We Have a New Fave Person on 'Hostages'

This week's Hostages was one of the bloodier episodes, no doubt. Toni Collette's Dr. Ellen and Dylan McDermott's Duncan continue to muck up each others' plans, but in an unexpected turn, Ellen's daughter becomes the wiliest character. We've all heard that adrenaline can drive someone to do something otherwise physically or mentally impossible (such as the tried-and-true example of a mother lifting a car off of her endangered baby). I've never cared to look into it, but I always assumed it was a myth. In this week's episode, Morgan proves me wrong. Morgan was chucking cars, er, tracking devices around left and right. Her survival instincts were TINGLING and no one was going to stop her. Here are the MVP highlights:

• When Ellen tells Morgan and Jake that they will have to cut out their microchips ("but, mo-om! I just got it," said Jake. Just kidding. He's not that dumb), Morgan is all business, no nonsense. While Jake is busy smoking/selling weed as some sort of "strategy," Morgan ransacks the nurse's supply drawers. Because if Morgan has learned anything from being a surgeon's daughter, it is that infection can KILL YA!

• Morgan is such a secret agent about those medical supplies. She rushes into the nurse's office and lies about a twisted ankle in the gymnasium. The nurse cares so much about helping this imaginary student that she doesn't bother to call the gym teacher to get more details. I'd definitely want to phone someone for info before I ran across campus. I'd make a terrible nurse. Good hustle, nurse!

• And then when the nurse returns (I missed whether or not she found a kid with a twisted ankle or not), she almost catches Morgan pilfering the supplies. Morgan's mind is going 350 mph, however, and cannot be bested. She says she needs something for stomach pain. The nurse has a memory for all of the students' ailments, and recalls Morgan complaining about nausea the week before. Morgan DOESN'T HAVE TIME to get flustered, and rushes on out of there.

• When it's time to cut out the tracking devices, Morgan can't find her idiot brother, Jake. Jake is busy getting stoned/hatching a plan. I don't know. Whenever Jake talks, I zone out. Thanks to the persistence and tunnel-vision of Morgan, the pair remove the devices. It's a disgusting scene. I recently got stitches for the first time and I nearly passed out. They didn't hurt, but I couldn't stop sweating. So seeing the gaping wound in Jake's back triggered a pavlovian response in me and I immediately began perspiring. Gross, all around.

• In a shocking twist, Jake is the one who realizes they can't smash the tracking devices (that move would send a huge red flag to the Hostage Squad), so he and Morgan cleverly leave the chips in the backpacks of two random students. Take that, Hostage Squad!

The efforts of Morgan (and Jake… ugh, I hate to admit it) probably don't matter, however. even though they are thiiiis close to meeting up with their mom and making their way to Montreal, Duncan calls Ellen. Via videophone. He then scolds Ellen for running away, pans over to Brian/Jimmy Cooper, and shoots Jimmy Cooper. Great. They were inches away from eating poutine in peace, but now Ellen has to go deal with a maybe-shot Jimmy Cooper.

IF I KNOW OUR DUNCAN, the "gunshot" was all a sleight of hand. This is Angela, version 2.0.

Photo: CBS