'FBI: Most Wanted' Season 1 Episode 3 Review: CBS show effectively puts the focus on gun violence survivors
Over the past few years, incidents of mass shooting in schools have increased in the US. It's an overtly painful subject, debated constantly with hardly any solution. Fear is the new normal, and this emotion forms the crux of 'FBI: Most Wanted's latest episode, titled 'Hair-Trigger'. The episode explores the traumatic effects of gun violence on a survivor, his eventual derailment and distortion of what is actually right and wrong. It's heavy, gritty and dark and high on the emotional factor.
The episode begins with a teenager named Doug Timmons driving fast on a rather lonely lane. Another car almost knocks into his vehicle. A man steps out to apologize but by then a cop arrives on the scene. He arrests the man, saying he is inebriated. Doug is furious at him for doing so and makes this telling statement, "Cops. Good for hassling drunks, but never there when we need you."
After some curt exchange, Doug shoots the cop and then, he goes to the car where the man is sitting and shoots him.
This beginning is enough to give one the jitters. It also sets the dark tone.
On the face of it, the episode is straight-forward. Jess LeCroix (Julian McMahon) and his team have to track down Doug (Charlie Tahan) and understand what his plans are. Doug is a survivor of a school shooting that claimed a friend of his and he has never recovered since. This incident causes a psychological crisis for him and his rage towards the US government for not enforcing gun control and laws spirals out of control. And so, he has plans to bring down government officials and it is up to the FBI to track his next move and prevent him from wreaking further havoc. His half-sister Molly (Jess Gabor) is a unique player in the game because at first, she seems to prefer to stay away from the whole mess but there is something more insidious at hand. Doug is out to exact revenge on everyone who he believes broke his trust.
In the end, Jess just about manages to stop him from carrying out his plan by talking to him, rather than using violence.
This intense episode tackled the burning problem of gun control with sensitivity. The message is loud and clear. How long do we let youngsters live in fear like this? And what do you do when the survivors are so broken that they turn into perpetrators themselves?
'FBI: Most Wanted' airs on CBS.
