211 JBTF10... — Judging By the First 10...

Estimated Read-Time = 43.7 minutes

JBTF10? Worth Watching.

Review synopsis: Well, they’re coming? I guess? Maybe at night? But probably not? Odd, in that the First 10 of 211 is an inversion of how Bangkok Dangerous began. And, if I had to choose between the two, I’d throw my lot in here with 211.

Despite the unfortunate timing of the entrance of our hero. Sure, Bangkok gave us Nic Cage right from the get-go. But I questioned in that review if he was ever really there. Yes, it may have been Joe, his character in that film, that was depressed to the point of nonexistence (as opposed to Cage). But after 10 minutes of that, and all the voiceoversposition, I wasn’t thrilled to continue on with the rest of the movie.

But you gin me up with 10 minutes of NOT Nic Cage and drop THIS on us in the 10th minute???

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This!

This [chef’s kiss] was hard to walk away from.

Look at that. That’s great. I wonder if he’s close to retirement in this film too? (By the way, 211 is police code for a robbery. I forced myself not to look it up until now.) Was it a build-up though? Did the setup of the first 10 minutes and the knowledge we now have that this team of super killers will soon be descending on what is probably a sleepy little town lead to the excitement I had in finally seeing Cage’s character?

(To be fair, it’s more like minute 11 he comes in, but I was losing my shit a bit when we cut to the drone shot, sorry gang.)

Or was this simply delayed gratification, for lack of a better phrase? Well, I don’t have a truck-hunted knot in my stomach. And I don’t feel like a set of cinematic dominos has been masterfully set up and, at the end of 10, we sit in anticipation of how they’ll soon fall — in a way I hope The Night Comes for Us will do. But 211, despite some of its odd moments (why was Carter laughing?) wasn’t bad. The explosions went boom well. The guns went boom well. We have a seasoned cadre of killers descending upon a small, unsuspecting town. Cage’s character will have some sort of relevant backstory. Right? While the execution in these 10 minutes might have been a bit lacking, the intent is there. If this was a Steven Seagal film, I think we’d pass. But with the unpredictability of having Cage in the lead role, I feel oddly optimistic about where this movie’s headed.

Bring on the Nicolas Cage Netflix anomaly I guess.

Until next we meet: Cue Middle of the East music…

Stars: Nicolas Cage, Sophie Skelton, Michael Rainey Jr.

Directed by: York Alec Shackleton,

Written by: York Alec Shackleton (based on a screenplay by), John Rebus (screenplay by)

Check streaming availability via JustWatch

JBTF10 Review: 211

Found by Netflixing: The Night Comes for Us

Wasn't it just Halloween? Weren’t we just not going to Thanksgiving Dinner (long story)? And now we're well into the season of feverishly checking and re-checking Amazon shipping deadlines for the 24th. And I still haven't watched The Night Comes for Us.

Around Halloween, this movie was mentioned repeatedly on the Twitter as a "must see." And when you see a film described in reviews like it was by Variety's Richard Kuipers, you don't doubt it:

"Consisting of almost nothing but highlights, the action is so intensely and consistently over the top that Night travels beyond the boundaries of a crime film and becomes something more akin to splatter horror or a video game gone berserk."

That sounds fairly rad. And, while I've always loved martial arts movies, I haven't done a good job keeping up with what seems to be an energetic infusion of titles from places like Thailand and Indonesia.

And frankly, I like the title. The Night Comes for Us makes me wonder if the film is an inversion of The Raid. Where, instead of our heroes having to progress through overwhelming odds, our heroes are on the defensive, trapped, having to keep overwhelming odds from progressing through them.

That could lead to some wonderfully tense moments of foreboding and dread, or even some character building like we touched on in Aliens and the original Predator.

For we high BMI, top-of-the-food-chainers, it's quite disturbing to feel hunted. To know that someone is out there, actively coming for you. And, in a way, I can personally attest to this.

Lol. No, silly. Mine is not the life that inspired the John Woo/Jean-Claude Van Damme opus Hard Target. One evening, long ago, as a junior-higher in small-town Iowa, my friends and I decided to hop a fence on the edge of town and check out a rolling bit of land flanked by a thin strip of forest. I'm pretty sure this wasn't my idea, as I don't personally like stepping in piles of poop (this seemed to be grazing land of some sort ... cows probably).

Little did we know though, that the family that owned the land was sitting in their driveway across the street, watching us, and getting pissed. Because, who knows. When y'all sit in your driveway drinking beers, you gotta get yourself pissed off at something, right?

So we're losing the light. It's getting foggy. And I'm not thrilled because both factors are making my poop-avoidance dance increasingly complicated.

Suddenly, loud as hell, we hear an engine roar. Sounded like something out of that loud place the people go to see the big trucks smash the small cars. Almost like it was a Spielberg movie, or more realistically now, like a J.J. Abrams movie, these bright, white beams of light suddenly cut through the fog back where we'd entered the field. Yelling. It's a truck full of dudes coming for us.

Truck engine roaring. Lights getting closer. And the only thought that is able to enter my brains is that THEY ARE GOING TO GET US THEY ARE GOING TO GET US WE CANNOT LET THEM GET US.

Made no sense, really. Don't think we had any real chance of getting shot. Maybe a slightly greater chance of getting run over, or having our asses kicked. Didn't matter though. WE NEEDED TO ESCAPE.

I yell-grabbed my friends, pulling them in the direction of the trees. We booked it, cow patties now an afterthought, and dove into the woods. There was a slight ridge; so, lying completely prone and burrowing down into the who-knows-what like ticks, we were able to just peek out to see what was coming for us.

Soon, a big truck roared into view. Could barely make out a couple folks in the cab. Two more standing up in the truck bed, hanging on the roll bar, where those bright spotlights were attached.

We couldn’t make out what they were saying. But they were definitely looking for us. They roared on down the field a bit. Circled a few times. We were frozen. If the lights hit us, I doubt we'd have been able to run. But they didn't. And the truck gang got bored. Or gave up. And roared back across the field to where we'd all entered.

Don't think we moved for another 15 minutes or so. Took a while to trust that the Iowa-quiet was going to stay that way. Eventually, we decided to risk it. We trudged back toward the fence we'd jumped, not saying anything. I didn't care about what I might or might not be stepping on by that point, figuring if there was any shit on my shoes, it was probably my own.

We hopped the fence and started to walk back toward home. My house, for instance, was only 4 blocks away from where this had all happened. This is where we noticed the large group of people sitting in their driveway, staring at us silently. And the big truck next to them all.

Now the story doesn't quite end there, but we're going to end it here. Partly because the length of that Tremors review broke something in me that might never be whole again (You and me both, brother. -Ed). But also because the point here is that, even though I doubt we were ever in any real danger, recalling the events of that evening here to you now, upward of three decades later, I still get a knot in my stomach. Being hunted, knowing people are actively engaged in finding you for not-good reasons, even when it’s done by small-town douchebags, is absolutely terrifying. So, for this reason, I'm stoked that The Night Comes for Us is going to just kill it.

But, as it's not out on Netflix yet, my expectations were fairly low with what we’d get back with our search. (Actually, by the time this was published on the site, it most definitely is on Netflix, so maybe go watch that and ... uh, come back to this review? Please? Shit.) I was pleasantly surprised though:

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Oh man. Is that Robert Patrick? I didn’t really watch him when he was on The X-Files. Why do I kinda think of Michael Biehn when I think of Robert Patrick? And vice versa?

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Oh hey. It’s that movie with The Rock in it. The one that’s supposed to have really, really questionable CG effects in it. Huh. What was that supposed to be a sequel to again? The Mummy?

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Some trendy new stuff here. Nice. Action. And horror. Yeah. Nice…

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Sigh. Yes. I know. We must. I worry a bit that we have some sort of Nicolas Cage Netflix anomaly brewing here, a content singularity fueled by the Netflix algorithm, priming itself to serve up (or even create!?!) Nic Cage movies at every opportunity. I knew when I worked out this convoluted process that my inherent biases (or those of the Netflix overlords) may become an issue. But we’ll roll with 221 today, in part, because of how sad I was not giving a “watch it” recommendation to Bangkok Dangerous.

UNLIKE Bangkok Dangerous, 211 does not begin with excessive and dour Nic Cage voice-over. Instead, we begin with money, the transferring of all the money, from everyone, everywhere:

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Methinks someone is getting HACKED on the INTERNET.

No. The music here is not plucky and adorably dated. The music is ominous. So I do not think these are the good guys. Or Ally Sheedy.

As the credits roll, we see much transferring of much money from ... many bank accounts from all around the world.

Amidst the transferring, we get a close-up shot of someone typing, making the hacking go, which is interesting because I don’t think hacking is like a quick-time event where you need to keep tapping the buttons to make things work. I think with codes you, like, hit Enter or something, or Return if you’re on a Mac, and the computer does all the work? Whatever, because this hacker has blue fingernail polish on. THIS MIGHT BE IMPORTANT.

The hacking shots cross-fade to a shot of crappy mountains and a dude in glasses looking out at them through a window. The movie tells us we are in Afghanistan.

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Oh hey, Afghanistan? I didn’t mean to rag on your mountains. If they are, in fact, your mountains. They just look drab and cold. It’s winter in the hinterlands. I’m a little depressed. I’m sorry. Not trying to be a jerk.

Glasses Dude and his peculiar facial hair turns around and smirks. He is giving off a strong Evil Business Nerd in the Action Movie vibe.

Crossing what appears to be a double-wide trailer in this quarry or whatever, Glasses Dude passes behind a woman with dark hair, seated in front of a computer. She has BLUE NAIL POLISH, guys! She must be the hacker! Told you that little detail would probably pay off for us.

We cut back to a POV of her screen. The “transferring” is now going. Or continuing to go. Not quite sure where we’re at here. But more of something seems to be happening.

Cut to the woman, her eyes darting back and forth at something that doesn’t seem to be present when we get to see her screen. More fingers flying on the keyboard. More of Glasses Dude looking amused.

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As we hold on him for a bit too long, it ACTUALLY looks like he’s reacting to the director who we can’t hear yelling, “Yeah. You’re amused! Give us amused! That’s good! Little more! Little more! Too much! Less eyebrow stuff. There. Good!”

Cutting back to the computer screen. We see over seven hundred THOUSAND dollars has been transferred so far. And that seems like not a lot for all we’ve been witness to here. But the amount continues to tick up there, so who knows. And I’m also assuming they’re dollars. Could be gold bars. Or bitcoin. Right?

More blue fingernail typing, though slower, she may be tiring.

More screens of transferring.

More amounts — and the statuses of those amounts (transferred!).

Then, a very deliberate pan down and hold at the bottom of the screen, so we can clearly see that Unity Savings and Loan is apparently amongst the hackees. Or maybe that’s where the money is being transferred to?

Maybe it’s where it’s being transferred to, because when the transferring is (finally) complete, we cut back to the lady, reflected in her screen, and it still says Unity Savings and Loan. So yeah, my money’s on that being our location.

Cut to the woman, with Glasses Dude looming weakly behind her.

“Is done, Mr. Donovan. The mah-nee is secure,” she says with a not-American accent.

Okay. The bitcoins are now at Unity Savings and Loan. Mystery solved.

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“Good,” says Glasses Dude. “Good. Then we can go home.”

We cut back to a close-up of the hacker. A weird series of vague expressions cycle across her face, including, for one moment, an arched right eyebrow. But she does not turn around to face him. Maybe the director was just yelling at her to? I don’t know what it means.

She SLAMS her computer SHUT with an echoey BOOM and we cut to, a flag?

Then three flags?

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Then the ominous music changes slightly to include that instrument we lazy, ignorant folk use when we want the audience to know we are in the MIDDLE OF THE EAST. I’ve always thought it has a very pretty sound actually. But I’ve always flinched when I hear it used to convey the sense that WE ARE NOT IN KANSAS RIGHT NOW, GANG.

We cut back to a long shot of the quarry, then pan over to the building we were just presumably in. It looks very cold here. Men with rifles guard a series of SUVs outside this building we were just hacking in. (Must have good Wi-Fi?) All of these men have very good trigger discipline. And it’s hard to tell if this means they are professional gun-handlers, or if these actors were simply instructed by the same. Military and weapons advisers were part of old movies too, right? Like, back when movies started in the ’80s? Odd how this little detail has changed so completely, even in remakes.

Maybe it’s an insurance thing.

Anyway, door opens and Glasses Dude and the hacking woman come out. An armed man leads them downstairs to the waiting SUVs.

“The plane is ready?” Glasses Dude asks.

“You’ll be in Dubai by dinner,” the woman replies, with a sort-of-not-American accent.

“And the special operations team?” the man inquires further.

“Contract canceled, sir,” the woman says, suddenly with a completely different, slightly sassy, non-accented voice.

“Awesome,” Glasses Dude replies. I laugh at this.

Before the women steps into her waiting vehicle, she turns back to smile at Glasses Dude. Yes. It is awesome, isn’t it? Right before a vehicle blows up behind them.

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Decks are hit. More explosions. Wait. No. Multiple camera angles of the same explosion. Stunt guys fling themselves forward in slow motion. It’s pretty good.

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Then, like, a big gun starts shooting from off in the distance. The guards start getting picked off — and painfully, by the look of it. As chaos begins to unfold around them, Glasses Dude shoots the Hacker Woman a reassuring look, then calmly assesses the situation.

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Cut to a shot behind our sniper, nestled somewhere out in the mountains beyond the quarry. He’s got one of those mega-big sniper rifles that, according to movies I watch, are SUPER fucking common these days. Must be able to pick up a dozen at Walmart as needed. Kidding aside, those .50 caliber sniper rifles are terrifying. Great scene in Kathryn Bigelow’s The Hurt Locker featuring one. Single shot can go right through an engine block.

Instead of seeing this guy fire, we cut to another shot of some other guy, in the rocks, with a more normal gun. He fires it down at our unlucky groups of soldiers.

The second guy fires his more normal gun a few more times, taking down another soldier. Then, for some reason, the camera zooms up in his face all quick, like the shot’s gonna freeze and his codename will appear on screen or something.

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It doesn’t. So, maybe this is the director having cast himself as the heavy in his own movie?

Wait. But then we cut to a close-up of the Hacker Woman, half out of the SUV, and the camera super-zooms up into her face?

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Wait. Can he see her? Is she seeing him? Do they know each other? Where are we right now? I can’t tell where we are in relation to any of this.

These guys should have watched The Hurt Locker …

The woman looks over and we cut to a panning shot that matches the turn of her head (nice touch), revealing a dude wielding an RPG.

But he’s in front of all the cars. So, with the way they’re parked and how her door is open for her to hide behind it, the zoom-into guy would have to be in the rocks behind them for him to see her, or her to see him. But she seems to look at the bazooka guy here. But as we cut behind him, he’s clearly in front of the convoy?

Oh well. This new guy shoots his RPG (I keep wanting to call it a bazooka, but my 8-year old son assures me it’s an RPG. I’m going to not worry about rocket-propelled grenade knowledge at the moment). And the car IN FRONT of our (heroes?) blows up. This is also a pretty good blowing up of something. But then, we’re super up in THIS dude’s face.

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Okay. Nice to meet you, too.

It’s okay, though. Because as the Hacker Woman turns to Glasses Dude in a panic, it’s pretty clear our guy has everything under control.

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Also, what is HE looking at? Because the car behind him was what just blew up. Whatever.

The guard-soldier behind him whips open the front door of their vehicle. Uh-oh. Sniper Guy with his super gun that can punch through engine blocks just took a shot at this dude who thinks the door window is going to save him?

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Haha, what? I actually stop the review here to go on YouTube and research whether I just don’t know what I’m talking about when I imagine what’s going to happen when the world’s most powerful sniper rifle encounters bulletproof glass. (Turns out I know enough. But hey, MOVIES!)

Well hell, fellas, based on the logic of your own movie, you now can see that the best thing to do is get in the damn cars and get out of there.

Instead, the soldiers try to return fire. Which is smart, because now they’re using the open doors with that super strong glass for cover. That silly sniper, though. Undeterred by the strong window, he fires at another guard ... who is also hiding behind a window. And his shot goes right through the window, killing the guard.

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…

That guy’s buddy looks shocked that his friend has just been shot (me too, dude). So he decides to yell and run out into the open so that first dude can more easily shoot him. Can’t cast any shade on this though, because that could have been the kill cam from me dying in every first-person shooter I’ve ever tried to play.

So now we’re down to Hacker Woman, Glasses Dude and the one guard whose lucky window saved him. Deciding that now is finally the time to get out of there, Dude and Woman throw themselves into the back seat of their SUV and yell at the guard to get moving, which is super easy for him to do now that he’s suddenly sitting in the driver’s seat.

C’mon, movie. You’re losing me here …

They begin to speed away. And, for some reason, no one’s shooting at them. But then we learn why.

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Haha, what?

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Okay okay. I’m back, movie. You got me back.

So I think the guard in the front seat is probably dead now. And, in the backseat, Glasses Dude and Hacker Woman are super banged up. Because yeah, bulldozer …

The woman makes a point to pull her purse with her as she struggles to get out of her door. She starts to run away, clearly limping, toward ... the snow-covered mountains of somewhere in Afghanistan? I don’t know. When you’re scared, you’re scared. Iowa trucks in Iowa fields ... who am I to talk shit?

But then another guy, probably the Dozer Driver, takes careful aim with a pistol and shoots her in the back. Awww, man.

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Then there’s a pretty smooth camera move that circles right around him to get all up in his face. It’s like a reveal. But we don’t know who he is. So it’s not.

Glasses Dude kicks his way out of the SUV and supposes he’ll have a go at escaping, too. But he trips and falls, his glasses flying off and landing on the barren, rocky ground. Looks like the kind of shot you set up so a big ol’ baddie boot can come in and step on them.

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I was close!

“Hello, boss,” the boot’s voice says.

Glasses Dude looks up. But without his glasses, neither he nor we can make out who we’re looking up at.

So Bootman helpfully takes his foot off Glasses Dude’s hand. So he can put his glasses back on. And look back up at him again? Doesn’t he know who this is?

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It’s this guy. Bootman. Who looks happy to be here.

After the two stare at each other for a while (they know each other? Yes? No?), Bootman slams the butt of his rifle into Glasses Dude’s face. Ouch.

“You should all be fuckin’ dead,” Glasses Dude says, his face now abust.

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Whoah. Now the gang’s all here. Okay.

This idiosyncratic lot gives Glasses Dude some helpful advice: Basically sometimes it’s not smart to rely on other people to kill the people you want dead and, instead, you should just do said killing yourself. That, and that Glasses Dude is a dipshit.

“All this for the money!” Glasses Dude cries out. (The bitcoins!)

“Oh we’ve done worse for you over the past two years,” Bootman says. “By my calculation, you owe, what with time and expenses ...”

“Aggravation,” Bearded Sniper adds helpfully.

“Let’s just call it a straight-up million,” Bootman concludes.

Glasses Dude does not agree, telling Bootman F-to-the-U.

This earns Glasses Dude a bullet to the leg. Yeowch. And I will say the sound effects, the echo of gunshots among the rocks, is pretty dang good. These guns sound like guns.

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It’s out of the country, Glasses Dude explains. It’s now somewhere these four cannot touch.

Bootman isn’t happy and points the gun at Glasses Dude’s head, saying as much.

By the sound of it, suddenly Glasses Dude is from Bahstan Maass as he explains the money is in the banks, scattered, everywhere, thousands, small automatic deposits …

Look, I really hope touching on inconsistencies like these doesn’t come across as picky. Even the worst movie ever was hard to make. But details matter, in stories and in movies … and for the stories in movies. Details provide all the enriching syntax we aren’t quite aware of while we experience a film. Things can be different, or odd, but I think it’s inconsistency that can really pop our suspension of disbelief. And part of what makes a really good director or storyteller is understanding which details will make or break what you’re trying to create with your audience.

Anyway …

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“US Bank?” Bootman asks.

“GUAAAAARGH. US BANKS. RUSSIA. SWITZERLAND,” Glasses Dude responds.

“Name one.” Oh hey. Might it be ….

“UNITY SAVINGS AND LOAN, CHESTERFERD MASSACHUSETTS…over a million, I promise, I can help you get it…”

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“... you NEED me, just give me some fuckin’ medical attention and we can make a deal,” Glasses Dude pleads.

“Or we could just do it our way,” Dozer Driver says, eyeing his crew.

“Your way … ?” Glasses Dude asks, confused.

“The hard way,” Bootman says, and then shoots Glasses Dude dead.

...

Then, as the four walk away, Bearded Sniper may or may not mutter, “Dibbs.” (?)

We cut to Kabul, because the movie tells us so and, according to the soundtrack, Kabul is SOMEWHERE IN THE MIDDLE OF THE EAST.

Don’t mind that, though. Because it would make sense that this shift in locale would be the perfect time to introduce whichever character will be played by Nicolas Cage. Hacking and bulldozer-kills … sure sure, that’s all well and good, Movie. But now let’s get us to some Cage. Please?

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A woman with a red scarf around her head walks down the street toward us, large suspicious bag in hand.

Amongst shots of local folk, there is a great shot of a kid being led across the road by a parent, one who is making sure the car stopped for them is going to wait its damn turn.

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Probably Nic Cage in that car. So it’s all good though.

Back to the woman in the red scarf. A dude takes her arm and kinda pulls her into a sorta alley. He looks in the bag.

Some sort of golden statue is not very well-hidden by a white piece of cloth.

He speaks to her, and through subtitles we learn it’s the Englishman in the bright scarf she wants to talk to. He’s got the money. Said Englishman has been, quite helpfully, blocked into the center-background of this shot.

The woman turns to look at him.

She looks at him A LOT. Like, for long enough that we start to feel like she’s just realized it’s her long-lost father, or that she has x-ray vision and she’s unsettled by his choice of boxer shorts.

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But, no. None of that.

The Englishman, who apparently will NOT be played by Nic Cage in today’s film, very ... painfully …obviously ... begins ... to ... walk ... toward … the … pair.

In … turn ... the ... woman ... begins ... walking ... to ... him …

They come to face each other in the middle of the street. You know, like normal people do all the time.

They begin to exchange opposite-looking bags (Brilliant!) until … WHAAAT?!?!

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They wheel to face the camera, the sound of a large engine suddenly gunning toward them. (Ooo. Might doth a bulldozer approacheth?)

Nope.

A military Humvee (screeches?) to halt on the wet, muddy road, just shy of running them over.

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The Englishman turns and makes a stiff break for it. The woman stands there, frozen as one soldier pours out.

But hell, you’d be frozen too if there were a remote possibility you’d soon be in the presence of General Nicolas Cage!

Tugging her into the Humvee, the soldier informs her she’s under arrest.

“I didn’t do anything,” the woman protests. Too bad. Because she’s shoved in back and right next TO … (!!!)

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… God dammit.

Okay. It’s okay. Little glass of wine here and we’ll be okay ... it’s okay. We can do this. We’ll just bear down on this sucker like Luke in The Last Jedi.

Nic Cage will be here in no time!

This guy, whoever he is, assures the woman that all is clear. Which is good, because she then begins to cuss him out in, like, Italian? Or one of those other languages I flunked my way through some of back in college. (Go Hawks!)

Basically, that Englishman was, apparently, the biggest antiquities smuggler in Asia. Hah. Does HE know that’s what he is? I didn’t get a real Vincent Cassell vibe from that dude. This lady was just six steps away from arresting him, too.

She must mean these six steps metaphorically.

“Sorry ma’am, orders,” Sgt. Not Nic Cage says, pulling out a phone and handing it to her.

“Carter,” the woman out-of-breathily Italians into the phone, “if this is another security drill, eye kill you.”

While she listens to whoever’s talking, the Sgt. stares at her like this:

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And it’s funny for some reason. I don’t know. People can grow very protective of their bosses.

“Yes sir,” Carter says, rolling her eyes at herself. Haha. Fucking Carter. Every. Damn. Time. Right people?

Then she switches back to full-on Italian for some reason. And we don’t get subtitles, so I’ve helpfully translated the word I think she says here:

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You’re welcome.

More listening before Carter tells her phone friend that this time, she’ll find them.

And we cut BACK to that place everyone died. That instrument isn’t playing on the soundtrack, so Afghanistan is definitely in the MIDDLE OF THE EAST.

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Stuff’s still smoldering. Dudes be checking out passports and what-not.

(Another?) Humvee pulls up and an American lieutenant colonel, not Nic Cage, gets out to address an Afghani major, also not Nic Cage.

The major informs the Lt. Col. that something very bad has (obviously) happened here. And that “we” are investigating it. The use of “we” catches the American off guard. Until we, with them, turn to look in the background, where a woman in a red hjiab (!) is inspecting a body on a stretcher. CARTER!

The camera pushes between the two military men in a nice Steadicam shot that drifts gracefully toward her and then … we cut to an awkward static shot of the two men just staring at her. Which is kind of, what?

Carter is using an app on her cellphone on the dead face of Hacker Woman. Why does her face look like that? She got shot in the back? Are we concerned that she wouldn’t look dead enough in this scene? She’s in a body bag. Maybe the app will explain this to us.

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The Lt. Col. sighs. This is totally such a Carter thing to be doing?

Carter confirms as the men approach, that this is, in fact, “Islavia Poskova,” (sp?) wanted for money smuggling, arms laundering and drug ... uh, dealing? Something like those.

Lt. Col. asks who Carter is. I guess he doesn’t know her. And Carter introduces herself as “Rossi,” from Interpol. (Is her full name Carter Rossi? This is more confusing than the shootout.)

Lt Col. seems bored and unreceptive to this. He proceeds to ID Glasses Dude as “Donovan,” CEO of a Large Construction Company (LCC). Which there are a lot of in Bahstan Maass. So I buy it.

We learn, as the Lt. Col.’s speech seems a bit unsynced from how his mouth is moving, that Donovan would set up local companies to bid on American reconstruction contracts.

“War profiteering,” the Major concludes.

“Mmmhmm,” the Lt. Col. mmmhmms.

Carter is all ears as the Lt. Col. notes that Donovan had, before dying, stolen close to a hundred million ... over the last two years. At hearing that this amount had been stolen, or that it had been stolen over the past two years, Carter’s eyebrows shoot up with surprise. Then she looks down and tries not to laugh … for some reason. I’m serious.

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Carter and the Major run the Lt. Col. through the what and how of what happened. Cars blown up. Prey captured. 5.56 ammo used. But also a big sniper gun. Probably an American one.

Carter suspects to no one in particular that this was the work of Donovan’s own team. All ex-special forces. They are the ones she is (now?) chasing.

“Why,” the Lt. Col. (and my own brain) asks. “What’s Interpol’s take in this?”

Carter explains they killed a bunch of other people. In addition to all the people here. But also, one of Carter’s own agents. An agent we would probably eventually learn was her husband. Or boyfriend. Or partner. Or the new guy, freshly married with baby on the way, and who was very insistent about showing off a photo of his family before he got bulldozered.

From all this for some reason, the Lt. Col. concludes that Carter is getting close. To Bootman and his crew?

The Lt. Col. nods. Yeah. With Donovan trying to run they probably panicked.

No way, Carter corrects him. These guys don’t panic.

(Oh I see what we’re doing here …)

“They adapt,” Carter says.

As she continues, I super-get where this is going.