#personofinterest

The Machine has a new number — and it's yours.

The Contingency Con, a free virtual fan convention celebrating the 10th anniversary of the Person of Interest series finale. July 31–August 2, 2026. Three days. All timezones. Every corner of fandom, together.

Character panels. Episode watchalongs. Fanvid screenings. Fan art showcases. Meta discussions. The State of AI in 2026. A convention zine. And a lot of feelings about a show that saw the future coming.

Programming submissions are open now. If you have an idea for a panel, discussion, or presentation — this is your invitation. All experience levels welcome.

This is a fan-run, community-driven event — free admission, no paywalls, built entirely by people who love this show. We're just getting started, and we want you here for it.

Submit a panel proposal: ContingencyCon.com Join the mailing list for updates on registration, vidshow calls, and zine submissions.

Please repost to help spread the word.

Oh My God! Carter dug Still's body! Carter. And Bear, of course, but OMG, she's how Fusco got away. You did it again, POI, you blew me away.

God-freaking-dammit, I hadn't seen that coming!

So good. What a way to end s02e20 "In extremis".

This episode not only gave us the best of Fusco yet. The bathroom scene... Cheff's kiss. It's the peak of everything Fusco had lived, his house of cards about to fall down over the weight of his past sins.

Damn.

The flashbacks were a nice touch. A bit of Still, and how Fusco got to the point we met him on the Pilot. POI once again wisely uses flashbacks.

The investigation on Fusco was as interesting as the number's plot. Both threads coming along nicely, tightly, and as gripping as the other. It has been a while since both plot points had the same weight, the same relevance in the episode.

And the poisoned doctor was a nice character, a good metaphor for the poisoning spreading ahead, the virus corrupting the Machine. Again, a master parallel.

Joss's face as she walks away, holding Bear's leash, dirty boots and trousers as she leaves incriminating footprints on the floor. Beside her, Bear leaves his own dirty paw prints. Oh my, and not a soul in that precinct full of cops notices the evidence she leaves behind. *whistles*

I'm in love with this episode, seriously.

And speaking of threads, how could I not mention Cal's fate in the previous episode (s02e19 "Trojan Horse")?

Elias is always a freaking delight on my screen. And his chess matches with Harold are slowly becoming my favourite interactions. The dialogue, the hints as they speak beyond the events of the board... I freaking love it.

Tracie Thoms is a familiar face to me. Not only from 9-1-1, but from Cold Case. So it was a lovely surprise that she played Monica Jacobs. And Reese's smile when Monica mentions IFT was exactly my reaction.

Back to Cal, Sterling K. Brown was a great addition to the cast — however brief Cal's life was on Person of Interest. I maintain that he made Cal half as interesting and nuanced as he was. He was a great love interest to Carter, and his unwitting connection to the HR Boss was a nice touch. So it didn't come as much of a surprise to me that he was killed off — not after the clever foreshadowing Elias gave us when the good detective Beecher interrogated him in prison over a chess match. And how is Elias always dominating the scene, always stealing it whenever he's on-screen? It's so charming. Man's got charisma every second. It's actually a bit annoying how charming I find him, LOL.

So, no Cal's death wasn't a surprise. But it was a nice send-off. He had a good run. A great run, actually. A good arc. And I rather like that POI is not afraid of killing the characters now (emphasis on the now, because I got spoilers, okay?) — from numbers to secondary characters.

And the song that plays when they find Cal's body. Perfect.

Cal died like an honest man. That's what he had been trying to tell (show) Carter all along. He was unwittingly manipulated, yes, but he was honest. Suddenly, thinking back on his actions, you can see subtle signs that he was genuine. He joined Carter on an island trip in the middle of a goddamn storm! He really liked her. He investigated the guy from Organized Crime because he had been tipped off by his crooked godfather (not that he knew), and he was played by the HR's hands, but he was doing what he thought was right. That's more than Fusco did in the past and more than Carter herself has been doing, as she descends further from her duty and bathes her moral code in shades of grey the longer she associates with Reese and Finch. It's interesting to see how opposite their journeys are when they meet. It's how good POI is in storytelling. Carter tampered with a federal investigation, that's a long way from her honest cop origins. How did Harold once frame it about himself?

"Thank you for appreciating my descent into deviant behavior, Mr. Reese." (Episode Till Death)

The same can be said about Carter, she’s been descending the longer it goes on. And that's what her actions by the end of s02e20 solidify: the final nail on the coffin. She finally picked a side.

For all her initial rejection of Fusco's confession in the bathroom, she finally picked a side. And that haunts her conscience.

But she did.

Cal picked a side too. He chose to stand on the side of honesty. That's why he became collateral damage. Because honesty — pure, clean honesty — is unsurvivable in this world they live. It's a rigged game. Either you live mostly oblivious or you embrace the greys and learn how to play the game.

Cal died like the cop Carter used to be. And it's fitting that his death should be the threshold she crosses: from the old Carter to the new Carter; not crooked by definition but not a saint either.

They're on colliding paths, but symmetrically opposites. And symbolism is something POI understands well.

They're shooting stars. Crossing each other's lives right at the point of no return, the moment their lives are about to change (they just don't know it). The moment they can't turn back, their trajectories already set. And that's why Cal's death feels so tragic.

Not because of the romance — that's the surface. But because he's the inverted mirror. The romance is the hook. Make no mistake, POI doesn't make coincidences.

(And that's why I find the writing superb)

It had been coming all along. Her covering the circumstances of Donnelly's death. Her already being there at the crime scene before the call was placed (remember every time someone remarked how quick she was there or assumed she was there about a 911 call?). These dominoes were already set, now they've fallen.

Can you hear the sound?

It's why Fusco's protection is endearing. When Fusco faces Cal on the bathroom, telling him to stay away from Carter... it's because Lionel sees. Unlike his dumb exterior, Lionel Fusco is anything but. He's not smart like Harold, that's not his smarts. And it's easy to be overshadowed next to Mr. Vocabular and Mr. Happy. Fusco is smart because he sees the writing on the wall. He sees the signs. He sees who's Carter is becoming — because in a way he once was her.

Episode 20 shows us he wasn't always crooked, he wasn't always a "bad cop". He was good once. Honest. But he descended. And like our fellow characters have shown us, the descent into hell is inevitable. Once you take the plunge, it's like free-falling. Prolonged, lasting, but inevitable. You're gonna meet the ground, no matter what you do to slow the fall.

It's bittersweet. And it's ironic.

Because Lionel feels protective of the mirror he sees in Carter, the 'innocence' you could say; the honesty he once had. How honest, the show leaves up to you to interpret. He feels protective because he wants her to keep it, guard like he couldn't guard his. It's a pandora box: once you know, you can't unknow. Reese warned many episodes ago. (Remember that diner scene? When she questions how he knows the numbers? When she presses for answers. Reese mentions Taylor, her son, the one who might suffer if she keeps chasing cursed knowledge). Mostly oblivious or grey game player. Those were the choices.

(And if all that feels like foreshadowing to events I know will come... Damn, spoilers. Forget them. Delete. DELETE. You hear me?)

Fusco changed. Carter is a bigger influence than they give her credit for. Sure, Reese (and by extension Finch) set him on the straighter path (no puns intended), but it was Carter who made him want to stay there. That visit from the ghost of Christmas Past. That glimpse into the mirror of what he used to be. That human reminder dangling in front of him (quite literally with the placement of their desks). It was what made Lionel so dismayed when Reese told him to go under the HR. Lionel was craving to be the person Carter reminded him of. He yearned. That's why it feels so tragic when it first happens. (And not that Carter doesn't have her own agency outside of Fusco's mirror. She is a mirror, not a perfect one. She's still her own person.)

But it was necessary. And Fusco was the back door to flesh out a plot introduced right in the pilot: the corrupt HR organization. And so he was sacrificed, but not entirely.

Because his dilemma doesn't erase his struggles, doesn't erase his journey, doesn't erase the Lionel he's becoming. It murks the waters.

When Fusco tells Carter what he's done, who he became — that's his confessionary. It's Lionel talking to past Lionel. It hurts, but it frees him. He's whole. Not honest, but past and present aligned (not in the traditional sense, but aligned nonetheless. They're one even as opposites. Lionel is working towards integration. Maybe that's all those studies on heroine's journey, maybe it's a fangirl's rambling... who knows? )

In a roundabout way, Lionel is facing the consequences right as Carter stopped falling, finally reached the ground.

It's poetic that she should be the one to rid him of the Still's issue — they become an ororoboros. Past becoming present. Present becoming past. One-and-the-same. Heads, tails. End, beginning. Where does it start and where does it end?

This show's relationships, dynamics — whether platonic or romantic, and regardless of how you see them — are never unintentional. Reese finds his light in the darkness in the purpose Harold gives him, the mission, in his friendship (he rediscoveres Ying and Yang). Carter frowns upon the morality and the unaccountability of their actions as she goes from hunting to join them. Carter mirrors old!Fusco. Fusco glimpses in Carter the person he left behind, the one before he crossed his own threshold. Carter feels attracted to the detective who more resembles her (the her she once was). Fusco feels protective of his mirror. It's a cy(r)cle. And it's a web. Every relationship affects someone or more someones in the web.

i absolutely love this artwork of John Reese and u can’t tell me that isnt Hobbs at the bottom left😩🤚🏻 found this on rednote. i will leave a link to the creator of this bc ima nice biatch to give credit to a masterpiece