We were being watched by Mr. Finch and Mr. Reese when Person of Interest went online Thursday, September 22, 2011 on CBS. Created by Jonathan Nolan of The Dark Knight trilogy, the series starred Jim Caviezel, Taraji P. Henson, Kevin Chapman, Sarah Shahi, Amy Acker, and Michael Emerson.
Set in a post-9/11 world the decade after 24, POI was also set a few years after Burn Notice with Caviezel as John Reese, a tragic, brooding ex-spy who was given both a job and a purpose by an eccentric, reclusive billionaire named Harold Finch (Emerson). Finch created an artificial intelligence entity known only as ‘The Machine’, whose purpose is to predict relevant acts of terrorism, but it can also predict violent crimes that the government calls ‘irrelevant’. Knowing now that everyone is relevant to someone, Finch enlisted Reese, Joss Carter (Henson), a NYPD cop with a strong moral compass; Lionel Fusco (Chapman), a bad cop gone good; ex-government assassin Sameen Shaw (Shahi), and reformed computer hacker/hired killer Root (Acker) to stop bad things from happening to good people … because everybody deserves a champion.
The fastest-growing show of the 2012-13 television season, POI followed the blueprints of The A-Team and The Equalizer, with Team Machine becoming a justice league of their own as New York’s mightiest superheroes: avenging the innocent, helpless, hopeless, and powerless against the mob, the ring of corrupt cops called HR, and the Brotherhood gang. Not only that, they were fighting a cold war against the age of Samaritan, a second Machine that wished to cleansed a world that has become a cesspool for crime, corruption, and poverty. Samaritan, though, doesn’t have the Machine’s moral code, for the Machine still believes in free will.
The character of John Reese is Batman in the Suit meets Captain America: an urban legend, a ghost doing what needs to be done, a vigilante shielding those who’ve been bullied, a man who walks in the dark because he is the dark as a modern-day dark knight who protects people from danger … even at the cost of his own life.
Sadly, POI went offline on CBS this summer after five seasons, but you can see Team Machine keep saving the world from bad guys one life at a time with reruns in syndication, DVDs, and binge-watching on Netflix.
Remember: the numbers never stop coming, for if your number’s up – victim or perpetrator -, Team Machine will find you.