The Inside Job

The Inside Job
Season 3
Episode 3
Airdate	June 27, 2010
Written by	Geoffrey Thorne
Directed by	John Rogers
Guests	Lisa Brenner Glen Baggerly Kirk Mouser Richard Chamberlain
Previous episode	The Reunion Job
Next episode	The Scheherazade Job
Episode list	Season 3

“	Let's go steal a Parker.	”
— Nathan Ford

The team schemes and scams its way to rescue Parker, who's trapped in an undisclosed location while working for her mentor, Archie Leach.

The Client

• Archie Leach, Parker's mentor.

The Mark

• Dr. Anne Hannity

Locations

• Boston, Massachusetts
  • Wakefield Agricultural Corporation
  • Nate's condo
  • The roof of the building across from Wakefield Agricultural
  • Parker's Warehouse
  • Underneath an overpass

Cons and Scams Used

Nate gets an anonymous call informing him that Parker is trapped in the Wakefield building, which is armed with a Steranko security system, the toughest, most sophisticated security system around. Nate, Sophie, Eliot, and Hardison meet up at Parker's warehouse home, where they learn of the job she has taken. The team quickly head to the Wakefield building where Nate and Eliot go to meet the anonymous caller based on the positioning of the photographs they've seen, while Sophie and Hardison grift their way into the building so the latter can break into the Steranko.

Nate and Eliot meet up with the anonymous caller, Archie Leach, Parker's mentor and adopted father. Eliot quickly takes down the guards who were keeping a leash on Leach. Leach tells Nate that he had been blackmailed into stealing a certain canister from the Wakefield building despite being in retirement. He called upon Parker to plan on how to steal it, but she had went in ahead of him, thus leading to the current situation. Nate sends Eliot back to the Wakefield building to find his own way in.

Meanwhile, Sophie and Hardison get into Wakefield posing as financial advisors. Hardison is given an empty office guaranteeing him privacy for him to directly access the Steranko while Sophie distracts the employees by causing chaos in a meeting room via threatening layoffs. Despite breaking into the Steranko, Hardison is unable to shut it down, and anything he may try to locate Parker will only expose her location to the marks. Eliot suggest finding a blank on one of the offices. Once Hardison finds a suitable office free of cameras, Nate has Eliot climb to said office, from outside. Fortunately, Eliot noticed a window washing lift he could use.

Parker crawls through the ventilation shafts, but had to get out since even the enclosed place was rigged with laser tripwires, limiting her movement. She was forced to get back inside the building and managed to temporarily disguise herself as an employee. Because she lacked her earbud, she tried to call the others, but her cell didn't have any signal. Parker resorts to calling Hardison with a company phone. Before Parker could explain where she is, she was surprised to know they were all already there, but then Hardison warns her to get out of her current location since her call had triggered the Steranko of her location. Parker quickly leaves for another cubicle as instructed by Hardison and to wait.

Nate and Leach then discover that the latter's client is in on the situation. Nate is then informed by Sophie that of all the panicking employees in the meeting room, Dr. Hannity, head of the bio research department, didn't look at all worried, making her stick out like a sore thumb. Hardison brings up the info on her, relaying that she had spent $60,000,000 of the company's money developing a super wheat, and hadn't made any returns. It seemed strange because this would definitely get her fired if it were found out, yet she didn't seem too worried. Nate then instructs Sophie to let everyone but Hannity leave, and to get her angry. 

Sophie taunts Hannity about her competency in the company, who then threatens to get her terminated by her CEO. Sophie counter-threatens by saying she will remind the board of directors that Hannity wasted 60 million of Wakefield's money developing wheat. Hannity angrily justifies her work that it was needed since her variation of genetic wheat is immune to a plague known as UG-99, which if ever released in the continent, will kill all the normal wheat, and half the world's food supply destroyed, causing a famine. Sophie states that it is useless since it's for a famine that may or may not happen, then Hannity counters that what if they had known ahead of time when and where the UG-99 would hit, and companies would pay out the nose for her genetic wheat before leaving arrogantly.

Nate soon realized in horror what Hannity was planning: she had Leach try to steal the UG-99 blight so it would get out, causing a nationwide famine, all to increase demand for her wheat.

The Reveal

Parker leaves the office but is caught by a security guard. She is saved by Eliot and Hardison, then leads the two downstairs using the staircase because she knows where the vault is. Hardison tells them to do it quickly as Steranko is locking him out fast. Worse, Vorhees tells Hannity that Sophie and Hardison are impostors. He decides to take care of them first, and then deal with Parker. Hardison and Sophie make a break for it while Parker and Eliot manage to enter the room using a scanner that Eliot steals from one of the guards. Parker manages to steal the blight but causes Steranko to reach a level 4 Hazmat Containment Breach. Soon, fire engines surround Wakefield as everyone evacuates the building and news crew comes in to do a report.

Nate and Leech steal a couple of Hazmat suits. Leech pulls a gun and points it at Nate. Nate says that they're trying to protect Parker and gives Leech the Hazmat suits. Back at the office, Hannity and Vorhees realize that the team plans to disguise themselves as members of the Hazmat squad. They decide to cut them off in the middle and when ambush them at the elevator at gun point. As they lead them to the vacant office, one of the people reveals himself to be Leech. Leech tells her that she breached his contract and demands they make a new deal. Hannity says that instead, she'll kill Leech and his crew and make them take the fall for blight.

Hannity asks him how they prefer to die. Leech says he refuses either and the crew reveals themselves to be reporter Janet Lin and her crew from Channel 6 news. They announce they have been broadcasting live since they set foot in the building. A flashback informs the audience that before Hardison left the office, Nate had him create a fake Hazmat alarm and open the elevator door for them. Nate and Leech promise Janet Lin a Pulitzer worthy story, convincing her to enter the building with her crew. Confused and shocked, Hannity and Vorhees then see Nate and his crew leaving the building using the window cleaning platform.

Artifacts

• UG99

Guest Cast

• Lisa Brenner as Dr Anne Hannity
• Glen Baggerly as Vorhees
• Kirk Mouser as Charles Rushing
• Richard Chamberlain as Archie Leach
• Sophie Soong as Janet Lin (uncredited)
• Kelsey Rider as Executive Assistant to Mr Rushing (uncredited)

Notes

• This was the first glimpse of Parker's life outside the team, including the warehouse she resides in. Parker's stuffed bunny, from the flashback in "The Nigerian Job", is seen on her bed.

To Catch a Thief

Several references to the Alfred Hitchcock movie: To Catch a Thief (1955):

• Archie Leach or Archibald Leach is the real name of actor Cary Grant who was the male lead in To Catch a Thief.
• The premise of this episode, two parties are trying to catch a thief: Parker.

Major Events

• Archie Leach, Parker's mentor is introduced for the first time.

Trivia

• Sophie and Hardison use the aliases Emily Peel and Jonathan Steed, respectively, when they pose as auditors. Emma Peel and John Steed are the main characters in the British TV series The Avengers.
• Lisa Brenner (who plays the character Dr. Anne Hannity) is the wife of Leverage executive producer and director Dean Devlin.
• The name of the security system, "Steranko", is an homage to comic book artist and writer Jim Steranko.
• The Chief of Security, and Steranko administrator, is named "Vorhees", a nod to the Friday the 13th villain.

• The two main antagonists, Dr. Anne Hannity and Charles Rushing, are anti-homages to controversial right-wing talk radio hosts Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh. In addition, during her escape, Parker wore a nametag with the name of Beck, an anti-homage to ultra-right wing talk radio host Glenn Beck.