The FBI actually makes some progress on this week’s episode of The Following! It’s about time! Violet gives her recap of the episode, while Josh offers his commentary in blue font. Click through to read more!
The episode starts out at the police station in Havenport, Maryland, where Parker and Hardy are talking to “Sheriff Nelson” (Roderick) about tracking down the cult house. Right after Roderick leaves the room, Weston comes in, just missing him. Remember, Weston can identify Roderick as one of Joe’s guys that beat him up. Weston walks down the hall and discovers Roderick talking on the phone in another room, and pulls his gun on Roderick. However, Roderick walks away through the busy police room, and when Weston chases after him, the officers restrain plain-clothed Weston when they see that he has a gun, allowing Roderick to easily get away. When Hardy learns the Sheriff’s true identity, he says they need to lock the town down.
All that I can say here is FINALLY! The FBI in this and last episode have actually been able to be much more proactive in their investigation. This episode we get some much due breakthroughs for the FBI. At the end of the last episode I knew that Weston would be the key to identifying Roderick, and I was on the edge of my seat when the scene opens, and we see Weston just miss Roderick. Despite Weston getting away, I much enjoyed how Weston reacted to seeing Roderick. While it would have been awesome for Weston to nail Roderick himself, it was still a great scene. Probably my favorite scene in the entire show thus far.
Back at the cult house, Joe asks Emma to keep a close eye on Claire and Joey for him, and Emma protests, saying that Claire hates her. Joe asks if Claire knows about him and Emma, and she says no, it’ll stay between them. Jacob comes in and says there’s no news about Daniel Monroe’s death, and then Roderick bursts in telling Joe they’re screwed. Meanwhile, the FBI is trying to track down Roderick, whose real name is Tim Nelson, and we find out he initially met Joe in college when Joe was his faculty advisor. Back at the house, Roderick is freaking out, saying he wants to execute some sort of “escape plan” they have, and is upset about Joe killing Daniel Monroe. He tells Joe that he fixed the property records and hid the cult house, but it’s only a matter of time till the FBI finds them, so they need to leave. However, Joe says it’s not time to leave yet. Roderick questions Joe about whether there is something Joe’s not telling him, but Joe tells him he’s paranoid. Roderick makes a remark to Joe about wining and dining a wife that’s never going to want him back, which leads Joe to strangle Roderick, who realizes that Joe used him, and wonders if Joe is going to kill him like he killed Daniel. Just then, Jacob comes in the room and tells Joe that Hardy is on the news.
Another thing Roderick is upset about, and I have to admit, I am a little concerned about: What is Joe’s plan? Roderick had an idea of what the plan he thought he was carrying out was, which seemed to involve some heavy military-like operations. Joe’s plan on the other hand has been completely shrouded in mystery to everyone except Joe himself, and maybe Claire, as she was reading his laptop a couple episodes ago. That is unless the entire plan is the book Joe seems hung up on lately. If that is the master plan, I really may be disappointed. For portraying such a mastermind criminal, for this all to be just for a work of fiction would seem rather mediocre.
Hardy is announcing on the news that any cult members willing to come forward with information about Joe will be given immunity. Agent Donovan is pissed off when he finds out Hardy is holding a press conference, telling Hardy that he has no authority to offer immunity, and that he needs to run stuff by him first.
This was an interesting ploy by Hardy. But a dangerous one as well. We know that the Followers already play games with the FBI, and this seems to just leave the door wide open for something to go wrong (consider this a foreshadowing).
Claire and Joey are walking together outside the cult house, and Joey is saying that Jacob is his favorite, but Claire tells him they can’t trust anyone and they’re going to leave real soon. Roderick walks out of the house right then, pushes Claire down, takes Joey, and drives off with him. Claire goes in to yell at Joe, who tells her he will find Joey and fix this, and that she needs to calm down, adding that he’s “having a really bad day.” Joe sends Jacob and two other men to find Roderick and Joey, and tells them to kill Roderick because he betrayed them, and to make him suffer.
Roderick is showing his desperation here. To kidnap Joe’s kid is probably an unforgivable act. I am surprised that Roderick didn’t try to plan more of a coup, since you would think he would have at least some allies. Moreover, he would likely have the more combat trained allies.
Roderick goes to a woman he knows named Betty for help, and she gets into the car with him when she sees he has a gun. A roadblock stops them as they are driving along, and a cop comes to the car asking for IDs. The officer asks Roderick to step out of the car, which he does, and immediately shoots the two cops, gets back in the car, and tells Betty to drive.
Here I was actually glad the cops were bright enough to check Roderick out, rather than simply let them through. This probably leads to his arrest, as it would provide a location to Roderick’s last known whereabouts.
Claire tries to appeal to Jacob before he leaves on his mission, saying she knows that Jacob cares about Joey, and telling him not to bring Joey back to the house. But Jacob says he is doing want Joe wants, and leaves.
More foreshadowing here–I am convinced that Jacob is not a mindless drone as all of the other Followers seem to be. We see more this episode of this being the case.
Betty is freaking out about what just happened, so she pulls over and gets out of the car. She starts to run away as Roderick pulls his gun on her, but just then the cops pull up. Roderick surrenders, and they cuff him. They take him back to the police station, where Hardy questions him, and Roderick says he wants to make a deal. Hardy doesn’t believe him that he has Joey somewhere, so they use Roderick’s phone to call Joe, who threatens to peel the skin from Roderick’s body if anything happens to Joey. Roderick tells Hardy he will give them Joey in exchange for his freedom. Donovan, who has been watching the questioning, says he won’t do the deal. Meanwhile, Jacob and the two men are sitting in a car outside of the police station.
The exchange between Roderick and Hardy is fun to watch during the interrogation. You can’t help but wonder what cards Roderick is going to play. Without a deal, the options are limited, as is Hardy’s ability to get Roderick to provide the location of Joey.
A little while later, Hardy goes back into the room to talk to Roderick, immediately disabling the camera. He uncuffs Roderick, and tells him to take him to Joey. Hardy calls an FBI agent into the room and holds him at gunpoint, taking his FBI hat and jacket and giving them to Roderick to wear as a disguise. As they leave the station, Hardy comments that he has already taken care of the camera in the hall. Before Roderick will take Hardy to Joey, he tells him to get rid of his gun and cell phone, which he does, and they drive off. Jacob and the two men follow Hardy.
Another note, was that Hardy said that he would cut Roderick loose upon finding Joey. While this is probably something Hardy would do if he had to, I had a feeling there was some plan being played here. While it didn’t play out as I thought it would, I knew it wasn’t going to be simply letting Roderick go.
Back at the house, Emma tells Joe that everyone is freaking out with the FBI so close, but Joe says they’re safe and everyone just needs to calm down. Emma tries to kiss Joe, but he pulls away, saying she needs to stop this, and he may have given her mixed signals, that it’s sex and nothing more. Joe gets angry at Emma, blaming her for what happened to Joey, saying it was her one job, and he slaps her. Emma is stunned that Joe would do that, and storms out of the room.
We are seeing Joe’s disintegration here. While he is trying to maintain his cool, his misfortunes are clearly getting to him. At this point it almost feels that Joe doesn’t want to be bothered with his cultists, and that they are just getting in the way, as he doesn’t seem to acknowledge any of them with the slightest warmth. He seems bent only on his own agenda, which right now, is his book.
Hardy and Roderick arrive at a house and go inside. It turns out this has all been a clever ruse by the FBI, as Weston climbs out of the trunk of the car and calls Parker, telling her to wait until he has eyes on Joey. Donovan, who is with Parker, calls it in, saying they are waiting for a go and to have the men move on his orders. He comments to Parker, “Now I’ve drunk the Ryan Hardy juice.” Inside the house, Hardy hears muffled sounds, and finds Joey in a closet and unties him, while Roderick finds a hidden gun. Before Roderick gets a chance to do anything, Weston comes in and pulls his gun on Roderick. Just then, shots ring out through the sliding glass door Roderick is standing in front of, and Roderick falls down dead. They realize that it’s Joe’s people. We hear gunshots outside of the house, as the men run toward the house. Jacob tells them to stop firing at the house because they might hit Joey. Weston calls Parker and tells her about the gunshots, saying they can show up anytime now.
Weston is probably my favorite character in the show. He has had a great episode this week, and I was excited as soon as I saw him climb out of the trunk. I had thought their whole plan would have been just to have some agents follow Hardy at a distance, but hiding Weston in the trunk was awesome.
Hardy sends Joey with Weston, who takes Joey to a bedroom and tells him to wait there while he checks the rest of the house. One of Joe’s men attacks Weston, while the other attacks Hardy. Joey stumbles over the dead body of the owner of the house, causing him to scream and give away his location. Weston and Hardy are able to shoot their attackers, but not before Jacob finds Joey and takes him. Joey tells Jacob to let him go because his mom told him he was one of the bad guys. Jacob takes Joey and hides behind a shed, while he exchanges shots with Hardy. Hardy tells Jacob that Joe doesn’t care if he lives or dies, and that Joey’s just a kid, and he should do what’s best for Joey and let him go. Meanwhile, we hear sirens as the cops arrive, and Joey pleads with Jacob to let him go. Hardy sneaks up to the shed and finds Joey alone there. Joey recognizes Hardy, commenting, “Mom said you’re one of the good guys.”
A great scene for Jacob here. I think the combination of Claire’s plea with him earlier, Joey’s calling him a bad guy, and Hardy’s conversation with him outside, Jacob shows he still has a heart, despite his involvement with these sick, twisted people. I hope to see more of these moments with Jacob, although I still think he should spend the rest of his life in prison.
Back at the cult house, Claire is watching the news and is relieved that Joey is safe. Joe is upset that they have “Ryan bloody Hardy to thank for that.”
Emma goes to Jacob’s room to ask him what happened and to make sure he’s okay, to which he replies “We’re gonna die soon, I can feel it.”
I think the cultists and Joe know the net is tightening. This may be another reason why Jacob was compassionate in letting Joey go. Joey could have very well died in the crossfire if the FBI was able to locate the mansion. With Joey away from the house, he is all but guaranteed safe. What I do wonder is what Joe thinks of Jacob’s “failure”. We know how Joe treats failure…
Later, while Joe is in his office working on his book, Claire comes to see him and wants to make a deal: if he gives up Joey, she’ll stay with him and do everything he asks. Joe is skeptical at first, but Claire convinces him, saying that she loved him once, maybe she can love him again, just give her time. She kisses him passionately, then stabs him in the stomach while his guard is down. Two of his guys come in and drag her kicking and screaming upstairs.
I almost bought Claire’s act in this scene. I was looking in disbelief at the TV, thinking “no way, she can’t be serious! This has to be a ruse! I don’t know what sort of ruse, but it can’t be true!”. Luckily it was a ruse, and Claire shows some guts trying to stab Joe. I think it was a brash move, but maybe there is something in the plan that she saw that required a drastic decision. Only she and Joe know that answer.
Joe calls Hardy, telling him “our story has taken an unexpected turn” and that there has been a complete rewrite. We see that Joe has a large bloody bandage over his wound. Joe tells Hardy that Claire is no longer the leading lady, and that it is time for Claire to die.
This sort of reinforces the idea that the whole plan is about his book, which, again, would be rather upsetting to me.
A woman shows up at the police station, asking to speak to Hardy, saying she saw him on the news, and that he wants to turn herself in. The officer has searched her and determined that she is unarmed. However, she suddenly jumps on Donovan’s back and stabs her hair chopstick into his eye. Weston shoots her dead.
Worst scene in the episode. How does the FBI not handcuff this girl? We have seen these cultists in action, and it just seems to me to be common sense as a civilian that dangerous cultists (no matter how unarmed) should be cuffed before going anywhere! It looks like we will have a Nick Fury in The Following given that Donovan isn’t completely out of commission.
My thoughts on this episode: I’m glad that the FBI finally was able to do something right and get Joey back, and that they figured out who Roderick was. I thought Roderick would do something a little crazier before his demise, considering how insane he’s been acting the past few episodes. I think Joe made a big mistake rebuffing Emma’s advances and going so far as to slap her. She was one of his biggest supporters, but after that slap, she may just start turning against him. It appears that Jacob’s emotions have started to return, and that he’s no longer the cold Jacob he had become. He’s probably right about them dying soon, but maybe he and Emma will join forces against Joe first.
This was my favorite episode so far. Aside from the “needle to the eye” scene, the FBI showed some real intelligence, rather than always being forced to be react. Like Violet said, I expected more drastic measures for Roderick, especially towards Joe. He did not seem like one to simply run. As for Joe, we really need to know his plan, as right now it seems rather silly if it is all is just about his book. I also do not know what season 2 will hold. Without catching Joe, I feel this show will just be more of the same, and end rather anti-climactically. I would worry about its longevity for season 2. Another thought might be having Jacob and Emma spin off into their own cult, It would be hard for me to see Jacob doing that however. I am excited to see what happens in our last two episodes though!
