A new day and another prisoner has returned for the team to track down and capture. Through these first four episodes of Alcatraz, the format has remained consistent with flashbacks to help us understand the prisoner, the pursuit of the prisoner in 2012, plus hints of what the heck is going on. This format started to bore me in this episode, “Cal Sweeney.” Consistency can be good, but it gives the show more of a procedural feel than I’d like to watch.
Revenge started out with a revenge-of-the-week format to introduce the character and the story, but then moved away from that format. I hope that Alcatraz gets more into the mystery and the story of the characters rather than chasing one prisoner each episode. We know that Rebecca’s grandfather is at large, why aren’t they pursuing him?
And what about other prisoners? Sweeney had to have been in 2012 San Francisco for a little while to build the relationships with the tellers. How long? And, where was he staying? Once Hauser and Madsen have captured the prisoners, why aren’t they finding out more from them? Or, is Hauser doing that without letting Madsen, Soto and us in on it? I guess I’d expect Madsen to push harder. Lots of questions, but so far not too many answers.
Through Sweeney’s story we did get more insight into Alcatraz and the time shift. Like Jack Sylvane, Sweeney was non-violent prior to his incarceration at Alcatraz. He stole from safe deposit boxes, but never hurt anyone. But, also like Sylvane, when he returned in 2012 he killed without remorse. Why is that?
I have a few theories. The flashbacks to 1960 Alcatraz showed us that the prisoners were not treated well and in some cases were tortured. If nothing else, their time in solidary confinement would change a man. Did their time at the prison turn them into killers? Perhaps, as part of this time shift program, they were trained to kill without remorse. They have a mission and must complete it at any cost.
My last theory comes from information in this episode. At Tiller’s birthday dinner, Lucy was there and talked about her plan to rehabilitate the prisoners through psychological means. She wanted to remove their tragic memories to “fix” them. What if her method failed and she actually heightened those tragic memories? In effect, turning non-violent prisoners into brutal killers. For some reason, these prisoners are coming back meaner than they ever were before arriving at Alcatraz.
Another similarity between Sylvane and Sweeney is they were both on a mission to retrieve a key. What is the purpose of the keys? We are lead to believe they are to open the secret vault in the basement of Alcatraz, but Hauser’s team found they were laser made. That technology was not available back in the 1960s. Do you see any other clues about the keys?
So, what was in the vault? My guess — Tiller’s sister! She saw the young prisoner, Harlan, at her brother’s party and wanted him to be her companion. It was mentioned (I can’t remember who said it though) that she only came out once a year. What better place to hide her than in a secret safe room at Alcatraz? Yes, this is a despicable idea, but given the people involved, it’s within their moral range to lock her away.
In the end, the episode was better than I first expected because we were given insight into the story beyond just Sweeney. Given the episode titles for the rest of the season refer to specific prisoners, I don’t see a change in format happening. But, maybe just maybe they will be incorporated into a more comprehensive story.
Do you have a guess about the keys? What about the basement vault?
Clacked by Carla Day 
on Feb 01, 2012 @ 02:09 EST5EDT
I keep thinking how cooler the show would’ve been if Michael Emerson was Hauser… Or he had some other role…
I’ve tried, but I really, seriously can’t think of anything else during the show!
And sometimes I expect Jack to jump in and save the day!!!
I’m going nuts!
*POST AUTHOR*
He would have been a good Hauser. But, he is perfect on Person of Interest right now. Do you watch that? If not, give it a try.
I like Sam Neill in the role. His subtleties help sell his questionable intentions. Is he good? Bad? Both? I’m not really sure.
yeah, I watch The Person of Interest too.
But I think Benjamin Linus was unique. I miss him. He was my favorite character in Lost.
But I think you’re right about Sam Neill too!
I’m just a bit confused and I have no idea why!
If they actually bother to subtitle an establishing shot of the Golden Gate Bridge with “San Francisco” one more time, or subtitle every single color-dulled scene set in a prison where people have old-timey haircuts “Alcatraz”, I’ll go NUTS. WHAT OTHER PRISON WOULD WE BE AT? I hate it when shows treat their audiences like idiots. They already color-change all the 1960s scenes so we can tell them apart from the modern-day ones. And 90% of the people in them are different. So why over-use the subtitles?
This episode was fairly low on mythology until the end, where they revealed Hauser’s room o’ geeks and the key analysis. Still, the story was interesting enough, and the use of that weapon horrifying enough. I would’ve preferred some more character development of one of the leads. And again, they made the prisoner somewhat sympathetic, at least in the Alcatraz scenes. I hope they’re going in the direction you suggest, where the experiments performed on them there or later caused the change in personality. That would explain why they’re working so hard to make us sympathize with these present-day murderers. I don’t like the feeling.
I’m sorry, have we actually seen any non-violent prisoners yet? Even when describing this bank robber, I thought he was described as avoiding killing, but did it easily when his cover was blown.
I think Carla covered that in her review, in the paragraph that begins “I have a few theories”. I agree that all the prisoners have been violent in the modern-day scenes. But they seem to be suggesting that they weren’t like that when they were first placed in Alcatraz–at least not all of them, and not to the same degree. What about the first guy, who was there for stealing something, I think? He went on a murderous rampage when he got to the present day, but I don’t remember that he had a violent record before Alcatraz.
My point (and I’m not as solid on my information, which is why I’m asking) is that I had thought most of these offenders WERE violent in the past. I’ve always understood that you didn’t get sent to Alcatraz for
But I’d forgotten the details about the first guy.ure. He was sent to prison for robbing a store that sold stamps (and thus was technically considered a Post Office, and thus under Federal jurisdiction).
But now that I’m thinking about it more, didn’t he commit a murder while in prison that prompted his transfer to Alcatraz? I get the details of the Pilot confused because of all of the changes from the original screener/Comic Con version and what actually aired (Not saying that this particular point was different, tho).
Yep, just verified on the aired version. Jack killed another prisoner while at Leavenworth, prompting his transfer to Alcatraz.
*POST AUTHOR*
He killed a fellow prisoner, but it was to protect himself. My theory is that something caused these men to become remorseless killers when they show up in 2012. Both Sylvane and Sweeney came back much more brutal than they initially were in 1960. Why?
What is interesting about the show is the main-plot, the time-travel aspect: why send the prisoners into the future. What significance do the keys have, why are the prisoners collecting the keys on auto-pilot. “Something caused these men become remorseless killers” I would guess it has something to do with the discussion about rewiring there brains as they talked about the dinner party. When Rebbeca was talking to the bank robber he essentially didnt know why he was getting the package didnt know what is in it (and essentially acting on auto-pilot).
“We know that Rebecca’s grandfather is at large, why aren’t they pursuing him?”
How would they do that? They’re only able to track people by following their trail of murders long enough for Madsen to discern some hokey pattern that evaded countless previous federal agents during the original manhunts in the 1960’s. Since the grandfather has only killed one cop so far, these investigators are useless until he kills again.
Also, they obviously have no large server farms to run facial recognition software on public and private San Francisco surveillance cameras until they find the man. It’s not as if they have clear, well-lit portrait and profile photographs of each missing prisoner and guard to use.
In the end, this is one of those series that only doles out answers after they’ve been teased long enough, and can’t stand too much scrutiny in the meantime. Maybe they’ll get better at building the plots more organically later on, but I’m not sure I’ll hang on that long, as they’re not using even Sam Neill all that well. Right now it just feels like a subpar procedural that they’ve smothered with flashbacks to plant their neat little breadcrumbs.
I know four episodes is a small sample size, but I have to wonder just how often in the future Madsen is going to continue to put down her gun when facing an armed escapee so she doesn’t accidentally shoot the felon. And I haven’t felt the slightest bit of sympathy for any of the murderers thus far.
*POST AUTHOR*
They should get one of those face recognition systems! That would help them with their case. But, there hasn’t been a mention of Prisoner Madsen since the premiere. That doesn’t really make sense to me. You’d think they would be doing something … anything to find him.
I love the discussion that this show is generating.