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PERSON OF INTEREST (2011-2016) l The Cold War

#the meme #!!!! #the cold war #root | samantha groves #sameen shaw #john reese #lambert

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[π] person of interest quarantine rewatch ➥ 2x04 triggerman

#john reese #joss carter #triggerman #heeee #carter is so done

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Rinch + going undercover Rinch Fest 2022 | Day 5

#rinch #gifs #john reese #harold finch #!!! #eee

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'Harold' and his 'boss'

#hee #john reese #harold finch

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CHAIN

#hooo #lovely #fanart #harold finch

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Requested collectively by my POI friends over on Discord: Harold Finch ruining laptops after laptops (Person of Interest, 1x11, 4x02 and 4x05)

reposting for completion of the collection:

POI 4x05 as well.

#harold finch #bby #yissss

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if then else sketches

#root #sameen shaw #fanart #if then else #!!!

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Your concerned 3rd party...

...is watching you.

#rinch #fanart #eeee #so good

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So I was going through the Elias tag (well, carl elias), and I saw this post about people describing Dominic simply as a “brutish thug” in contrast to Elias as “a more refined man of honour and respect.” …do people really do that? ‘Cause that’s extremely irritating.

Dominic’s smart. That’s part of his whole thing. That and the fact that people consistently underestimate him, implicitly because of the colour of his skin and his general build. He looks like the sort of person the word “thug” is meant to bring to mind. But he’s clever. He manages to take over several gangs, he works out a lot of what Elias must be doing to stay on top and takes a lot over from Elias, too–it was Elias that used to own the prisons, remember. The guy brings Elias to his knees, for god’s sake.  And he’s good at people, too–Shaw buys his act, and it’s not like Shaw is unobservant; he sets up the school; he gets Malcolm’s mother free, in “Brotherhood,” after he decides that Malcolm would be a valuable asset; he convinces the guy’s second to betray him in “Point of Origin;” and in “The Devil You Know” he understands Elias enough to know that there was a chance Elias would turn himself in if it meant that he’d let Anthony go (and although he didn’t anticipate it before Elias made the comment about hubris, he worked out that it was a trap before the explosives went off). In a lot of ways he resembles Elias. (I maintain that it was out of character for him to have not realized Elias set Link up after Elias literally warned him that he was going to, and correspondingly that it’s out of character for Elias to warn him.) (…also, just from a “refined” point of view, they both clearly have some basic understanding of Roman history. Also see Link vs. Anthony on the subject. (Oh, and I’d forgotten this until I saw it in the wiki, but talking about Dominic’s tactics Elias refers to Sun Tzu.))

Which isn’t to say that there isn’t a difference between Elias and Dominic. Of course there is, and it’s an important, thematic one. But it’s nothing like “brutish thug” versus “refined man of honour.” No: Dominic operates more impersonally, rather as a businessman, while Elias operates on ties of personal loyalty. It’s an implicit replay of the dynamics of Team Machine versus Samaritan.

Consider Dominic. In “Blunt,” he’s revealed to be laundering money through video games–both clever and impersonal. I can’t recall the exact line, but in the same episode he says something to the effect of “We don’t need more soldiers. We need more gamers.” Indeed, he never seems to care very much for most of his soldiers except, basically, as tools, as extensions of his will. “Only one rule,” he says; “we all die in the end,” which does not exactly imply he has a lot of close attachments. He obviously cares about Link, but arguably not as much as Elias cares about Anthony, and more importantly he doesn’t trust him (even though he was childhood friends with Link, just as Elias was childhood friends with Anthony). He misunderstands the understanding between Elias and Reese and Finch, mistaking what is basically a personal relationship for a business arrangement. Even his introduction to Team Machine is a more impersonal reflection of Elias’; like Elias, he successfully deceives one of Team Machine’s agents for most of an episode, but unlike Elias a) he’s not a Number (meaning there’s less of a personal connection) and b) his deception isn’t revealed to Team Machine at the end of the episode–it’s not until “Point of Origin,” I think, four episodes later, that they work out who he is. Similarly, Elias comes to develop a personal relationship with Reese, while Dominic does no such thing with Shaw (and indeed I think it’s significant that it’s Shaw, here, and not the more relationship-oriented Reese).

It’s an impersonal view, and it’s one which sees people as largely replaceable. In other words, it’s Samaritan’s.

And–look, this approach obviously has its flaws. He kills Link, who never betrayed him (though did not seem to be loyal like Anthony was loyal; “I think my boss is wrong about you. If you had the numbers, you’d have given them by now,” he says (approximately, this is a paraphrase), and seems to be in all sincerity. And then he appeals to Anthony’s self-interest. Which is a standard tactic, sure–but he very much does not seem to get the depths of Anthony’s loyaly.). But it’s important to note that Dominic, like Samaritan, was winning.

Elias, in contrast, operates on ties of personal loyalty–in this season, it’s pretty much entirely on ties of personal loyalty. There’s his relationship with Anthony, with Bruce, even with Harold and John–everything’s about relationships. And consider: in “Asylum,” he tries to get John (and Fusco) out of there, at least in part I think to keep John safe. Talking about Harold: “so I should betray a friend?” He’s obviously not loyal to John and Harold; their interests are too opposed. But he cares about them. And if you look at the way John’s talking to him in the basement towards the end, I think he cares too. (Even in TDYK, it seemed to me like they cared about Elias for more than just his restraining influence on violence.) But it’s more than that–Elias’ arc in TDYK parallels what happens to Team Machine later on in the season (!). One of the people who was loyal to him has turned against him (Gino/Shaw (though, yes, obviously Gino was less loyal than Shaw–but Elias seems to regard Gino turning against him as a sign that things are grim indeed).). This leads to the capture of his most loyal lieutenant (Anthony/Root & Finch). But the boss of the other side (Dominic/Samaritan) offers a deal: if Elias (/the Machine) turns him (/it or her-self) in, the lieutenant(s) will be let go. Despite what the lieutenant would prefer, Elias/the Machine agrees to this deal. Despite surviving, however, they are severely weakened by the encounter. And no, obviously the parallels aren’t perfect, but they are significant, especially when you contrast Dominic’s approach. Elias’ “weakness,” essentially, is the same as the Machine’s: he cares about the people who work for him. (The fact that he’s able to exploit Dominic’s lack of trust in Link makes me wonder if Team Machine will be able to do something similar to Team Samaritan.)

TLDR: There is an important, thematic difference between Elias and Dominic, but it has absolutely nothing to do with intelligence. Instead it’s a difference in approach, one which (deliberately) reflects the differences in approach of Team Machine vs Samaritan. This reinforces the main conflict and also allows the show to explore the dynamics of such a conflict without having to handle the sheer stakes a Machine vs Samaritan conflict would necessarily involve.

#hooo good stuff #carl elias #dominic #meta

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"YOU ARE BEING WASHED, THE GOVERNMENT HAS A SECRET S-"

#fanart #aksksjsjsj #awww

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ok i love the show Person of Interest. And I think how the Machine handles the numbers is super interesting.

Because at first you just think, yeah, the machine sends every 'irrelevant' number it gets to Harold. But then you realize that they consistently aren't dealing with more than one number at a time and are somehow still like getting enough sleep and such. And then you see the Machine give multiple numbers, and they're either connected or the team is able to divide and conquer. In fact, they seem to get more numbers once Carter is helping them, and then more when Shaw and Root are around as well. Plus once Fusco is less of a gopher and more of a partner, they entrust numbers to him. So they keep getting more numbers than they had before, or crazier situations and more to balance with work and life.

How does this work you may ask, cause I don't think it's the showrunners being sloppy. I think that the Machine only gives them what they can handle and only gives them people they can actually save. Like on the show, they hardly ever fail. And you can see that as just part of the genre, the inherent hope of the show in the face of inevitability, but the times they actually fail are when the target chooses to spurn their help, or when there are too many outside factors for them to be able to fight (generally multiple dangers at a time).

And there are several times (especially during the Samaritan Era) where they are given the name of someone close to someone who already died, something that was clearly pre-meditated. But our team machine wasn't given those other numbers because they wouldn't have time or the ability to actually save the person.

The machine knows that the team loosing hope and drive because of repeated failure and overwhelming exhaustion would be so much worse than letting the people die that couldn't be saved anyway.

Even the relevant numbers aren't always given to the teams, its names snuck into documents and little nudges given. The Machine never solves the problems itself, but it knows how to give the nudges needed for people to fix problems. It would make sense why Finch and Reese always seem to get numbers that need computer skills and guns, that's what they have and the problems they deal with are beyond being saved by an anonymous tip to the police.

Later of course we find out that the machine has multiple teams, but the team we see is made of people with skills paired with either instance curiosity or willingness to follow bizarre orders, but I firmly believe those teams were pretty late in the show. Before the machine was 'free' it definitely had less power and only seemed to reach out to Harold, even when Carter and John were obviously trustworthy. It only contacted 'Admin'. However, I assume it had more freedom to reach out to random agents that weren't in NY because Samaritan was so focused on finding team Machine that they didn't even consider other teams.

It was very fun as the Machine kept growing how it was constantly contacting anyone on team Machine, like John would let Harold know they got a new number instead of the other way around. Season 1 very much felt like the machine would only reach out to Finch on his morning walk (which had to be crazy early because we never actually see where he sleeps) but it felt so structured, like the Machine knew that Harold would be freaked out by too much deviance, so it kept to pay phones and as normal a time as possible. As they got better it was able to give information based on when it called (and it definitely texted Harold too when it had to). The slow progress and change to the Machine and team Machine is just so satisfying to watch.

#the machine #oooh #meta #this seems right

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Tried out my TouchFive markers after a long time. Good thing they're not dry! 😊

#harold finch #fanart #oooh #love the coat

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AU Concept: the Machine knew Joss had worked out that it existed and that Finch had built it, which is why it left it so late to ring Finch. John and Harold might have trusted her with their secret, but the Machine didn’t.

#oh my #ohhh myyyy #fic ideas #FIC IDEAS #the machine

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like…. imagine being able to experience watching person of interest for the first time all over again

#YES #who wouldn't?

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robot friend does not agree. 'failure' is inability to fulfill directive. human has no programmed directive. human evolutionary directive is to live. you are alive. everything else is bonus.

I’ve been saving this message in my inbox for a long time because it always makes me feel better. I needed it today. Thank you

#aw #reminds me of something the machine might say

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- Samantha Groves

This show lowkey broke me but here are some of my favourite outfits/poses/screenshot redraws

zoom in for: root in a suit!!! ballerina root!!

#root | samantha groves #fanart #!!!!!! #wow #lovely

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Revised Rinch Fest Schedule

First off, thank you to everyone for your support. I really appreciate it.

New Rinch Fest schedule: October 24 through October 31. Prompts stay the same, rules stay the same, everything stays the same except for the month and that extra catch-up day.

Here is the link to the prompts and rules and everything else. Just ignore all of those Septembers.

Thank you!

#rinch fest #!!! #signal boost