Foyle's War - The Cage - Episode Review

My review of last week's episode: The Eternity Ring

If one is a detective, it’s a fairly certain occupational hazard that your privacy will be violated by a man—wounded in some manner—stumbling into your office, gasps out a cryptic phrase to the tune of “Purple Elephant!”, and falls dead.

“This man has been murdered, Holmes!”

It had to happen. Except, in this case, the man stumbles into a hospital, gasping out the phrase “Ten I!” Meanwhile, a woman gets a mysterious phone call, promptly disappearing and playing merry hell with operations at MI5.

Things are a bit less chaotic than episode one—Foyle is starting to settle into his new job (because, let’s face it, he has nothing to do in retirement but fish and drink scotch), Sam is finding her feet as Foyle’s secretary, and Adam has begun awkwardly campaigning in the dastardly world of politics. And how’s life at the work place? Horowitz has spun a world of lies, interdepartmental spying, and blackmail. Needless to say, Foyle doesn’t fit in. Though actually, he does a bit. Foyle isn’t above using a little misdirection, but it’s still his tenacity that gets him through.

This case takes a lot of tenacity. In this new world, not only the baddies but the goodies are trying to obstruct Foyle’s investigation—and it’s becoming increasingly difficult to tell the difference between the two.

The dead man with the cryptic message turns out to be Russian, connected with a nearby military facility that’s up to some shady business. Foyle may be working for MI5, but he isn’t Bond. Rather than do his own dirty work, he finds an extremely unlikely method to circumvent this, which results in a rather fun (but again, pretty unbelievable) action sequence. Like the first episode, we have a modified whodunit—searching for a mole rather than a murderer. Story-wise, I find this episode less interesting, especially with the meandering subplot of Adam’s politics. As an aside: Sam would make a much better politician. Foyle was too complacent at times—one obnoxious policemen was just asking to be given a trademark Foyle dressing down.

Wrongdoing is widespread, but the episode also gives us a glimpse of hope: that some good may be done, even in a corrupt system.

My review of next week's episode: Sunflower

3 of 5 stars.

Longish