FBI Season 6, Episode 9, “Best Laid Plans” is an episode that plays with two different story ideas familiar to crime drama fans: the “one of our own” story and the “couple or potential couple goes undercover” story. Combining the two means that neither one is fully developed, but the episode also avoids several pitfalls in the process.
After former FBI agent Mike Rosen is tortured and killed, the team probes into his new job at an armored car company. This puts them on the trail of ambitious thieves who shoot indiscriminately to get their hands on millions of dollars in diamonds. The situation gets thornier when one of their suspects is revealed to be Nina Chase’s confidential informant, forcing Nina and Stuart Scola to go undercover as married buyers to get the diamonds back and solve Rosen’s murder. Naturally, this puts the real-life relationship between Nina and Scola under pressure.
“Best Laid Plans” features two major action set pieces: one in which the team tries to foil the diamond robbery and it turns into a gun battle, and the other once Nina and Scola have separate encounters with the two main suspects. Both are tense enough to hold the audience’s interest, even though there’s a degree of false jeopardy in the latter. The former actually having a civilian wounded by the enormous amount of bullets discharged is a nice touch, too, because so many crime dramas cause chaos that never gets acknowledged again.
But like most FBI episodes, the strength in “Best Laid Plans” comes from the main characters and not what they’re actually doing. It’s worth specifying because the guest characters aren’t fleshed out enough to be memorable. They feel more like plot pieces to get the main cast where they’re going. John Boyd in particular is on a roll; between the previous episode focusing on Tiffany and now Nina returning for another appearance, audiences have seen a lot of Scola in a strong supporting role, even if he’s not always right. FBI also has what Chicago P.D. has been lacking for a few seasons now: the team element. Though it’s a Scola and Nina episode, Maggie, OA and Tiffany all contribute to the action. (Jubal and Isabel are limited to doing all the headquarters work.)
The biggest tropes that FBI falls into are stylistic ones. Something it does have in common with other Dick Wolf shows is the very obvious underscore that practically slaps the viewer upside the head when something serious or dramatic is about to happen. And the washed-out cinematography in most scenes leads to some of them being too dark; the trend of TV dramas also having to look dark and serious is a bad habit that can’t stop soon enough.
But past that, “Best Laid Plans” is a solid FBI Season 6 entry because it continues to rely on its formidable cast first and foremost. It’s not an original story or even a very surprising one, unless one counts the cringe-worthy moment of the cops who just so happen to drive by at the worst possible time. But it doesn’t spend too much time on Jubal rallying the troops because it’s an FBI agent who’s dead, it doesn’t drag out the arguing between Nina and Scola for drama’s sake, and it doesn’t end on a down note.
FBI has proven to be as efficient as the team at its core, and there’s something to be said for a reliable, solid TV crime drama that doesn’t look for a gimmick or a forced plot twist or an awkward message. It simply does its job of entertaining viewers and does it well.
FBI airs Tuesdays at 9:00 p.m. on CBS and streams on Paramount+.
