F.P.S. 3.10

One word: Yearning. 

This is a great episode. Not only are there computer geeks galore (it's the Facebook origin story meets computer gaming), but this episode is a love letter to Eames, who doesn't even appear. We learn more about Goren this episode than any other, I'd argue.

Nerds! Only one thing can stop a nerd from having sex with a real live willing girl ... computer hackers! Raymond the computer nerds is pumped! Check out those guns!

He may have been handling it better in the previous episodes, but we know Goren's missing Eames ... cuz he pretends to kill Bishop. (Don't worry Goren, we do too sometimes.) And she's incredibly offended. We're pretty sure Goren has never re-enacted a murder using Eames as the stand-in victim. We imagine he might have in the beginning of their partnership, but she put a stop to that right quick!

Goren dances Carver around the ballroom, we mean, Deakins' office. Goren's "predilection" (what a nice way to put it!) for "hounding deadbeat dads" is obvious and well-know to everyone.

It's George from Grey's Anatomy. We'd be more excited, but we really hated George in Grey's Anatomy.

Goren flips out on the wrong nerd. Then we have the greatest couple of Goren/Eames scenes that Eames isn't even in. Goren looks longingly across his desk at Eames' empty chair, with tears in his eyes. He crumples up the paper in front of him and throws it at Eames' chair in frustration, then quickly looks around to see if anyone saw. There's a Santa head mug on her desk and a framed photo we can't tell who or what of.

Then Goren has a meltdown on Bishop. Which comes as a shock to her, because the two of them were having a pretty good time together the last couple cases and were really getting along until this case. Obviously, Goren has hit his limit of no Eames (as suggested earlier in the episode when he crosses the line by pretending to kill Bishop). We have to deal with She Who Shall Not Be Named being talked about, but we get Wally Stevens AND Eames name dropped! Then he verbally slaps Bishop in the face: Eames would've known.

After his meltdown, he looks at the floor, then up at Bishop, then back at the floor, like, I'm sorry, I'm a little lost boy without my real partner. Don't hate me.

Check out the Quotable section for the full write up, but here are some highlights from the episode: Eames would've known. It's about yearning. He misses his partner. Panic is a primitive emotion. That's how he felt without his partner. 

The interrogation in the court room hallway is really just Goren working out his own sh*t: Because he's your only audience. He's the only opinion that you've ever trusted. You needed Jack back, you know.  

But his anger and frustration and complete loss at not having Eames comes to a calm fruition with this line: If my partner was putting me through that, abandoning me, leaving me vulnerable, impotent, for a nobody -- That's unforgivable. But, he realizes, Eames didn't leave him for a nobody ... she left him temporarily to have a baby. And that's okay. He's rather proud and excited at the end ... that guy's partner left him for a nobody ... but mine didn't.

In the last scene, Eames texts? beeps? Bobby to let him know that she'd given birth (and, consequently, was on her way back to him).

Clothes Call: Raymond the Computer Nerd's lack of shirt sleeves. George's hoodie over dress shirt .. he looks like he's wearing a cape and is about to get his hair cut. The Parson's School of Design student's whole outfit.

Quotable:

Bishop: Overdue bills. No wonder she stays at home eating crackers.

Goren: What are you running here, Raymond, a group home for computers?

Bishop: A computer geek who can clone himself. Scary thought.

Deakins: When we catch this guy he's gonna owe me a bottle of aspirin.

Zach [the police computer guy]: Gotcha monkey brain!

Goren: Croydon. McVee is another Croydon.
Bishop: Who's Croydon?
Goren: He ran out on his wife. Hitchens used him to get at me. And the pattern, one, one, two, it's Wally Stevens.
Bishop: I don't know who you're talking about.
Goren: He was an actuary. He had a pattern of five. Five notes. Five ...pins. Eames would've known.

Goren: It's about yearning. He misses his partner.

Carver: The testimony dealt with your predilection for detecting obscure patterns.
Deakins: Far as your predilection for hounding deadbeat dads, all anyone had to do was read a couple of old newspapers.

Bishop: Neil might have been jealous of the time Jack spent online with Corinne.
Carver: He killed her to drive his partner back into his arms? That's almost juvenile.
Goren: It's primitive. Panic is a primitive emotion. That's how he felt without his partner.

Cadogan: You knew?
Neil: I didn't tell you because it was a distraction. There's nothing to it.
Cadogan: Nothing? I'm being arrested!

Bishop: I don't know, it meant nothing unless Jack said it meant something.
Goren: Because he's your only audience. He's the only opinion that you've ever trusted. You needed Jack back, you know.

Goren: If my partner was putting me through that, abandoning me, leaving me vulnerable, impotent, for a nobody -- That's unforgivable.

Goren: Seven pounds, eight ounces.
Bishop: It's great. You -- You should call her. I'll handle the booking.