NUMBER CRUNCH (1.10)

Reese and Finch are confused when the Machine produces four numbers. When Reese finds one person of interest dead and is unable to prevent the murder of a second, he realizes that all four have something in common, and begins to dig deeper. He finds that the four stole drug money from the scene of a car accident, and that a corrupt banker and congressman are conspiring to have them killed for it. Meanwhile, Detective Carter has been stood down following the death of her confidential informant in "Get Carter". She is approached by a man named Mark Snow (Michael Kelly), who identifies himself as a CIA operative, and asks her to lead him to Reese, revealing the reason why Reese faked his death – supposedly, Reese was responsible for the death of his CIA partner, Kara Stanton, and then disappeared, until Carter's investigation put him back on the agency's radar. Finch confronts the conspirators and records evidence that they established a charity in Haiti to launder drug money. Reese saves the two women (Bridget Regan, Melonie Diaz) by killing their attackers. But before he can escape, he is approached by Carter and Snow and flees after being shot by a CIA assassin (Darien Sills-Evans). Carter eventually catches up to him, but decides to let him escape.

Air Date: December 15, 2011
Written by Patrick Harbinson and directed by Jeffrey Hunt.

GET CARTER (1.09)

Detective Carter's investigations into the Charlie Burton/Carl Elias case have earned her a place on Elias' hit list, making her the next person of interest named by the Machine. This makes life complicated for Reese as he tries to protect her without revealing himself to her. While Carter investigates the murder of a teenager during a drive-by shooting and tries to counsel the wife (Jennifer Laura Thomspson) of a violent drunk (Charles Flint Beverage), Reese follows a confidential informant (Francois Battiste) that Elias has turned against Carter. He stops the CI from killing Carter, but is disturbed by the way the Machine has started ignoring violent crimes; the Machine never predicted the death of the teenager killed in the drive-by.

Air Date: December 8, 2011
Written by Greg Plageman & Denise Thé and directed by Alex Zakrzewski.

FOE (1.08)

Reese and Finch track former Stasi agent Ulrich Kohl (Alan Dale) across New York City. Kohl, having been secretly imprisoned by the German government for twenty-four years, has finally escaped and located his former Stasi team-mates – Hauffe (Kent Broadhurst), Wernick (Larry Pine) and Steiller (Sherman Howard), all of whom betrayed Kohl to the American and German governments in exchange for new lives in New York. Further, Kohl believes that his former Stasi colleagues are responsible for the murder of his wife Anja (Laila Robins), who was killed while attempting to flee Germany with him. Kohl kills Hauffe and poisons Wernick, but Reese manages to save him. When confronting Steiller before killing him, Kohl learns a terrible truth – Anja is still alive, having staged her own death to escape from his atrocities. When he attempts to locate her (running into Reese instead – who he briefly connects to as a fellow spy and soldier), he also learns Anja had their child, Marie (Aubrey Dollar), and so sets out to find them both. Kohl finally locates Anja, having taken Marie hostage, and admits that he understands the reasons behind her flight, before raising an unloaded weapon to her, forcing Reese to shoot him dead. Kohl's predicament leads to Reese reflecting on his own life as a spy, where it is revealed that "John Reese" is an alias bestowed upon him by his former CIA partner, Kara Stanton (Annie Parisse).

Air Date: November 17, 2011
Written by Sean Hennen and directed by Milan Cheylov.

WITNESS (1.07)

Reese must protect Charlie Burton (Enrico Colantoni), a school teacher who witnessed a Russian mobster shooting an Italian-American mob lieutenant in a Brighton Beach bodega. As Reese and Burton flee the Russians and the Five Families, they stumble into territory controlled by Bulgarian mobsters. Meanwhile, Carter searches for Burton to place him in protective police custody, and in doing so, draws closer to finding Carl Elias – believed to be the illegitimate son of an aging mobster with a plan to unite the Five Families and reclaim the New York underworld from the Russians. Cut off from Finch as he tries to evade the Russians and the Bulgarians, Reese comes to realize that Charlie is Elias. Elias thanks Reese for saving him, but warns him to not interfere with his future goals or face unpleasant consequences, leaving Reese feeling guilty that other people will suffer because he saved Elias' life.

Air Date: November 3, 2011
Written by Amanda Segel and directed by Frederick E. O. Toye.

THE FIX (1.06)

Reese takes the case of Zoe Morgan (Paige Turco), a professional fixer who uses her influence and her connections to powerful people to perform favors for her own clients. Zoe has been enlisted to retrieve an incriminating recording of a pharmaceutical executive from a rival company, but comes under threat when she hears the contents of the recording itself and realizes that her employer is just as corrupt as his rival. Finch finds that Zoe's case is connected to that of Dana Miller, a person of interest whom he was unable to save before meeting Reese. Meanwhile, Carter takes a homicide case when the murder weapon is proven to be the same one that was used in the "Elias M." case featured in "Mission Creep", and begins to suspect that Reese is more than just a vigilante.

Air Date: October 27, 2011
Written by Nic Van Zeebroeck & Michael Sopczynski and directed by Dennis Smith.

JUDGMENT (1.05)

A Polish street gang known as SP-9 kidnaps the son (Seamus Davey-Fitzpatrick) of Samuel Gates (David Costabile), a judge known to be tough on crime. In exchange for his son's safe return, they demand the judge release a banker who is key to their money laundering operations without any punishment. Breaking with his preferred means of operation, Reese makes himself known to Gates in an attempt to stall the kidnappers while he uses Detective Fusco to process evidence from the scene of the crime. He misleads SP-9 into believing their demands have been met, securing the release of Gates' son, before delivering them to Detective Carter and the NYPD. Meanwhile, Reese makes overtures of friendship towards Finch, but is actually trying to find out more about Finch's habits.

Air Date: October 20, 2011
Written by David Slack and directed by Colin Bucksey.

CURA TE IPSUM (1.04)

Reese begins twenty-four hour surveillance of Dr. Megan Tillman (Linda Cardellini) when the Machine names her as the next Person of Interest. He and Finch believe she is being targeted by Andrew Benton (Adam Rothenberg), a serial stalker and sex offender who drugs his victims before taking advantage of them, only to discover that Tillman is actually stalking Benton and planning to kill him; one of Benton's previous victims was Tillman's sister, who committed suicide shortly after Benton assaulted her. Reese assaults a group of dealers connected to a Mexican drug cartel, stealing their product and planting it on Benton to have him arrested before Tillman can catch him. Tillman, however, abducts Benton, forcing Reese to talk her down. Meanwhile, Detective Carter starts to get closer to Finch and Reese when she finds a surveillance tape from the robbery in "Mission Creep" that shows their exchange. Reese blackmails a police captain (John Fiore) to transfer Fusco to Carter's precinct so that he can sabotage her investigation.

Air Date: October 13, 2011
Written by Denise Thé and directed by Charles Beeson.

MISSION CREEP (1.03)

The Machine produces the Social Security number of Joey (James Carpinello), a former soldier. Upon returning from Iraq, Joey joined a gang of former soldiers who have taken to robbing banks once they rejoin civilian life. Reese infiltrates the gang for their final robbery at an NYPD evidence lockup. They steal a file marked "Elias, M." before Latimer (Ruben Santiago-Hudson), the ringleader, starts killing the gang members off and escapes. Reese starts trying to track Latimer down, but discovers that Latimer has himself been murdered after handing the Elias file over to his client. The file is revealed to contain photos from the scene of a brutal murder.

Air Date: October 6, 2011
Written by Patrick Harbinson and directed by Steven DePaul.

GHOSTS (1.02)

Reese takes the case of Teresa Whitiker (Valentina de Angelis), a girl who supposedly died with her family two years previously. Reviewing the evidence, Reese finds the crime scene was staged to look like a murder-suicide. He deduces that Teresa's family was killed by a hitman, and that there is still a price on her head. He follows leads back to Solmick (Michael Medeiros), the original contract killer, who admits he let Teresa live because he refuses to kill children. Meanwhile, Detective Carter starts investigating Reese, using his fingerprints to access his file, only to discover it has been redacted. Using information given to him by Reese, Finch manages to locate Teresa, but they are interrupted by the arrival of another hitman (Ritchie Coster). Reese intervenes in time to save them, leaving Teresa in the care of Carter. When asked about Reese, Teresa claims the experience was too traumatic to recall anything. (The episode is interjected with flashbacks of Finch and his partner at the founding of "The Machine".) Finch is concerned that if the public ever found out about it, he would be forced to shut it down. At the end, a memorial bust of Finch's partner (Brett Cullen) is shown in his offices.

Air Date: September 29, 2011
Written by Greg Plageman & Jonathan Nolan and directed by Richard J. Lewis.

PILOT (1.01)

 
John Reese (Jim Caviezel), a former CIA agent and Army Special Forces soldier-turned homeless alcoholic, has a struggle with a group of hot-headed teenagers on the subway. After this, he is extracted from police custody, before Homicide Detective Joss Carter (Taraji P. Henson) can confront him on his links to previous killings discovered through analysis of his fingerprints on the police system. Reese is brought to a mysterious and somewhat secretive billionaire, Harold Finch (Michael Emerson), who is the creator of the next-generation software, "The Machine". After 9/11, Finch developed a computer program that can sift though enormous amounts of data, looking for patterns of behavior or activity that would predict another attack. It also provided information about individuals who could be in danger; it can predict the identity of a person involved in a premeditated crime that will happen at some point in the future – however, Finch's back-door link to the Machine only provides the Social Security number of the person, and offers no clues to their involvement or when the crime will take place. Finch, who needs to do something to help these people, enlists Reese to aid him in preventing these crimes. Finch offers Reese a job to do this, as well as give Reese a purpose following the death of his girlfriend, Jessica (Susan Misner) (which is the source of his depression). The first on his list is Diane Hansen (Natalie Zea), an Assistant District Attorney currently working on a major prosecution of a prominent drug killing. Reese agrees to help and begins by watching her. Reese soon learns that Hansen is not the victim, but the perpetrator, running a ring of corrupt police officers and planning to kill a fellow DA, Wheeler (Brian d'Arcy James). After blackmailing one of the corrupt officers, Detective Lionel Fusco (Kevin Chapman), into being his source of information inside the NYPD, Reese reveals Hansen's corruption to an open court, kills the leader of the corrupt gang of cops, and links Fusco to the crime to ensure his future cooperation. Having previously rejected Finch's offer of work, Reese recants and agrees to continue preventing violent crimes.

Air Date: September 22, 2011
Written by Jonathan Nolan and directed by David Semel.