Karma has a very bad way of bouncing back on you.
After a case involving a wild drug trip gone wrong, the FBI: Most Wanted team had their Thanksgiving plans ruined in the worst way.
A shooting spree at a Buddhist temple had the team wondering if this was a hate crime. Instead, they discovered it was someone seeking some harsh justice.
This had the team tracking him down while uncovering a dark web that led to a bitter end.
Meanwhile, Remy was in for a rough turn in his relationship with April that would change things up.
Thus, Karma was a rough way to celebrate the holiday, yet it also left some things to be thankful for.
A peaceful retreat is shattered
At a Buddhist temple in New York, a group of people prayed while a man locked a door outside. After checking a map, he pulled out a gun and began making his way through the offices.
A temple resident found the man and was shot, startling the others inside. He entered the main prayer room, shooting a woman who tried to run and a man trying to stop him. As a trio of dancers broke down the door to escape, he shot them, too, then two more monks.
The man seemed horrified at what he’d done as he ran out, unaware one of the women was still alive.
Remy and April were complaining about having to go to work the day before Thanksgiving. Remy’s family would be busy as April teased her family’s plans but then said they could have a meal together.
Remy seemed unsure but agreed just before getting a phone call from Isobel. He arrived on the scene with seven victims dead. Remy was disgusted at someone killing people in a sacred place.
They found the map and thus knew the man had scoped the place out. The survivor’s daughter was able to translate for her and showed a video from a phone of the shooter wearing a face shield.
Barnes found a connection to the shooting of a Catholic priest days earlier, and someone could be going after religious places.
Thom (Tim Lounibos) was horrified at the crime as he knew the priests and couldn’t understand why someone would do this. They had been preparing for the New Moon Festival, and the agents believed the shooter didn’t expect to find anyone there.
Remy checked in with a sheriff on the priest killing as witnesses had said a young man was the likely killer. Hana wasn’t happy about putting together a sketch from limited information as that could hurt the search but had figured out the shooter’s height.
In Central Park, a Buddhist had finished teaching a class when the masked man (Scott Ly) confronted him only without his mask as, “I want you to see my face. The way he saw yours.”
He shoved the man down and bashed his face with a rock. Two passersby saw him as the man slipped on his mask and took off running. He pulled his gun, as did one passerby with a woman being accidentally shot in the crossfire as the masked man ran off.
The victim was Arthit Anwar, who had no connection to the temple, so Gaines and Cannon wondered if it was a pure hate crime.
The passerby defended himself on saving lives, only for Remy to point out the woman he shot was still in critical condition. When he snapped about the FBI not doing their jobs, Remy fired back that “idiots like you” just made it harder.
Cannon chatted up the doorwoman of an apartment building to share security footage of the gunman running off. They got word the priest’s shooter was arrested, and there was no connection to their case.
A surprising identity for the shooter
A car license plate search was connected to Adam Moore. They checked in with his wife, Doris (Molly Leland), who was worried about him. She was tending to Adam’s father, Grant (Harris Yulin), who was dying of lumbar disc disease.
Adam’s mother had been a Buddhist from Vietnam as the principal of the school he taught at was horrified at his actions. Remy found Adam had been checking out the United Nations calendar.
Ambassador Jennifer Wong was doing a conference there, which Remy figured could be Adam’s next target. Sure enough, he was outside the building as the FBI rolled in.
Finding his car, the team worried Adam had built a bomb. Instead, they found a man bound and gagged in the trunk.
The man was Rico Ramirez (Miguel Aviles-Elrod), one of Adam’s students who had been part of a model U.N. event. He’d spotted Adam, who stole his car, and now knew the FBI was after him.
Adam drove Rico’s car to a fancy Westchester mansion, confronted Wiliam Hunter, and shot him dead.
The team was confused why Adam was now targeting a white man and had booked a ticket to Amsterdam. Rico’s dad lived in the area, so Adam stole the car to get close to Hunter, who was a retired U.S. senator.
Up came DOJ agent LIv Whitley (Amy Hargreaves), who said Adam had come to her some time before with a list of names he claimed were war criminals responsible for atrocities on an island in Asia. She couldn’t do anything because the U.S. wasn’t part of an international agreement thanks in part to a deal made by Hunter when he was in office.
Remy figured Adam was now targeting men off that list and blamed Hunter for not prosecuting them.
Grant was in a car with an elderly man (Vien Hong) when Adam drove up to cut them up. He pulled Grant out of the car, the driver trying to stop him, but Adam pulled his gun to make him back off. He took Grant away in the car.
Grant’s friend was Tony Bui, who revealed Grant was the one headed to Amsterdam as he’d chosen assisted suicide to end his pain. He explained that when Vietnam fell, several refugees were attacked by pirates.
Tony was one of their victims, with Grant personally rescuing him and hundreds of refugees from an island. Adam wanted to see justice done while his father was alive and was taking it too far.
Two of the pirates had become monks to atone for their actions and were among those killed in the temple, while another was the man from the park. Tony said that their leader, a vicious man with a scar, was still out there.
Adam complained to Grant about choosing to die as Grant tried to reason with him, talking about protecting Adam as a child and that there was always a light inside him. Adam cried he had no idea there would be so many people in the temple and regretted killing them.
A not-so-Happy Thanksgiving
The team theorized the scarred man wasn’t on the list as Adam wanted to take care of him personally. They finally got a hit on Lek Saengarun (Marshall Factora), who Tony confirmed was the pirate leader who’d killed his baby brother. To top it off, Grant’s disease was thanks to Lek shooting down his plane years before.
Tony wanted Lek, and his men punished but not like this, as “karma will find a way.”
Adam brought Grant to Lek’s Brooklyn restaurant, smashing his car to get attention. Lek and Grant instantly recognized each other as Adam prepared for his revenge.
The agents showed up in time to hear a gunshot as people fled the restaurant. They found a worker injured as Adam had Lek held hostage in the kitchen.
Remy used Tony’s words on how violence just begets more violence as Grant added this wasn’t the way. Adam yelled it wasn’t right for Lek to walk free, as Grant said he didn’t want their legacy to be more murder.
Adam told the agents of the horrors Lek and his men had perpetrated. Grant told his son it was over, and he needed some “good karma.” After a few tense moments, Adam turned the gun over to Grant and surrendered himself.
Just as Lek was smiling with relief, Grant shot him himself, forcing Remy to shoot him too. Adam was arrested, reeling that his quest for justice had destroyed his family’s legacy.
Gaines and Barnes talked about their Thanksgiving plans as Remy got a call from April on how she was heading to her family after all. He said he’d meet here only for April to respond, not to bother.
“We both know where this is headed, but we had a good run there,” April intoned. She recognized that Remy was always committed to his job, and she wasn’t ready to handle it.
Remy was sorry, but April said it was all right and to be thankful for the time they had. Remy summed up killing a war hero and getting dumped was one lousy Thanksgiving.
Cannon and Hana decided to cheer Remy up by inviting him to Thanksgiving dinner at their place. Despite not getting a real turkey, they still had a good time, as Remy realized he wasn’t so alone after all.
It was a rough episode for one family, and Remy was in for a tough time, but a reminder of how Thanksgiving can still be a time to be grateful for what you have.
FBI: Most Wanted Season 4 returns Tuesday, December 13 at 10/9c on CBS.