians, who of course are also looking for Quinn. Everybody wants everything, they should team up or get in line or something. So now that both John and the bratva have Quinn’s location but Team Machine doesn’t, who they gonna call? Shaw once again mentions they have an option, and that option is Root. Shaw is game for it, and finally – an avoidable death later, fucking coward – Harold accepts.
[2005] Shaw is in a lab coat, so probably during the time she was a military doctor, and she is also talking to a therapist. The shrink questions Sameen’s lack of emotional investment in caring for her patients. He tells Sameen that she knows she has ASPD, and that that’s why she isn’t fit to be a doctor. Which is bullshit. Poor Shaw, my sweet wife.
Root guides Shaw as she rides a car in the dark with no headlights, and Shaw trusts! She trusts the Machine, not Root necessarily, but still! Fusco questions the logic behind trusting Harold’s kidnapper, which is fair, and so Root tells him all these random details about his routine and his childhood, in a calmly creepy way. He is not less confused by this, of course. But we are more entertained, and that’s all that matters sometimes.
They enter the building across the street from where Quinn is, and just as Fusco wonders if Reese is there too, a car outside is lit on fire and some of the marshals guarding the exits get out to check it out. Which of course is what John would do to get inside. Classic Reese.
[2007] It’s John’s turn to go to therapy. He seems to be new in the army, though from the dates we know – or I do, because I’ve watched this many, many times, and know the timeline pretty well – he is not. This shrink-type is assessing whether he is ready to do Bad Things for the Good Guys (TM). John reassures the shrink that he knows he’s just doing his job, that he’s been through this process before. Ah-HA! He tells him he was tasked with finding out a traitor among the army, and he found him. And then he shoots the therapist dead.
The marshals are checking out the fire, and just as the landlord is complaining about all the troubles to hide Quinn, John is already inside, looking really pale and really determined. The guy who is in charge, who is in the room with Quinn, brushes it off as some nuisance from some schmuck or another who is trying to get to Quinn, and then the marshals call him to tell him they’ve been locked out of the building from somebody already inside. Classic Reese.
The power is cut off, and the score kills me once again. The boss marshal tells his team to secure everything and to get ready to move Alonzo. But Alonzo knows who he fucked over, and tells the marshals there is no point in even trying. And sure enough, John incapacitates most of them with his usual badass shenanigans and gets to Quinn in no time. He isn’t doing well at all with his gunshot wound.
Quinn refuses to give Simmons’ location, because loyalty. John tells him very calmly that he’s gonna kill him no matter what. But he’s learned to kill quickly and painlessly, and he is learned to kill at an excruciatingly slow and painful pace. So that’s Quinn’s choice.
In the meantime, the rest of Team Machine are accessing the building. Root asks for two guns please, which Shaw points out is kinda absurd. But then the russians arrive, and she goes all baddass in god mode and Shaw points out she stands corrected, and that it was very hot. Hell yea, it was.
Just when John is about to shoot Quinn after he gives in and gives John the location of his buddy, Finch arrives. And John is bleeding very badly, and the gun doesn’t shoot properly. So he agrees to leave with TM.
They’re riding in the car back to get John patched up, and Shaw is mad that they aren’t gonna get to kill Simmons. But then!
Root: The Machine never said John was the only one trying to kill Simmons.
Who else, though? The rogue part of the gang is there in that car. Well…
Fusco stayed behind to make sure Quinn gets taken back to jail, and sees the note where Quinn wrote down the location for John.
[2005] Now Fusco’s in the (cop) therapist’s office. He’s there after an incident where he shoots a suspect, and the therapist reassures him that it’s a safe place, that nothing he says would leave that room, etc. So Lionel finally opens up: Lionel confesses it wasn’t at all a “good shooting” (what they call when it is justified, and in accordance to code, or whatever. That suspect had apparently shot an off-duty 24yo cop the year before and had gotten away with it.
So a year later he runs into him and he was unarmed, with no muscle with him, and shoots him twice in the chest. And he sleeps like a baby.
Lionel: He got the devil’s share. That’s what you call it when a guy like Jules gets his. (…) And, you wanna know how I’ve been sleeping? Like a baby.
Well, that was dark, but I dig it.
Fusco catches up with Simmons just as he was about to get on a private plane to fucking Canada. He gets into a fist fight with Simmons, for some reason. In an extremely unlikely turn of events, he gets the upper hand. It looks like he’s about to kill the fucking asshole. But instead he tells him about how Carter helped change him into a better man and better cop who isn’t a sleezeball and isn’t a killer, so he arrests the dude. Ruh-roh. Once again we are disappointed that nobody is properly avenging the queen of my heart.
But hey, the episode’s not over yet, my pals! Simmons is in the hospital being guarded by cops, and it seems one of the guards is leaving his post. For some reason. But Shaw isn’t there, John isn’t there, and Fusco isn’t there. So it should be fine, right? Wrong again.
It’s Carl motherfucking Elias, there for a friendly visit.
A creeply, satisfying visit, indeed.
And where will Root go now that she is free? Back to being imprisoned at Harold’s base of operation. She reminds Harold that scary things are afoot, and theyd better stick together. Intriiiigue.
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