Person Of Interest / Tropes H to M

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• Handicapped Badass:
  • In "Super", Reese is confined to a wheelchair or crutches for the duration of the episode after being shot by the CIA. It doesn't stop him from taking down the Villain of the Week.
  • Despite a permanent injury that restricts his movement, Finch has shown himself capable of taking down a bad guy or two.
• Hannibal Lecture: Root gives her psychiatrist an epic one at the end of Liberty. The one she gives to Control in "Aletheia" is just as awesome.
• Happiness in Minimum Wage: Cyrus Wells in "/", who left his lucrative banking job after a mass shooting and found some peace of mind working as a janitor.
• Happy Place: Discussed by Shaw in "6,741". She says that the government taught her to go "someplace safe" in her mind when undergoing torture, but that she never had such a place. At the end of the episode, she tells Root that she had found such a place after all: her "safe place" was thinking of Root. Turns out, the whole episode is taking place inside Shaw's head while she's being tortured, meaning that she's talking about her Happy Place while inside her Happy Place.
• I Have Your Wife: In "Flesh and Blood", Elias kidnaps Carter's son in a bid to force her to stand down her defense of the mob bosses she was protecting. Visibly tormented by this, her resolve is only maintained by Reese, who vehemently assures her that he will rescue her son. He does.
• Head-Tiltingly Kinky: A variation in "Super". Reese and Finch hack into the Wi-Fi of everyone in an apartment building so they can access the webcams. One woman is doing yoga in full view of her webcam. In her underwear. Evidently, the unseen position she gets into is Head-Tiltingly Contorted.
• He Cleans Up Nicely: The hero turns from bum to handsome badass in the pilot via a good shave.
• Heel–Face Turn:
  • Mildly. Detective Fusco started out as a Punch-Clock Villain, only a dirty cop out of loyalty to a friend. Reese turns him into a mole in the NYPD.
  • The fake hypnotherapist decides to reform himself as a real hypnotherapist after he realizes that his girlfriend was also a con artist, in "The Perfect Mark". It helps that he was actually pretty good at it.
  • Root... kinda.
• Heroes Love Dogs: As the "team" may very likely end up in some morally gray areas during the course of the show, the addition of Bear is likely a way to make sure you'll keep rooting for them.
  Shaw: To be honest, I'm only in it for the dog.
• Hero Antagonist:
  • Detective Carter is actively trying to track Reese down for the first few episodes, anyway.
  • Agent Donnelly wants to catch Reese because he believes Reese is a dangerous criminal.
• Hero Killer: There are a total of six characters that attain this status over the series run, none of which survive to the end:
  • Officer Simmons, who kills Carter and is himself killed by Scarface an episode later.
  • Martine Rousseau, who takes down Shaw and could easily have killed her, but takes her alive instead. Root eventually subjects her to a Neck Snap.
  • Jeffrey Blackwell, who originally targets Finch, only to get Root instead when she takes the bullet for him. He also makes an attempt on Fusco, but he survives. Shaw later tracks him down and executes him in revenge.
  • Three Samaritan mooks, who kill Reese only to be taken out by a cruise missile sent by their own boss.
• Hero of Another Story:
  • "Prisoner's Dilemma" shows glimpses of Fusco on an adventure protecting supermodel Karolína Kurková (As Herself) from some Armenians.
  • The opening of "Relevance" shows Sameen Shaw to have been one working for a government counterterrorism agency, later revealed to be Northern Lights, the program that's following up on the Relevant numbers.
  • The audience only sees Northern Lights when they are acting against Team Machine, but off-screen they've thwarted over eight-hundred terrorist attacks.
  • Root carries out missions for the Machine mostly offscreen.
  • Zoe Morgan has appeared in a couple of episodes working as The Fixer, but not Working the Same Case as Team Machine.
  • The Washington DC Team Machine, made up of three former irrelevant numbers, which may or may not be one of many other teams.
• Heroic Ambidexterity: John Reese is equally accurate shooting either right- or left-handed.
• Heroic RRoD: In "The Devil's Share" Reese goes on his Roaring Rampage of Revenge ignoring his serious injuries, and can barely stand at the end of the episode. Finch even says that they have to find him before he dies of his injuries.
• He Who Fights Monsters:
  • Reese is a very self-aware version, and tries to dissuade some of the people he helps from going down the same path ("Cura Te Ipsum," "Wolf and Cub"). His mentor Kara Stanton was an even more aware version, and told him that this would happen to him. She however, is not bothered by it.
  • Lampshaded in "Many Happy Returns:" "I'll show [an abusive husband] what a real monster's like!"
• Hidden in Plain Sight: The series has a recurring element of major figures pretending to be innocents, including Finch in the first few episodes.
• Hit Them in the Pocketbook: When Finch finds out an irrelevant number that he lost before he teamed up with Reese was killed by her Corrupt Corporate Executive boss to prevent her from becoming a whistle-blower. The boss's son-in-law who was the victim's immediate supervisor did the dirty work so there was no way to tie the murder to the boss. Finch arranged to meet the boss under the guise of an investor.
  Finch: I know exactly who I'm dealing with. You're the kind of man who doesn't care about anything except money. So that's what I'm going to take away from you.
• Holding Out for a Hero: Leon gets a CMOF at the intro to "All In", when he's unexpectedly attacked by a couple of thugs.
  Leon: "Wait, you plan to kill me?"
  Thug: [confused] ...Probably.
  Leon: [grinning] OK, that's a big mistake. Yeah, you better get out of here. Right now while you still can.
  Reese: [busts down the door and beats the thugs down] We have to stop meeting like this.
• Hollywood Law:
  • In the season four premiere, Reese (in his new persona as a detective), doesn't bother with filling out the paperwork justifying his shooting a drug dealer because he didn't fire his gun. Even though the circumstances behind the shooting are easily justifiable (the guys he shot were trying to rob and kill him), this is a no-no. It doesn't matter if a cop shoots his attacker with his own gun or the perp's gun, what matters to the department is that the cop shot somebody, and that has to be legally justified-every officer is put on leave until Internal Affairs clears it.
  • In "Wingman", Reese stops a suspect through shooting him in the knee (as is his signature). It's different now, Fusco points out, because he's a detective. Their captain rightly chews him out, but no one mentions that the NYPD could be sued, or the injured suspect filing an excessive force complaint, quite possibly even a civil rights violation. Also, since Reese has already done this three times in a month, he should not even be back to work since Internal Affairs would have taken away his gun and he'd be on leave until cleared (not likely in this case) as it says above.
  • After yet another kneecapping in "Prophets", the department puts him on desk work only until the department shrink can figure out whether or not there's something wrong with him after the 'four years deep undercover work' that he did before transferring to homicide.
• Hollywood Silencer: Done a few times, especially with an ex-Lancero commando turned assassin who uses a pillow to muffle the gunshot along with timing it to when the shots rang out in the in-flight movie.
• Homoerotic Subtext: Between Finch and Reese, and more blatantly between Root and Shaw. See Ho Yay page for details.
• Honest Corporate Executive:
  • Turns out that Pierce, the PoI in "One Percent" is one, which is why his life is in danger. This actually comes as a bit of a twist because he's obnoxious and a bit of a jerk to everyone around him.
  • Nathan Ingram and Harold Wren turn out to be these; they built the Machine because they felt it was their duty, and built it in such a way that it wouldn't infringe on anyone's rights. And then Nathan sold the machine to the government for one dollar.
• Honor Before Reason:
  • A former soldier and Afghan War veteran robs banks because he believes he has a debt of honor to repay and needs to support the family of a friend who died in Afghanistan after they switched seats during a mission.
  • Shayn and Abby's scheme to bring down Chapple in "Shadow Box" is this as well.
• Humans Are Bastards: Plenty of this once Artificial Intelligence comes into the plot. Not that they can't be evil as well, but even that is a reaction to human foibles. Samaritan is only created because Northern Lights insists on having an ASI under its control, and is encouraged by its A God Am I belief by the likes of Greer who believes in this trope.
• Hunting the Rogue: Reese and Shaw are being hunted by various intelligence networks including the CIA and ISI due to working with Finch to stop various criminal and terrorist plots from taking place after they go rogue from their previous organizations and are assumed dead.
• Hyper-Awareness: Whenever The Machine decides to talk to its assets directly, it usually turns into this. Best exemplified when The Machine points out targets for Reese or Root to shoot at.
• I Am Spartacus: Hilariously inverted at the end of "Shadow Box:" the FBI is chasing "The Man In The Suit". Reese is stuck in a gunfight with a bunch of thugs, and the FBI is closing in. He knows he won't be able to get free in time, so he charges the thugs. Cut to another scene. Cut back to the FBI arriving, and what do they find? Four different guys in suits, and they have no idea which one is Reese!
• Iconic Outfit: Partway through Season One, Reese settles on a particular suit (after trying out a few others). The lack of the suit in "Lethe" and "Aletheia" underscores his disillusionment, while his desire to get a new suit in "4C" heralds his return.
• I Have Your Wife:
  • Used by the villain of "Critical" to force the POI to commit murder. One of the first times this trope has ever been invoked when both spouses are of the same gender.
  • In "Zero Day", Finch agrees to go with Root after she threatens to harm Grace.
• I Owe You My Life:
  • Although it has never been stated in those terms, it's becoming pretty clear that Reese thinks this of Finch, and outright states this of Carter in "The Crossing", because they stopped him from committing suicide.
  • Elias considers this of John. Although he and Finch may not like it, it's probably for the better, because of the extra trouble Elias would probably cause them otherwise.
  • The To Be Lawful or Good ambiguity for Joss Carter is removed the moment Reese rescues her son. Likewise Fusco's Teeth-Clenched Teamwork with Shaw becomes an Odd Friendship after Shaw saves Fusco's son.
• Idiosyncratic Wipes: Scene changes are handled by The Machine "panning" across hundreds of different shots from surveillance cameras until the next scene is found and zoomed into. Flashbacks include a timeline at the bottom of the screen that "flashes" from the current year to the year in which the flashback is set, and then back again to the present once it's over.
  • In "Beta", Samaritan's scene changes move vertically rather than horizontally, and the camera views are distorted compared to The Machine's.
• Idiot Ball:
  • Elias tells Detective Cal Beecher he is holding this because of his inability to ask the "right" questions that will gain real answers. Elias suspects the man knows something he doesn't even know he knows and warns him to be careful with his future questions because if he does not choose his next move wisely, that move will be chosen for him. And he's right
  • Root thinks Finch has held it for his mistrust of the Machine and her as the Machine's proxy. Had he accepted her help to protect Arthur and Samaritan, it would have been saved and all would be good. But because he refused, Root had to go to their rescue, the change in situation and increase in danger facilitated her capture, torture and as a result she now permanently deaf in one ear (along with a weaker heart because of all the drugs used in her torture) and Samaritan is now in the hands of Decima. She also implies she could have helped protect Reese and Carter when they were being hunted by HR. She's not angry at him, but simply decided it would be better to work away from him as he has messed up.
• If You Ever Do Anything to Hurt Her...: Inverted by Reese in "Shadow Box." Reese tells Carter that if the detective she's dating ever does anything to hurt her, he'll take care of him.
• I Know You're Watching Me: Many times, when addressing the Machine or Samaritan.
• I Love You Because I Can't Control You: Well, not "love," but Zoe states that despite knowing everything that goes on in the city she can't figure out Reese, which seems to pique her interest in him.
• I'm Cold... So Cold...: Played with in "Terra Incognita". An apparent flashback has Reese on a stakeout, during which he keeps complaining of the cold and turning up the heater. Later it's revealed this is a Fever Dream Episode, and Reese is actually dying of shock and hypothermia after being shot by the Villain of the Week.
• Impairment Shot: Used in "Matsya Nyaya" when Reese loses and then later regains consciousness. There's another in "Mors Praematura" when a stun grenade goes off (despite this, Reese still manages to accurately shoot a Vigilance mook). The shots from Finch's POV when he's drugged in "Identity Crisis" may also count.
• Impersonating an Officer:
  • Reese has repeatedly used the badge of Detective Stills, Fusco's Dirty Cop partner whom he killed in the first episode (this backfires when a Number sees Stills picture on a MISSING poster in the police station). He also once used the ID of Jennings, a wife-beating U.S. Marshal he deposited in a Mexican prison.
  • Elias' number two, Anthony "Scarface" Marconi, was first seen impersonating a patrol officer.
  • One episode had a pair of ex-FBI agents who had been forced out for corruption, but were now pretending to be FBI while acting as hitmen.
• Improbable Aiming Skills:
  • Reese is a very good marksman, and generally fires one-handed, from the hip. He's most likely utilizing "the center axis relock" style which allows him to balance accuracy and speed (at short range), or point-shooting which allows him to forego the use of the gunsights altogether. Sometimes he also wields a digital camera in the same way.
  • Shaw herself is no slouch either; among her feats is pulling off a shot through a brick wall in the dark, relying only on muzzle flash and a guesstimate to determine the target's location. (Well, she did end up killing him instead of wounding him in the arm, but it was still a pretty good shot.)
  • Root gains these in God Mode, with the Machine giving her highly specified audio tone cues to determine the exact target orientation. Reese one-ups her by having only general directions given ("eleven o'clock", "one o'clock") and still managing to score incapacitating shots in the dark with iron sights. Firing from his weak hand.
    • Taken to a more ridiculous degree in season 4 episode Prophets where Root and Martine fight each other - while standing on different floors of a hotel, shooting through the floor/ceiling based on the orders their respective A.I.s cobble together on the fly using their surveillance data. Neither of them ultimately hits, but that's mostly because they're also evading the same way. Against more traditional opponents, Root has pulled off many a victory through closed doors and walls.
• Inciting Incident: The September 11th attacks figure prominently into the backstories of a few important characters:
  • Finch built the Machine for the government as part of its response to 9/11.
  • Reese was ready to quit the Army and marry his sweetheart Jessica, but 9/11 motivated him to rejoin.
  • Carter was an interrogator in Iraq.
  • Control was in the Pentagon when Flight 77 hit the building.
• Inconveniently Vanishing Exonerating Evidence: In "Zero Day", the Dirty Cop organization "HR" tries to assassinate Detective Carter, but Carter proves quicker on the trigger than the shooter. HR member Detective Terney improvises, pocketing the shooter's gun to make it look like Carter shot an unarmed man and getting her demoted by the premiere of the next season.
• Indy Ploy: Finch throws one together in "Baby Blue" when he realizes that the two orderlies walking in to the clinic are actually hired goons there to kidnap baby Leila.

  Finch: I'm afraid I may have done something rather rash.

• Informed Attractiveness: Reese is often called attractive by various people throughout the series. One "client" in particular (also quite attractive herself), even stated to him that she's not interested in men who are better looking than her.
• Inside Job: Reese and Finch are trying to save a Number who is a security guard working for an armored truck company. They find out that he is about to guard a very valuable platinum shipment and they suspect that the shipment will be attacked by robbers who are likely to kill the guards. What they fail to consider is that the robbery is actually an Inside Job and the Number is the mastermind behind it.
• Instant A.I.: Just Add Water!: As of "Firewall", things have officially crossed over into this territory, given that the Machine decides to cooperate with Reese to save Finch. It does take a little persuasion from Reese in "The Contingency" before it actually does what he wants.
• Interface Screw:
  • After a virus is uploaded into its network small visual glitches and artifacts begin to appear in the Idiosyncratic Wipes.
  • The opening credits also get these, on occasion:
    • In "Zero Day," the credits appear to bug out due to the aforementioned virus.
    • In "RAM" (a Season 3 episode), the Season 1 version of the opening credits is reused — only to be interrupted by a rewind effect to indicate that the entire episode is a flashback to events that occurred prior to Season 1.
    • In "Root Path (/)," parts of the opening narration are spoken by Root instead of Finch.
• Interrogation by Vandalism: Reese interrogates a gang courier by taking a blowtorch to... the money the courier was supposed to be delivering. Both he and the courier know that the courier's boss will assume that the burned money was stolen by the courier rather than destroyed.
• Interrogation Montage:
  • In the first few minutes of "Prisoner's Dilemma," between Carter and the four men accused of being the Man in the Suit (including Reese.)
  • The flashbacks in "The Devil's Share" are various dialogues between an unseen person behind a desk and each of the protagonists at different points in their lives.
  • Done again in "Proteus," with Finch hooking up a seismograph to the table to serve as a lie detector.
  • "Terra Incognita" has a montage of the same suspect being interrogated by two different questioners, one in flashback and one in the present.
• Intertwined Fingers: Root and Shaw in "The Day the World Went Away."
• Intoxication Ensues: Happens when Finch gets too close to a drug dealer. She drugs his tea with ecstasy. Depending on your point view, it's either really terrifying, or really hilarious.
• In-Universe Marketing: the Universal Heritage Insurance website, complete with a working phone number (917-285-7362) that's the direct line to Harold Wren's voicemail.
• Ironic Echo: The show loves this trope, and its cousin the Meaningful Echo. There are dozens of examples.
  • For instance, in one flashback scene in "Flesh and Blood", when Elias' father decides to have some of his men kill his illegitimate son, he has them tell Elias that he's sorry that he couldn't be there at the end. At the end of the episode, Elias calls his father and half-brother and tells them that he's sorry that he couldn't be there at the end. Then the car they're in explodes.
• Ironic Nickname: Fusco does this with with all the nicknames he gives. He has Finch's number saved as "Mr. Good News", and calls Reese "Wonder Boy" and "Mr. Sunshine".
• I Surrender, Suckers:
  • In "Blue Code" between Vargas and a Triad gang.
  • Also Reese letting himself get caught by the Aryan Brotherhood to rescue Fusco and Leon.
• It Has Been an Honor: Suffering a potentially fatal gunshot wound and pursued by a CIA wetwork squad, Reese chooses to address his final words to Finch.
  Reese I wanted to say thank you, Harold, for giving me a second chance.
  • In "Asylum". Reese and his Friendly Enemy Elias have been captured by the Brotherhood with no apparent escape. Elias says, "You're an honorable man, John. It's been nice knowing you."
  • A subversion occurs in "Bad Code". A senior member of Northern Lights discovers Finch is the hidden genius who invented the Machine, so says this to Finch as he's about to kill him.
• It's Not You, It's My Enemies: Finch lets his fiancée (whose existence he had, fortunately for her, kept quiet about due to his very private nature) believe him to be dead so those who are out to silence anyone connected to the Machine won't kill her.
• It Won't Turn Off: The early prototypes of the Machine. One overrode the deletion sequence so that Harold had to physically pull the plug. Harold ended up taking a hammer to the last one.
• It's Personal:
  • In the "Get Carter" episode when Reese told Finch that people like Carter are worth protecting. The song used at the end of the episode actually shares the name of the trope.
  • Finch invokes this when he realizes that the CEO of the company he and Reese are investigating caused the death of another person on his list.
  • Stanton appears to have taken this stance in regards to Snow's attempt to "retire" her.
  • Shaw really didn't like Root at first, although she eventually got over it. For a woman with apparently professionally diagnosed APD, she definitely takes some things personally.
  • After "If-Then-Else," Root was determined to kill Martine in revenge for apparently killing Shaw. She finally succeeded in "Asylum".
• It Works Better with Bullets:
  • "Mission Creep" does the "firing pin" variation where the leader of the robbers sabotages the firing pins so he can pick them off in the street.
  • Root uses this in "Bad Code". In order to prove to Finch that Humans Are Bastards, she gives Weeks the chance to free himself while she is absent. When she returns with her pistol drawn, he disarms and beats her, then asks Finch a few questions and tries to shoot him with Root's empty gun - upon which Root calmly stands up and tases him. Point made.
• I Will Find You:
  • Reese ( when Finch was kidnapped by Root)"I just want to find my friend."
  • Root (when Shaw is taken by Samaritan after If-Then-Else. Curiously, she never believed that Shaw had been killed other than taken hostage, differently than Finch (and even Reese after a while). ) "Hold on Shaw. We're close."
• Jerkass: The Drug Lord L-O-S later revealed to be a CIA agent who smuggles drugs to use the money to finance the War on Terror, wants the CIA to kill two NYPD police officers simply because they did their job and arrested him for smuggling drugs. Though it makes it all the more worthwhile to see him get his Laser-Guided Karma when Snow informs him that he was "caught behind enemy lines".
• Janitor Impersonation Infiltration:
  • Finch often impersonates some sort of nondescript technician in order to get information or bug a place.
  • Reese frequently does this as well, except he tends to impersonate the types of workers who would wear a nice suit. Waiters, valets, stuff like that.
• Joker Jury: In the season three finale, Peter Collier holds one for everyone he can find who is connected to The Machine. He served as prosecutor. One of his own men was the judge. The person dragooned into being the defense attorney does not get to examine any of the evidence beforehand, and in fact has no lines all episode. Collier gets the legal definition of treason wrong (It's knowingly aiding the enemies of your country, not using methods of questionable legality to fight them). At one point he murders a defendant in cold blood on the witness stand for refusing to self-incriminate himself as is his constitutional right. And the jury deliberation period consisted of Collier saying "Everyone who finds them guilty on all counts, please raise your hand" - to a group of 'jurors' who were surrounded by several heavily armed bailiffs in the employ of the homicidal prosecutor. At least Control manages to give Collier a "Reason You Suck" Speech about the whole thing before they were unanimously found guilty. And then later Greer reveals the "trial" was never actually broadcast to anyone, and also that Vigilance itself was contrived by Decima all along.
• Karma Houdini:
  • Senator Ross is the only higher-up member of Northern Lights who doesn't end up dead.
  • Alistair Wesley escapes after his plans are thwarted and is never heard from again.
• Keeping the Handicap: Harold Finch walks with a limp due to an injury. He chooses not to have the damage repaired because he believes the pain is appropriate punishment for choosing to ignore the irrelevant list.
• Killed to Uphold the Masquerade: Northern Lights is ruthless when someone gets too close to finding out about the Machine. The Machine itself doesn't support the practice; at least twice it gave the number of someone who was about to be silenced to Finch. Samaritan combines the ruthlessness of Northern Lights with the foresight of the Machine to be truly terrifying about this.
• Kinda Busy Here: People have a tendency to call Reese while he's in the middle of a fight; he always answers.
• King Incognito:
  • Finch keeps himself Hidden in Plain Sight by working as a low-level employee in a company he himself owns. He even wears cheaper suits.
  • Elias has spent the better part of the past years being a schoolteacher of the children of his enemies so he can better understand them and turn the children against their families.
• Knee-capping: Reese's signature. Seriously, he could be the poster boy for this trope.
• Knight in Sour Armor: Finch doesn't trust anyone and is cynical about everyone, believes that in the end (when they die) he and Reese will have made no real lasting difference, and is usually the first to spout the cynical explanation about a current person of interest, yet he has a high moral code and is the driving force and moral compass in their team and pretty regularly puts himself in danger to help someone.
• Knuckle Cracking: Reese occasionally does this when he's preparing to kick some butt.
• Laser-Guided Karma:
  • What Root does to the man who murdered her childhood friend, revealed in a flashback in "Bad Code." She hacked a drug cartel's bank account and transferred funds to an account in the joint names of the killer and her deceased friend. Then she made sure the drug cartel found out about it....
  • What happens to L-O-S. See Jerkass entry above.
  • What happens to the bounty hunter in "Triggerman."
  • Reese works as a tactical instructor in one episode, and gets shot in the knee with a paintball round.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: The in-universe dates for every episode in season 1 coincide with the date that the episode aired. It's most obvious as the Machine timeline becomes more precise in the final few episodes of the season.
• Lensman Arms Race: A small one between Greer and the Machine in "Allegiance." For every method the Machine uses to track him, Greer has a countermeasure. Ironically, it takes a non-technological method to catch Greer; Bear's nose.
• Leitmotif:
  • Finch, Reese, and the Machine all have them. There is noticeable (and appropriate) overlap for Finch and the Machine.
  • Reese also has a more actiony motif, Knock, Knock which is usually used when he intervenes.
  • Root has a unique theme, and is usually introduced by the main notes of it being played in absence of other music.
• Loophole Abuse: The Machine's modus operandi, due to Finch attempting to restrict it. For instance:
  • Finch forced the Machine to delete its memories every night. The Machine gets around this by creating a data entry company, impersonating a fake CEO, printing out its memories prior to their deletion, and having them entered back in.
  • As of "Most Likely To...", Control orders the relevant program be shut down. The Machine promptly sends the relevant numbers to Root, instead.
  • Another one of Finch's commands is not to prioritise Finch above others. And yet, the Machine is circumventing this rule as well, by instead using Root to rescue him whenever he is in trouble. Until the very end, Finch is led to believe he needs to sacrifice himself to destroy Samaritan, only to find out it was Reese who would sacrifice himself because he once made The Machine promise to save Finch if it ever came to that point.
• Lost Lenore: Jessica, to Reese.
• Lotus-Eater Machine: Samaritan is keeping Shaw in one in an attempt to learn Team Machine's location. It took over 7,000 simulations before Shaw managed to successfully break out - and even then the objective was to convince her that reality was yet another simulation.
• Love Interest: Zoe for Reese, though it's pretty subtle. It's been slowly building over the course of the first two seasons, including one episode in which they operate undercover as husband and wife. For a brief period in the latter part of Season 4 and early into Season 5, Iris, John's therapist, became his girlfriend.
  • Carter gets one in the second season, in the form of a handsome narcotics detective. Things are going pretty well between them, right up until she discovers he's being investigated by Internal Affairs...It's eventually revealed that he's not a dirty cop, but he is murdered almost immediately afterwards.
  • Fusco also looked like he might have been getting one in the form of a teacher named Rhonda, but she hasn’t shown up again since they went on a date together in “Til Death” (though it’s implied in one episode that they are at least still communicating through email).
  • In "The Crossing" in Season 3, Reese tells Carter that meeting her changed his mind about wanting to die (even before he met Finch) implying his feelings are much stronger than the playful physical relationship with Zoe. They kiss, but Carter is dead by the end of the episode.
  • Shaw for Root, though it starts at what appears to be just playful flirting and a way to keep Shaw in check, some long looks with emotions hidden within begin to happen and it canonically shows to be more than simple playfulness in "Prophets" ("If the worst comes to pass... if you could give Shaw a message?"). In "If-Then-Else" it's shown that the Machine believes Her Analog Interface's feelings for Shaw to be real and She even plays it while running scenarios for Her assets situation because it could affect the outcome. It did. Though curiously not from Root's end (in reality). We see how deep Root's feelings actually run after Shaw is taken by Samaritan in If-Then-Else.
• Ludicrous Precision: The Machine's POV shots often display exact probabilities of certain events happening. Becomes a plot point in "If-Then-Else".
  CHANCE OF ASSET SURVIVAL: 2.07%
• Macguffin: In "The Devil You Know", Elias has a safe that he insists on going to even when his life is in danger, leading his enemies right to it. Turns out it holds nothing but a very large bomb. Perfect for disposing of enemies who try to get into it.
• MacGyvering:
  • In "Root Cause," Finch turns a Pringles can into a directional Wi-Fi antenna.
  • In "Super," Reese makes a "bump key" so Finch can get into the other apartments.
  • In "Witness," Reese cuts into a phone cable and improvises a land-line after his cell phone is destroyed.
  • In "Mors Prematura," Shaw builds a cutting torch from an oxygen bottle and a box of spaghetti.
• Mad Bomber: In "Till Death", a hitman plants a bomb on his target's car and plans to detonate it while the car is on a busy Manhattan street.
• Magic Countdown: Averted in "God Mode", after the Machine resets and calls the payphone at midnight, Root answers and is given 24 hours of access to the debug mode. She gained access at 00:00 in New York City, on the East Coast. When Root waltzes in to the nuclear research facility and asks for a passcode, the camera view says that her admin access has expired - at 21:00 on the West Coast, or 00:00 East Coast time.
• Male Gaze: In "Booked Solid," Pennsylvania's sexy secretary, Ms. May (Root actually) walks into the room wearing a tight skirt. Before we see her face, the camera focuses on her behind. This is also done to conceal her identity for as long as possible, and heighten the surprise when it's revealed. Not that anybody's complaining about the camera focusing on Amy Acker's arse.
• Masculine–Feminine Gay Couple: Shaw shows some masculine traits (big shoulders, hard face), while Root is more feminine.
• The Matchmaker: The Machine is the person who introduced Harold to Grace. The Machine also pairs up Root and Shaw for missions and in "If-Then-Else" runs simulations that include Root and Shaw (kinda) talking about their feelings.
• Meaningful Echo: Like the Ironic Echo, a favorite trope of the show's writers. To give just a couple of examples...
  • "Razgovor:" In the flashback, the EMT tells young Shaw, "hang on, kiddo. I'm coming to you, okay?" When Shaw calls HR on Yogorov's phone, she tells Gen, "Hang on, kiddo. I'm coming for you."
  • Reese and Jessica's dialogue in reaction to seeing 9/11 on the TV in "Pilot"—repeated between Nathan and Harold when Harold learns about 9/11 in a flashback in "One Percent":
    What was it, a plane?
    Two planes.
• Meaningful Name:
  • Superhacker "Root," also known as "Caroline Turing." See Shout-Out entry below for details.
  • The man who leads them to the nuclear facility in "God Mode"? Lawrence Szilard.
  • Samaritan, the project Arthur Claypool worked on, as in The Good Samaritan. Especially when you consider that Samaritan's goals, aims and execution are identical to the Machine.
  • Nathan Ingram's last name sounds very similar to engram, the mechanism by which the brain records memories. He died before the series begins, and his memory is an important driving factor in Finch's character.
• MegaCorp: Though there are no (obvious) links between any of them, the various companies that Finch owns could be considered this. So far we have a computer company, an insurance company, a construction company, a power company, and a magazine publishing company. It's entirely possible that this is not the complete list of industries that Finch (or the Machine) has companies in. Not to mention the companies that The Machine itself runs independently of Finch.
• Mercy Lead:
  • In "Number Crunch," Carter lets Reese go when she recognizes the man with him (Finch), who had presented himself before as a witness to a robbery in "Mission Creep".
  • She does it again at the end of "Baby Blue."
• Mexican Standoff:
  • Between Vargas and a Triad gang in "Blue Code".
  • The church scene in "The Cold War."
• Mid-Season Twist:
  • Season 1 utilized this to great effect with "Witness".
  • Season 2 had a mid-season twist four-episode arc: "Shadow Box," "2-Pi-R," "Prisoner's Dilemma," and "Dead Reckoning."
  • Season 3 had a mid-season three-part Wham Episode: "Endgame," "The Crossing," and "The Devil's Share" — followed immediately by a two-part Wham Episode ("Lethe" and "Alethia") that kicked off the dominant Story Arc of the last half of the season.
  • Season 4 has a mid-season "trilogy" of its own: "The Cold War," "If-Then-Else," and "Control-Alt-Delete."
• Minor Crime Reveals Major Plot: For the most part averted as the Machine only warns of lethal intent, so all the crimes investigated involve premeditated murder. However some cases do lead to much larger conspiracies, often over the Machine itself.
  • The theft of evidence in a murder case from The '70s kicks off the Elias arc.
  • Agent Donnelly thinks Reese is just a hitman, so delegates an apparent murder-for-hire in New Rochdale to Detective Carter, thereby missing a chance to discover the true identity of the Man in a Suit.
• Mirror Character:
  • Elias and Dominic. Both are highly intelligent and erudite gang leaders; both of them are secretive and stay out of the spotlight; both run highly efficient, organized gangs; both seem Affably Evil; both know how to use technology to leverage an advantage. They're even introduced in similar manners, with both hiding their identity as unassuming, average guys. Also, Elias was a math teacher. Dominic is fond of trying to teach his men.
  • Season 4 introduces a Decima operative named Martine Rousseau, who comes off as, basically, evil Root. She also comes across as a mix between Root and Shaw. She carries the stoic demeanor of Shaw and lack of morality Root has (or used to have before her change of heart).
• Misapplied Phlebotinum: Played straight for season 1, subverted afterwards. Harold created a surveillance supercomputer that predicts crimes, which the protagonists use to help the helpless. However, the true implication of the Machine isn't as a surveillance device, but the fact that it is true artificial intelligence. This trope is subverted as the series shifts to examine the ramifications of human-equivalent AI in a near-future setting, eventually culminating in Decima Technologies bringing a rival AI, Samaritan, online to Take Over the World. Notable in that the showrunners had to fight to include the AI aspect of the show, as the network didn't even want them to talk about AI or address where the numbers came from.
• Missing Mission Control: Occasionally Finch gets himself into trouble while helping Reese. The most notable examples are both due to his abduction by Root.
  • The Machine temporarily became this during the end of the second season. Afterwards it resumed contact with Reese, Finch, the government, and Root.
• Mission Control:
  • Finch and the Machine itself to a degree.
  • Inverted in "Super" due to Reese recovering from a gunshot wound sustained in "Number Crunch".
  • Taken to extremes in "Firewall" when Reese and the POI are trapped inside a hotel with the FBI and a hit team of corrupt cops hunting them. Finch is trying to guide them to safety, Agent Donnelly is at Taskforce headquarters guiding an FBI SWAT team towards Reese, Detectives Carter and Fusco (unknown to each other) are sending Reese and Finch information to help them dodge the SWAT team, and a corrupt NYPD officer is helping the hit team avoid the cameras and FBI while guiding them towards Reese and the POI.
• The Mole:
  • Det. Fusco inverts the trope, being a mole for Finch and Reese.
  • "Scarface," who works for Elias. First appears as a uniformed officer in "Witness." In "Flesh and Blood," he's seen triggering the bombs Elias uses to kill his father and the other Mafia dons.
  • Carter's new Season 3 partner Laskey is a member of HR.
  • By the end of Season 4, Samaritan has dozens in the ISA and other agencies at all levels of government.
• Mole in Charge:
  • In "Prisoner's Dilemma", Agent Donnelly puts Carter in charge of interrogating the four men suspected of being the Man in the Suit.
  • In "Trojan Horse", Detective Terney is revealed to be in charge of investigating Szymanski's murder.
• Mood Whiplash: The hands-down funniest scene in "Endgame": realizing that the person who has potentially started a war between the Russians and HR is a woman using a grenade launcher and wearing a gas mask, Reese and Finch suspect Shaw due to the M.O. Shaw promptly walks in, notices she's getting funny looks, and calls them weird. They show her the video and she starts fangirling over the tactics used, which reveals to Finch that it's Carter, because Shaw has no other friends. Shaw reveals that she gave Carter some of John's equipment, leading to the bemused "That's my grenade launcher?" From there, the scene quickly devolves into John all but commanding Shaw and Finch to get eyes on all 38 of the HR members whose numbers came up, despite there only being two of them, because if HR or the Russians discover who's really behind the attack, Carter is the only person who is going to die.
• Mugging the Monster:
  • If you are picking on a homeless man on the subway you might be in for a nasty surprise.
  • One PoI was a conman who seduced women and then stole their money. Turns out one of his victims was the daughter of a ruthless mobster who loves his daughter and does not take kindly to people stealing from his family.
• Murder by Inaction: At the end of the episode Reasonable Doubt, John decides the POI and her husband just aren't worth saving, and leaves a gun for the husband to even the odds in allowing them to kill each other.
• Murder by Remote Control Vehicle: On two different episodes, the Number of the Week has his car hacked in and forced to accelerate (and disabling all other controls), which makes Reese and Finch run to try to stop the car/counter-hack the car before it inevitably crashes.
• Mushroom Samba: Finch has one in "Identity Crisis" when the identity thief he mistakenly believes to be a POI slips him some Ecstacy. Hilarity Ensues.
• Must Have Caffeine: In No Good Deed, Finch bugs an NSA facility by slipping a wired coffee machine into their daily mail.
• Mutual Kill:
  • Almost achieved by proxy in "Til Death". A husband and wife each hire a hitman to kill the other spouse. Reese and Carter are able to stop one hitman and a few minutes later Fusco is able to stop the other one.
  • In "Liberty" a group of Russians mobsters and a team of corrupt Force Recon Marines wipe each other out after John walks in on a Mexican Standoff they are having over some stolen diamonds.
  • Implied at the end of "Reasonable Doubt". Reese finds both the victim and villain of the week so distasteful he decides to Leave Behind a Pistol and let human nature take its course.
• My Greatest Failure:
  • The event that drove Finch to protect the "non-relevant" numbers was his discovery that Nathan's death had been predicted by the Machine, but could not warn them because he blocked Nathan's access to the list.
  • Similarly, the event that triggered Reese to become a homeless drunk who lives on the subway was the death of his ex-girlfriend Jessica at the hands of her abusive husband. Bonus points that her number came up on the irrelevant list.
• Mysterious Backer: Definitely an odd example, but... the Machine itself.
  • A practically omniscient computer which only provides the team with the basic information (the "irrelevant" list) it needs, but never, say, gives them the number of their (and arguably the public's) biggest threats, i.e. the various Big Bads they face, or even any of the various corrupt/criminal organization's higher-ups, unless they happen to line up with the Machine's "irrelevant" list. It gives them the basic information they need to carry out their mission, and nothing more.
    • While it's true that Finch intended for it to be as inaccessible for personal use as possible so as to not be abused by anybody (including himself), it still has never lead them to a Big Bad, even when violent crimes are plotted by and happen only because of them. It will only give Finch their numbers if they're personally involved in the violent crime, even though it must know that some of these numbers have, and will continue happening only thanks to the people who are masterminding them. It even, in a way, occasionally helps some of their enemies.
    • It's also been shown to be perfectly capable of giving out reliable on-the-go information, although, granted, this only happens in certain specific situations (after Finch made it personal-use proof), such as when something is happening to the Machine itself, like while it's searching for a new administrator after being attacked by a virus, following a self-reboot.
  • Definitely some bonus points for it being capable of learning. At times, it's even vaguely hinted at being self-aware.
    • ...Which was practically stated in the episode Aletheia.
    • The fact that the Machine is a sentient artificial intelligence has become a major defining factor of the show, earning the show's listing under "science fiction" in addition to the other genres the show falls under.
  • There are also some other things even Finch couldn't predict and doesn't completely know about it.
  • This is also what Finch is to Reese, from Reese's point of view, in Season 1.

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