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Scorpion Review: “Revenge” (Season 1, Episode 11)

With a provocative title like "Revenge," you better believe that this week's Scorpion was going to get real, but do we watch Scorpion because it's real? That's the question. Although the titular nerd herd cashes checks from Homeland Security, there's very rarely an ominous cloud of death coming any minute for the main characters. But on the occasion that the danger gets very real, it feels like a spasm in the show, as if the writers were asking their program to accept something it didn't want to. "Revenge" was an exception though, the emotional ringer that the episode puts Walter and the crew through felt like an adequate escalation in the stakes as a group of murderous thieves put a key team member in the hospital.

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The other development was something Scorpion – the team and the show – sometimes struggles with: EQ. When Walter’s sister Megan spent the last episode hanging out and learning about the team through Sylvester, it was in the back of my mind whether a love match was trying to be struck between Sly and Walter’s sickly sis. I think the idea sticks even more convincingly thanks to Megan’s bedside vigil, and sure you can say that Walter insisted, but Megan seemed more than the normal amount of upset when Sylvester had the usual recovery room seizure that calls a TV character’s recovery into question. Of course, the romance is somewhat doomed, as we’re always reminded that Megan’s illness is fatal, but I’d rather go there than see another TV character get addicted to pain killers after an injury. (I’m looking at you, Blacklist.)

The biggest news though was that Paige had something to do, or at least she offered a counterpoint to Agent Taylor’s push to get the Ghosts, using the Scorpion gang’s helplessness in the wake of Sylvester’s condition to finish a seven year chase she had undertaken to get the people who cut her partner in half with bullets. Paige made the argument that they all had to deal with their feelings of anger and sadness as they sought to catch the Ghosts because they may catch the crooks today, but then what are you left with tomorrow? Cabe says that he knows what seeing the bad guys get away does, and while that’s fine to drive someone to achievement, Paige is probably right in the end that one should think about the long term consequence. That doesn’t come across because, you know, it’s Paige.

The episode ends on a dark note, with Walter unsure if he just wasn’t able to save Javier, who ended up dangling off a roof while trying to escape, or whether he let the crook fall. Sylvester is also unsure, unsure if he wants to return to work after getting so terribly injured on the job. As Leonard from Community once said, it’s your classic tee-up going into next week’s episode, which will mean no new episodes of Scorpion for a couple of weeks, so we’ll need an extra amount of drama to tide us over. Ultimately, I wouldn’t look for Walter to turn into The Punisher or anything either, and I’d look for any sabbatical for Sylvester to be short-lived.