The beans are made out of guns

Mmmmm...what a delicious Leverage tonight. I knew I was in for a treat when I saw that series creator John Rogers wrote tonight's episode. Ladies and gentlemen, may I present...Part 1 of the season finale.

The client this week is Team Leverage's favorite cop, a lieutenant who is the go-to guy when a job needs to end with the mark in cuffs. He's been shot up by FBI agents (or "agents") after he shows them a thick file regarding the corrupion of the mayor, played by "Spin City"'s Richard Kind. No one plays weaselly better than him. Nate goes to visit the cop's wife in the hospital, sees his son, and has flashbacks to his own son (i.e., the reason Nate is currently Nate). We cut to Nate leaving (likely drunken) phone messages for Sophie, rambling on and on until Tara shows up to take him upstairs to plan the job. The gig seems simple enough; trick the mayor into giving them a bribe (in this case, to build a baseball stadium on land he secretly owns), then use that to set him up and get him caught by the good guys. Lot of funny bits in this episode: Parker complaining about never getting to do anything fun (right before jumping off a bridge), Tara taking over Sophie's mentor role while walking Parker through a con, Elliot going from baseball hater to power hitting local hero, Hardison and Parker hitting all the local sports talk shows in order to spread rumors about the local team moving, and probably a couple more I missed. The con turns sour at the end, as it turns out that the mayor is an FBI snitch. Some quick thinking (and the sacrifice of Hardison's beloved van) gets the team out of the trap, but their troubles aren't over yet...because here comes Sterling. James Sterling, Interpol.

And "To Be Continued". Awesome cliffhanger, as the team has to recover from a loss, and now they're being pursued by Sterling backed by the FBI (and his own considerable authority at this point). I don't think I'm spoiling anything when I say that this is the perfect situation for Sophie to make her return in, so next week's episode should be extra sweet.

Thursday comedies/Burn Notice may be a little late, I've got tickets to see Michael Ian Black (of the very underrated "Stella") and then I'm going to Austin to see "Web Soup"'s Chris Hardwick do standup. I'll likely have reviews of those up here once I get back.