Leverage: The Miracle Job (Episode 104)

The Patron Saint of thieves.First and foremost, Merry Christmas/Chanukah/Yule/random day in December!  I hope everyone had a great day!

This week’s episode is brought to you buy the Catholic Church.  Here there be shameless commercialism, gang violence, and false miracles, but the real tragedy is that we have an entire episode about a church and somehow none of our boys dress up like priests.  WTF, show?  Wasted opportunity much?

A priest, Father Paul, and a woman walk away from St. Nicolas’ Church, discussing an upcoming meeting with the City Council.  It seems the city wants to close down the church, and an embittered Fr. Paul practices a speech he will give begging the Council to leave the church alone.  Just then a group of thugs comes up behind them and start attacking the father.  Oh, they are going to be in trouble when they die!  I once had to say three Hail Mary’s for arguing with my sister, so I don’t even want to know what sort of prayer it’s going to take to cleanse these souls.  Fr. Paul manages to give one of the thugs a solid punch to the shoulder before they take him down.  The woman screams for help and the thugs finally walk away, leaving Fr. Paul semi-conscious on the ground.

At Leverage headquarters, Eliot and Hardison are desperately trying to avoid Sophie.  When she finds them and thanks them for attending her play the previous night, they stutter out lies about how amazing she was.  How adorable is it that these guys go to her plays?  They all seem to have developed genuine friendships through Leverage, and I couldn’t love it more if I tried.  Parker also gives her review of the play.  The good news: it was awesome in the way that a horror movie is awesome; the bad news: it was Death of a Salesman.  Wow, this theatre must be really crappy if it had to a) hire Sophie to play the male lead and b) hire Sophie at all.  The second Sophie leaves the room Eliot confesses that last night was “the worst night of [his] life, though Hardison thinks he’s exaggerating.  We get a brief flashback of someone playing Russian Roulette with Eliot’s head, but when he returns to the present he still insists that the play was worth.  Based on our past experiences with Sophie’s acting, I can believe it.  Sophie goes into Geek Central to see Nate, who immediately praises her performance and accidentally reveals that he didn’t really see the show.  Just when they’re all about to get down to business, Nate gets a call from someone named Maggie.  Sophie looks very uncomfortable, and informs the team that Maggie is Nate’s ex-wife.

Maggie also seems to be a parishioner at St. Nicolas’, because she’s calling in regards to the attack on Fr. Paul.  Nate visits Fr. Paul in his hospital room after reading the police report of the incident.  It’s uncomfortable for him, because he cannot separate hospitals from memories of his son’s death.  Neither man believes that the attack was unrelated to Fr. Paul’s meeting with the City Council.  Regardless, Fr. Paul has resigned himself to the church’s closing and asks Nate to attend his last mass.  “It’s not going to be your last mass,” Nate tells him, and he leaves to go “help God’s plan along.”

The team gathers in St. Nicolas’ Church.  There is a fairly large statue of St. Nicolas at the back of the church, and Parker is convinced that he’s actually Santa.  Hee.  It’s pretty clear to everyone that whoever attacked Fr. Paul did so to make sure that nothing stopped the church’s closing.  Hardison informs the group that a company called Kennedy Corp. bought the church via a number of shell companies.  Once everyone has their assigned jobs, Nate has a brief flashback of his son’s baptism in the same church.  The child’s mother and godparents are mysteriously absent from the flashback, but whatever.  When we get back to the present Nate tells Sophie that Fr. Paul is an old friend, and it is suddenly apparent just how important this case is to him.

Eliot and Hardison walk through a tunnel to lure a local gun.  This all seems pretty par for the course for Eliot, but Hardison is about one sudden movement from shitting his pants.  The gang shows up and the leader tries to intimidate Eliot by showing him the gun tucking in his pants (not like that!)  Eliot quickly responds by grabbing the gun, removing the safety and keeping in pointed at the leader’s penis.  Awesome.  Another thug immediately holds a gun about an inch from Eliot’s face.  “See, this is why I don’t like guns,” Eliot says.  “They have a specific range of efficacy.  Most guys make one mistake; they get too close.”  With that, he quickly knocks the gun out of the would-be shooter’s hand and knocks the man to the ground with a fierce headbutt.  That whole “range of efficacy” thing may be true, but I don’t buy it as the only reason Eliot doesn’t like guns.  There is most definitely some gun-related trauma in this guy’s past.  In any case, Eliot asks who beat Fr. Paul up, but the leader insists that they would never hurt a priest.  One gang member is hanging back, looking generally suspicious.  Hardison pushes him to the ground and the main cries out in the pain when his shoulder is jostled, revealing that he was the thug Fr. Paul punched.  The gang leader doesn’t take kindly to this news.  He holds his gun at the thug until the man tells Eliot and Hardison everything he knows.  All he can give them is the number of the person who hired him for the job, but that’s all Hardison needs.

The team gathers at Geek Central, where Hardison informs them that the call came from a pay phone.  This pay phone is located outside of a luxury apartment complex owned by Andrew Grant, who probably owns the shell companies that bought the church.  The man is “a media whore” who constantly goes through publicists and who takes a boatload of anti-anxiety pills.  The ribbon cutting of the apartment complex is the next day, so the team plans to make their move then.

Over at the apartment complex, things are kind of a mess.  Grant (a hilarious Scott Lowell) verbally abuses his assistant Tomas, blaming him for pretty much everything that has been going wrong.  Sophie approaches him as a reporter, but he tells her to go down to the press conference.  Eliot, Hardison, and Parker are all disguised as construction workers.  Parker knocks into him and sneakily switches his anti-anxiety medication with another pill bottle.  A moment later Eliot flips Tomas with a wheel barrel, effectively separating him from his boss.  Meanwhile, Grant and Sophie get on an elevator to the ground floor.  Mid-trip the elevator stops, and Grant freaks out.  He pops several of his pills, not knowing that Parker replaced them with speed.  Yes, speed.  Because Parker is awesome.  The results are predicable hilarious.  Grant has an epic freak out, screaming that he’s “going to fire every one of you!”  Naturally, the press can hear him, and Grant starts freaking out about how he’s just ruined his reputation.  Sophie quickly solves this problem by letting Grant pick her up and tell the press that she fainted.  While the paramedics attend to her, Grant whispers that he’ll give her an interview.

When Sophie meets Grant in his office for said interview, he has a little surprise for her; he’s making her his new publicist.  She takes the job on the condition that there be no secrets between them, and he agrees.  As a result, the team learns that Grant plans to build a “lifestyle center” on the site of the church. They discuss it back at Geek Central; Grant doesn’t want anyone to know that he had a hand in closing the church, but he’s made sure that nothing will stand in the way of his building plans.  In light of this discovery, they realize that three days is not enough time to pull off the con.  The only thing they can do is try to buy themselves more time, and the only way to do that is to fake a miracle.  Nate knows an awful lot about miracles, as he once went to seminary school.  You know, for some reason I have no problem seeing him in seminary school.  It just seems to fit with the character.  The team is quite a bit more surprised than I am, especially since faking a miracle will “put them in mortal sin territory.”  The Catholic Church also says that stealing and lying are mortal sins, so you guys are already down for time in the pit.  Plus, all you have to do to get rid of a mortal sin is go to confession, so it’s really not all that “mortal” to begin with.  Get a new argument, guys. 

The team eventually agrees to go along with the plan.  Parker poses as a nurse and fakes Fr. Paul’s test results to keep him in the hospital and away from the church.  Sophie leaks Grant’s plans to build the new mall, giving him a ton of negative press.  When she talks to Tomas about the plans, he says that Grant’s plans will “sweep out the gangs,” but there seems to be an undercurrent of nostalgia for his hometown in his words.  Grant doesn’t share this nostalgia, and is simply distraught about the bad pr.  Sophie suggests that they hold a press conference at the church about how his mall will open “new opportunities for all.”  He loves the idea, and immediately restarts his verbal abuse on Tomas.

Back at Leverage headquarters, Hardison has made quite a few replicas of the St. Nicolas statue we saw earlier.  He’s got a bunch of different “miracles” prepared, including bleeding ears and a “stigmata paintball gun.” Too bad he can’t aim for shit, as Eliot happily points out to him.  “Everybody can’t be Eliot,” Hardison replies testily, as Parker warns them not to “melt Santa.” I love them all.  Nate meets Sophie in another room, and tells him that all systems are a go.  She also asks how talking to his ex-wife was.  “Strange,” he says, and he confesses that he still feels guilty about something unnamed.  “You never cheated on her, Nate,” Sophie says.  “Tempted,” Nate corrects her, and it’s blindingly clear that Sophie is the temptress in question.  They briefly talk about their relationship then and now, and gaze longingly at one another before Sophie tells Nate not to take too long figuring out exactly where he stands with her.  FYI, next to the dictionary entry for “eye-fucking” there is a screencap from this scene.

Over at the church, Grant is giving his press conference when the woman from the opening scene interrupts him.  She declares that there’s a miracle in the church, and everyone goes inside to see the statue of St. Nicolas crying what appear to be real tears.  Outside, Hardison reveals that he did some fancy chemistry thing that makes the statue cry whenever someone lights a candle.  Alrightly then.  The church is absolutely swarming with people, and the team realizes that they might not be able to control the ramifications of what they’ve done.  Despite everyone’s doubts, Nate is feeling pretty good about the whole situation.  That is, until Fr. Paul gets a hold of him.  The good father is pretty pissed about the whole situation, as he’s guessed that Nate planted a fake miracle.  Nate refuses to tell him anything, but assures him he’s “got it covered.”  Fr. Paul does not look reassured.

Meanwhile, Sophie meets with Grant at his office.  He’s actually not freaking out, and claims that the miracle gave him “a crisis of conscience.”  For a moment everything seems to be looking up, but then Grant reveals that this crisis has inspired him to build Bibletopia at the site of the church.  It will include the statue, food courts, St. Nicolas bobbleheads, and a sea that parts every half hour.  Perhaps this reaction is sacrilegious, but goddamn.  That is some crazy shit right there.  And it’s pretty fucking improbable, since the Catholic Church would almost certainly find a way to seize the site and declare it a shrine if they found that the miracle was legit.  They don’t mess around with this stuff.  Of course, Grant doesn’t actually think that the miracle is real, which means that when the inevitable investigation happens and the Church debunks the statue, his whole Bibletopia idea won’t be worth a cent.  But whatever, apparently this is a legitimate threat, so just go with it.

It’s still five kinds of crazy over at the church.  The team is just about out of idea when the whole situation gets even worse; investigators from the Vatican arrive.  Everyone except Sophie and Nate book it at that point, because they are seriously in some deep shit now.  If the Vatican finds that the statue is a fraud they’ll blame Fr. Paul, so Nate is going to have to undo the con.  A more immediate concern presents itself when Fr. Paul tries to confess the fraud to the visiting priests.  Nate drags him into a confessional and starts to explain the fraud, but Fr. Paul won’t let him until he phrases it as a confession.  He isn’t repentant for what he’s done because he did everything for the right reasons, but Fr. Paul doesn’t buy the whole “ends justify the means” thing.  He also thinks that Nate’s actions border on suicidal, and that maybe his true mission isn’t to save the church but to save his friend. 

Grant arrives at the church and is actually pleased to see that the Vatican has arrived.  He sees the situation as win/win for him, since he’ll look good if the miracle is a fraud and he’ll get the land deed ripped out of his hands by the Pope to open Bibletopia if it’s declared real.  Again, whatever.  While Grant schmoozes with the Vatican, Tomas gets a contemplative look on his face and decides to go to confession.  Looks like it’s only a matter of time before that shoe drops. 

Commercials!  Does anyone else keep thinking that the lady in the HP commercial is Parker until they reveal that it’s Fergie?  Nope, just me?  Okay them, moving on!

The team is pretty much freaking out, since any scientific test will prove that the statue isn’t crying real tears.  Isn’t any form of liquid falling from the eyes of a statue pretty miraculous?  Since they can’t just steal the statue without making Fr. Paul look guilty, Nate wants to make it “miraculously disappear” in the middle of mass the next day.  Everyone thinks he’s crazy, but the man cannot be stopped.  Cut to the mass, and holy crap, I can still recite the entire thing by memory.  Get out of my head, Catholic school!  While Fr. Paul is giving his homily about how miracles shouldn’t be necessary to inspire faith, Parker repels down the back of the church and grabs the statue (it’s no longer too heavy for her to lift, since they already replaced the real one with a light one Hardison made earlier).  A little girl sees her do it, but she thinks that Parker is an angel, and declares this believe when everyone else notices that the statue is gone a moment later.  Fr. Paul notices Parker standing outside, and declares to everyone that he knows what actually happen.  He leads them to a van outside, declaring that “there is no miracle” as he opens its doors to reveal the real statue.  Hardison exits the van with a registration saying that it’s owned by Grant.  Grant immediately says that he’s being framed and that Tomas can vouch for him.  Of course, he doesn’t know about Tomas’ recent crisis of conscience.  We get a flashback to Tomas’ time in the confessional, in which Nate possess as a priest and tells him to confess everything.  When we return to the present Tomas does just that.  Sophie finally reveals herself as a fraud to him, and as he’s carted off by the police he screams “are you even British?”  Awesome.

A bit later, Nate and Fr. Paul meet up inside of the church.  Nate says that Fr. Paul broke the seal of the confessional, doing the wrong thing for the right reason, and the father can’t really argue.  He says that Nate had better come to the next service, and Nate does not commit either way.  Fr. Paul leaves and Nate lights a memorial candle before joining the rest of the team in front of the returned statue.  When Parker reasserts her believe that St. Nicolas is Santa, Sophie reveals that he’s actually the patron saint of thieves, and the team leaves with the satisfaction of a job well done.