MacGyver SN1 E9 – Chisel

I want to apologize for being so late with this review… I’ve had a crappy week.  However, I’m on the mend and refuse to stay down for long… kinda like Team Mac.

This episode, the Phoenix Team goes to a country I’ve never heard of to capture the leader of a group of terrorists that are on the rise, promising to be the next ISIS (or so Thornton assures them).  So, Mac, Jack and Riley go to extract Janis (who Jack calls everything from Yanni to Janet) but they hit a snag.  Of course, you knew that already because nothing is ever that easy for Team Mac.  Janis manages to send out a text blast to all of his terrorist friends in his phone before Mac captures him… so the cavalry is coming to save him before Team Mac can get to the airport (their extraction point).  They end up in a traffic stop where the terrorists are checking cars for Janis and end up on foot.  With some … well… MacGyvering, a cell phone (provided with much complaining on Jack’s part) and a makeshift hot air balloon becomes an eye in the sky to help them avoid the terrorists.

Eventually, their makeshift satellite gets too high and pops, and Mac and the gang make a mad dash for the American Embassy in this small (never heard of) country that is a low risk spot… so low risk that there’s only 4 marines to man the gate.  Thornton calls in some reinforcements for them, but they can’t arrive for SIX hours.  Mac must use his head to hold off a terrorist army for six whole hours with an embassy staff of civilians.  One guy tells Mac that his wife is 8 months pregnant and all he wants is to get home and see her again.  Mac promises him (and the rest of the staff) that if they’ll listen to him and do what he says, he’ll get them home to their loved ones.  They all look doubtful but promise to help do what they can.

I think the best MacGyvering done in this episode isn’t the “chisel and a matchbook” stuff he does, but the physics mathematical genius stuff he did on the whiteboad where he figured out exactly how many reams of paper it would take to stop the bullets the terrorist extremists were firing at them.

My favorite part of the episode is when Janis decides to try and talk Riley into letting him go.  This was when they showed us just how bad ass Riley really is.  Her response … so cool and cucumbery I almost made a salad…. “Oh, I get it.  You think I’m the weak link.”  Then she goes on to tell him that his friends aren’t trying to take over the embassy to save him, but to kill him.  She points out that he’s been in their custody long enough to give away a crap ton of secrets.  Of course, he says that he hasn’t… and Riley quickly points out, “I know that, and you know that… but they don’t know that.”  Calmly, she tells him that in prison he’s what they call a narc.  He puts on an air of stoic bravado, but you can see those wheels turning in his head.

Mac’s big save comes after a talk with Jack.  He decides the best way to defeat the bad guys is to invite them in.  Once almost all of the terrorists are inside the embassy, he traps them in a room while everyone escapes out the upstairs window.  Team Mac carjack the remaining bad guys and they all take off for the airport…. after that guy with pregnant wife thanks Mac for keeping his promise.

During this whole thing in Latvia (that’s the country I’ve never heard of), Thornton has been interrogating Bozer.  When Mac gets back to the Phoenix Foundation, Bozer is sitting in their conference room making a paper clip chain out of the big bowl of paper clips on the coffee table.  After a touching scene of forgiveness, Mac gets to offer Bozer a position at Phoenix.

There’s not a new episode this week, and the gang at CBS has decided to air the next two episodes out of their original order.  So, next week (on Dec. 2nd) we’ll see what was supposed to be episode 11, then episode 10 will air on December 9th.  I’d give you a look at next week’s new episode, but I can’t find the promo any where on line.  I really hope that’s not some sort of bad sign.