Law & Order: SVU Episode 19: Sunk Cost Fallacy

This week's episode was another tough one for our ADA Peter Stone but not in the courtroom. He is told by the doctor in charge of his sister, Pamela's care that she is suffering from tardive dyskinesia, a disorder resulting from long term use of anti- psychotic medication. It manifests itself in uncontrolled and repetitive body movements such as jerking, smacking lips, grimacing, and pursing of lips among other symptoms. The doctor informs Peter that one possible treatment is to up the dosage of her medications even though it seems to be completely counter intuitive. Peter asks about taking her off them all together, but the doctor tells him the last time they stopped her medications, she attempted suicide. Peter does what anyone who is unfamiliar with medicine would do, go with what the doctor recommends. Unfortunately, the doctor cannot make the choice for Peter.

I do not know what Philip draws on to bring out his emotions but he always seems to get it right. The struggle and pain and uncertainty of what to do is written all over his face. I know what it is like because this, once again, hits a nerve with me in regard to my mother. My family was faced with the same type of decisions toward the end of her life. Given two options, not knowing which one will work because the doctors can only give you a list of "what might happens", but knowing once you make a choice there is no going back to try the other if the chosen one doesn't work. Making the decisions even more stressful is having to make the choice "sooner rather than later", just like the doctor told Peter. Once you make the choice, if the results are not what you had hoped for, you constantly live with the agony of "what if I had made the other choice".

For Peter, the stress he faces is only compounded with the case that was brought to him by Benson. What started out as a kidnapping of a woman and her daughter, veered in murder charges against the husband/father, and culminated in a $50 million lawsuit against Peter, Olivia, the DA's office, and the city when the mother and daughter were found to be alive. Their "deaths" and the planting of evidence that pointed toward the father/husband was orchestrated by none other than former ADA Alex Cabot.

While her intentions are great, trying to get victims of domestic abuse away from the abusers when the system fails them, her methods are very illegal. She doesn't deny the fact when Benson asks if there are other men sitting in prison for murder because of what she has done. Why she is not brought up on charges by Peter is beyond me. Again, I feel the writing of the show fails big time in this episode. Is the husband/father in this a total dick? Absolutely! He likely did orchestrate his wife's death at the end and injured a police office in the process but the investigation into that just falls flat and nothing is done to Cabot, who is now costing the city $50 million because of her actions. I know, it's only an hour long show. However, it just seems like everyone is happy to let everyone walk away from their misdeeds. Two wrongs (Cabot & the husband/father) don't make a right.

Benson's speech to Peter after all is said and done with the case is misplaced coming from her. She made it known that the wife and daughter were still alive because it was her obligation to the law, but, since when has "taking yourself out of the equation" (as she said) ever made a difference in her decisions? She has consistently made ones that push, if not completely step over, the lines of what is legal because of her emotions and sense of morality. I was equally shocked earlier in the show when Peter jumped right into charging the husband/father with murder without so much as one piece of hard evidence. Maybe he was just heading Benson off at the pass because he knew she'd push him on it. Maybe the thoughts of his sister weighed too heavily on his mind. Or, maybe it could be chalked up to inconsistent writing along with Benson's speech.

In any case, Benson's words struck a cord with Peter and the tough decision he still had to make about Pamela. He decided to up the dosage of her medications in hopes of stopping the tardive dyskinesia or at least keep it from getting worse. He asks the doctor what if he had chosen to stop the meds all together and the doctor said "That would have been the right choice, too." Peter then goes to sit with Pamela and hold her arm. He loves his sister, even if she doesn't know who he is, and thanks to Philip's beautiful acting, we see he is still struggling with the choice that he made. I dearly hope, somewhere in this season we get to see more than just a few minutes of Philip's acting. I understand this is an ensemble show but please, let him show off what he can do in a character centric episode! And delve into the past relationship between Peter and Pamela.

As a last, but no less important note, mad props must be given to Amy Korb and her portrayal of Pamela.

Law & Order: SVU Episode 18: Service

This week's episode seems like another routine case where a prostitute is raped and almost beaten to death. However, throw in a somewhat reluctant victim and three Army servicemen, two of whom want to keep to the military code of silence to cover up for their CO, and the SVU squad has it hands full. 

The victim, Sky aka Sandy, doesn't really want to pursue the case of her rape and beating, knowing what most people think about prostitutes. Eventually, she starts telling bits of the story of three men, one who raped and beat her, one that she hit with a lamp, and a fresh-face shy young man whom she was paid to have sex with. That man left his money clip behind which led the detectives to a local Army base where they locate one of the trio, Sgt Jim Preston, who had sought treatment for a gash on the chin and just happened to be off base with two other service men at the time of the attack. He refuses to speak of the incident though, simply citing his name, rank, and ID number as an answer to all questions. 

When presented with pictures of members of the Army from the base, Sandy picks out Sgt. Preston, Pvt. William Shaughnessy as the shy young man, and Staff Sgt. Tyler Jones as the man who attacked her. When confronted, Pvt. Shaughnessy says he's the one who raped her but the detectives already know this isn't true.

Benson goes to Stone with the positive IDs of the men and pushes for prosecution. Stone pushes back. I'm glad to see him not letting Benson pressure him into a case. He knows he needs more corroboration than just the victim's ID. He feels for her, but her word alone will not make a case. He tells Benson he needs one of the three accused to flip on the others. Olivia almost storms out of the office, not pleased with Peter's decision. And the look on Peter's face...  he's definitely not pleased with the attitude that just left. Annoyance, frustration, and tinge of disbelief all at once. Philip does it perfectly.

The Private eventually spills the beans about what happened and both Jones and Preston are arrested. Here we get to see a "Chicago Justice" alum come to NYC for a visit. Defense Attorney Olson, from the episode "Friendly Fire", reappears here to defend Staff Sgt Jones. And his attitude is just like most... "She's a hooker, Peter." As if that makes her less worthy of justice. Peter's reply: "And your client's a rapist."

It looks like Peter has this case in the bag though. He has the young Billy's statement saying exactly what went down, Staff Sgt. Jones raped and beat Sandy. But to Peter's shock, once on the stand Billy recants his story. Says he lied in that statement. Peter knows he's trying to protect the Staff Sgt out of a somewhat misplaced sense of loyalty to the man and the military code. Billy insists Jones is a good man. But what "good man" would rape, beat, and nearly kill a woman? Billy has perjured himself and will now spend time in prison and that doesn't bother him one bit. "I'd rather be a criminal than a traitor." 

With his case crumbling a bit, Peter turns to Preston, hoping to get him to realize protecting Jones isn't the honorable thing to do. Now we learn the real reason Preston is so reluctant to testify... the lab results from the blood on the lamp Sandy hit him with has the DNA markers of a female. Preston is transgender and he knows the precarious place transgender troops have in the military even if they are highly decorated and have a spotless record. Peter drops the charges against Preston with the understanding he will instead be subpoenaed as a witness and failing to appear will cost him.

And yet again, Benson is not satisfied with what Peter is doing.She wants him to convict Sandy's rapist yet says bringing Preston on the stand could ruin his life, knowing this is now Peter's only way of winning the case. Peter replies back: "And if he doesn't, you'll ruin Sandy's. It's your choice." I like that he leaves the decision in her hands since she is the one that pressed for it.

Preston proves to represent what the military stands for and does the right thing and testifies against Staff Sgt. Jones. In what is truly the best moment of the show, after having the fact he is transgender made known to the courtroom and the Staff Sgt. convicted, the members of the Army base that are present stand and salute him as he walks out.

Now, for what bothers me about this episode. Both during Sandy's testimony and Preston's, the judge allows the defense attorney to verbally attack both of them, ignoring almost all of Peter's objections. Philip was wonderful at showing his frustration at the judging letting it go on and I certainly shared it!  This would not have happened in a real courtroom. Yes, I know this isn't a real courtroom but doesn't SVU pride itself on it's realism? Just like in a real police unit, the commanding officer would have never let someone like Rollins, who also verbally attacked Sandy, remain on the case. Rollins' attitude, based on the fact her boyfriend was cheating on her with escorts, was completely ignored by Benson. After Rollins first outburst with Sandy in the interrogation room, Benson should have yanked her off the case and gotten to the bottom of the attitude, not let her continue to let Sandy be victimized and devalued. Rollins apology at the end didn't even seem to be enough to make up for the way she treated Sandy. The writers would have had much more powerful episode if they hadn't overlooked these issues.

Strike Back Retribution Episode 10

When we left Stonebridge and Scott last week, they had just rescued Novin from the clutches of Stillwater, the dirty PMCs sent to do clean up. They take up places covering all the entrances, slowly picking off the bad guys with Novin's help. Scott breaks away from his spot to pressure Novin for information about Lowery and the Atlas. Novin doesn't budge or backdown. She's not afraid of these yahoos. This affords Reynolds time to sneak in. She recognizes Stonebridge and Scott as ex Section 20 members. Now disavowed by the British military, they do the jobs that the British need done but don't want to get caught doing.

Sully and Philip play brilliantly off each other. You'd never know it's probably been at least 2 years since they portrayed those characters together. Unfortunately, Novin and Reynolds both seem a bit unimpressed with our intrepid duo as they banter about something that took place in Sao Paolo that distracted them from chasing down Lowery and the Atlas. I want to know what the writer's had in mind for what took place! Or what Sully and Philip think happened. What did Mikey get himself into that Damien would probably use against him in the future?? We will likely never know.

Reynolds gets a call from Wyatt with news that they know where the Atlas is. With her and Novin being closer, they decide to head out to the island where it is being kept. Stonebridge and Scott agree to hold off Stillwater so that the women can get away. Before they take off though, Stonebridge tosses Reynolds a cell phone telling her to keep in touch.

Now, something I don't get. Scott asks Stonebridge if they are still going to steal the Atlas from the new team when/if they get it. Why? Don't they work for the same team? Do they only get paid if they hand it over? The dialogue just seems out of place.

Guns once more ablazin', our duo makes their way out. It's also great to see Sully and Philip easily slip back into the weapons handling habits they learned on the show. Granted, Sully keeps his a bit honed thanks to Blindspot but the deadliest thing Philip gets to pick up now is probably a letter opener on SVU.

While the new Section 20 is oh so close to the Atlas, the dirty Russians are able to make off with it. Disheartened, knowing the Atlas is their only hope of keeping the section and themselves alive, Reynolds makes use of the cell phone Stonebridge gave her and calls him for backup.

We join five of our heroes at a old KGB safehouse now bar to figure out their next step. Five?? Wait... where is Scott? Late as usual, according to Stonebridge. In reality, mother nature kept Sully away from some of the filming so we missed out on one of the now infamous Scott shagging scenes.

But first things first. In episode 8, the team lost one of its members. Will Jensen (pronounced Yen-sen), the computer tech/comms guy, got taken out by the team's CO at the orders of Whitehall. Novin, particularly attached to him, grabs glasses and a bottle of liquor to mark his death. It made me tear up. I adored Jensen. He reminded me so much of Baxter, who also met a tragic end. And then I got mad remembering Scott & Stonebridge's Section 20 never marked Baxter's death. I blame the writers 100% for this.

Stonebridge remains quietly in the background, knowing all too well what it's like to lose a teammate and a friend. Even if you didn't know Stonebridge had lost far too many of them to count, the beautifully, subtle facial and eye expressions by Philip would tell you he's touched by what he is witnessing.

The team has no idea where to find the Russian GRU Black Ops who took the Atlas so they decide to find something to trade. And, low and behold, not too far from where they are is a Russian data bank of servers. All they have to do is break in and steal them. Except for all those pesky security protocols. Unless, Stonebridge suggests, they take out the power grid to give themselves a window during which only the barest of security will be online. The team thinks this is a great idea, except for Wyatt, and convince the reluctant Stonebridge to handle that part of the plan.

Scott suddenly bursts into the bar and is greeted by the barrels of 5 guns pointed at him. Much to his chagrin, Stonebridge ushers him out of the bar without so much as a drop of beer to inform him of the new plan.

The new teams heads to the GRU site and the last we see of our dynamic duo, they are shooting up the power station to bring down the grid. And with a toss of his phone into the burning equipment, Stonebridge says they should head back to Sao Paolo.

The new team does steal the server and makes a trade with the GRU, unceremoniously dumping the server rack out of the back of a truck and causing my techie/geek heart to cry a little. In true covert ops fashion, the Russians turn on them and try to kill them after the trade. The episode ends as they take off in the truck still in a firefight with the GRU team.

It was just announced this week that Strike Back was renewed for a 7th season. Will we see Stonebridge and Scott back again? Never say never but both Sully and Philip have made it clear they come as a package. I loved seeing the boys together again, loved their banter, and how beautifully they play off each other. I'd love to have this every week again but, they've cheated death too many times already. I'd rather have them never be on the show again and know they're alive than see them again and worrying they may die. Besides, the new team has built their own dynamics and adding them into the mix shifts everything around.

This may be an unpopular opinion, but it's the new team's Strike Back now. Dan MacPherson, Alin Sumarwata, Warren Brown, and Roxanne Mckee have worked hard and gave it their all. They really started to gel over the last half of season 6. As they head out for destinations not yet unannounced for the new season, I can't wait see how much better it gets with them.