SPOILER ALERT: The following contains spoilers for FBI Season 8, Episode 13.
As FBI Season 8 reaches its halfway point, there will be some more standalone episodes. Not every installment of the CBS show can be a major event or have some character revelation. “Fanatics” is one of those hours; it’s not filler, but it doesn’t stand out either.
The plot of the episode concerns a death row inmate named Eric Atwood. The men Eric mentored before his arrest have hatched a plan to get his conviction overturned by having basketball team owner Stan Gibney admit that he influenced the trial. And to do that, they’ve taken Stan’s son Landon hostage—or so they think. The guest characters are predictable throughout, so the audience pretty much knows where the story is headed. The heroes ably get from Point A to Point B, and the show gets a break between bringing back villains.
There’s not even necessarily a featured character; the majority of the spotlight belongs to Jeremy Sisto as Jubal Valentine, but Jubal has had better episodes than this. He spends most of his time negotiating with the antagonists, and even when he opens up about his past to the main villain as part of the negotiations, the scene feels like it could be bigger. The other cast members do their jobs well as always, with Zeeko Zaki in second position since OA Zidan gets to go undercover as a paramedic. But Missy Peregrym is absent entirely, presumably as part of the usual Wolf Entertainment cast rotation, with her character Maggie Bell said to be off at training in keeping with the subplot about her becoming a profiler. (FBI deserves credit for explaining where missing characters are, at least.)
“Fanatics” connects its dots capably but never gins up the kind of tension to make a hostage situation—or actually two of them—work on TV. The script spells out two of its big plot points early on, when Stan reveals that one of his players owns a gun and that the arena has a secret door. That takes away a lot of the surprise. And viewers will be expecting the fourth-act bit in which Eric speaks directly to his mentee, too. The script can’t talk about him for thirty-plus minutes and then not show him. Even the button at the end, in which Jubal attempts to have a heart-to-heart with Stan, is fine enough yet not as moving as the show wants it to be. Viewers already know Stan isn’t going to change. But even if they see everything coming, at least FBI fans are satisfied at the end. There’s nothing pulled out of thin air just to create some more excitement, and no plot threads left dangling.
There could have been a lot more done here; for a more involved story with a similar mistaken identity kidnapping plot, audiences should see the Grace season 5 premiere on BritBox. It’s much more intense and yanks on the viewers’ heartstrings. Yet that isn’t the function of “Fanatics.” It doesn’t have a complex plot because it’s meant to be self-contained. Its purpose is to give both the characters and the audience a chance to breathe before the next big haymaker. And by those criteria, this one is a success. Viewers are unlikely to remember it, but they won’t regret having watched it either.
FBI airs Mondays at 9:00 p.m. ET/PT on CBS. Photo Credit: Courtesy of CBS.
