My Own Worst Enemy: The War Within

I want to believe in this show just as much as Henry wants to believe his life is real. But as Henry accepts that all he knows is an illusion, I can’t fake enthusiasm for show with a plot as believable as Santa Claus is for a child over 13.

Please tell me this isn’t Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip all over again. Let me check. Stellar cast? Check. Great director choices? Check. Funny, realistic writing? Okay, maybe no check. A show that takes itself way to seriously and totally goes over viewers’ heads? Check, check, check.

I hate to see a show die where a plot is so utterly unbelievable and so hard for viewers to connect to that you find yourself laughing at inappropriate times. During this episode, the only scenes worth watching included Tom/Raymond. The final scene gave a glimmer of hope for the show to find its footing. Let’s recap.

As we begin, Raymond and Edward are off to another mission. (Does the agency only have two spies on their bill? Budget, don’t you think?) Raymond’s unhappy that he’ll have to improvise if Henry wakes up mid-mission, but it’s on to the task at hand, kidnapping a man from his home. This goes off without a hitch. The writers have decided to throw at us another too simple way to distinguish when Henry and Edward trade places. (I guess different personalities, lingo and even tone of voice aren’t enough. These guys may be talking auras before the season’s up.) Now, Edward gets a tingly feeling he equates to anxiety before a switch.

At HQ, we meet Trumble, a boss above Mavis, and the interrogation commences. Edward is their on-staff interrogator and therefore Henry must play pretend. He seems to be tortured by the idea of having to torture someone else for information. (Henry clearly has been taught the Care Bear technique of torture.) So Mavis orders him to inject the man with a painful serum, but he can’t follow through.

Henry goes home to sift through old photographs, and his wife Angie prompts him for a hotel date in the evening. He then visits an old doctor friend for a CT scan. This excursion makes him late for work, and Mavis notices. During his bus ride, Henry searches for some of his old classmates, but none of them seem to exist. (Sad music montage ensues, but I have a hard time feeling sorry for this guy. Yes, I know that he’s found out his whole life is a sham, but he knows that he’s a fake person! Accept it, and let’s move on. Better yet, turn Henry off, and let Edward just lead one big life.)

Before he can exit, someone sprays a mist that triggers a heart attack. Raymond appears as the EMT and takes Henry into an ambulance. Inside, Mavis recaps to him why he was created and what he must do to live. It’s play by her terms or die now. He chooses life, and as she resuscitates him, Edward wakes up.

Edward spends the hotel date with Angie, and Henry wakes up post-coitous. (Sadly, he gets no action now, and Edward gets all the play.) She has been reinvigorated by this “changed” Henry, loving the newly-tried hummingbird position. (All men should know this one apparently.) Henry meets Dr. Skinner to discuss his Edward/Angie sex issues in a scene so boring, it should be erased. (It’s another means of understand Henry’s mindset in a real world context but a waste for Saffron Burrows. My bet is that the shrink works for the agency as well, and keeps tabs on Henry’s psyche.)

Back at work, Edward’s left Henry with a gadget that can genetically distinguish who uses it since they share DNA. Edward calls this a confidential line. I call in a load of BS. Upstairs, the prisoner, finally, gives up the location, and Raymond and Henry are sent on another mission. Henry thinks Mavis is insane for sending him, as do I, but he’ll only work surveillance. (Suuuuure. And that isn’t the case, as Henry/Edward must rescue Raymond.)

When Edward arrives home, his wife asks him about the CT scan because the insurance company called. Now, he knows where Henry went. Later, Henry wakes in bed to more talk of their sex-capades. (I appreciate a healthy sex life, but not in my spy shows unless it has something to do with a mission. On Entourage, it works. In a show like this, it’s just gross.) Again, she asks about the CT scan, and Henry is tipped off that Edward must know about it. He arrives at the hospital to find his friend, the doc, dead.

Thoughts:

This cliffhanger definitely got me, but that was the best part of the show. They’ve upped the ante of having the two personalities not actually trying to co-exist but actually be at war. If this is where we’re headed, I feel like that will add a burst of excitement and uniqueness to a storyline that seems trite and unreal. The writers need to step it up a notch to keep me interested.

Quotable:

Tom: You rock…Angie gave Mary the low down on the humming bird. Seriously, is this even physically possible?
Arlene: Legal’s waiting.
Tom: Mary and I aren’t into that kind of thing, but thanks for showing me what kind of sexual positions you and Angie enjoy.
Henry: That’s not what I was doing!
Tom: By the way I don’t even think you’re allowed to access these sights at work. Isn’t that true Arlene? Okay, I want to file a complaint with HR for what he just showed me.

Season 1, Episode 2: The Hummingbird (originally aired October 20, 2008)

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Photographs courtesy of NBC