Warning: Fullfor Season 3 follow..

I've never formally reviewed a Person of Interest season before, but I think we can all agree that the show has steadily risen in quality since the start - each season being better than the previous. Which is the ultimate goal of TV, I'd say. To escalate drama, raise stakes, and sharpen emotions in a genuine-feeling way as the series progresses. What makes this particular season of TV stand out even more is the fact that it currently resides on a network not exactly known for shaking up the status quo of its shows (there are exceptions, naturally). And by the end of the Person of Interest's Season 3 finale, "Deus Ex Machina," the series had ascended to new heights with a series of shocking, game-changing chess maneuvers.If the closing moments of Season 2 can be looked as as a victory for our heroes (though with threats looming on the horizon), Season 3 is the year they really took it in the teeth. Backed into such a corner by the end that overcoming the sheer momentum of Samaritan wasn't even an option. It was all they could do just to scurry off into the darkness. Or, if we're talking in POI terms, actually becoming normal unassuming citizens with a digital footprint so as to hide from a super-computer searching for anomalies.

IGN's Post-Finale Q&A with Person of Interest EPs Jonathan Nolan and Greg Plageman

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Structurally, aside from the unnerving distribution of episodes during the first three months of 2014 (gotta spread out the 23 episodes), Season 3 was strong. And I loved the way the first act was devoted to the pyrrhic wrapping up of one of the show's biggest threats since day one - HR. A storyline that cost Joss Carter her life and revealed to us that actress Taraji P. Henson's ultimate fate had already been decided way back when she took on the role. Much to the chagrin of many mourning fans, the character wasn't meant to last. And thematically, with her character's story being so connected to the crimes of HR, it made sense for Carter to give her life in order to take them down. Plus, with Finch's group ever-expanding, Joss' role had become marginalized to the point where she was basically just doing her own HR-related side investigations. Shaw was now another gun, Root would grow to be an extraordinary ally, and Carter herself had already helped both Reese and Fusco become more well-rounded redemptive characters.All that being said, the moment when Reese held a dying Carter in his arms gutted me. And the fact that that specific moment (and storyline in general) now seems so distant only speaks to how many great things have happened on the show since the fall. For the sake of frugality, let's just review some of the wonderful moments from this past season. There was Root becoming, essentially, a Philip K. Dick-style "precog" and escaping the mental hospital. Then we had the amazing trio of episodes with "Endgame," "The Crossing," and "The Devil's Share" - making up bulk of the HR arc. Soon after, actor Saul Rubinek gave an amazing performance as Arthur, Finch's old MIT classmate who had invented his own thinking/categorizing surveillance system called Samaritan. And in those same episodes came the reveal of Camryn Manheim as Control.And all the while, a new group of adversaries was introduced in the form of uber-patriotic, pro-privacy mercenaries Vigilance. Who, at the time, seemed to have been brought in to fill the "villain gap" left by HR. Not that Vigilance's ideas and tactics weren't interesting from the start, but Person of Interest has always thrived best when there were multiple threats lingering in the background. Little did I know that Vigilance wasn't even truly it's own entity. It wasn't a new, extra group for our heroes to contend with (though they did always show up at the worst possible moments). They were directly connected to the Decima storyline which began back at the end of Season 2. The show wasn't simply filling out its rogues' gallery - Vigilance and Decima were interwoven. Both meant to drive us into the season finale where Greer's mad plan triumphed over all. Clever, contemplative storytelling.I do realize, that as Person of Interest has grown more serialized, I've become less patient with the stand-alone episodes. Especially ones that strangely ape other properties as with episodes like "Provenance" and "Last Call." Because if there's anything Person of Interest doesn't need to do, it's shift its tone by borrowing from Ocean's 11 or 2013's The Call. It already has style, wit, and complexity in spades. Though, to be fair, some of the stand-alone "number of the week" episodes did wind up directly tying into the larger arc. Much more so than in previous seasons. Both "PA37ABOP" and "The Perfect Mark" wound up feeding into the HR story while "Most Likely To..." brought Vigilance into the mix.And, much like last year's "Relevance" (which introduced Shaw), "RAM" represented this season's chapter of creative playfulness. The "time out" that helped expand the world of the show by giving us a fuller picture of what was going on. "RAM" may have also been helpful to those viewers in need of something that tied everything together, as its final minutes (set to Radiohead's "I Might Be Wrong") showed us the exact track of the pinball, from Finch's first "employee" Mr. Derringer (who Finch himself had to bury in a shallow grave!) to the current storyline.And speaking of songs, Johnny Cash's cover of "Hurt," two Radiohead tracks, and Daughter's "Medicine" were all expertly used this season to heighten emotion and perfectly round out some episodes. Or in "Hurt"'s case, hauntingly kick off an episode.More often than not, the character of Reese might have felt like an afterthought given the swelling of the "numbers" team, but I don't consider this a bad thing. The show had focused on him and his torment for a few years and it had gotten to the point where things could easily get repetitive. Person of Interest is still on-point when it comes to their use of flashbacks and one of the reasons why is because they still use them carefully. Being three years in now, we could easily get Reese's "flying a kite" episode (LOST fans out there will know the reference), but with so many other characters on the show, Reese might now represent the least of our interests, story-wise. Which is fine. Characters should serve the story. And he did. Especially the way he temporarily quit after they lost Carter.Plus, if we're looking for newfound crowd-pleasers, Root and Shaw fit the bill nicely. Not only do their team-ups come to us teeming with flirtatious bickering, but Root herself has grown into somewhat of a show-stopping badass. The way she, now gifted with Machine-driven foresight, blasts bad guys away with two guns. Plus, the somewhat haughty, cryptic way she half-explains things to anyone caught up in her cyber-cyclone. All due respect to her star-making performance as Winifred Burkle/Illyria on Angel, but this is Amy Acker's best role.