The Following - Season 1 Episode 5 - Recap and Review - The Siege
Recap and review of The Following - Season 1 Episode 5 - The Siege:
The Following is still a show that has a bevy of problems, but I'll spare you all the sermonizing of last week's review. I'll simply say that "The Siege" is better about minimizing what doesn't work about the show, namely the notion that we're supposed to care at all about what happens to the trio of child-abductors out in the middle of scenic nowhere. The episode is actually pretty effective in what it sets out to do, crafting a tense hour that's almost singularly focused on the mission to rescue Joey (Kyle Catlett) from his captors. I say "almost" because there's a plotline that's a fairly languid addition to the narrative, as Carroll (James Purefoy) blackmails his former lawyer into running messages for him. I can see why this was a component of this week's episode, since her relaying is what allows much of the plot to move forward, with the other followers discovering that the cops are closing in on the farmhouse. But the scenes, in which Carroll psychologically tortures the lawyer, complete with flashbacks to their earlier acquaintance following Carroll's attempts to appeal his conviction, rob the episode of any momentum that it builds over the course of the hour. However, the episode still gets enough right to keep from feeling like a waste of time. The story is ramping up now, and for the first time since the series began, I'm genuinely anticipating next week's episode.
Credit: Nicole Rivelli/FOX
The trio of Emma (Valorie Curry), Jacob (Nico Tortorella) and Paul (Adan Canto) have solidified their bond with a raucous bit of implied, emotionally-charged love-making to solidify their commitment to one another. Except there are cracks in the partnership. Jacob is miffed at how he continually gives in to Paul, insisting that he isn't gay, despite Paul's inferences to the contrary. Jacob remains generally stand-offish to the idea that their union means anything more than it does, and his attitude isn't helped by the fact that he still can't bring himself to kill Meghan (Li Jun Li), who remains tied up in the basement. Making matters even worse for the group is Joey's gradual realization that he's essentially being held captive. He steals Emma's phone and makes a call to his mother, and the call lasts just long enough for Joey to infer that his mother never gave Emma permission to take him away. Unfortunately, Paul happens in on Joey's secret phone call, and hauls him back to his room while Claire (Natalie Zea) can only listen to her son's cries on the other end of the line.
Credit: FOX
Surprisingly, Joey proves remarkably resourceful, breaking the lock on his room and escaping into the wooded area surrounding the farmhouse. He encounters a married couple that recognizes him from the news. They are about to offer to let Joey use their phone to call his mother when Emma arrives on the scene and tries to play it off like everything is alright, and that Joey will be allowed to call his mother back at the farmhouse. Of course, we know this isn't the case - worse still, we know what Emma intends when she tells Jacob and Paul to go back and "thank" the couple for finding Joey for them. It's one of the more gruesome crime scenes in the series, a blunt, unflinching portrait of grim brutality. It says every bit as much about the base villainy of the farmhouse trio as it does the goodness of Ryan (Kevin Bacon), who shows patience and understanding with the young officer accompanying him on the search.
Credit: Nicole Rivelli/FOX
And make no mistake, Ryan is on the search. After telling Claire that they'll discuss how their relationship ended once he returns with Joey, Ryan sets off to find the boy. What Ryan doesn't know is that Carroll has been using his ex-laywer, Olivia, to relay news of the police investigation to his followers via a televised press conference, and to also deliver a message to Claire. Carroll threatens Olivia with physical harm, as he's done in the past, to get her to cooperate despite her protests. Two new followers enter the scene: one to arrive at the farmhouse to warn the trio about the impending police arrival, and one other to abduct Claire under the pretense of bringing her to Joey. And it all happens almost concurrently with Ryan's arrival on the scene, as he kills one of the new followers in self-defense, after the man had mortally wounded Ryan's officer partner and looked to do the same to Ryan himself. Ryan, on the warpath, kicks in the basement window, briefly encountering Meghan, whom he promises to rescue before this is all said and done. Yet almost immediately after heading upstairs and finding Joey, Ryan suddenly has Paul's gun pressed to the back of his head. And like that, we've got ourselves a hostage situation.
Credit: FOX
If this all sounds brisk, it's because the episode itself was considerably so. In fact, it's the episode's biggest strength. "The Siege" never has time to waste, and that sense of urgency and purpose gives the episode a very palpable momentum that carries the viewer through the hour. I still don't give a damn about Jacob's crisis of conscience, or his fears that Paul and Emma are conspiring against him (after overhearing Paul joking that Jacob needs a good smack-around), but I can at least appreciate the intensity of the situation at the climax of the episode. Ryan isn't the only hostage, there's Joey and Meghan as well. The followers have all the leverage, but there's no real sense that any of them will get out of it alive. How could they? I suppose that's the question propelling us forward, as the narrative has upped the stakes in a commendable fashion. Enough innocent lives have been lost over the course of these five episodes that we should be desensitized to it by now, yet there's still that hope for a happy ending, at least half of the time. We know that Ryan isn't going to be able to save everyone, but this is a guy who badly needs a win or two to balance out the scales. It might be a little early in the show's run to be hoping so fervently for it, but the good guys really deserve having something go their way. While Ryan at least got to save his sister last week, and Claire in the weeks before that, the measure of justice is woefully imbalanced. I can safely say that it's one of the principle successes of the show that the viewer would so badly want to see its protagonists succeed.
