Episode Title: "Entry Point"
Writer: Craig O'Neill
Director: Jeffrey Hunt
Previously on "Burn Notice":
Michael Westen (Jeffrey Donovan) and crew tracked down the house that belonged to Jonathan Kassar — Jesse's (Coby Bell) lone contact within the conspiracy, only to be initially thwarted by the nosy neighbor from hell; Kendra (Navi Rawat). Michael initially seemed to have Kendra fooled with a fake FBI badge, but he soon realized that she had killed Kassar and was waiting to see who would show up looking for him. After a brief firefight, Kendra escaped while Michael and Jesse recovered an obsolete high density tape cartridge that she had hidden.
Wanting to get the cartridge back, Kendra played a flirtatious game of cat and mouse with Michael, much to the annoyance of Fiona (Gabrielle Anwar). Following two failed attempts to capture Kendra, Michael finally agreed to meet with her one-on-one and accept a payoff for the tape, while still trying to catch her. However, she double-crossed him first and attacked him with a knife. Michael was able to subdue her with the help of Sam (Bruce Campbell), before the two of them locked Kendra in their trunk.
Story:
Michael and Jesse prepare an abandoned house and covert it into a third world holding cell to disorient and interrogate Kendra. However, she laughs off their initial attempts to intimidate her by inflicting injuries upon herself, which alarms Jesse. Michael pulls Jesse out of the room and allows Kendra to believe that she has identified the weak link in their operation. Michael brings in Sam to act as "the boss from hell" vocally, to make Kendra believe that she is in danger if she doesn't provide answers, but also to make Jesse appear desperate to her.
Fiona soon drags Michael to meet a potential client named Buddy (Steven W. Bailey) — a maker of high end knock-offs — who believes he is being targeted for death by one of his latest clients, a mysterious man who wanted him to create a highly ornate replica. Using info from Buddy, Michael and Fiona track the buyer to an old machine shop, which promptly explodes when they approach it. Michael calls the fire department to save the building and pretends to be a county arson investigator to get past the fire fighters and examine the evidence left behind. Michael and Fiona soon learn that Buddy's mold was used to recreate a sword once owned by Alexander the Great, which is currently in a museum on loan from its owner, a local software mogul named Ken Bocklage (Alan Dale).
Michael and Fiona approach Bocklage as high priced security consultants chasing the would be sword thief. They meet initial scorn and suspicion from Bocklage's personal assistant, Selena (Meta Golding) before getting Bocklage to agree to accept their help. They bring in Buddy as an "expert" to identify the real sword, but the thief manages to steal the sword out from under everyone's nose while also murdering one of the guards. Michael and Buddy are accused of working with the thief and they are forced to flee the building following an explosion. Realizing that the explosion is being used for cover, Michael spots a fake firefighter moving away from the disaster and chases him down via car. They successfully catch the thief, who turns out to have been Selena all along.
Meanwhile, Kendra believes that she has Jesse where she wants him and offers him a massive bribe to get him to let her go. Armed with a link to her bank accounts, the team makes it appear that her employers have robbed her blind. Furious, she offers up everything she knows about her employers and she tells Jesse that the tape drive had the names of four operatives (including Jonathan Kassar) who failed to steal a safety deposit box the previous month and were therefore expendable. Kendra also asks Jesse to let her former employers know that she aided their downfall when he finally catches up with them.
Later, the team celebrates two successful missions, while making plans to leave Kendra in the custody of the FBI. However, Jesse seems to have developed an odd attachment to Kendra, leading Michael to tell him that he needs to find more friends.
Breakdown:
This was an unusual episode of "Burn Notice" in which the A plot wasn't as interesting as the B plot. Everything involving the Kendra subplot was compelling and the show has managed to make forward progress with its season long conspiracy storyline in every episode, which is very impressive.
Navi Rawat's Kendra was fun to watch during her three episode stint this season and I hope she'll show up again down the line as a recurring villain, Again, it seems odd that she was essentially in the background plot of three episodes, but never in the main narrative or A plot. That seems like a waste of a good villain.
Michael's long con to convince Kendra that she was detained in a foreign country by a private company was also interesting, especially as he and Jesse converted the house into a hell hole. It seem kind of odd that there was absolutely no one else around for miles — which could have tipped off Kendra that the con wasn't real.
There were some interesting developments with Jesse which suggest that life as a burned spy is taking its toll on him. Or maybe he's just lonely. But he definitely seemed interested in Kendra, which he basically admitted to at the end of the episode. Michael's comment to him was also telling, because it's inevitable that Jesse will learn that Michael "burned him" out of the spy biz, which may ultimately kill their partnership and friendship.
The main storyline with Michael and Fiona tracking down a murderous thief had a nice caper flare, it just wasn't always exciting. Though Michael's brief stint as an arson investigator named "Randy" was fun, as was the moment Fiona decided to shoot Buddy rather than let him die in a rigged explosion.
I have to admit that I did a brief spit-take upon seeing Alan Dale show up in a non-villainous role. He was Charles Widmore for so many years on "Lost" that it's kind of hard to see him as anything else so soon after the end of that series. It also wasn't quite as surprising that the thief turned out to be Selena as I think it was hoped originally hoped for by the producers. The surprise just didn't seem to work, even if the episode essentially gave us two femme fatales.
Still an overall solid episode. While it may not have been near the best episode of the season, there's always next week.
Crave Online Rating: 7.5 out of 10.
