- Title: Burn Notice – Bitter Pill
- wiki: link
Michael (Jeffrey Donovan), Sam (Bruce Campbell), Fiona (Gabrielle Anwar), and Jesse‘s (Coby Bell) assignment from James (John Pyper-Ferguson) to protect a Middle Eastern reformer (Christopher Maher) from an assassination attempt runs into problems with the man is poisoned. With less than 24-hours, Jesse and Fi try to convince the local Libyan drug maker (Sammy Sheik) who designed the poison to give them the antidote by kidnapping him, throwing him out a window, and watching as Schneider (David Meunier), James’ assigned field leader for the team, poisons their hostage with his own poison in a last-ditch attempt to get him to give up the cure.
Although Fi and Jesse are able to get their hands on the antidote, a double-cross and Schneider’s quick shooting get the threesome pinned down inside the now dead drug dealer’s factory. Schneider and Jesse are able to make it out before the factory goes up in a blaze, but when Schneider abandons a trapped Fi to save himself Michael is forced to brave the flames to save the woman he loves and leave Schneider at the mercy of his master.
In the episode’s B-story James is forced to pay a visit to Maddie (Sharon Gless) who begins acting erratically after she realizes she’s being watched by the underlings of Michael’s new friend. Given Michael’s lack of concern for the situation and his half-hearted attempt to save the man who almost got Fi killed it would appear that Mr. Westen has fallen more under the sway of his new friend and his righteous cause than anyone would like to admit. Aside from Michael’s continued fall in to darkness the episode also suggests James’ organization is even more well-informed and equipped than the team had realized as Fi remarks that their weapons cache is a candy store of goodies that could do real harm in the wrong hands.
