‘Brilliant Minds’ Outdoes Itself Again In Episode 5

I’m wondering where the ceiling of Brilliant Minds is. With each instalment I find a new high-water mark, and Episode 5, “The Haunted Marine”, is the latest. It doesn’t just have a very compelling case at its core, but has some of the best interactions between the interns, the most progress in the John Doe plot, and almost a first date between Wolf and Nichols.

What more could you ask for? Anyway, let’s talk about the marine.

The Haunted Marine

Needless to say, the Marine, Steve Hill, isn’t really haunted. But he has all the signs. He’s suffering from confusion and paranoia, and he’s seeing ghosts. His wife is heavily pregnant and he doesn’t want to be a burden to her and his child by breaking down every time he goes to tie his shoes.

Steve has a theory, which is that the military implanted a microchip in his brain. Luckily, Brilliant Minds doesn’t go down this conspiratorial route. Steve never saw combat. He was miles away firing long-range artillery. And yet, somehow, most of his former unit is dead, some by accidental overdoses and some by suicide.

Through Nichols, who has some military experience himself, Wolf theorizes that Steve has CTE caused by relentlessly firing howitzers. It’s incurable, but it can be managed with the right approach – especially once Steve is fairly compensated for his service despite his wrongful dishonorable discharge.

Daddy Issues

There’s a lot bundled up in this subplot. You don’t just have the approach to CTE, but also veteran’s affairs – Steve was discharged for trying to disclose military secrets, not willingly but as a consequence of his condition – and Wolf’s past.

Flashbacks crack a window into a camping trip Wolf went on with his father, who I don’t think had CTE, but had some neurodegenerative disease that caused him to be excessively paranoid. He stopped taking his medication – which Wolf knew about but Muriel didn’t; another thing, like being asked to live with him after the divorce, that Wolf’s father thoughtlessly saddled him with – and believed people were out to get Wolf because he was a messiah.

The Marine story also ropes Carol and Nichols into the A-plot more directly. Nichols takes Wolf to a shooting range to give him a first-hand demonstration of how firing heavy artillery might rattle one’s noggin, and while I’m not sure this strictly constitutes a first date, that’s what I’m taking it as.

Alex Ozerov-Meyer and Zachary Quinto in Brilliant Minds | Image via NBC

John Doe Is Russian (Maybe)

After the breakthrough with John Doe in the previous episode, Wolf thinks he has locked-in syndrome (LiS), a neurological disorder caused by damage to the brain stem, often by a stroke – which John Doe has had.

Sufferers of LiS are completely paralyzed but they can communicate using their eyes, which the interns try to coax John Doe into doing throughout Brilliant Minds Episode 5. It’s one step forward and two steps back – sometimes he seems to be answering binary questions accurately, sometimes he doesn’t. But when Mrs. Petrov, a visitor who keeps trying to smoke in the hospital, walks past John Doe’s room noisily shouting in Russian, he responds enthusiastically.

With the help of Mrs. Petrov’s translation and a board showing the Cyrillic Russian alphabet, John Doe is able to communicate a message – “Don’t leave me.” Wolf, of course, has no intention of doing so. But his latest idea is to have Nichols implant a chip in his brain – inspired by Steve’s conspiracy theory – to create a machine-based communication system. Risky stuff.

And Another Thing…

“The Haunted Marine” also has some stuff going on with the interns:

• Van tells Dana about Wolf having diagnosed him with Mirror-touch synesthesia but swears her to secrecy. Of course, she subsequently tells everyone. This is a bit of a d*ck move on Dana’s part, but to be fair Van later reveals that he told her because he knew she’d save him the trouble of having to tell everyone individually.
• Ericka and Jacob definitely have a thing for each other, though Ericka in particular doesn’t seem sure about how to proceed. They’re chalk and cheese personality-wise – Ericka is buttoned-up and careerist, while Jacob is a party-hard failed athlete who doubts his competency as a doctor. At one point in Brilliant Minds Episode 5 Jacob turns up at Ericka’s place drunk and tries to kiss her. She rejects him but lets him sleep on the couch, and in the morning he doesn’t seem to be able to remember anything.