City On Fire – Episode 7 “The Demon Brother” Recap & Review

The Demon Brother

Episode 7 of City on Fire starts with Sam captivated by William’s rock band. However, he’s more intrigued by Nicky than frontrunner William.

As she turns to leave the crowd, we fade across to the hospital, where Sam appears to be coming around to consciousness. She’s not dead and Joe, Sam’s dad, is convinced that he saw her eyes flutter. Whether that’s true or not, remains to be seen.

Meanwhile, police storm Nicky’s hideout. They find a whole trove of evidence, including bomb tests in the bathroom (which we saw several episodes back) and a good deal more up on the rooftop. The kids are long gone though and Detectives McFadden and Parsa discuss this while letting the pigeons out of their cages.

One of the police dogs barking from the hallway discovers a secret lab just next to the hideout, including a whole bunch of different chemicals and vials. The pair curse their luck, realizing they’re sitting ducks while they wait for Nicky’s gang to make their move.

As for our terrorists, they watch from afar as Nicky believes everyone will feel much better after they’ve made their move. As they head out to do just that, Charlie shows up to see Sam, managing to sneak into her room while all the receptionists are busy looking the other way. “I’m sorry Sam.” Charlie says when he heads into the unsupervised room, as he goes on to spill his truth to her.

Although Sam can’t understand him, she can hear his voice. Charlie believes she’s a good person and was going to meet him that night to potentially tell him the truth. He’s also going to turn himself into the cops and reveal everything he knows. He’s also there to say goodbye too as he doesn’t know when he’ll be back.

While this is going on, there’s drama over with William and the kids, as the former introduces himself and is actually lucid enough to have a proper conversation with them. Regan is upstairs asleep and Will wakes her up, admitting that she’s glad she didn’t ditch motherhood altogether.

“I know,” William says. This is, of course, regarding her child she gave up. The Amory Gould files could be used against her but Regan is still bitter and hurt about what went down. She gave up her semester abroad to Italy and drove all the way to Buffalo to a nunnery to give her child up for adoption after initially going crazy and psychotic about her inability to have an abortion given she was 26 weeks down the line.

Charlie falls asleep by Sam’s side and is forced to scramble for cover when the nurse shows in the morning. After, Keith arrives and begins speaking to Sam, holding her hand. When Charlie notices, he springs out like a terrible birthday surprise. However, it also gets the pair talking about Amory, “the demon brother”.

Charlie knows that’s who the bomb is designed for but the pair end up wrestling with one another, prompting a nurse to show and, subsequently, get security involved. They’re both arrested and McFadden leads the charge in Farsa’s absence.

William ends up having a reunion with his father, and meets with Parsa where he’s actually figured it all out. In fact, isn’t it rather amusing that a frazzled, recovering drug addict has managed to figure this out and yet the police couldn’t even tie their own shoelaces? Anyway, I digress.

William gets the detective up to date on what’s going on, including how Nicky is motivated by money and is being paid by Amory to burn these buildings down. He’s also using Nicky’s pyromania as a weapon. This is all business to Amory, hence why Nicky’s files were mixed in to his stuff. LH stands for is Liberty Heights and Amory’s plans to acquire these lots of land were made that much easier by hiring Nicky to burn down the entire neighbourhood.

This means he could also apply to the city council for a Blight Decree. In doing so, the city can expropriate the land and then sell it back at a very low price. More fires mean more people get hurt, and Bill Sr. has further proof of this. It comes in the form of an application for a Blight Decree, signed by Amory himself.

Keith shows up, given he’s overheard the whole thing and he’s not actually in lock-up or being interrogated either. Regan also nonchalantly mentions how they’re breaking up and that Keith is Amory’s “bagman”. He was told to ferry an envelope downtown for Amory in exchange for keeping Keith’s secret. Specifically how he flunked school and when he lost all the family’s money, Amory bailed him out. This is how Keith became Amory’s bagman.

With everything now out in the open, a bomb threat is called against Hamilton-Sweeney and Amory is forced to evacuate. However, he skips away before everyone else, just as an arrest warrant comes in for Amory himself. Amory rides with Charlie, who happens to be in the front seat for some reason, and tells him to stay in the car.

Of course, Charlie does no such thing when he notices Sewer Girl rush in the building, and he heads in to follow her. Parsa too decides to follow, as they all head up the stairwell.

While Charlie chases after SG, William and everyone else catches up to Amory Gould, who happens to be on the rooftop. His bodyguard gets involved and stabs William, prompting everyone to be too concerned with his wellbeing to stop Amory, who just nonchalantly wanders out the building.

As the episode closes out, Charlie tries to talk SG out of blowing up the building. With tears in her eyes, Sewer Girl eventually reveals that it’s down on the window washer outside. Charlie makes a split second decision and takes a leap of faith, trying to get the bomb.

Just as he does, there’s a massive blackout. The whole block ends up blacked out, while Amory’s car is smashed into on the streets.

The Episode Review

So this whodunit isn’t really a whodunit anymore is it, since it’s been painfully obvious since day 1 that Amory Gould is the one up to no good. It’s now almost certainly going to be him, or someone he’s hired, that shot Sam. And as a typical cartoon villain, he manages to get away after a big montage up on the rooftop.

If that wasn’t enough though, the show continues to slip up with even basic facts and police work. Why is Charlie riding the front seat of the police cruiser? Why is Keith just allowed to wander about in the station after initially being arrested? How on earth did nobody recognize Charlie with a haircut? And why has nobody mentioned the trousers and shoes in Central Park?!

There’s so many questions swirling around this one and it ultimately adds up to a disappointing and poorly written drama. With one episode left until this one ends, it doesn’t look like we’re in for any sort of surprises with this one. Roll on next week’s finale.