When Person of Interest (or POI for short) started out back in 2011, I only watched its pilot episode and concluded that the show was not for me. The show then got renewed for a second season and the third! Three freaking seasons? Okay, that’s it. I have to give this another try.

Person of Interest centers on two men: Finch and Reese who run around the city saving people who are in danger or about to commit a crime. How do they know this? The machine tells them. The mysterious machine spits out someone’s social security number when it detects danger around them and these two will prevent it before it happen. Pretty cool concept, right?

The machine is designed by Finch, who is a billionaire with dozens of companies doing God knows what. He is smart, wears nerdy glasses and is socially awkward. He designed the machine with his deceased friend (shown in flashback scenes) to prevent terrorism attack. Things turned south when he realized the government will abuse the intelligent property if they have it in their hands. Since then, Finch has lived as an outcast, lurking in the shadows and helping people along the way.

Reese is an ex military man. An assassin of some sort. He is tall, sexy and have a lot of cool moves to knock down his opponents. Reese is hired by Finch in the first episode after he “quits” from his so-called job. Basically they are both an outcast and make a solid team.

But that’s not all. While both of them are doing noble job, they are not exactly affiliated to any form of organization. They are independent and that means red code to the government! Enter NYPD officer Joss Carter played by the effervescent Taraji P. Henson who hunts down the duo at the beginning until she realized they are on the good side.

The first few episodes dealt mostly with Finch, Reese and Carter playing a game of cat and mouse. But once that ends, the fun begins! The show then forced itself forward to introduced wider and more menacing bad guys such as Mafia families, corrupt cops to mysterious hacker playing God.

After a few episodes, I understand why was I not interested with the pilot back then. Because frankly, POI doesn’t follow the normal procedure for a television show. There are no good guys VS bad guys here. Much like in real life, Jonathan Nolan’s show centers on the grey area that is not found in many safe-bet series. It’s hard to categorize POI as a cop show because it isn’t. If you call this a thriller that doesn’t even make sense since there are plenty of heartfelt drama written here as well. Thus why Person of Interest is an amalgamation of everything and I believe single-handedly paved ways for more complex and intricate TV shows in the future.

Another cool aspect in POI is they have no rules of morality. I love these thought-provoking issue, since it constantly questioned the viewers whether what these two men are doing are right or wrong? Should we blindly follow the law and orders, or rules and regulations set up by our government because we are told to do so. For instance, doesn’t Reese got the right to kill a rapist who has corrupted countless of young women instead of leaving him to rot in jail? That is, of course, if he actually goes to the prison in the first place. The law is a complicated process and Person of Interest doesn’t give a rat’s ass about them. There are also many occasions when we see the law enforcement themselves doubted the legal system and helped the dynamic duo taking matters into their own hands.

As I stated before, POI also dealt with its own fair share of drama. I particularly enjoyed the way the writers handled Reese and Finch’s personal histories, which are both sad and heart-wrenching, and were fantastically acted out by Jim Caviezel and Michael Emerson. The interactions between these two are quite amusing in a sense that they are so self-conscious about what they are doing and why they are doing it. I also need to point out the brilliance of Taraji P. Henson who played officer Carter.

The first season ends with a cliff-hanger where a young psychologist whose life is in danger turned out to be the hacker named Root. What will happen next?

Favourite Episodes: Cura Te Ipsum, Witness, Baby Blue & Many Happy Returns

Other Thoughts:

* I really dig Amy Acker as Root. I never seen her before (apparently she played in Alias and Angel), but now I am slightly obsessed with her.

* Jim Caviezel played JESUS in The Passion of the Christ!

* Michael Emerson is still Benjamin Linus from Lost to me.

* Zoe Morgan needs to come back.

* Carrie Preston as Finch’s fiancée? They are married in real life. Whoa!

* Quite disappointed with Elias’ story line, but I am open to his return any time.

* The series is created by Jonathan Nolan which is the brother of auteur Christopher Nolan.