La Femme Nikita: A Time For Every Purpose

Jones: "Always trust your father."This episode had a certain symmetry to it, a synchronicity bordering on predestination.His son, her father. It was satisfying to see Michael and Nikita working together and trusting each other under the most serious and emotional of circumstances. Early in the episode, Nikita chose Michael over her absentee, manipulative father. Not a surprise. Jones

La Femme Nikita: Let No Man Put Asunder

Nikita: "I lied."Michael: "I know."Bride of Section. Can you believe the extreme wedding imagery?Nikita met Michael in a church. She was wearing a long coat and a kerchief that covered her hair. (Yes, black, but they're Section, after all.) She walked down the aisle and met Michael at the altar. Nikita said, "You want to do this?" and Michael said, "I do." Yes, there was an aggravating

La Femme Nikita: The Evil That Men Do

Walter: "Calm down."Nikita: "I've been calm long enough."This was an odd episode with a lot of separate pieces that weren't very cohesive: Nikita vs. Operations, Michael and the Collective, Quinn undercover for Mr. Jones, Adam tacked on at the end.Operations and Nikita, celebrity death match. It's high noon, and there's no room in Section for both of them. The struggle for power between

La Femme Nikita: The Man Behind the Curtain

Nikita: "You think you can just pass this along like a family business?"Jones: "Why not?"Michael showed up at the end of the episode looking like an extra in a biker movie. Have we ever seen him looking that shaggy? Who cares? Damn, I was glad to see him.Casting Edward Woodward as "Jones" was a good move. You look at him and believe he's a powerful man. Too bad Jones is such an

La Femme Nikita: All the World's a Stage

Walter: "The truth will set you free."Nikita: "Not in this place."I can feel a Mick-related tirade coming on.When Mick was revealed as Mr. Jones in the middle of season four, silly me, I thought it was cool. When it was revealed at the end of season four that Nikita worked for him, I was only partially on board because, come on, three years? What about all the times we saw them together in

La Femme Nikita: In Through the Out Door

Operations: "He's right. The place is falling apart."Section isn't doing very well, what with the personnel shortage and constant equipment failures and a new arch nemesis and all. And Operations is taking every opportunity to try to bring Nikita down. What a time for the Gelman process to kick back in, huh?"Michael, help me." Was that really Michael who was communicating with her through

La Femme Nikita: A Girl Who Wasn't There

Operations: "If Madeline were alive, this wouldn't be happening."We finally got to say goodbye to Madeline. Her death was almost an afterthought at the end of season four. This was an episode they really needed to do.Yes, Operations missed his Madeline. And they were lovely together here. My favorite scene was the two of them dancing cheek to cheek in the perch. It was nice to see the

La Femme Nikita: Deja Vu All Over Again

Operations: "Am I in command, or is she?"Okay, better.This episode made me think about a line from "The Princess Bride:" "Fool, fool, back to the beginning is the rule." The writers almost immediately addressed everything that went wrong in "Four Light Years Farther" and made a valiant attempt to clarify Nikita's motives as well as reconcile conflicting plot threads.Nikita did what she did

La Femme Nikita: Four Light Years Farther

Nikita: "You can live without me a lot better than I can live without you."Michael: "No."This episode made me want to run screaming out of the room. This was how they were going to end the series? Are you kidding me?It actually started out very well. I was totally taken in by Operations and Madeline deciding that the only solution to the Michael/Nikita problem was to kill one of them. In

La Femme Nikita: Up the Rabbit Hole

Jason: "Hey, Walter. What's up?"Walter: "My faith in humanity."And they were back on a boat together. How appropriate.It was utterly lovely to see Michael and Nikita so happy together, literally sailing off into the sunset. This would have been a wonderful way to end the series, and I sort of wish that's just what they had done. There were just a few things that bothered me, though. A few

La Femme Nikita: Face in the Mirror

Grenet: "In Section, I suppose passion is out of the question."Was this for real? Please tell me it wasn't. Please.This was an interesting and confusing episode, and wow, did it bother me. During the second half, I kept hoping the whole thing was some sort of covert mission that only Nikita knew about, but even that wouldn't explain what she was doing. Nikita's love for Michael has been

La Femme Nikita: Time Out of Mind

Nikita: "The toxin is where the bulls run. Why are you on TV?"This was the second episode in a row that Nikita spent dressed in white, tied to a bed, and injected with stuff against her will. There was even another lunatic mother and son. I wouldn't mind if this had been a good episode. This was not a good episode.Right off the bat, I had oh so many problems with this one. They drugged

La Femme Nikita: Toys in the Basement

Operations: "If you have to grieve, do it on your own time."Michael: "You owe me fifteen days."The whole psycho in the basement plot left me cold. It's been done so many times, let's face it, and much, much better. At least Mrs. Collins turned out to be a psycho Betty Crocker instead of a mouldering body in a wig. And Henry wasn't your typical serial killer type since he was healing

La Femme Nikita: Sleeping With the Enemy

Nikita: "What did you expect? Horns and cloven hooves?"More extreme carrying on with Red Cell, as they exchanged key operatives with Section to ensure a truce while fighting off a deadly third party. Second in command for second in command. Madeline for Red Cell superwoman Satin. Dark hair, dark eyes, cold demeanor... Satin even looked like a younger version of Madeline. Maybe Madeline's

La Femme Nikita: Catch a Falling Star

Nikita: "So Dingman's Hollow is..."Michael: "Section Six."The initial crash felt like the precursor of an alien invasion, and at first, I was worried that we were getting another sci-fi plot. I was relieved that it was a downed satellite and a terrorist sleeper base instead of the Section version of "Invasion of the Body Snatchers."This assignment was yet another friendly attempt by

La Femme Nikita: Abort, Fail, Retry, Terminate

Walter: "It's going to be okay, sugar."Nikita: "No, Walter. It's never going to be okay."Maybe this one should have been called, "Ego, Superego, Id, Kaboom." Omigod, did I hate it. I hated it even before Birkoff died.This episode went right over the line into science fiction, and it wasn't even good science fiction. A couple of the scenes were direct rip-offs of 2001. "Would you like to

La Femme Nikita: Line in the Sand

Hillinger: "After all we've been through, it really couldn't end any other way."Last week, the return of Elena and Adam. This week, the return of the exceptionally annoying Hillinger.Even though he was supposed to be brilliant, Hillinger was stupid enough to betray the organization just to make Birkoff look bad. Sabotaging such a hugely important mission for such a petty reason was taking

La Femme Nikita: Kiss the Past Goodbye

Corliss: "You gotta stay detached, Michael. It's the only way to do this job."Finally, a return to Michael's family. It was about time.Michael must have suspected right away that Corliss wasn't just a boyfriend, because I can't imagine Michael begrudging Elena another relationship. And he was right to be concerned, since Operations was ready to use Elena and Adam as bait with no more

La Femme Nikita: Hell Hath No Fury

Leon: "For us, it's the thrill of the game that makes our hearts pound."We appear to be in the middle-of-the-season Michael/Nikita relationship hiatus, so what did we get? Proof that Michael and Nikita aren't the only ones who can screw for Section.This was a particularly intense episode, a Madeline emotional tour-de-force. And Alberta Watson was just terrific. For that matter, so was Colm

La Femme Nikita: Time To Be Heroes

Nikita: "Do you think they'll make it?"Michael: "No."Yes, they've played house in the past, but this time, Michael and Nikita got to play Section. They were assigned to train their own little squad of Section Muppet Babies.Something didn't feel quite right about the whole situation, but I was still surprised when the battle turned into a bloodbath suicide mission. Operations and Madeline