No more Mr. Happy Nice Guy.
Warning: Full spoilers from the episode follow.
While Limitless has had no shortage of paint-by-numbers procedural cases so far, the series has done a good job of giving them all solid emotional through lines. And despite this week’s bomb threat being fairly typical, the toll it took on Brian kept the episode engaging throughout — especially since it mirrored Brian’s own turmoil over telling Rebecca the truth about her father.
Again, the RDD storyline wasn’t the most original idea for an episode, and the threat it posed was never fully realized in a big way. As it happened, the “climax” was just a drop-off sting involving three people, with no actual “Weapon of Mass Disruption” endangering the city at any point. That said, Brian’s humorous antics, cutaways and narration were all on-point this week. I particularly enjoyed his recall of Bruce Lee’s Enter the Dragon, which turned out to be way less useful than he thought.
“Quick study” my foot!
Enter martial arts extraordinaire Casey Rooks, played by Jennifer Carpenter’s former Dexter costar Desmond Harrington. While most of “Personality Crisis” was centered around the RDD case, it was fun seeing Brian interact with an FBI agent that he actually got along with, besides Rebecca. Also, it was only a matter of time before Brian received formal combat training so he could take pee breaks without having to worry about getting his butt kicked by bad guys. (“Don’t… move?”) I thought the fact that Rebecca was dating Casey was a nice twist, too, making the latter’s involvement more personal than, say, Naz or Boyle’s.
This episode also benefitted from Brian’s attachment to his latest informant, Chris Harper (Derek Goh). Not only did it make Brian’s manipulation more personal when it came time for Chris to turn his brother in, but it also fed into Brian’s own decision to tell Rebecca about her father’s NZT file. Obviously, this wasn’t a smart move in terms of Brian infringing on Eddie’s rules — and that’s probably why Eddie is returning in the next episode. But on the plus side for Brian, it will probably earn him some trust points with Rebecca when she inevitably finds out about Brian’s immunity shots.
We want to hear it.
Meanwhile, Brian’s back-and-forth on that matter had some fun moments as well. As stupid as it was for him to record super-incriminating videos of himself, I did get a good chuckle out of his clay effigies of the characters. I also thought it was interesting how he tested with waters with Sands to see if he could offer any info on Rebecca’s dad. I’ll be curious to see if the two continue that cat-and-mouse dynamic or if Sands could eventually become an asset to Brian as well.
However, not unlike the RDD case, the “Badass Brian” of it all never really gained momentum. I mean, Brian certainly talked about it enough, and he even put on a black leather jacket at one point — the mark of a bonafide badass — but that was all cut short when Chris showed up to give Brian new intel on his brother. Hopefully Badass Brian will come back around, because I actually kind of liked that idea.
This week’s Limitless was definitely more low-key than previous installments, but it maintained good character development for Brian. Between his combat training with Casey Rooks and his unexpected bond with informant Chris Harper, “Personality Crisis” gave the characters plenty to chew on. That’s not to mention the progress made with Brian’s investigation into Rebecca’s father, which will likely come back to haunt Brian when Eddie shows up again next week.
