If Nina had to return to FBI, her story this time was the best possible way to use her.
FBI Season 8 Episode 11 had Nina and Scola butting heads over how she conducted her mission, demonstrating why it’s better that they remain on separate teams.
However, the conflict elevated this episode above standard FBI fare before culminating in the fastest TV wedding ever.
Scola Couldn’t Put His Fear Aside While Nina Took Risks
When FBI: Most Wanted was on the air, Nina and Scola’s relationship worked perfectly because they weren’t involved in the same missions and scheduled their workloads to ensure someone was always at home with Dougie.
Working together instead was as much of a disaster as I’d expected.
Scola saw everything as too dangerous. Nina wanted to answer to Jubal and Isobel, not him.
Their argument about it in front of the entire team was unprofessional, but it made for great TV!
The drama between them worked as well as it did because nobody was wrong.
Nina was doing her job — the same one she did under Remy Scott for years, without Scola getting a say in how she conducted it.
So for Scola to suddenly jump in with comments about how she was taking unnecessary risks and wasn’t thinking of their son had to grate on her last nerve, long before she exploded.
I was glad that Scola explained their arrangement, though, because I was wondering what had happened to it.
It seemed like the idea of working separate cases for Dougie’s sake had gone out the window.
Scola’s explanation didn’t really help since they seemed to be breaking their policy, but at least it acknowledged that it existed.
The Case on FBI Season 8 Episode 11 Was More Original Than I Expected
When Nina went undercover during the first scene, I expected her cover to be blown right away.
The setup seemed perfect for the type of case FBI has had over and over: Nina secretly in contact with the team while the target was away from the table, giving him the opportunity to overhear or otherwise figure out that she was an FBI agent.
Fortunately, that didn’t happen — it would have been boring and redundant, and there are no words for how much I hate the kidnapped agent types of stories that pop up on Dick Wolf crime dramas at least once a season.
Luka Has To Be One Of The Stupider Criminals FBI Has Targeted
Nina was pretty obvious in the way she pushed him to take her to the deal site with him at the beginning of FBI Season 8 Episode 11, but he never suspected a thing.
His behavior at the cartel wedding was even worse, making the shocked look on his face when Maggie and Nina re-arrested him at the end of the episode one of the most hilarious FBI moments ever.
He joked about them being FBI agents and thought he was being clever, then outed them for real when he was afraid the cartel would attack him.
How could he possibly think that his deal with the FBI was going to stick after doing that?
The Case Itself Was More Convoluted Than Interesting
Did anyone else find it difficult to understand exactly what FBI’s mission was?
I understood that Luka had given some kind of missle or something to the new cartel leaders and that there was a wedding involved, but it wasn’t clear exactly what crime they were trying to prove.
Obviously, they wanted to get the cartel leaders on general principles, but I couldn’t quite grasp what they were trying to prove they did this time.
The wedding setup was interesting, but other than Maggie snooping, there didn’t seem to be much investigating going on there before the big climactic scene.
I have to admit that I zoned out a bit once the shooting started.
I’m not a fan of these huge shootouts, which seem to be a staple of every FBI episode for some reason.
It’s not just that they’re violent. They’re all the same — bad guys with machine guns vs. good guys with handguns.
And in this case, I felt like the leader of a cartel should be less impulsive than Alicia Ortega was.
Deciding to shoot a crowd full of people because she didn’t know who was an FBI agent didn’t seem realistic for a woman in her position.
Maggie’s fight with the bouncer was more hilarious than exciting, too.
I know Maggie is skilled in self-defense, but the way she knocked him out when he’s supposed to be a trained cartel goon seemed unbelievable.
The computer stuff with Ian was surprisingly interesting, though.
I always enjoy the spy gadgets and whatnot that FBI uses to try to catch the bad guys, and I also was hoping that we would have more of Ian unscrambling the signal.
What about you? What were your thoughts about FBI Season 8 Episode 11?
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