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“Painkiller Jane” Recaps: Episode 1.3 “Piece of Mind”

Going off the rails on a crazy train – A runaway train is speeding through the heartland. Cut to the interior of the train, where the engineer is sweating and looking around wildly. One of his co-workers is yelling at him, which clearly isn’t helping. “What are you doing? You know we’re not supposed to hit this patch doing more than 70 mph! We’re gonna jump the tracks! Throttle back! Throttle back now!”

Cut to the engineer’s view. Landscape is racing by at a dizzying speed, and this may just be the worst use of a blue screen that I’ve seen since Contact. The engineer blusters that he “doesn’t know how” to throttle back (he must have gotten his certification online).

The men scream in unison as the train crashes, and the last shot is of that god-awful blue screen again, cleverly tilting the landscape on its side to indicate the train tipping over. Is this really the same network that gives us Battlestar Galactica? Hmm, maybe they’re spending all their money on that show.

Cut to fiery wreckage. Cut to Jane’s slow-mo voice-over.

Vasco V.O.: They say that you can feel lonelier in a crowd than by yourself. Maybe. I’ll tell you this though, whoever said it never had to wade through the crowd that I do everyday.

As Jane says this, a hapless woman carrying a bundle of groceries is knocked to the ground by a guy as he walks by. Jane dutifully stops to help the woman gather her things.

Vasco V.O.: It’s hard to feel lonely when your every walking moment is spent trying to avoid being pickpocketed, jostled, hassled and cursed at. Did I mention getting pinched? I realize that I don’t live in one of the better parts of town, not that there are many better parts anymore – and that I couldn’t afford one anyway. But when is your environment an excuse for bad behavior? Whatever happened to common courtesy? Is everyone so completely absorbed in their own personal drama today?

A guy walks by with a face full of piercings.

Vasco V.O.: All right, forget that I asked that. I realize that appearances can be deceiving. Sometimes a lot deceiving. Let’s face it: Life can be deceiving. Just when we think we have it all figured out, it gets turned on its head.

This is the part where I expect to see Grocery Lady fishing cash out of Jane’s freshly pinched wallet. But no, instead we cut to two people panhandling for spare change. And their faces appear to be somewhat melted off. Did the PKJ design team borrow some extras from 28 Weeks Later?

Reruns again? – Inside their super-secret headquarters, the Geek Squad is watching the video from the train. Is it possible that the acting of the conductor and his assistant seems even worse when filtered through another TV set? How is that even possible?

The Squad watches intently as the two men argue over throttling back before the screen goes snowy. Riley says that all systems appeared to be working on the train, and that Unity Rail is attributing the crash to “driver error.” Andre orders him to pull up the driver’s head shot, and Subway Expert Joe Waterman (WTF?) intones, “Jason Hampton. Good man.”

Jane: You know him?

Joe: It’s a small world when it comes to trains.

Particularly model trains. Heh.

Maybe we’re about to get an episode that finally explains the usefulness of Joe to the team. So far, I haven’t been able to figure that out.

Joe: He worked for the rail company for as long as I worked for the subway. And for the record, his record was spotless.

The Ugly One: Well it just got smudged.

Andre: This might fit the pattern for other skill-specific amnesia cases we’ve been tracking.

Ooh, I like that term. I’m going to claim “skill-specific amnesia” the next time someone asks me to write a recap of a bad TV show.

The team discusses the conductor’s medical history, finding nothing more serious than an angioplasty in his past. Heartbreaker Maureen speculates that he was suicidal, but Jane doesn’t buy it. All she saw on his reel was terror and confusion.

McDorky: Last week at the hospital a patient came in for a full neurological workup. He was worried because he suddenly couldn’t remember a critical part of his job.

Andre: How often does that happen, where a person loses only part of a memory?

McDorky: It’s rare, usually accompanied by a trauma or aneurysm or “something psychological.” Edgar Dawson had none of those.

Riley: Edgar Dawson?

Riley explains that Dawson is a “software frickin’ genius” who developed some IT-esque thing that didn’t really make any sense to me, so I’ll spare you the details.

Andre sends Jane to talk to Dawson and encourages her to “take an interpreter.” Heh.

Chez Dawson — Jane and the Dorky IT Guy are having a sit-down with Dawson. Well, actually Riley is sitting down with Dawson, talking about, I dunno, HTML code or something, and Jane is fondling his awards and degrees and brainiac tchotchkes.

Vasco V.O.: There’s a place for people like them. Anywhere I’m not.

Dawson begins to fumble when Riley asks him a question about his work. It’s just the sort of “skill-specific amnesia” that the Geek Squad suspected.

Jane asks him if he recalls meeting anyone new just before the memory loss occurred. But — big surprise — he doesn’t recall.

When they leave, Riley tells Jane that he’d rather be dead than suffer Dawson’s fate.

Back at the ranch — Riley tells Jane and Andre that Dawson has completely forgotten some “third-level algorithms” that he created, algorithms related to his patent on “high-speed electronic relays.”

Andre is almost as irritated as I am, and he asks the IT Dork to cut to the chase and tell him what it’s used for. That’s when Joe, who’s been quietly working in the corner, pipes up with, “train switching routers.”

Jane does the math. “So a train engineer and a guy who designs switching systems lose part of their memory within three days of each other.”

Andre tells Riley to check into the personnel files of Unity Rails (Rosie’s latest travel venture?) to see if any employees might have held a grudge.

Something’s cookin’ in hell’s kitchen — Across town, a scruffy-looking guy sits amid piles of garbage on a street corner. He looks dazed and out of it, but when a body falls on him from the collapsing porch above, he gets a little pep in his step. The person who fell on him is moaning and squirming, and the scruffy guy tries to comfort him with promises to “get a paramedic.”

Then, something strange happens. The person who fell grabs the arm of the scruffy guy, and some sort of Freaky Friday-type presto change-o occurs. And it has something to do with the ostensibly magical bracelet being worn by the person who fell. Suddenly, the confused scruffy guy is a medical expert, bossing around the paramedics when they arrive. And he’s pretty convincing because they hand over the defibrillation paddles to him and let him zap the guy back to life. Then Trapper John promptly keels over. They guy he saved? He gets up and walks away.

Hospital — Trapper John (aka patient John Doe) is hooked up to an array of machines in an ICU ward. McDorky stands over him, recording his notes about what happened when the paramedics arrived. Something about his melodic voice rouses Trapper John Doe from his slumber, and he opens his eyes and begins rattling off medical jargon. McDorky is impressed, but spooked.

Trapper John Doe tells McDorky that he’s an M.D. who studied “neuromuscular syndromes” and wrote some hoity-toity articles on the topic. McDorky recognizes the title of one and identifies the author as Dr. Alan Rafferty. Trapper John Doe nods and says, “That’s right.” McDorky doesn’t respond, but the look on his face screams, “I served with Dr. Alan Rafferty: I knew Dr. Alan Rafferty; Dr. Alan Rafferty was a friend of mine. You’re no Dr. Alan Rafferty!

Psych Ward, Somewhere, USA — A man identified as Dr. Alan Rafferty sits in a wheelchair and stares off into space as other psych patients interact around him. McDorky is there too, and Rafferty’s wife tells him how Rafferty froze up in the middle of performing a surgery, unable to remember what to do. She tearfully tells McDorky that when her husband’s medical career ended, he started drinking and tried to kill himself.

Geek Squad Headquarters — McDorky tells Andre that only a handful of doctors could do what Rafferty does, so it makes no sense that Trapper John Doe knew the procedures. Andre gets it. “So we’re not talking about sudden partial amnesia. We’re talking about picking people’s brains.”

McDorky agrees: “It looks that way. And no, he’s not a neuro. I tested him.”

They figure that in order for the mind-swap to happen, there must have been a middleman, and that the victims’ specialties (trains and medicine) must have something in common. I wait for Joe to pop in and tell them — thanks to his expertise on everything that runs on rails — but he’s not there. Probably out working on the nonfunctioning subway line again.

Don’t just stand there, bust a move — Cut to Jane’s apartment. She’s in the bathroom, shaking it in her bra and undies to a song on her iPod while she brushes her teeth. You know, a few more scenes like this one and maybe the show wouldn’t be so bloody boring!

While she’s convulsing in the next room, a man breaks into her apartment and begins looking through her things. Jane gets rid of an earplug and hears someone rattling around in the other room. She spits out her toothpaste and puts on her game face.

Bam! Jane throws open the door to her living room and aims a gun at the intruder. Who turns out to be Riley. He’s acting nervous and guilty about something (like the fact that he picked her lock, or maybe because he can’t stop starring at her scantily clad body). Jane wants to know what he’s doing there, and she starts to get pissed when he won’t give her a direct answer. Personally, I think he’s there to get some protection from the toughest person he knows.

Riley: There was a break-in at the pharmacy close to where the paramedics were working on that homeless guy.

Jane: Junkies break into pharmacies every 10 minutes.

Riley: Yeah, but there weren’t any drugs stolen. At least not the kind of drugs you get high off of.

Hemoglobin accelerators. The paramedics used hemoglobin accelerators on the guy that was having the seizure.

Jane: So what are you saying, that the guy who had the seizure is the middleman?

Riley: Or he needed someone with some medical expertise to help him out. Doctors can’t operate on themselves, right?

Jane: Unless he had contact with Dr. Rafferty. He could have taken his medical knowledge.

Riley finally admits that he hoped Jane would come with him to case out a few pharmacies. Jane tells him that she knows he wants to be in the field, and she knows that he knows about her reputation as a rebel. But, she tells him, “not tonight.” She tells him that she’ll grab a drink with him another time and then gives him the boot.

Down and out — Even without his ass-whipping, Amazonian bodyguard, Riley decides to do a little fieldwork of his own. He walks through Skid Row using his handheld GPS system to find the pharmacy. It’s only a matter of minutes before three guys jump him, beat the crap out of him, and take his Game Boy away from him.

Later, when Riley comes to, Trapper John Doe is hovering over him and diagnosing his injuries.

Riley: You’re the one with Dr. Rafferty’s medical knowledge. Seth was looking for you. The homeless guy, the one who you were telling the paramedics how to treat — can you tell me where to find him?

Riley calls Andre to tell him that he found the neuro. Andre tells him to stay put until they can get to him. But as soon as he hangs up, the neuro latches onto him, and we all know that this can’t be good.

A day late and a neuro short — The Geek Squad shows up at the designated alley, but there’s no sign of Riley or the neuro in question. Jane finally spots him, and when she calls out to him he runs away. The group finally corners him and asks him what happened to the neuro. Riley pitifully replies, “What’s a neuro?”

Bad things always happen on the IT guy’s day off — Andre and staff are struggling to take charge of their computer systems in the absence of Riley. Or, rather, the absence of Riley’s mind. McDorky joins them to deliver some bad news: “It’s not partial like the other ones. Riley’s got full-on amnesia.”

Jane brings them up to date with Riley’s information about hemoglobin accelerators, and McDorky tells them the accelerators are used to treat a fatal disease from which the seizure-victim probably suffers.

Heartbreaker Maureen asks the obvious question: Stealing the knowledge of the doctor makes sense, but what does that have to do with the train engineer or Dawson’s railway switches?

Andre doesn’t have the answer, but he barks a series of orders at everyone and sends them off to gather more information. He tells Jane to stay on-site and mind the computers, but she tries to convince him to let her accompany him. “Why?” he asks, “because you didn’t go out with Riley last night?” Um, yeah, I’d say that’s a safe bet. She tells Andre that she’s afraid that they’ve lost Riley, but Andre ain’t hearing it.

Among the hoary masses — Andre and The Ugly One go back to Skid Row and try to find the neuro. They have a basic physical description to rely on, but not much else. And unfortunately for them, pretty much every homeless guy milling about with them fits it — including the guy who brushes against them and gets a little “charge.” Uh oh.

Computer blue — Back at headquarters, Jane and Heartbreaker Maureen are sniping at each other because they don’t know how to run the computer system. They’re kinda cute when they bicker. Are these two ever gonna get it on or what? Jane admits that she feels guilty for not being there to protect Riley.

Riley: I’m Riley, aren’t I?

Still slipping around and sneaking up on people — so I guess he didn’t forget everything.

Jane is visibly relieved to see him up and about, but Riley doesn’t share her enthusiasm.

Riley: So what, I’m some sort of computer geek?

Heartbreaker Maureen: In the best possible sense, yes. Do you want to try?

Riley sits down at the control deck next to Jane and instinctively pushes some buttons and types some commands. His typing gets faster as the “Eye of the Tiger-esque” music swells in the background. Hey, I think it’s all gonna be OK!

Or maybe not.

An ominous female voice intones: “Warning: System Failure. Warning: System Failure.”

Riley, Jane and Heartbreaker Maureen look incredibly bummed out.

Touched by a neuro — On her way home from work, a man asks Heartbreaker Maureen for some change. She gives it to him, and in the brief moment when their hands touch, we hear the zapping sound that tells us the man is the naughty neuro and that he may have just stolen some of Heartbreaker Maureen’s memory.

Cut to Joe at Headquarters, who’s fast asleep. Someone enters the room, wearing the telltale magical bracelet — and lightly touches his arm, eliciting the zap of memory theft. Joe’s eyes flutter open, but no one is there. Joe gets up to check on Riley, but finds nothing amiss.

The morning after — The next morning, the Geek Squad is gathering for breakfast. Riley is playing a computer golf game (and sucking at it) when Maureen notices that someone has breached their security. The Squad draw their guns and watch in stunned silence as an older man hobbles into their complex like he owns the place.

He tells them, “Your security system isn’t working because I shut it down,” and lets loose with a smug, evil villain laugh. While he does have a mustache, he mercifully resists the urge to twirl it. Now I’m watching in stunned silence.

Mr. Mustache: Well I suppose I should be flattered. An entire team devoted to finding people like me. [to Andre] Your friend Riley, his mind’s a vault of information. Neuros, that’s what you call us. At least I’m glad to know that I’m not alone in my uniqueness.

The Ugly One: That’s OK pal, ’cause I’m about to arrange for you to meet the rest of the freaks so that you don’t feel so lonely.

He draws his special neuro gun on Mr. Mustache, who tells him, “If you ever want to see your friend again — intact — that might not be the wise thing to do.”

Andre doubts that Mr. M can do anything to help Riley, but Mr. M tells him, “Oh, I can. I can steal knowledge, I can transfer knowledge, and I can restore knowledge.”

McDorky magically appears and tells them:”He can. I just got a call from Paula Rafferty. It seems that Dr. Rafferty has made a full recovery.”

Mr. M says they should consider it an act of good faith — and proof of his abilities. But wait, there’s more. In exchange for the return of all of Riley’s marbles, Mr. M wants the help of the Geek Squad. He wants them to help him rob a train!

Driving that train — The man’s name is Simon Connolly, and there’s something that he wants. And, oh yeah, it’s “important.” “It” is being shipped in a high-security container by rail the next day.

Simon: If the robbery is successful and I get to do what I want, I’ll restore Riley’s mind. I’m also prepared, when all this is over, for you to chip me.

Jane: Andre, this may be our only chance to save Riley!

Andre: Even if we agreed to do this, what makes you think we have the expertise to rob a train?

Simon executes some stupid human tricks, asking each of the Squad members random train technology questions, and they surprise even themselves by knowing the answers.

Hmm. It seems that with all that inappropriate touching he was imparting knowledge, not stealing it. But he never laid a hand on Jane. Why is that? He tells her, “You won’t be needing any additional knowledge, Agent Vasco. You’ll be handling the most physically challenging part of the operation.”

Simon helps himself to the Squad’s computer system, rapidly typing in information and doing “what Riley would have done: manipulating the system to the team’s advantage.” Simon tells Jane that she has “an amazing gift” and that he just didn’t feel right zapping her like the others. He tells her: “I’m on your side. And to be honest, I’m a bit saddened that you’re not on mine. Did you ever wonder which side might be the right side? Is being different such a crime?’

Jane reminds him that his “uniqueness” has a body count. Simon says (heh) that he regrets the loss of life, and it was never his intention. Jane tells him that this merely puts him “on the road to hell with a lot of other people.”

He asks her, “Where does your being different put you?”

Riding the rails — The next day, Connolly’s train is running right on schedule, and the Geek Squad members are all in their positions, Mission Impossible-style. In case you were wondering, Jane’s job, so far, is to take out the two security guys on the train. And she looks very dykey in her black knit cap and flannel shirt while she does it.

Everyone does their thing, and the team executes the theft of the rail car without a hitch.

Behind door number one — Jane and The Ugly One enter the stolen car and spy a giant “electrostatic pulse” carrying a 15,000-volt charge (aka a bug zapper for humans). The pulse is protecting the safe that the Squad is supposed to crack open, and I think we all know that Jane is going to be taking yet another one for the team in this situation.

The Ugly One gives her a gadget to affix to the junction box charging the pulse. If she can do that, the thing will fry itself out. Unfortunately, getting to it might just turn Jane into a very pretty piece of toast. After a brief protest that her part of the mission is “unacceptable,” Andre reminds her that they’re doing it all for Riley — a nice little passive-aggressive jab suggesting that if she had gone to the pharmacy that night with Riley, maybe he wouldn’t have gotten his mind warped in the first place!

The Ugly One wishes Jane luck, and she barks a “bite me” in his general direction before hurling herself at the junction box. Sparks fly, then Jane flies through the air and lands on her back with smoke rising from her barbequed flannel shirt. But she’ll be OK (and maybe now we won’t have to see that fugly shirt again). Andre and The Ugly One crack open the vault and find a painting inside, sealed in bubble wrap and bearing a “Fine Art, Handle with Care” sticker.

Simon’s pad — Cut to Simon standing before the stolen painting, now mounted on the wall over the fireplace. He’s waxing poetic while Andre and Jane stand waiting to chip him.

Simon: I was 10 years old when I sat for this painting. He was completely unknown at the time. My dad lost his business, and he was forced to sell it. Who knew it would eventually be worth millions. The funny thing is that I never really liked it. I was always embarrassed when my friends came over and saw it. But when it was taken away, I always felt that a piece of me was taken away. When I heard it was being shipped to another city for a showing, I knew it was my chance.

Jane: To experience life as it was?

Simon: One more time, before I died.

Andre asks why he stole Dr. Rafferty’s knowledge rather than just going to a hospital. Simon says (heh) that he watched his father die in a hospital and he wasn’t about to go that way himself. Jane wants to know if it was worth it — this moment. Simon isn’t sure, but he can tell them — duh — that it’s not like it was before, and he’s not like he was before.

Simon wearily takes a seat and announces his readiness to be chipped, but Jane can’t bring herself to do it. Andre is all to happy to finish the job, and before he leaves he warns Simon that now he’s basically on permanent probation.

Home again, home again — Andre casually asks Jane if her burns have healed, and she grudgingly admits that they mostly have.

Jane: Which is more than I can say for every stitch of clothing I had on. You know, I go through a lot of clothes on this job. Maybe the agency might think of compensating —

Andre: No.

Jane: Just thought I’d throw it out there …

McDorky interrupts their friendly discussion about Jane’s expense report when he enters with Riley. Only he’s not smiling, and neither is Riley.

McDorky: Simon seems to have given Riley back his thoughts, but there seems to be a bit of a problem. He seems to know his name and that he works here, but when I checked the logic side of his brain with some simple questions … seven minus one?

Riley: Seven minus one is … zero. Seven minus one is zero!

Heartbreaker Maureen: Seven minus one is not zero.

Riley: Hmm. Well, it depends on how you quantify the equation. Seven people on this team, minus one of me, equals six zeros. And since six times zero equals zero, without me …

Joe: We’re nothing.

Riley: Now there’s a smart man. Stephen Hawking ain’t got nothing on Riley Jensen, baby.

Hardee har. The team is all smiles now. That McDorky really had us going! Sheesh.

This property is condemned — Back at Simon’s shambles of a home, he’s just where Andre and Jane left him: staring at the painting with a blank expression on his face.

Vasco V.O.: Like I said, appearances are deceiving. What makes people special isn’t always what you see on the outside. Unless you’re a nudist maybe, but that’s not the point.

Jane enters the room and tells Simon: “It really is beautiful, you know. You were beautiful.”

Vasco V.O.: The point is, whatever makes us different — love or hate it — that’s what makes us who we are. You take that away—

Simon tells her that he’d thought he would feel a sense of loss when his power was gone, but he feels very much the same.

Simon: Or am I the same? That chip gun, you put a blank in it.

Jane: Don’t read too much into it.

Simon: When the hunters realize that they’ve become the hunted …

Jane: You got what you wanted! You can spend the rest of your own days in your own home.

Simon: And intact.

Jane: Don’t believe you know everything about me. We’re monitoring you. You take one step off these premises, and we’ll kill you.

Jane stomps out of the house so she can continue her interminable voice-over in private.

Vasco V.O.: Was I surprised that Andre McBride did something that Andre McBride never does: Give a neuro a break? Yes. It even crossed my mind then maybe he’d been neuroed. But then after about nine glasses of wine, it came to me. Andre is just as conflicted about what we do as I am. Only difference is, he can’t say it. He can’t show it. With his one simple, beautiful gesture, Agent McBride just became an open book. Goodbye Simon, I’ll miss you. And don’t even think about screwing me over.

Next time on Painkiller Jane: A neuro who sees the future sends messages to Jane. Maybe he knows something about the fate of her crappy TV show.

 

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