Burn Notice/WMG

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


The group that Mike now works for is the group he thinks he's fighting against, posing as an adversary of themselves.

Duh.

  • Problem. Mike doesn't think he's fighting anybody. He thinks they're all dead. Considering this ALL happened off screen however fuels the next WMG

The government needed Kessler dead

Micheal Weston is clearly among if not the best spy and most dangerous man on the planet. If he wants you dead you die. While he's a brilliant man his judgement when it comes to being burnt isn't always rational. So the government takes the most dangerous man on the planet forges a few connections and turns the most dangerous man on earth against their problem. So it's at least possible that the people who burned him got away with it, decided that keeping him out was more dangerous than bringing him in. They will continue to get away with it until someone trips and does or says something stupid. Or Mike sees some guy he interogated having tea and crumpets.

Michael was burned by the yogurt industry.

Michael and co. have to be the largest consumers of yogurt in the Miami area. Knowing he's much more useful to them sitting in his house unemployed, top yogurt executives called in a favor to the US government to can Westen. Fortunately, Michael can make his own entertainment when he's not eating yogurt.

In the Burn Notice 'verse, Michael is the head writer for CSI: Miami.

He based Horatio's personality on the police officer who harasses him on a regular basis. But he also saw Horatio as a stand-in for himself; thus, Horatio picked up some of his quirks. (Don't ask why Michael imagines himself played by David Caruso.)

    • Horatio isn't him. Since Michael's still trying to get back in, he can't risk telling too much about himself. Horatio is the good guy-Expy of Victor and Larry -- the two people who are about as close to him as possible without being him -- with a few of his own quirks tossed in.
    • Michael's in charge of writing, not casting.

Michael was burned by Fulcrum.

He was being considered as a candidate for The Intersect, and Fulcrum knew that having all that badassery wrapped up in one package was just asking for trouble.

Michael is being groomed to take over a top secret Government Agency that deals with policing the Intelligence branches of the United States and its allies.

It's a Xanatos Gambit. They need an agent who hasn't burnt out yet. Sharp and inventive. Capable to make ties with others and fight to win, no matter the odds.

They burn Michael and dump him at home. They force him to rely on his spy skills to help others for profit, but in the meantime regain any humanity he may have lost on the job. He will be a mixture of rogue spy and modern day knight.

When the time is right, they'll offer him the job on policing his former bosses and other agencies, balancing security needs with preventing them from going too far.

The entire Gilroy/Simon plotline was a Xanatos Gambit on the part of whoever has Michael now (probably Management) to get him under their power.

And we won't see him again until several episodes in to season 4.

Michael is an insane person with multiple personality disorder.

Each of the big bads that Michael has had to deal with was similar to him -- a dark reflection, a version of him that was amoral, sociopathic, hate filled, ruthless, rabid, etc. In fact, all of what we have seen has been a way for Michael's mind to help lead him back to sanity.

Sam and Fiona are important people in his 'real' life, as are his family. They've been necessary for him to rebuild and remake himself, thus letting him tackle the increasingly difficult and dangerous parts of his psyche.

Michael is MacGyver

He's just changed a lot since the 1980s. MacGyver was a pseudonym to keep people guessing.

  • The "street gang" phase of MacGyver was during an earlier burned period. He's not so patient now.

Fiona is a Desolation survivor.

Look at the facts: Very thin, perpetual sunburn, no problem with shooting people in cold blood. It's possible she was actually captured by British intelligence and subjected to the Desolation Test, but they disavowed any knowledge of it so Jones thinks he's the only one.

Jesse knows Mike's the one responsible for his burn.

He's getting close to Michael et al to finish his job, and then take Michael down. Otherwise, he would have to be awfully thick not to have put together...well, as TWOP puts it:

But since Madeline is still fishing for info on him, Jesse comes clean about being a former spy who was fired when someone used his clearance to steal a file, but luckily for him, Michael was there to help. You know, when he puts it that way, it's kind of shocking that he hasn't connected those two facts yet.

  • To be fair, he was lying to Maddie about that last part. Jessie actually sought out Michael because he was a legendary burned spy.
  • Of course, given how it's getting to be about Once an Episode that Jesse screws up the plan of the week, it's also not implausible that he's just that dense.
    • Jossed, when Jesse finally figures it out, after reviewing security camera footage from across the street from his workplace and discovers that Michael DID burn him. Cue Roaring Rampage of Revenge.

Michael will meet Annie from Covert Affairs

And the crossover are awesome.

Michael was burned by Sam and Fiona

That would be awesome!

    • I spent the first two seasons thinking Fiona was in on it, though it's probably not tenable now. But she's awfully eager to keep him around, and in Miami, isn't she?

This season, or possibly next season, will end with a three part to be continued crossover, and then a movie.

You can see that White Collar, Covert Affairs, and Burn Notice are all moving in similar directions. There's a shadowy organization doing shadowy things in the shadows that has to be stopped. This is the only suitably epic way to deal with it.

    • That... would actually be one of the less odd crossovers possible. Although the style of White Collar is somewhat subdued compared to the explody style of BN and the untested rookie style of CA. Yet at the same time, WC and BN pull off some really good schemes...
    • Season three of Leverage has them blackmailed by someone to take down a banker who provides his services to terrorists, criminals and dictators. There is definetly potential there.
      • Though Leverage isn't a USA show while the first three are. This makes it a lot easier, at least in some senses.
    • Word of God says that while White Collar/Burn Notice would be pretty cool, the two shows film at the same time in different cities. This means in order to do a crossover between those two shows, they would have to give up an episode for one of the two shows and neither show would probably want to do that.
      • Not if the only crossover part is the movie.

Matt Nix and the rest of the writing staff are tropers!

They certainly pay a lot of conscious attention to such things, much more so than most other shows. Watching various episode commentaries reveals just how much Matt Nix and the team keep in mind when doing the show, whether big or small, long term or short.

The narration is being given as a lecture

At the end Mike is unburned, but for some reason or another isn't put back on field duty (given all the things he has done during his burn, finding a reason isn't hard), instead being used to train new spies.

  • Additionally the Show itself is training footage using actors that resemble Micheal, Fi, and Sam (Jeffrey Donovan, Gabrielle Anwar and Bruce Campbell?), that the real Micheal uses to teach certain lessons to new recruits, I.E. how to handle reluctant assets, how to improvise, and why it's better to stay single in the field.

The last words of the series will be an Ironic Echo.

Specifically, either Michael will get unburned and finish the series by saying, "My name is Michael Westen - I'm a spy", or he'll repeat the "My name is Michael Westen - I used to be a spy" line in such a way that indicates he's made peace with not getting back in.

  • Well now that Nate has a kid, maybe it'll be a Time Skip. The final show will be from the perspective of Nate's kid at a young age playing with a friend. All sorts of Running Gags will be used - the kid will eat lots of yogurt, play with duct tape, have fancy shades, etc. The final scene will be the middle of some Noodle Incident and have Team Weston Pet the Dog before walking out of the house. The friend will be all in awe and ask who that is. The kid will say "That's Uncle Michael. He use to be a spy." as if being a former spy (and doing crazy things on a daily basis) is the most normal thing in the world.
  • Well, it's not the end of the series, hopefully, but we've finally gotten the official line drop tonight in Dead or Alive.
    • Finally? This is at least the second time.
    • And not hopefully since they were given two more seasons some time ago. So there's at least until season six to figure something out.

John Barrett isn't actually the Big Bad.

It's Vaughn and the people he works for. Barrett is just a rival. We know Simon worked for the Evil side, and we know that Vaughn's people worked with Simon up until they decided to switch to Michael.

    • Well kinda Jossed. Barrett is a Big Bad but not Michael's Big Bad and -is- a rival of Vaughn. He had information that would take down Vaughn's group. How all that plays out is the basis of the second half of season 4.

John Barrett/The Real Evil Side is behind the huge conspiracies on White Collar and Covert Affairs.

Julian Larson and Ben Mercer both work for them, and ultimately we're going to end up with a three hour crossover movie at the end of Next Season.

Michael's mother is actually working for the agency that burned him and she's secretly Michael's handler.

  • Think about: despite numerous situations that could have resulted in her arrested,injured or killed...nothing happens to her.

She apparently has plenty of money for cigarettes,food and clothing,yet no visible source of income. Knowing that her son is a killer,a thief and a potentially an agent of a foreign government seems to have little impact upon her and in fact, she ENCOURAGES him to to do it. She doesn't seem to be surprised or even more than mildly concerned about the numerous violent acts that have suddenly started to occur around her.

Why does this happen in this manner? Because she has been assigned by the group that burned Michael to "handle" him while he is in Miami.

  • Actually, a quote from the narration of pilot episode really seems to support this: "My mother would have made a great NSA communications operative. Drop me in the middle of the Gobi Desert, bury me in a goddamn cave on the moon, and somehow she'll find a way to call me and ask for a favor." That's pretty much the short definition of "handler."
    • Hilariously enough, it turned out that Madeline's counselor is the Big Bad of Season 5. There might be something to it.

Burn Notice will cross over with Dexter...somehow.

Some possibilities:

  1. Dexter will mistakenly identify Michael as just another Miami murderer and begin hunting him. Michael will become aware of Dexter and have to work to thwart him.
  2. A family member of one of Dexter's victims will ask Michael to find the killer. In the course of tracking the killer Michael will meet Dexter in person, not realizing he is the target. The two of them will "team up" only Dexter will be secretly working to stall Michael's investigation. In the end Dexter will lead Michael to the wrong conclusion but the final shot of the episode will be Michael stumbling on some small factoid or inconsistency that makes him suspect Dexter was behind it all.
    • This makes the most sense as it would fit with Michael's "Sometimes you have to let bad people do good things... good people do bad things..." phrase. Yes, Dexter is a killer... but he only targets other killers. Michael may not be very happy that Dexter is killing people, but he's not likely to go out of his way to stop him either. It would also lead to the situation where Michael would have to help the client -and- protect the 'villain' -and- somehow come up with a happy ending.
  1. One of Michael's clients will hire him to expose a known killer who escaped justice. Coincidentally, Dexter is also tracking this same killer to be his next victim. The two of them will run into each other by accident while both are casing the killer's house and the story will unfold like a superhero crossover. The two of them will briefly come to blows, then reach an understanding and team up. In the end Michael will be conflicted over whether to let Dexter go free to continue killing, and Dexter will be conflicted over the wisdom of exposing himself to Michael.

Other tropers are encouraged to come up with their own theories.


Michael will be out of the picture for a time

Jesse is also a burned spy, which lets them keep the title, and it would provide for some interesting group dynamics by removing the leader. I actually thought it would happen earlier, like when Jesse shot Michael.

Burn Notice and Mythbusters will do a crossover!

Both shows tend to have lots of fun playing with wacky things. Heck, I can think of at least two BN things that the Mythbusters did (phonebooks as bullet resistant armor, fooling a motion detector with a sheet).

Fiona is Scorpia from Champions

Scorpia is a former IRA terrorist with a love of random violence and overkill, who has a record of double-crossing her employers and making people who annoy her dead. And her real name? Fiona.

Michael Westen's father was actually a spy like his son and may still be alive and have been the cause of Michael's burn notice

It seems very convenient to me that Frank Westen died shortly after his son Michael became a spy and that no specific cause of death is given, you would think that the Westen family would have found this a very odd coincidence. Also the Westens never seem to mention what Frank Westen did for a living so it seems probable to me that he may have been a spy and he disappeared so that his enemies wouldn't figure out about Michael being his son and compromise both of their lives. From there Frank Westen may have been observing Michael Westen's career and saw the interest that all these hostile organizations had in his son and decided to put a burn notice on his son to protect him from them and so that he could find a semblance of normalcy back home with his mother and brother. The burn notice was meant to help Michael, but Frank can't reveal himself or both of them might be killed.

  • Highly unlikely -- especially from the "helping Michael" angle. I can see this making sense to an occasional watcher, but Frank has been established from day one as a no-good, abusive drunk with a history of chronic unemployment and criminal activity. Think of the recent episode where Maddie posed as a nurse and Michael had to shout at and abuse her -- they were both shaken because Michael was channeling Frank, and was a little too convincing for comfort. Michael fled home and joined the army at 17 to get away from him. As for whatever caused Frank's death, given his lifestyle, he'd have to have been hit by a meteor for it to count as surprising. Given the above, if Frank was a former spy, he would definitely not be one of the good guys -- any protective instincts would have revolved around himself, not his wife and children.
      • Just seems to me that any man good enough for a woman like Madeline to fall in love with and have two sons with must not have been all bad. Even good men can spiral down into darkness, Michael himself is implied by Larry to have had a dark side during their time working together filled with wetwork and top secret black ops. It seems probable that Frank not making Madeline privy to his spy work wouldn't have a means to vent his frustrations like Michael does with Fiona and Sam and would hold on to those dark tendencies and emotions. I've heard all sorts of horror stories about soldiers struggling with post-traumatic stress emotionally breaking down in front of their families, its a wonder that Michael himself doesn't suffer from this. Also all the items that Michael's father left behind that conveniently help Michael in his job along with the fact that his emotional displays emulating his father give rise to the possibility that Michael is starting to realize he and his father aren't so different. Plus Michael can be seen arguing with his brother over who Frank liked more and thus who deserves to keep his car, arguing with his mother over whether Frank ever loved any of them, and visiting his father's grave which implies to me that Michael at least has a begrudging respect for his father and has a "Daddy didn't love me enough" complex. Frank's profession and moral character are up in the air since we only have Michael's word instead of a visual representation of the man himself.
      • Certainly value points, but generally abusive behavior doesn't emerge until after the relationship is fairly well established. Before them, abusive people actually tend to come across as more charming and confident because they're trying to get close to someone first before they can assert authority.
    • At this point, I have to ask ... just how long has the OP been watching this show? The stuff Michael's father left behind that helps Michael -- it's been explicitly stated that he used those things for low-level criminal activities. Michael uses it because said activities overlap with his various con jobs. It's also been explicitly stated that Nick felt betrayed when Michael left, because Michael would draw their father's attention to keep him from abusing Nick. If there's a "Daddy didn't love me enough" complex, it's that "Daddy didn't love me enough because he was an asshole." As for Frank's profession and moral character, we don't just have Michael's word for it -- we have the entire Westin family, its collective behavior and its various mental and emotional scars to vouch for Frank. We haven't been told about Frank, we've been shown his legacy. And his legacy sucks. To be blunt, "Frank was a spy and has secretly supported Michael" would completely break the show for me.
  • Probably Jossed as of "Depth Perception". Michael's father was killed by Ansen. He described him as smart enough to get suspicious and too close to the truth, but that's the extent of his abilities. Which might have been a lie, but it seems unlikely.

Max's "wife" is involved in his death.....if she exists.

You've just been shot. The guy you've been working with comes into the room and asks what happened and who shot you. You're going to start talking about your wife being mad? Unless.......his wife is involved somewhat. Maybe there isn't even a wife in the picture. I fully expect Michael to say to the CIA chick investigating Max's murder "How's his wife taking this?" and getting a puzzled look and a "Max wasn't married" response.

  • Jossed. His wife was mentioned by the CIA agent investigating his death in Eye for an Eye.
    • Well, the "if she exists" part is Jossed. Still entirely possible Max's Mrs. is in on Max's death.
      • Double Jossed as of the season finale.
        • Still possible Max's wife had a sex cha........who am I kidding, octuple Jossed at this point.

John Marston from Red Dead Redemption is an ancestor of Michael Westen.

Think about it. Both of them have been screwed over by corrupt forces in the government and are confined to a particular area until their mission is over and then they can go home. They help people on a consistent basis out of the good will of their hearts but always are realistic telling their clients that they "will see what they can do" because there are never any guarantees of mission success in life. They are highly athletic and talented gun-fighters being able to take on groups of much greater size in comparison to themselves and come out on top through skill, wit and ingenuity. Are highly personable people who are quite capable of talking their way out of a situation and prefer to give people a chance to surrender or walk away before they refer to violence, not to mention that despite being fighters are deeply philosophical and articulate in the way that they talk. Both of them have a rag-tag group of friends that may seem unreliable at first but deep down they know they can depend on with their lives. And lastly both have a family worth fighting for and coming home to. All in all John Marston comes off as a vigilante cowboy that works hard for the greater good and Michael comes off as a modern cowboy soldier fighting for the greater good as well. Coincidence? You decide. (it is already in my personal fanon)

Anwar from season one is the same man as Ranjit from How I Met Your Mother

Well, they're played by the same actor at least. Also, think of how useful a role driving a cab or limo in New York City would be for intelligence gathering. Hell, considering that he works for Libyan intelligence, he's probably investigating Barney's employers - if he isn't working with them...

Fiona Burned Micheal.

A few things kind of stuck out at me, one was that Fiona was right at Micheals bedside when he got to Miami. Now maybe it was coincidence or maybe she knew he would be there. It would also explain part of why she gets so irritated at Micheal trying to figure out how he got burned and finding the source since he might discover it was her. It could also be part of why she seemed to react more strongly during season 4 with Jesse than Micheal did, because that old guilt was surfacing again. To clarify, I think it was an accident, she ended up using one of his passwords or something similar and it all came tumbling down. It's also part of why Strickler wanted Fiona removed, aside from her reputation information about what she did and why would end up rippling back through others and cause him no end of grief.

  • The reason Fiona's there when Michael wakes up in Miami for the first time is because she's the contact on the "In Case of Emergency" card in Michael's wallet, which Michael failed to remove even though he left a while ago. Fi brings it up. The rest...well, it's up to you.

Larry is still alive

And he will be pissed that the psych planed for him to be caught in the explosion. Providing a handy way for him to be killed without any of the group doing it.

On the Sorting Algorithm of Deadness, Larry's score

  • Cause of death: No one could survive that: 2
  • Type of show: Killed off for real: 3
  • Body found: Left for dead: 1
  • Reaction: Tricky to figure out
  • Last words: Oh Crap expression: 4
  • Character: Regular: 2
  • When: Same arc: 1
  • Came back alreddy: Let's count the prison as a "death" due to the fact that it is treated like a death from a character reaction prospective and the first fake was such a defining character trait in-universe and say 2

15 with 7 boxes is 2.1: Soon

The biggest hint at his survival is the paper at the end says 2 were killed in the bombing, not 3.

Mike was burned so he would eventually deal with someone inside/has control of the CIA

Just like the other burned Micheal.

  • Who are you talking about? Who's the "other burned Michael"?

The person who was "working with Anson all along"? Pearce.

  • When Michael says this line in the preview, someone out of frame is holding a gun on him, and all we can see is their hand. The hand is slender, definitely female, and attached to a grey suit sleeve. The holder looks to be about four inches shorter than Michael. Also, she's the only character this season who could pull off that kind of Face Heel Turn and have it make narrative sense.

Larry will be the wild card that kills Anson in a public manner.

There's the WMG that Larry isn't dead, of course. And given he's the kind of guy with a very long memory and a lot of resources and that he's been trying to re-retire again for a while, if he's alive, he's exactly where he wants to be... except he's probably very very pissed at Anson (and Michael, but he probably rationalizes it as Michael being an unwitting pawn). Anson - perhaps rightfully - believes Larry to be dead and so hasn't made any sort of plans against what he might be doing in the background. So Larry shows up and gets revenge on Anson in a very public way (Larry isn't one for subtlety after all). Team Weston will Indy Ploy their way through the situation such that they can maintain their good guy status while Anson still gets killed and Larry gets caught.

When Anson is beaten, he'll still win, at least with Michael.

See, Michael has been trying very very hard not to knock Anson on his ass. In the end, Michael will be the one to do so, willingly or otherwise. But the thing is, Anson is doing what Michael was doing as a kid - being calm and collected in order to focus someone's anger and abuse on to him as opposed to focused on other stuff. So in short, when Michael beats Anson, unless Michael can do it some other way, Anson will have played his final card: making Michael do something his abusive father would do and beat the crap out of someone in anger and fury. Michael will be left with a corpse and a heck of a lot of emotional baggage on top of the 30 years worth he already has.

The real Professor Moriarty from BBC’s Sherlock is Anson

This assumes that the character we know as “Jim Moriarty” is actually working for Anson. We know that Moriarty is at the center of a vast network of spies and criminals; Anson certainly fits the bill. As a highly educated psychologist, Anson fits the “professor” role better than “Jim”. Coupled with his intelligence and ability to construct intricate plots and manipulate others, this makes him a worthy Holmes adversary. Plus, the tactic of strapping explosives to helpless victims and detonating them is something that comes up in both shows. In fact, the similarities in tactics are striking. In both cases, the bad guy eventually introduces himself to the target (Michael or Sherlock) after a long period of pulling strings and watching from the shadows. Both manipulate the target by threatening their loved ones. Both try to discredit the target by framing them for crimes they didn’t commit, casting doubt on an entire lifetime of service. So here’s the working theory: Anson slowly builds up his international criminal/terrorist network as he lays the groundwork to burn and recruit Michael. During this time, Sherlock Holmes visits Florida to deal with the case of Mrs. Hudson’s husband. Sherlock’s talents and unique behavior catch Anson’s attention, so he assigns “Moriarty” to play games with him, carefully observing how he’ll react so he can come up with a psychological profile. Eventually he realizes that Sherlock won’t be corrupted, so he sets up the framing/suicide plot to get rid of him before he finds out about the organization. This theory explains why “Moriarty” acts more like a psycho underling (maybe someone like Simon) than a master criminal. He clearly wants to kill Sherlock at the pool, but is ordered to let him go by a mysterious phone call from on high. Also, he commits suicide just as it seems his master plan is coming together. This would be unusual for an arch-villain, but very similar to Anson’s agents, who sometimes commit suicide or are killed to prevent Michael from learning more. So “Jim Moriarty,” like Simon Escher, is probably a psycho burned spy who worked for Anson; this also explains why he is able to produce convincing cover I.D.s (such as “Rich Brook” or “Jim from IT”).

  • A little bit of Fridge Horror, too: We know Anson replaced Madeline’s psychologist during some of her therapy sessions to gain background information on Michael. John Watson has been visiting a therapist …
    • Who is a woman.
    • Doesn't matter, Anson wasn't Maddie's regular therapist either. He filled for a few weeks in while the regular one was on vacation.
  • And what about Moriarty's strange choice of words when threatening Sherlock? He doesn't say "I'm going to kill you" or "I'm going to destroy you." He very emphatically says "I'm going to BURN you."
    • To quote, "Burn the heart out of you." Not quite the same thing, there.
  • Dude, he's obviously a time lord. Kids these days, no respect for tradition ...

Jimmy, from E 2 S 3, lived.

Think about the ep ending: Jimmy and a third, unnamed guy (We'll call this third guy "Tre" just to put a name on him) are watching baseball when Big Bad Sandoval comes in, gun drawn. Everyone pulls weapons, there's a lot of yelling. Cut to Sam standing outside, listening. Sam puts a round into the ground at his feet. We hear a few more shots, then Sandoval faintly begging Jimmy "please, no, DON'T DO IT!" and a few final shots. Figure after Sam's shot, Sandoval shot Tre just as Jimmy shot Sandoval, then Jimmy finished off Sandoval despite his begging. Possible we might see Jimmy again as a Mook for another Villain of the Week, or perhaps a new Client Of The Week. ("I'm in WAY over my head, man, I do this or they go after my family! You HAVE to help me!")

Retrieved from "https://allthetropes.org/wiki/Burn_Notice/WMG?oldid=1086892"