This is another one of my all-time favorites, and it has an awful lot to do with Spencer Garrett as Mark Vector.

Never Have I Ever seen someone play as effective a bully as Spencer Garrett in a 42-minute episode where his screen time is maybe only about 10 minutes would be absolutely true.

Mark Vector is an absolute bully. An absolute bastard of a man and cruel with it to boot, saying 'I have a temper' like that'll just excuse his behavior. This season we've had a maniacal wheat expert willing to create global wheat shortage and an ex-IRS nerd footing the bill for a militia ready and able to blow people up, but Mark Vector takes the damn cake for me.

I don't like bullies, and The Cuban Sandwich (or if you think wrong like Hardison, The Vegas Wake-up Call) is everything the man deserves and more. I especially liked his meltdown at the end. I've spent a lot of time imagining the repercussions of his little hissy fit in front of the Grand Jury, and I bet Moreau sends goons to visit the man in whatever prison he winds up in.

As far as the rest of the episode, and the gang? What's not to love? Eliot and Hardison, geared up as cops, stuck with one of Hardison's 'too perfect aliases' situations? Those two boys have a lot of fun together and it's plain to see they love each other an awful lot. I clipped the RIGHT scene this time (IYKYK), and I just had to choose this one because it's all COPS all the time. I even think they switched to handheld cameras for that scene, just to give it that extra-real vibe.

And who doesn't love The Return Of McSweeten? I adore him and Taggert an awful lot, and seeing McSweeten just be hopelessly, hopelessly in love with Parker is, while a bit sad, a bit great as well.

Other clips that almost made the cut? Parker saying Ghostbustaaaaassss and looking absurdly pleased. The sniper shootout because that was some high-level action that's usually reserved for season finales and, of course, Vector's meltdown.

On a for real note, I think one of the reasons we all love this show is that while the Leverage team pretty much has superpowers, they're flawed as hell, they're protective of the ones they love, they stand up for the 'little people' and have just so much fun doing it. Even though some of the episodes aren't my favorite (the one where Hardison gets buried alive is my least favorite of all), I can genuinely say that for the entire 5 season run, there were no misses.

Some episodes aren't as great as the others, but even the ones that don't blow your socks off still count as (to paraphrase Agent Dale Cooper again) some mighty fine teevee.

Got the template from someone on a Discord server, so I made these. No AI was used, it's just the weird lighting. Should do one for Harry and Breanna soon.

Finally we get back to the business of hunting Damien Moreau. And in such style!

This is full-on a Sophie-centric episode and I absolutely plan on discussing the hell out of how great (and reckless, and dangerous) running the Heart Con on John Douglas Keller, but first and foremost, I gotta talk about Hardison's work to get the whole thing up and running.

Keller's no fool. He's a master at detecting forgeries because he has a super sniffer that'd get Gus Guster all outta whack. In order to get around the man's Super Duper Sniffer, Hardison has to essentially recreate very period-specific materials to make a very specific type of book. In the process, he goes more than a little wonky.

AS IT TURNS OUT, I wound up clipping a Parker scene, because it, too, makes me laugh. I guess my all-consuming love for Parker won over, even though Hardison losing his mind is superb!

The Heart Con itself is great, and James Frain (who you've definitely seen all over the place down the years) is an absolute bastard who puts the lives of children at risk by using them as art smugglers. He's wily as hell and not even Sophie's full-bore attention on the con can actually keep him on track.

He's so greedy, so desperate to become a Baron and so embedded with Damien Moreau that not even Sophie revisiting one of her first (if not her actual first) personas as Lady Charlotte Prentiss can keep him under her spell. They don't really dwell on it all that much in the episode beyond body language and the like, but using her Charlotte Prentiss persona to bring Keller down was both a calculated risk and a hard choice to make.

There's some real pain in the Prentiss identity, and Gina Bellman really brings that home in the subtlest of ways.

Naturally, Keller does what he does and through a cunning series of ret-cons (you remember: showing us the full steps of the con retroactively) we get to see just how involved the whole team was in bringing Keller down. And it's such a great takedown, too.

The best part? As great as The King George Job is, they set us up for The Morning After Job, which is even better. Outside two-parter season finales, I don't think Leverage has ever done that before.

Obviously this is one of the greatest episodes of Leverage ever made. How could it not be?

It's fun, it's funny and most importantly, ( I don't know if I mentioned this) it's great.

Okay, all jokes and fanboying aside, The Rashomon Job shows us what happens when four of the world's greatest criminals all work the same job, years before they ever 'met' one another in The Nigerian Job ... all while the world's greatest mastermind is working the other side.

It's the five-story setup that's just the best. We get to see how each of the team 'saw' their beloved teammates back when they were all just thieves, and it's pretty much how you remember it. I don't need to rehash the details of this absolute gem, do I?

One of my favorite things apart from all the other favorite things in The Rashomon Job is John Billingsley as Coswell and Sophie's absolutely wrong assessment of this security officer. She paints him as one of the greatest security men alive, possibly even better than Nate himself ... except all he is is a bumbling goofball who's in love with Sophie's art-nerd persona.

Another fave is the circumstances behind the Leverage team being pointed at The Dagger of Aqu'abi. Each of them has their own specific reasons for needing to lay hands on this absolutely priceless piece of art. Eliot needs it to stop having hordes of assassins at him, Hardison just wants to crack the security system protecting it to count coup, Sophie wants it because Sophie wants it and that's ... pretty much the same for Parker as well. Nate's there because there's a lottttt of hinky stuff going on with the owner of the gallery so that's a perfect thing and shows us that a pre-tragedy Nathan Ford wasn't actually all that terrible.

But the 110% absolute best thing about this episode is how every single one of them makes Sophie out to be ever-increasingly ridiculous sounding, culminating in Parker's recounting, where her accent is (as best I can describe it) 'dolphin-adjacent'.

I was very much going to stitch together a clip of Sophie's increasing incomprehensibility but (if I'm honest), my blind cat was going mental for some reason and it just seemed like a lot of work, so I went with my second favorite bit, which is the ending, when the team decides to reclaim The Dagger of Aqu'abi and teach an absolute jerk a mighty fine lesson in the process.

The Rashomon Job is the crème-de-la-crème of top-tier episodes!

This one's just plain old fun, and for plenty o' reasons, so let's start with the guest star, Bruce Davison.

You might recognize him from 'somewhere' and that's basically because he's been everywhere since the 70s. He's done everything from prestige drama to horror movies to playing a certain jackass Senator in the very first X-Men we ever got.

That's some kind of resume, you ask me. As Dan Blackwell, Bruce doesn't do a lot of overacting like a lot of the visiting stars. He takes from Clancy Brown's turn in The Gone Fishin' Job; Dan's just a greedy, amoral bastard who doesn't much care for human life. While I do like my over the top villains complete with mwahahaha and moustache twirling, there's something to be said about garden-variety shitty people.

And Dan Blackwell and his bought-and-paid-for AG Debra Pierce are shitty people. And bringing up Debra Pierce brings me to my other favorite thing about The Underground Job; Parker grifts Pierce mercilessly throughout the con, and she does it so well.

Our antisocial thief has come so far from stabbing people with forks it's not even funny. As Kelly Beth Laughlin, we see a side of Parker that's truly funny; Kelly Beth is a virtuous, wealthy go-getter who wants to work for a woman of power and every single thing Parker does in the role is just gold. All the weird little mannerisms, the turns of phrase, even the soft Southern accent is just so nicely done.

To top it off, Parker's notes on Pierce are ... well, they're Parkered, if I can invent a term on the spot. Her notes are 'she doesn't separate her PENS' and 'she puts SIX sugars in her COFFEE' and essentially all the normal things that normal people (who aren't on some kind of spectrum, at any rate) would do. And her having to have what Blackwell and Pierce were doing in her offices spelled out is just sweet. That whole scene is why I clipped that whole scene.

Not to say that there aren't a lot of clipworthy scenes in this one. There are, but for my money, Parker stole the show.

The con itself is nicely done, a perfect example of The Skagway Shuffle (it's like The Fiddle, except underground) and the payoff in this one is just extra nice. Eliot has a solid understanding of small town miners because of his own small-town background, and even though he didn't do terribly much this episode beyond look after Corey and kick a guy's ass, the scenes with him are great as well. That humbleness Christian Kane gives Eliot in those situations is just the perfect amount.

All in all, Leverage did a great job with this one, even if they didn't have to hustle to fix a con gone wrong.

This episode is, for some reason, not one of my favorites, and yet I did rate it very highly indeed. As much as the relationship between Nate and his dad Jimmy brings up weird feelings about my relationship with my own dad, I can't deny that this one's a really well done episode.

There's a lot going on in this one, and while I was sitting there (as I do every time I watch this one, which is infrequently on a rewatch), I was shouting at the screen, telling Nate was his dad was up to. I like to imagine that Nate's so hung up on the great Jimmy Ford being back in town, running a con from his bar that it's all just a bit too much for him to focus. And add all of those old memories rattling around in his noggin from his days at the bar on the bench, trying to learn 3-Card Monte while his dad yells at him?

That'd be a lot for any mastermind, I reckon. Still and all Nate does prevail, but not without a lot of help from his team. By now it's no surprise that the entire team is worried and showing their concern, because that's what a family does. Thieves or otherwise.

So why would I give an episode I don't like a 9/10?

For starters, Nate doesn't fuck around with his dad. At all.

In all honesty, the ending of this episode, which is what I clipped, shows our mastermind at his most vicious and mean. He treats his dad nicely during the kiss off, but getting to that kiss off meant Nate had to not only burn down every single one of his dad's bridges. No no. He had to salt the earth as well, and all to make sure Jimmy Ford had no room to move.

I feel as though Nate leaned extra hard on Jimmy because of how smug he was that his son wasn't as good as him, wasn't as cunning as him, wasn't as sharp as him. If there's one thing we know about Nathan Ford, it's that he learns his lessons very well indeed. And then he goes on ahead and puts the Nate Ford Spin on things.

The other reason I rated this episode so very highly is for the two guest stars.

First up we have David Meunier as Pieter. I know you recognize him. I know it. From Denzel's The Equalizer as Slavi and his role on Justified as Johnny Crowder and a whole bunch of other stuff. Fun fact: he's a 'Luxembourgish-American' actor, and has an American accent. Every time I see him somewhere doing some form of Russian accent (or whatever), it's hard for me to reconcile. It's kind of like when I found out Idris Elba was British years after watching The Wire, but in total reverse.

Last but definitely not least is the amazing Tom Skerrit. I know you've seen some of his movies. Poltergeist III, perhaps, or maybe Alien? Yeah, he's been around and not for nothing when I Googled to see what else he'd been in, I was half-expecting to be sad that he passed. Nope. Tom, who was born in 1933? Still kicking. He's a real one, Tom, and I just love seeing him up on there on the screen, even as Jimmy Ford.

So while The Three-Card Monte gives me complicated feelings about my own dad, who has passed, it's undeniably one hell of an episode all the same. I probably won't watch it the next time I sit down to spend time with Leverage, but that's okay.

The clip I included for this one is the kiss off, and it's a great showcase of both men's ability to act. I almost used Parker's extremely deep knowledge of every bank in the area, but this one won top spot.

Hey looking for a leverage AU fic where people wear their hearts outside of their bodies, centred around Parker and Eliot trying to fix their broken hearts.

Could be on any site as I flick through different ones.

Any help would be greatly appreciated, thanks.

Edit to Add - FOUND IT! Realised I was looking in the wrong folder of my fic downloads.

Three Hearts Beating as One - Diary - Leverage (US TV 2008) [Archive of Our Own] - In case anyone wanted to check it out.

Oh my goodness. He’s in Never Go Back with Tom Cruise? Stellar! Yes, that’s him. My goodness he’s such a good actor.

So, I've been rewatching lots of Mythbusters over the last few months and recently their YouTube channel uploaded the Breaking Bad & Simpsons episodes. This got me thinking, is there anything from Leverage or Leverage: Redemption that you would have liked to have seen them test?

A follow up is wondering how a crossover the opposite direction would have gone (in example, the CSI cameo & Simpsons 'Mythcrackers')?

My wife has been watching Leverage as she falls asleep because she needs the sound & picks shows she’s seen a million times to avoid being invested while trying to fall asleep.

We have also been watching the Nickelodeon version of Doug when we eat dinner & relax. One of the episodes we just watched was the episode where Doug’s sister Judy pretends to be his super sick cousin Melvin because Doug lied when Connie asked him to a dance because Doug wanted to go with Patti Mayonnaise instead of Connie.

Why bring this all up? Because my new head cannon is that Judy Funnie grew up to become Sophie Devereaux, and nobody can convince me otherwise. Judy’s propensity for over-acting, and constantly pulling off cons while in disguise & using various accents. Never mind her questionable one-woman play at Doug’s school that nobody in their right mind would praise, but you know kids shows. They loved her.

Judy is absolutely a grifter of the highest order, and is now Sophie’s new real name in my book!

This is a rare episode in that it's both (in my mind anyways) Parker-centric AND Sophie-centric to a degree, which is nice.

It's Parker-centric for the obvious reasons: she was a car thief from age 12 and so the episode relies extremely heavily on her expertise and knowledge, so that's sensible. But beyond that, we see Parker go all in on something she's only really recently been doing.

Take a chance on someone else. Her reasons for doing so are the purest of all motives. She sees herself in Shorty, and wants to do whatever she can do spare a young woman a life in an area of crime that would probably eat someone like her alive. It's a telling decision. Parker knows enough to recognize that Shorty isn't 'like Parker', and that's a big deal in car thieving rings.

Parker's play goes the way it goes, which queues us up for more Leverage scrambling, but I'm absolutely not mad about the way things shook out. Parker got her second chance, and after a lifetime of crime a lot worse than anything Shorty could've possibly done, so why shouldn't she give someone else the same courtesy?

After all. If the people in Leverage can change, why can't Shorty?

It's also a Sophie-centric episode because we get to see her running a much longer character than usual. The clip I included, where she sells the car to (I think) Carl, is just the tip of the iceberg. She plays that man like a fiddle because of course she does, but that's the tip of the iceberg. She spends a lot of time with Penzer as well, working him hard to get the con going the right direction.

I know Bill Engvall from his stand-up comedy days, and I gotta say, he's funny as hell. He's not as big as some of the other stars they've had so far this season, but he does a great job playing a terrible scumbag.

The final and best thing about this episode (beyond Shorty getting her second chance, that is) is the con itself. I've mentioned in each of the last two, maybe three episodes that the cons themselves were only mediocre, held together with some truly awesome character building and genuine skill.

The con they run here in The Boost Job is absolute S-Tier. Parker has a chance (as lame as it sounds) to pay it forward to someone who deserves a better life than the one she'd been given and we get firmly reminded why it is that only Sophie can really do Sophie shit.

Everyone got to play a committed part in bringing down Penzer, and that's always a good time from where I sit! As this was such a great episode, enjoy not one but 2 clips stitched together! Sophie selling a car and Parker driving like a bat out of hell!

Beyond the towering awesomeness that is Clancy Brown as Hugh Whitman (which I will DEFINITELY get to in a second), this is a great episode for a bunch of reasons.

First, we get a micro-buddy-escape movie starring Hardison and Eliot. The thing I appreciate most about this team up (and kind of despair over, if I'm being honest) is that we get to see Eliot functioning in his true capacity: as the man who knows how to survive and has the absolute tools to do it. I despair because Hardison's dismissal of Eliot's factual, lived experience of knowing where he is at all time is a little out of place in season 3.

By now our Age of the Geek Baby knows what Eliot can do. The brotherly ripping and teasing is one thing, and pretty sure we all love it, but when you are in the middle of the forest being hunted by 'trained' militiamen, handcuffed to Eliot goddamn Spencer, you LISTEN to the man's thoughts on the matter of survival. You just do. Everyone takes Hardison's skills with the computer most seriously (unless they're teasing him), so Hardison should do the same.

The clip I included was an easy choice. It shows the moment Hardison stops playing around. I accept that our cityboy was trapped in an extremely bad situation and spiraled. I live damn near in the country these days myself and if I have to go weed the back lot where the weeds grow really thick, I have myself a really good hissy fit as well. In his situation I would've for sure done the same level of bitching and complaining.

And now on to the legend that is Clancy Brown. He IS a legend. I first saw him as The Kurgan in Highlander, and I fell immediately in love with him, and I can't think of a single role that I've felt 'meh' towards. The man's a consistent deliverer, much like Michael Ironsides.

But here's the fun thing about this absolutely legendary actor. At no point is any scenery chewed. He's calm, stable and very focused on the numbers, and takes a lot of time out of his day to point out that he was District Manager for the IRS. He's still villainous as hell, but he's like ... an accountant level villain. He's really into math and, like, maybe blowing you up. But the math first.

The con itself, complete with stealing a train, is one of the better ones out there. It was an all hands-on deck situation the moment our boys got themselves caught and trapped in those woods, and that's when Leverage shines best and brightest. I particularly enjoy the payoff on this one, mostly because it's one of those rare times where, when the team does their reveal as a final 'gotcha' moment, Hugh Whitman points out Sophie and Nate and is like 'THEY'RE IN ON THIS TOGETHER!'.

That's some real classic fun right there and the show, like the team, shines best when things have fallen all the way apart.

This is a monster episode and not just because it's one of the coolest Eliot-centric episodes we get before The French Connection Job in season 5 (which, by the way, is one of the best episodes of the entire show, ain't that right ... YES CHEF!).

First, we get Evil Bo Duke (and if that's too old for you, Evil Jonathan Kent) as a thoroughly disreputable scumbag failed musician/murderer/exploiter of genuine talent. Now I COULD have plenty to say about the sort of person John Schneider's become in the last decade or so, but I won't. For a few reasons.

One, his time on Smallville was pretty damn good and in this episode, he plays a pretty damn convincing evil bastard. It's sometimes hard for me to separate the art from the artist, but I'm willing to do it here. The important thing (sometimes, based on how vocal older actor/artists are) is to remember that when we were all younger and the sun was brighter was that these people really had a foundational effect on our lives in one way or another. I'm not over here telling you to forget your personal vendettas. If you have 'em, you have your reasons.

The other enormous big deal actor in this episode is Alona Tal as Kaye Lynn Gold. If you try and tell me to my face that you did NOT develop an immediate crush on her as Jo in Supernatural not only are you a liar, you are a lying liar and will have Lucifer, Gabriel, Castiel, Sam, Dean, their dad, their mom, Bobby and quite possibly even Rufus Turner on your ass. Pronto.

Alona is extremely beautiful, but she's more than that. She has an ineffable sweetness about her in any role she plays, and as Kaye, we see some for-real-deal acting chops and a beautiful singing voice on top of that. Beyond the singing, her role is surprisingly complex, and we get to see every bit of it; her brother's seriously hurt and in the hospital, these strangers have come to help her, Sexy Eliot is also Sexy Singing Eliot So Complications Ensue, Naturally, the con goes sideways as they always do, and then the payoff is golden.

That's a lot to carry in what's probably 10 minutes or so of screen time, and Alona sells it, especially at the end, when her world has been righted.

Outside that? Kudos to Beth Reisgraf for playing probably the silliest Parker that Parker has ever been. Every time she's up there on the screen pretending to be Not-Bjork, I genuinely wonder how it felt for her on those takes. I HAVE to imagine she was thinking 'what in the actual hell am I doing' and 'I am KILLING this shit' in equal measure.

And of course, what Eliot-centric episode would miss discussing Eliot himself. He has the Luck of the Irish when it comes to his undercover work ... and it always goes super well until it doesn't. Doesn't matter if it's baseball or country singin', he's gonna knock it out of the park and as you saw from the clip or from your own memories of the show, Eliot's not the kind of guy who can afford his face being all over the Internet.

Fatwas and all that, right? Anyways, The Studio Job brings a lot to the table and weirdly, now that I actually think about it, it had nothing to do at all with Damien Moreau.

The con for this one is perfectly serviceable but doesn't ring any bells too loudly because let's be honest.

The Double Blind Job con IS basic. What's not basic is what's going on behind the scenes, which is where you know I like it.

The biggest and funniest thing is Parker's absolute jealousy that's on-screen every single time Hardison's being nice to Ashley, the client. I've seen the episode at least a hundred times and it never stops being precious. Why? Because I don't think Parker's far enough along on her emotional journey to even recognize that she's feeling anything at all, least of ALL jealousy.

Parker knows only that Ashley Moore isn't to be trusted. So even though she is the client, and won't do anything, she's got her eyes on Hardison's special new friend to the point where it's a miracle Ashley's head didn't explode a la Scanners. It's a wonderful little dive into our thief's growing emotional complexity without dialing down into it as hard as they during The Inside Job.

The other truly funny thing is Eliot ... ELIOT ... being dumped by Jennifer Pearson (played by Tracy Gaillard) for not being exciting enough. The look on his face, the sheer visceral reaction to being on the receiving end of the 'it's not you it's me' speech is something I dine out on every time it pops up. Because this Eliot. The Man's Man and The Lady's Man all wrapped up into one awesome hitter/chef combo package. Not only could he cook you a 12 course 3 Michelin star meal, he could (and has) fought off thugs while doing so.

Last but not least, a shout-out to Michael O'Keefe as Darren Hoffman. He's another accomplished actor that you might recognize from movies and TV here and there, but once upon a time he played Danny in Caddyshack, so he's got that goin' for him, which is nice. He's another one of these stealth top tier actors that drops into Leverage, plays an absolute shit-heel and fades into the night, only to pop up somewhere else.

While the con is simple, the emotional payoff at the end for everyone is great ... especially when Sophie finally spells the truth out for Parker. Why is this awesome? Because we get the people are like pretzels metaphor, and that makes my heart swell two sizes too big every time.

And that makes an only okay episode an 8/10 for me.

This is a very fun episode, but there's more to it than just that (isn't this always the case when I write a review?).

First off? Giancarlo Esposito as Alexander Moto? Gus Fring the Chicken Man himself? What's wild is that he played Fring in Breaking Bad BEFORE his turn here in Leverage, and it's like I say whenever the show gets a real heavy-hitting actor to drop by.

They let 'em chew the scenery as much and as hard as they want and as Alexander Moto, there's a lot of scenery being chewed. Having finished Better Call Saul about a month ago, it's truly wild to see a man capable of that kind of dramatic acting play someone as comically villainous as Moto.

Beyond that, I remember being super gaga over this episode and was expecting to give it at least a 9.5, but as I watched, it just kind of struck me that the con is kind of loose, the layup and the payoff not as great as other episodes. I mean, it's still a really great episode, but after seeing them hack a whole entire person last episode, the machinery that really got everyone into that vault seemed a little rushed.

Of course, two things in particular stand out. Nate's continuing to fence with The Italian. Her attitude towards Nate is so ridiculous it bears mentioning again: this woman has access to everything Nate did back when he was at IYS (presumably) and DEFINITELY everything he's bene up to since joining Leverage.

My personal headcanon is that we only get to see the big cons. The ones that matter kind of thing, so when I say she knows everything he's done in particular and the crew overall, I mean 'there's a lot that they've done'.

And she still thinks she's got (sorry) Leverage over him. There's just no way. I like to consider myself some kinda smarty-pants, and at no point in my life would I think 'no yeah I got this guy over a barrel' because Nate Ford is the kind of guy who saw the barrel coming fourteen days ago and has a speedboat waiting around the corner, remote piloted by Hardison, who's in a helicopter being flown by Eliot while Sophie's schmoozing with The Pope (special thanks to u/Garrettshade for putting the idea that The Italian works for The Vatican in my head) and Parker's out there sticking The Hope diamond in a shoebox under The Italian's bed.

But the most important (and worst) thing we see in this episode is how much of a bastard Nate can be. We saw it last episode (Could you do it for Parker), and we really see it in this one. I understand the mechanics behind what Nate did, and I can even accept the necessity of hypnotizing Hardison into being able to play like he had as a child prodigy.

But you really don't do stuff like that to your team. Nate's defense, that that's precisely what you do to your team, isn't good. We get it. He's squaring the team off against Damien Moreau, one of the deadliest criminal power brokers on the planet. He's juggling the side con on The Italian.

But like Eliot says. You don't run cons on your own people. Y'don't do it.

An episode so great that I wound up having to stitch together the things that were, for me, the best highlights of the entire show. Of particular note in what I think is a super-rad collection of clips, Eliot's hair flick on the window washer thingy, the look of absolute shock on Archie's face when Parker shouts 'NO! That's what YOU do!' and the look of a deeper shock when Parker hugs him.

Richard Chamberlain does a lot of heavy lifting in this episode. He was a truly great actor, and they couldn't have picked a greater actor to play Parker's adoptive dad than him. Full of swagger and (and to quote Roman Nagel from Ocean's 12) brio one minute, ready to fight whoever may come to keep Parker safe, desperately terrified for her life, angry at Nate and the others for 'breaking her', his astonishment at her success and then the team's ...

Like I said. They needed someone who could swing for the stars, and they nailed it with Richard Chamberlain.

But this episode isn't just about Archie Leach and him making Parker. It's about Parker becoming Parker's own person. She decides what to do in this episode and the entire goddamn team supports her without even blinking an eye and it's just glorious to me. It's a big moment for Parker, I think, because sure, she's been a good guy for 2 seasons plus a few, but Parker's Parker.

We can't really know what's on her mind or what she's feeling until she's already making US cry because SHE'S crying. And I think that's also something only Beth Reisgraf can do.

The first clip in the stitch, where Nate asks Hardison if he could hack the Sterenko for Parker is also one of my favorite moments ... and maybe one of Nate's dirtiest tricks. Everyone knows our Age of the Geek, Baby hacker loves Parker and would do anything for her, and it's kind of crappy that Nate used that bullet to focus Hardison, but damn me if it didn't work all the same.

Hardison is ejected from a Hardison Geek Spiral and focuses in on the problem like only he can.

Before I go, I simply must talk about Lisa Brenner as Dr. Anne Hannity. Holy cow what a villainess. I mean ... I know we're hunting Damien Moreau and all, but creating a global wheat blight just to make billions? That's some actual, for-real-deal supervillainy right there!

I love this episode, because even though I didn't really talk about Sophie and Eliot, EVERYONE was doing their part to bring their girl home, and the way they demolished Hannity and Vorhees was top tier tomfoolery!

I've binged both the original series and Redemption. I only started listening to Le Sserafim this past year and couldn't help thinking over how Sakura makes some of the same facial mannerisms in music videos that Beth/Parker makes in the show. Uncanny to me anyway.

There have been MANY 'go back to high school-isodes' in popular TV. Psych did, The Mentalist did it, Chuck, White Collar, Castle, and you know what? They're all pretty damn great, and The Reunion Job stands tall among greats.

This one's a lotta fun in that it brings us comedic TV show drop-in Arye Gross and Kari Wührer, but before I even get to them, I have to talk about how nicely they lay up how they're going to brain-boozle Larry Duberman before the con is even really properly on.

I was going to clip the scene, but the one with Kari's a lot more fun, but you've seen it, you know it. Sophie takes revenge on Eliot for basically being Eliot and not helping with the cockroach in her shisleek (I honestly have no idea how to spell it) by having him do a full on Japanese tea service.

It's hilarious, and while they overplay the power of Neurolinguistic Programming (NLP) to make it just the other side of an actual Jedi mind trick, watching our hitter autopilot his way through the process is just fun. Partly because I will bet the contents of considerably empty wallet that Eliot knows that kind of tea service cold and partly because of his reaction when the jig is up.

It's this kind of harmless team fol-de-rol that I live for. Eliot yanking Hardison's chain, Hardison suggesting Eliot's only skill is punching things and people, Sophie occasionally controlling their minds, Parker being ... Parker to all of them. It's a glorious family dynamic cranked up to 12.

Believe it or not, I can still remember it was for me when I watched this episode at it's airing. I was so INTO the flow of things I missed that NLP gag right up until the second it was revealed through the ret-con (my own personal portmanteau, you're free to use it, and it means 'retroactively displaying the con's steps') and it was so great to be bamboozled by the show.

It happens so very rarely.

Now onto the two great guest stars. Arye plays an exceedingly convincing douche who earned his high school nickname. As the owner of Manticore, a program basically designed for Evil Overlords, he's Leverage's target because he's a shit person who had a guy beaten up very badly.

That's enough for me. But what's ironic here is the efforts Leverage went through to hack Larry's Roman Room when all Kari had to do was show up and breathe on him. Con? Broken. Personally, I don't blame him. Kari Wührer came and breathed on me? I need an ambulance, some oxygen, a stiff drink and a cigarette.

If Nikki's job had been to get the passwords for Manticore, she could've gotten them out of Larry sometime between smiling at him and unbuttoning the first button on her blouse. That's how ultimately sad and pathetic Doucherman is.

But the real highlights for me are these: two sets of lovebirds get a high school dance and Eliot has a hissy fit.

Some real tender moments between Nate and Sophie and between Hardison and Parker. Of the two men in that dynamic, I lean more Hardison than Nate. I can EASILY feel the tremble in his heart and the constant reminder to not be weird, and to not screw it up, to just live in that awesome moment for as long as it lasts.

While I do like when Nate and Sophie get together, that was basically a guarantee from the beginning. So was Parker and Hardison, sure, but their relationship feels more 'me'.

And of course, we close out with Eliot's hissy fit. It's well-earned for sure, because that Iranian terrorist he was fighting was absolutely ridiculous in how many hits he could take. I DEFINITELY remember laughing and 'oh-ho-ing' the very first time that older dude pops up and is basically 'is that all you have, my friend' with nothing more than a smile on his face. The health inspector indeed, my Iranian terrorist.

The con itself is ingenious as hell, but once again, it's the underlying story that they're telling as they build deeper connections to the Leverage crew.

And also? We move one step closer to Damien Moreau.

This is one of the most important season premieres for the entire show, and for one specific reason.

They introduce a full seasonal arc at the end of the very first episode. More specifically, the devil that is Damian Moreau and The Italian. Neither of these people are good, both are actually people Leverage would hunt down and have them pay for their sins.

Obviously this happens, but we get so much out of this season, and all of it's great.

One of the most important things, naturally, is Nate's growth. After having accepted at the end of the last season that he IS a thief, we see him truly flourish in The Jailhouse Job in general, and the show in specific.

There's a lot packed into this 42 minute runtime. Sophie's grand escape plan (which very much resembles Nate's actual rescuing of the team in Season 1, after they flubbed their independent looksees into the museum). Eliot's very intense dislike of how Nate ran the con on them in last season's finale. The relationship between Parker and Hardison ('I like it when we pretend to kiss' ... 'Pretend?' ... 'Heyyyyy').

All of that's tastier than a fine bottle of ice-cold orange soda and the Reuben they named after Eliot, though I would've preferred if it'd been a Hoagie myself.

But here, in this very first episode, the writers and the show handle the appearance of The Italian so perfectly. A mysteriously beautiful Italian woman who's so powerful that she can threaten Adam Worth IV with basically every single member of every single Alphabet Gang on the PLANET?

Who is she? Why is she so powerful? What's her interest with Leverage? Naturally, this is all revealed in a very dramatic fashion, but not after they run rings around Adam Worth IV, and in equally dramatic fashion.

And they do it so well. The Italian's reveal has just the right mix of overwhelming firepower and intrigue, and all she does is tell Nate who their mark must be. The show lets the team inform Nate about the extent of Moreau's reach and power.

Leverage has grown up. Although I clipped the discussion between Nate and Eliot in the prison because it's the right one to remind everyone of this episode (I think), the final discussion between Nate and The Italian shows us just how much Nate's come to accept his new role as criminal mastermind.

When she says 'thieves die all the time' we can see it in Nate's eyes. She crossed Nate's very carefully drawn lines, and it was in that exact moment that she became a part of the overall plan. Before that moment, The Italian was just a woman with a lot of power in her own right who was using it to her advantage, with the carrot of freedom being offered for Leverage when they succeed.

Which is great, because the one thing hanging over Leverage's head are their pasts. Having their lives restored to new means they can go about the job of fighting for the little guy without having to look over their shoulders every time they run a con.

Nate didn't need a stick, but by giving him one, she became an adversary. It's a shame she read but didn't understand Nate's file.

As I said in the last review, The Maltese Falcon Job is a perfect end to a damn near perfect season. The only other show to do this well for me is Person of Interest, but that's another show for another time.

Down but not out, the team rallies around Nate and they agree to carry the con forward. They don't really have a choice. If they don't, they'd be (in The Ice Man's terms) 'tot'ly buggered, mate'.

The conversation Nate, Parker and Eliot have outside while Tara and Hardison are in the hotel is a highlight among highlights. It's was going to clip this scene because Eliot and Parker are the two that'll tell Nate the straight dope without flinching and the best thing is that both of them do it in their own way.

Eliot is precisely the ride or die you want in your life. He would literally saddle up and ride straight to the gates of Hell if he believed in you, and we never see that more clearly than here. He's pissed off and he's worried about the team, but he's in it to win it.

And Parker? Well, she shows emotion. "Be NATE FORD. Be the person we came back for." If that isn't heartwarming and touching and all kinds of powerful, I don't know what is. That being said, I do think you'll appreciate the clip I took even more.

But there's more going on here, and that's what makes this ep even more impactful, and Season 3 even better as well. We shift gears in a big, dynamic way. Nate makes the only choice he can when he's confronted by Sterling. I feel like he took the road he did because he genuinely feels terrible about how he's BEEN lately.

But here's the problem with that. As much as Nate has been fully invested in Leverage this whole season, he still hasn't really been invested in himself. Not as 'Nate Ford, criminal mastermind', at any rate. He still thinks he's a good guy, but that's just a terminology issue. He knows his friends are good guys now. He's said it often enough. But there's some weird disconnect in Nate's brain where HE would become a criminal. It's weird, but that's Nate.

So Nate chooses to do the logical, which is save the team, somehow either forgetting the cardinal rule about running a con on your own team, or willfully ignoring it altogether. Both aren't great. The ending is only overshadowed by two things.

Nate's desperate phone call to Sophie, where he finally (!) and at long last (!!) admits that he can't function without her. It took Nate too damn long to get there, but that's Catholic Guilt for ya. It's tragicomic in that Nate's spilling out his guts to the one person who matters most to him, and she can't hear a damn thing.

Because Sophie Devereaux is on her way to save the whole dang team. I remember how I felt the first time I saw this episode and I still feel the same way today. It's just so well put together. The con at the hotel, the con on the ship, Nate and Sterling, Eliot alone, Parker with Tara, Sophie swanning in ...

That finale scene.

It don't get much better than this, people.

Had a super-terrible sleep and my blind cat hates our new cat, but also wants to know where the new cat is when the new cat is outside, and so ... basically he meows a lot.

In honor of me saying Dammit, Raccoon, enjoy every single time Eliot said Dammit, Hardison.