Chris and Mike revisit The Last Man by Vince Flynn and try to figure out just what the heck Don Bentley will do in #Rapp23 - Capture or Kill - to get Mitch and crew to this point in time!
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00:00:12
Hey, guys, I'm Chris. And I'm Mike.
00:00:15
And welcome back to this week's No Limits the Mittrap podcast.
00:00:19
How you doing this week, Mike? Good, Chris, But we should call
00:00:23
it No Limits, The Mittrap Revisited podcast.
00:00:28
I know man, we haven't done any any new stuff recently.
00:00:33
We've been going back and sort of deep diving while we get
00:00:36
ready for Don's first book. But yeah, I'm, I'm excited today
00:00:40
to talk to you about The Last Man.
00:00:43
You know, I love the last man when we first covered it on the
00:00:47
Mittrap podcast, so much so I think was it second on my list?
00:00:54
I think it was second in my overall rankings.
00:00:58
You had it as third. Third.
00:01:00
OK, what did I have second? Behind Memorial Day and transfer
00:01:04
of power. Transfer of power.
00:01:06
OK, a little nostalgia there with transfer of power.
00:01:09
Yeah, I don't know if this one rises above transfer of power,
00:01:12
but. But I'm keeping it top three for
00:01:14
sure. I think so.
00:01:15
I had it fifth behind consent to kill Memorial Day transfer power
00:01:21
and I had lethal agent head of it.
00:01:22
I I don't know if I was like trying to have Kyle.
00:01:28
I wanted to have Kyle in the top four.
00:01:31
I don't know, like I need to go back to that.
00:01:34
I'm leaving the top three. I loved it.
00:01:36
I loved rereading this book. Nah, dude, this, this book was,
00:01:40
it was a breeze. It was, it was nice to revisit
00:01:43
these characters. This, you know, to think that
00:01:47
this is Vince's last full novel, It it hits, you know, it's just
00:01:52
like he he's setting everything up.
00:01:55
You can kind of like if you, if you sort of take a meta view of
00:01:58
it and think about all right, he, he probably knows this is
00:02:02
going to be his last book or, you know, surmises that might be
00:02:06
one of his last possible. How do I want to leave my story
00:02:11
in a good spot And to to take this bold, you know, to take
00:02:18
this bold step and have like a mole essentially inside the CIA,
00:02:25
have Mitch on the run. Like for the first, you know,
00:02:29
what is it 2/3 of the novel? You don't know that Rickman's
00:02:31
bad. There's like there's like a
00:02:33
little bit of inklings, like the one chapter where he gets
00:02:36
injected. Like there's like some secrecy.
00:02:39
You can kind of like read through the lines upon reread,
00:02:41
you can pick up on it and like Hubbard, like seems really weird
00:02:45
at the beginning. You know, when you think about
00:02:49
like, how did how did they know that Mitch was going to go to
00:02:52
that that dog play, you know, the the veterinarians ahead of
00:02:55
time, Like it would have had to have been like, you know,
00:02:57
something that was sort of staged right or set up and then
00:03:02
does switch you on a 180 do that reveal Rickman was in on it.
00:03:07
And then to think about like how this all sudden sets up the the
00:03:10
chase in the next book because you get that hint from Rickman
00:03:15
saying, well, you know, Durani can't kill me.
00:03:19
He can't kill me because I have lawyers.
00:03:22
If I don't check in with them, I'm I'm gonna start shedding
00:03:25
information a little. Did we know that, that that
00:03:28
could go both ways? You know, if if the CIA were to
00:03:31
get him and and not and that he wouldn't be checking in, then
00:03:35
yeah, he's gonna start dropping information, which we're gonna,
00:03:38
you know, not that I don't know if we should go revisit the
00:03:40
survivor. This book made me wanna then
00:03:41
immediately go into the survivor.
00:03:43
Oh, Oh my God. But yeah, it's it and I, I, I
00:03:47
don't, I don't find any flaws with it.
00:03:49
It's, it's, I think, dare I say perfect in the terms of like the
00:03:53
pacing. It's close the setting, it's
00:03:55
real close the. You know, bringing in old
00:03:59
characters of like Hurley and Louis Gould and like Mick
00:04:04
Reaver's death and like the, the whole, the whole scene when you
00:04:07
get to like, you know, Gould and interacting at the vet hospital
00:04:10
and then like the, you know, the whole corrupt police shakedown.
00:04:14
That whole scene is amazing start to finish.
00:04:17
You know, I, I think like the weakest part is like, maybe like
00:04:20
the Ariana Venter's like, side piece, which she like quickly
00:04:23
she gets sidelined. Like, it's all about like just
00:04:25
setting up this reintegration thing.
00:04:27
And that's what sort of pisses people off and sends us down
00:04:31
this, this path. But yeah, I don't know what else
00:04:34
is there to, you know, say. You just literally said it
00:04:38
absolutely so well, and we honestly both said it so well on
00:04:42
episode 71 and 72 of this feed. I listened back to those in our
00:04:48
covering of the book, we brought up all of these, these exact
00:04:52
same points and we're praising how nearly perfect this book
00:04:55
hits and how much it means. I mean, this book makes the rest
00:05:00
of Vince Flynn's works even better because in some sense,
00:05:03
it's a culmination of them, like you said, with Louis Gould and
00:05:07
Stan Hurley, who's a somewhat recent character.
00:05:09
You know, he was only around the last couple of books that Vince
00:05:12
wrote. But then it also makes Kyle
00:05:15
Mills's books better. Like this is the key, the
00:05:19
linchpin to decode so much about this series, so much about who
00:05:23
rap is post Anna's death that's unpacked here in this book.
00:05:28
So much about what Kyle needed to do to pick up the clues from
00:05:33
Vince is unwrapped in this book. And Kyle did that perfectly with
00:05:36
the Survivor and beyond. We even get clues here about
00:05:40
what Kyle's gonna do books later in Enemy at the Gates.
00:05:44
You know, the Mike Nash stuff comes into play here.
00:05:48
So it's it's like the perfect blend right here of Vince and
00:05:53
Kyle. Each of their bodies of works is
00:05:56
made better knowing about what happens in this book.
00:06:00
It's just so meta to think about how much power this book holds
00:06:04
for unlocking two different authors, multiple books in the
00:06:08
series, fleshing out so much about the characters while still
00:06:11
delivering on near perfect pacing, near perfect plotting,
00:06:16
and some of the best action sequences we've had.
00:06:18
Like you're saying at the vet, you know, rap gets blown up.
00:06:22
He pulls the countertop down to cover himself.
00:06:25
Gould comes over, turns himself in seconds before shit hits the
00:06:29
fan, saving everybody's life. Gould's on the rooftop about to
00:06:33
kind of escape. Who is it, Scott or or Maz pulls
00:06:36
him back and says, you gotta operate with me.
00:06:39
Cover over there. And they're just shooting out
00:06:41
from behind this parapet, operating perfectly.
00:06:44
And dude, let's not negate or let's not overlook this fact.
00:06:50
This book is also through and through an Irene Kennedy book.
00:06:54
Yeah. Irene rises above in this book.
00:06:58
If she wasn't our winner last time, she's my winner this time.
00:07:02
She delivers on so many levels. And my favorite one is when she
00:07:08
goes in to talk to Gould, where Mike Nash is like, you need
00:07:12
backup in there or I'm coming in with you.
00:07:14
I can't get him to talk. And Kennedy has the ace up her
00:07:17
sleeve. And it's such an Irene Kennedy
00:07:19
move to do. It's such a Thomas Stansfield
00:07:22
move to do one of my favorite moments.
00:07:24
You just want to stand up and applaud as soon as Kennedy pulls
00:07:27
that out, which, as I just said, enriches what Kyle gives to us.
00:07:32
Because Kennedy knew Claudia was an important piece of the
00:07:36
puzzle. You could use Claudia not only
00:07:40
as leverage to hurt Gould, You can use her as leverage to help
00:07:45
the team somehow down the road. Cultivating a relationship with
00:07:48
this woman and Louis Gould's kid is gonna be important.
00:07:51
And she even says at one point when Louie's like, why are you
00:07:55
giving me these opportunities and what not?
00:07:56
She's like, you still have a role to play.
00:07:59
It's not clear to me what it is. It's almost like this omniscient
00:08:04
understanding that she has, she can just see beyond what's here
00:08:08
and now, what's in front of her. And then she can start
00:08:10
calculating and using that brain of hers to figure out what that
00:08:15
divine plan is and do the best she can to manipulate that plan,
00:08:19
you know, or, or work with that plan to get people to do what
00:08:22
she needs and ultimately to protect her people and her team.
00:08:25
And I just think hats off to Irene in this book.
00:08:28
Yeah, and I think it after reading this and like thinking
00:08:33
about what you just said, I think it makes total sense why
00:08:35
Kyle would have want to reincorporate Claudia into the
00:08:39
story. Yes.
00:08:41
And, you know, we we even we haven't even mentioned that like
00:08:46
essentially rap loses his his memory for part of this novel
00:08:51
and slowly has to work to rebuild it back.
00:08:55
Has like some funny scenes that like, you know, rarely do we see
00:08:58
some of these, you know, quirks with Vincent's writing.
00:09:01
This is way more reminiscent of like where Kyle is or Kyle took
00:09:05
the you know, the humor, you know, with the whole like, did
00:09:09
we sleep? Are we in Ida?
00:09:10
You know, like, remember when the City High, City High, she
00:09:13
comes in, he's like, wait, wait, my, are we sleeping together or
00:09:16
like you did? That could have almost been the
00:09:18
loser of the book it but not that scene because that scene
00:09:20
was excellent. But the memory loss thing, he
00:09:22
almost snaps out of it too quickly and remembers too
00:09:25
quickly. I'm going to push back.
00:09:27
I yeah, I, I, I don't think he, I think it's too quickly.
00:09:30
I I think like it's, he slowly starts to remember and I think
00:09:34
like what's most important about like the reason why you set that
00:09:37
up is because the last thing that the last person he saw
00:09:43
right before he loses memory is the person who killed his wife.
00:09:46
And I think like you know it, it gives you this added element of
00:09:50
like, all right, we don't know what the hell he's going to do
00:09:53
when he sees Louis Gould again. And Louis Gold obviously has a
00:09:56
role to play because one, why was he there?
00:09:59
Someone hired him. You know, someone hired him, his
00:10:02
bankers involved somehow, his his handlers involved somehow.
00:10:06
So you're gonna have to let Mitch interact with him like
00:10:10
Irene, even like contemplates like even like bringing it like
00:10:13
when when to bring this up and seeing that slow, you know, sort
00:10:17
of, you know, we even get like those the scenes with the doc
00:10:21
right? And like how wait and then
00:10:24
slowly he's remembering, like wait, I think I told you not
00:10:27
you're not allowed to write notes.
00:10:28
He's like, oh, good, good. You remember testing tears it
00:10:31
out. It's.
00:10:32
Very good. And also he says some things
00:10:35
want to be kept private. When the doc presses them on
00:10:37
Greta Olmagya and shuts it down. That kind of helps us with the
00:10:42
kill shot problem where rap just says no doc.
00:10:45
That's off limits to everybody, including us, the audience.
00:10:48
We don't need to know rap. Rap's declaring off limits.
00:10:53
And I think it, I think it does one of two things.
00:10:55
It, it allows Vince to, I don't know, walk down memory lane
00:11:00
himself, you know, like if, if truly this is what he wanted to
00:11:05
do. But it like it's, it's a, it's a
00:11:07
literary tool to allow him to get catharsis to like, you know,
00:11:11
end his story or like tell his story in a way that he can
00:11:14
reminisce, he can build momentum.
00:11:18
I think rap becomes like a little bit of a different man
00:11:21
afterwards. Like I I think like by reliving
00:11:25
the trauma and having to cope with it so quickly again.
00:11:29
Again. Yeah, I think he he's the same,
00:11:31
but but it's slightly different. And then so, yeah, you throw all
00:11:35
that in into this novel and it's just like, I could see how you
00:11:38
could, you could say that that's almost like the loser of the
00:11:40
book. But I think he nailed it well
00:11:42
enough that it it's not a loser. Yeah.
00:11:45
And I'd say the same thing with the Ariana vintner stuff.
00:11:48
Let's say that was the loser as as you proposed.
00:11:50
Again, maybe it's the closest to the loser, but it allows another
00:11:56
gem of a scene which is a hallmark of Vince and he's going
00:12:01
out on a high here. It's usually a committee room in
00:12:03
front of Congress, but this time it's that closed door meeting
00:12:07
with Vintner and other people at the DoD and State working on the
00:12:11
reintegration plan. When Mitch gives it to her, it
00:12:16
is nearly perfect. So as much as that storyline is,
00:12:21
you know, give or take, it does set up the reintegration stuff,
00:12:24
one, But two, it allows us to have a classic boardroom meeting
00:12:29
room, Vince Flynn style scene. And Mitch delivers When when
00:12:34
Ariana Vintner is with that other guy, I think he's a
00:12:37
corporal or captain or something.
00:12:39
I don't even know what his rank was, but he's like the assistant
00:12:43
and he's just trying to get in Vintner's pants all the time.
00:12:45
Rap picks up on that in in their body language.
00:12:49
And he's like, you're sleeping with this guy over here.
00:12:52
So what about your husband who finds out you're probably ready
00:12:54
to divorce him. You're, you know, he's probably
00:12:57
a cock and and Rap just gives it to this lady and then she has
00:13:02
Rap. Do you think I'm stupid or do
00:13:04
you think I'm an idiot? And Rap's like, I don't have
00:13:07
enough information. You haven't started talking yet.
00:13:10
And then she goes off and he raises his hand.
00:13:12
He's sitting there raising his hand and she's like, are you
00:13:15
raising your hand? He goes, yes, I'm waiting to be
00:13:17
called on. She calls on him and he goes,
00:13:19
I've heard enough. You're an idiot.
00:13:22
Great. Line, Great line.
00:13:26
Yeah, I know. And it gives us it.
00:13:29
It's like the best version, one of the best versions of like we
00:13:33
we've seen it time and time again where rap is in a room
00:13:35
giving it, giving a talk. But if you juxtapose it against
00:13:38
the the previous revisited novel we did in What is that pursuit
00:13:43
of Honor? Yep.
00:13:45
Like complete 180. It's night and day, yeah.
00:13:48
I mean, but you have to, you have to think about like there
00:13:51
was two other books published in between those two books, even
00:13:53
though chronologically they exist back-to-back.
00:13:55
But but he he starts and ends with a great one of those scenes
00:13:59
because transfer of power, which is really first introduced with
00:14:04
the Chiefs of staff with General Flood.
00:14:06
And now he's going out in this meeting mouthing down to
00:14:09
Vintner. I just think that's that's a
00:14:11
perfect way to do it. Very much so.
00:14:15
Another time rap is classic rap is right in the opening dude,
00:14:19
the way he dresses down Zahir, that police commander, former
00:14:23
Taliban. I love the way this book opens
00:14:27
that is that is coming in hot with a crime scene and the the
00:14:31
little bits of the crime scene are gonna be like a whodunit,
00:14:34
you know, along the way. And so that's a lot of fun with
00:14:37
like where the blood is and what the blood trail is like away
00:14:40
from the safe and which kind of gun it was.
00:14:43
All those bits and pieces are sprinkled throughout as it
00:14:46
reveals Rickman was the mastermind behind his own
00:14:50
abduction. And we get this, I hear
00:14:53
character trying to play both sides again.
00:14:55
Vince is doing what he does, building a back story for this
00:14:58
guy. Is he with the Taliban?
00:15:00
Is he helping us out? He even asked Mitch, you know,
00:15:03
how much are you gonna pay me to be an informant to help you?
00:15:05
And Mitch is like, nothing. I'm shoving Hellfire Missile up
00:15:08
your ass like it's it's just classic Vince again, creating
00:15:13
these characters and bringing us right into the scene by knowing
00:15:17
exactly who they are, what they stand for, and watching Mitch do
00:15:21
everything we want to be done to people like that.
00:15:24
Yeah. And he also comes into play
00:15:26
later on with the whole memory loss thing because immediately,
00:15:30
you know, or closely after waking up and gaining some of
00:15:33
it, some of his memory back, he's thrust right back into the
00:15:36
action and has to call this guy and talk to right and has to.
00:15:40
And there's another funny thing we get, like I said that I
00:15:42
really I said that to that. Like I've had a softy Mitch,
00:15:46
softy Mitch, OK, all right. And then but as soon as that
00:15:50
phone call happens, he's back. He's back, you know, And I just
00:15:56
think it shows like the essence of what makes Mitch, Mitch like
00:16:01
what he can do, what he's good at is, is both one, getting
00:16:04
shots, like, and taking them, which we see in his book, but
00:16:07
also being a good operator in the sense of like knowing some
00:16:12
spy stuff. We don't often see Mitch do like
00:16:14
spy stuff, like, you know, the subterfuge stuff.
00:16:17
But he is a master at manipulating, at coercing, at
00:16:22
getting information out of people, getting people to do
00:16:24
what he wants them to do. You know, he breaks this guy
00:16:28
down, but brings him back up, you know, hangs him with a
00:16:32
lifeline with his life essentially, you know, and then
00:16:36
later on, you know, he says says we'll give him some money for
00:16:39
for helping out. So it's I I do would agree with
00:16:43
you. This this opening this set us
00:16:45
here is great. And yeah, like, not only do we
00:16:48
have Rickman's gone, but like, all right, we have literally
00:16:52
this whole whodunit, you know, like that's what Hayek's brought
00:16:55
in to do this like investigative, you know, because
00:16:57
she FBI background, Mitch's like sort of question.
00:17:02
You can you can feel that Mitch feels that something's not
00:17:05
right. Something can sit well with him
00:17:07
from the very first chapter. Like this doesn't seem like what
00:17:11
it is. And so like, those are the
00:17:13
little hints that you can pick up on on reread when you like,
00:17:16
you know, sort of piece it all together and can see like
00:17:19
earlier than the reveal that, oh, this was actually coming,
00:17:22
you know, a little bit of foreshadowing.
00:17:25
Sydney High, great character, I want her back.
00:17:28
So what do you think about the other FBI character in the book
00:17:32
and Joel Wilson? Yeah, and oh, he's got a history
00:17:35
with Hayek, which is not a good one when he he tries to kind of
00:17:40
play Mr. Nice Guy when he needs her, but he was obviously
00:17:43
abusing her when they were in a relationship.
00:17:45
Again, another Irene Kennedy, winner of a scene in the
00:17:48
hospital when she confronts Wilson, a winner of a scene.
00:17:53
But no, I, I kind of like Joel Wilson and why he's in here
00:17:58
because he, he kind of gave me that pause of, oh, wait, maybe
00:18:01
he's the guy who's gonna cut through the red tape and maybe
00:18:04
he's gonna do whatever it takes to investigate.
00:18:06
And but then he's just an asshole and a jerk.
00:18:09
And you realize Samuel Hargraves, who's in charge, is
00:18:12
actually trying to be the a good leader here.
00:18:15
And it's Joel Wilson ignoring him or disobeying orders that
00:18:20
allows the terrorists to infiltrate our system, right?
00:18:22
Because they're playing Senator Ferris.
00:18:24
Senator Ferris is playing right into their hands by finding a
00:18:27
guy in the FBI to do his dirty work.
00:18:30
But it's all under the guise of the system's broken, right?
00:18:33
They're selling to people, the system's broken.
00:18:36
Everybody's corrupt. So you can't work within the
00:18:38
system. You have to, you know, you
00:18:41
basically have to become your own kind of asset, but, you
00:18:44
know, working around your bosses in the FBI, guys like Hargraves
00:18:48
or even FBI Director Miller, who's brought in.
00:18:51
Right, The ultimate boss here. Yeah.
00:18:53
Joel Wilson and Senator Ferris think they're better than that.
00:18:56
And Wilson's being used. Ferris is using him.
00:19:00
Ferris is being used by Rickman and Associates and Durrani.
00:19:04
And it's all like how our upper echelons of government get
00:19:07
penetrated. And I really like seeing that
00:19:10
play out because this is essentially an intelligence op
00:19:13
against us to try to break us down from the inside.
00:19:17
Corrupting a senator, sending him false information.
00:19:20
He's being ruthless by going around people's backs to get
00:19:23
this investigation started by Wilson.
00:19:26
Like, this is this is bad news. And, and Kennedy's up against
00:19:29
this. Meanwhile in the dark most of
00:19:30
the time. But you know, they win in the
00:19:33
end. They bring him down.
00:19:34
And I love how a reason they bring him down is because Scott
00:19:38
Coleman is willing to do whatever it takes, including
00:19:42
bugging the dog of an FBI agent. Really cool.
00:19:46
And he even bugs it to listen to a private conversation in a car
00:19:49
with a sitting senator. If he and Kennedy are not
00:19:52
willing to take those drastic measures, we'll never get the
00:19:56
app, you know, the evidence to stop these guys.
00:19:58
I thought that was really cool, Scott Coleman willing to do
00:20:00
that, which necessarily means Mike Nash was not willing to do
00:20:06
it and play dirty. What did you think of that?
00:20:09
Well, first I wanted to say I think this is also
00:20:13
quintessential events like going back to the early days, transfer
00:20:16
of power, Stu Garrett, Senator Hank Clark, like giving us these
00:20:22
these congressman, senator politician side stories, B
00:20:25
plots. We called absolutely early on
00:20:28
that they're the actual villains, you know, even though
00:20:30
they're being manipulated, like, you know, they are doing harm
00:20:34
and, you know, driving it on. So to see that come back because
00:20:38
we we've kind of gotten away from that a little bit with,
00:20:41
with some of these Vince novels. And so to bring that back in his
00:20:44
last novel again, just one more point.
00:20:46
But yeah, I I picked up on that. I also picked up on, you know,
00:20:50
the whole they go into the back story about like why Mike is not
00:20:54
on Mitch's team anymore. And you know, why he when he's
00:20:57
coming over, he's going to be calling the shots because he's
00:21:00
technically Mitch's boss and because he outed him.
00:21:02
And like, you know, they're like, you're the war hero now.
00:21:05
Like that kind of you're the face of the so that that, you
00:21:08
know, there's some distrust there.
00:21:10
You can again, I think we pointed this out when we did the
00:21:13
enemy of the Gates pod. There's clear signs of like, you
00:21:18
know, 1 Kennedy is distancing herself a little bit from Mike
00:21:22
while elevating him. Like, you know, I guess the
00:21:26
trust is. Different roles.
00:21:28
Eroding. It's like, it's just like the
00:21:31
she doesn't, she can't use him the way that she used to, so now
00:21:35
she has to rely on Scott. Exactly.
00:21:37
She knows that he has to play a different role.
00:21:41
He has to not be involved in some of this Black Ops spooky
00:21:43
stuff 'cause he has to be that bridge between the CIA and the
00:21:47
Hill. He's eventually gonna be the
00:21:48
public figure who can get Irene what she needs while not being
00:21:53
involved in The Dirty operations she has to have her fingerprints
00:21:56
on. You know, his fingerprints can't
00:21:58
be on those operations because he has to Curry favor with the
00:22:02
politicians, with the public. You can't do that if you're also
00:22:05
the one pulling the trigger, you know, and like Irene
00:22:08
assassinating VP, president-elect kind of in the
00:22:11
in the Oval Office, Like you can't be doing those kinds of
00:22:14
tricks. And so those seeds are planted
00:22:17
here for what Kyle would grow into the the complex
00:22:21
psychological profile that is Mike Nash and how that
00:22:26
relationship between Nash and Kennedy, Nash and Coleman, Nash
00:22:30
and Rapp is gonna fracture. And we're seeing that begin
00:22:34
here. I mean, just listen to this.
00:22:36
This is the conversation that Kyle definitely must have had
00:22:39
his his finger on, had the pulse of when when he wrote Enemy at
00:22:42
the Gates, Mike says. So if you don't think you can
00:22:45
keep your temper in check, then I think you should take off.
00:22:49
Anger flashed across Rap's face so much that Nash took a step
00:22:52
back. Rap said, Let's be clear about
00:22:54
something. I know you have a fancy new
00:22:56
title and a nice office at Langley, but you are not in my
00:22:59
chain of command. You're Irene's message boy and I
00:23:02
personally couldn't give a fuck what you think.
00:23:04
If Irene wants me here then I'll act like a good soldier.
00:23:07
I'll follow her orders, but I don't need your personal input
00:23:09
or Darren Sickles, or anyone else's for that matter.
00:23:13
Nash was used to Rap's rough edges, but there was something
00:23:15
more to this. The two men have been in plenty
00:23:17
of heated arguments over the years, but there seemed to be
00:23:20
some genuine animosity this time, as if Rap now thought they
00:23:25
were on opposite sides. Nash took a long breath and said
00:23:30
you've never been one to follow orders and I sure as hell don't
00:23:33
see why you'd start now. Very funny, big man.
00:23:36
I'm really not in the mood for your shit and I'll play your
00:23:38
game, but I'm warning you that idiot sickles better watch
00:23:41
himself or I'm coming across the table.
00:23:44
Dude, Rap. Vince even writes rap now.
00:23:49
Thought they were on opposite sides and Nash says you're not
00:23:52
one to follow orders. Mitch Nash is eventually gonna
00:23:56
say I was just following orders with the cook stuff.
00:24:00
Yeah. And it dude, like it's all right
00:24:03
here. Anybody who didn't see it and
00:24:05
didn't like Animate the Gates, it's all right here in the final
00:24:08
words that Vince wrote. Yeah, no, it's for anyone out
00:24:14
there. Again, I'm gonna say this for a
00:24:15
thousandth time. Anyone out there that says why,
00:24:19
like they can't believe how animate the gates could happen.
00:24:22
It's all there. Just go back, reread these
00:24:24
novels. It's clearly foreshadowed.
00:24:27
Vince wanted it. You know, Vince, if it's
00:24:30
supposed to go in, like maybe it wasn't on that exact same route,
00:24:32
he was going to go some sort of route with them with this coming
00:24:35
to a head, so. Yep, Yes, it is.
00:24:39
OK. Can we maybe transition here?
00:24:42
Sure. We've already reviewed this
00:24:44
book. It's almost two hours of
00:24:45
content. Like I said, episode 7172.
00:24:49
Can we spend a few minutes here, Chris, talking about what the
00:24:53
heck is Don Bentley gonna have to do to get us to this point
00:24:58
where rap is on the ground in Afghanistan?
00:25:01
We we have a cold open here of rap coming in, jacking up this
00:25:05
general dude. What did it take for rap to get
00:25:08
here? I mean, there's some hints, but
00:25:11
we're gonna be in the dark about Don Bentley's plot for capture
00:25:14
or kill. Yeah.
00:25:16
So coming off the last novel and then going into this one,
00:25:20
there's entire story that's gonna take place between the
00:25:23
two. I'm super intrigued about this
00:25:25
and has to involve Bin Laden. I'm imagining, you know, is it
00:25:31
gonna involve anybody either in Iran, either in Pakistan?
00:25:37
Like, you know, I feel like Pakistan's gotta like play a
00:25:40
role because that's where they caught the dude.
00:25:43
So I it's, it's intriguing. Like what do you think he has to
00:25:48
do to get us to this point? So that's tough because here's a
00:25:52
a minor gripe about something and tell me if this is valid or
00:25:56
not. Maybe it's because we just read
00:25:59
protect and defend. We had Ashani listen to these
00:26:03
names. Ashani in what was it the IGRC
00:26:08
or somewhere in Iran who was kind of a back channel to Irene
00:26:13
Kennedy. They were even meeting together.
00:26:15
When Kennedy gets taken and all that, he ultimately comes into
00:26:20
Langley and is gonna play nice with the CIA.
00:26:22
And he's, he's our guy in Iran, right?
00:26:24
So he's kind of that figure who's sympathetic to us, but is,
00:26:28
you know, a patriot to his own country, but sees a relationship
00:26:32
with America as a positive thing for Iran's development.
00:26:35
Now you have Ashan. Not Ashani, but Ashan.
00:26:39
This was this was confusing. Me, this is confusing.
00:26:42
And Ashan is almost the exact same thing in Pakistan.
00:26:46
In the ISI, he's fighting the Pakistani hardliners who don't
00:26:50
wanna play ball with America, who wanna piss us off.
00:26:53
And you know who actually we're harboring?
00:26:55
Bin Laden. Like Ashan does say he did his
00:26:58
own report kinda off the books investigation into the bin Laden
00:27:03
stuff and he found the ISI culpable.
00:27:06
He directly found Durrani and the Pakistani intelligence
00:27:10
services knowingly held bin Laden, harbored bin Laden and
00:27:14
protected him. But that got covered up because
00:27:17
Durrani, Taj and all these guys played hardball and covered that
00:27:21
up. There was even a cover up about
00:27:23
President Musharraf, the assassination attempt that he
00:27:26
mentions. So Ashan is like this guy on the
00:27:28
inside, knows a relationship with us is valuable, doesn't
00:27:33
believe the corrupt people who are siding with the terrorists
00:27:35
are best for his country, and he's forming a back channel with
00:27:38
us. Is it not almost the exact same
00:27:41
thing as a Shawnee and a Shawn? I wonder if we're set up to be
00:27:46
confused by that because I don't know.
00:27:49
That's a tough thing to navigate there.
00:27:51
If you bring up one or both of these characters in the book, I
00:27:55
could just see right now the Facebook group getting a bunch
00:27:57
of posts of who is Ashan, what book was he, and see the guy
00:28:01
from Iran. No, that's Ashani.
00:28:02
Ashani sounds like Ashan. Are they the same person?
00:28:05
And I'm like, is this going to be sticky territory?
00:28:09
Yeah, but you're very right. They are essentially the same
00:28:13
character, different, different locations, different
00:28:16
organizations, but they serve the same purpose to be that
00:28:19
right. You know, the one true light in
00:28:23
the corrupt organization that's going to, like, have
00:28:25
interaction. I feel like Ashawnee had a
00:28:28
little bit more active integration with Irene Kennedy.
00:28:32
You know, like, actually tries to get her back.
00:28:34
Like, obviously like gives up all the names, the the phone
00:28:37
numbers, you know, that kind of stuff.
00:28:39
Here, Ashawn is just a in the end, he's a scapegoat.
00:28:43
Yeah. And it'd be interesting to see
00:28:45
if he comes back because I know that Taj plays a big role as the
00:28:48
main villain in the next book. So I can't remember if Ashawn is
00:28:52
in the Survivor, but yeah, it's, I don't know.
00:28:56
I I don't know enough about native Pakistani and Iranian
00:29:03
names to to know if those are just common names.
00:29:06
No, me neither. Sure.
00:29:08
But the my, I guess my bigger point is Don Bentley clearly,
00:29:12
and the synopsis we got for Capture or Kill mentions A Shani
00:29:16
and it talks about Iran and a Quds Force demonstration.
00:29:20
And it's like he's gonna be the back channel with Kennedy.
00:29:24
Yet this is also coming a book before Ashan plays a big role in
00:29:28
Pakistan and there's the bin Laden stuff.
00:29:31
It's just like there's Iran and Ashani stuff, and then there's
00:29:35
Pakistan stuff with bin Laden. Do we not mention Ashan because
00:29:40
we have Ashani? We don't mention Ashan.
00:29:43
Yeah, I think that's. Tricky.
00:29:45
I think you just ignore the Ashan stuff.
00:29:46
Good. Book with both of them in it.
00:29:48
I don't think so. I, I think, I don't think so.
00:29:50
I think the Pakistan Ashan, excuse me, Ashan stuff from the
00:29:55
last man isn't going to come up and capture or kill.
00:29:58
Do we see Durani? You might see Durani though so.
00:30:02
Yeah, but because. Durani is hiding bin Laden.
00:30:05
Ashan told us that. He told us his investigation was
00:30:07
that he knows Durani was doing that.
00:30:10
Yeah, that's, that's what I'm interested.
00:30:11
Like which characters do we see a a Joe Rickman?
00:30:15
That'd be intriguing. I honestly think we might
00:30:18
because he's spreading the money around.
00:30:20
Yeah. Like, he's even if he's just
00:30:23
like paying some people off. And do we see Rickman, you know,
00:30:28
interacting with Mitch? That's interesting.
00:30:32
I don't know. Does Rickman give some Intel to
00:30:35
Mitch or they work on the ground together?
00:30:38
And that's how rap figures out about the Abbottabad complex.
00:30:42
Do we get the conversation that ultimately led to Rick wanted to
00:30:47
kill Mitch? Yeah, that weird turn do Do we
00:30:50
have something happen in the search for bin Laden that
00:30:54
convinces Rickman? To turn on.
00:30:58
Wrapping and Irene or to turn on America, essentially.
00:31:01
To turn on America. To get into Durani's pockets and
00:31:03
and ally with him. I 'cause he seemed he seemed
00:31:08
like a patriot. Like why that that's the one
00:31:10
like thing always weird, always confuse me and I guess like, all
00:31:15
right, he wants the money, he wants to get out, but this dude
00:31:22
seemed like the ultimate patriot, like, you know, he's
00:31:25
just really smart so. If you don't show Rickman's turn
00:31:30
to get in bed with Durrani, I don't know how you then bring in
00:31:35
the Bin Laden stuff knowing what we know from the last man.
00:31:40
I don't know how you ignore that or or don't show that.
00:31:44
Like, or maybe that's the point, right?
00:31:46
Like Rapp and the Americans are trying to find bin Laden and Joe
00:31:51
Rickman has all the cards, but for some reason holds it back
00:31:58
and Rapp has to kind of find bin Laden himself, even though Joe
00:32:01
Rickman could have been helpful and an ally and, and there's
00:32:05
some spat over that or division over that.
00:32:07
I don't know. I just think that's really
00:32:09
tricky. Like I felt a little better
00:32:12
reading Pursuit of Honor about where we were headed and how, at
00:32:17
least on a psychological level, we get Mitch to where Mitch
00:32:20
needs to be. But reading The Last Man, it's
00:32:24
really hard to think backwards about how we end up at The last
00:32:27
Man. It's much easier to go forward,
00:32:31
but it's gonna be like an it can either be our super awkward jump
00:32:36
from this novel again, another intriguing reason why, like, why
00:32:40
would you want to go back and do this?
00:32:41
But it it, I feel like it's hard.
00:32:46
Louis Gould, is there any chance we see him getting back in the
00:32:51
game? Because it says he started
00:32:53
taking hits and he, he was starting up this company and
00:32:57
it's kind of kind of neat. He would use his skill set to
00:33:01
take on clients who want to someone to access their
00:33:04
vulnerabilities. So he would put together
00:33:06
packages for assassinations, but he wouldn't pull the trigger.
00:33:10
He'd instead sit down and show people and organizations their
00:33:14
vulnerabilities and how he would have hit them.
00:33:16
Like, that's kind of a neat role.
00:33:19
And then how does he ultimately get to the place where he does
00:33:21
accept the package? It says he went to a hotel room
00:33:25
in the UAE in Jumeirah. There was a package waiting for
00:33:28
him with a cell phone, $3, and said, all we're
00:33:31
gonna tell you is you're hitting an American official in
00:33:33
Afghanistan. And this was two weeks ago
00:33:36
before he attempted to take the shot.
00:33:38
So two weeks before the last man takes place, is there somehow an
00:33:43
opportunity there? Probably not.
00:33:45
But what's Louie Gould doing throughout this book, you know?
00:33:49
What would you rather have as like an epilogue like Louie
00:33:55
Gould going to this hotel room? The package.
00:34:00
Getting the package, you know, we just get like he checks in
00:34:04
and we get, you know, whatever. Or like Joe Rickman taking his
00:34:08
dog to the vet. Or something like that.
00:34:11
Just like, not even mentioning like and just, you know, it's,
00:34:16
it's like a treat for readers, you know?
00:34:18
Yeah, that's really good. Or even building that complex.
00:34:22
They use that guy, the American contractor guy.
00:34:25
He's like an energy consultant and Durrani becomes friends and
00:34:28
neighbors with him, but they secretly want to kill him to let
00:34:31
Rickman use his identity. Recruiting that guy would be
00:34:34
cool. Oh, the vet would be great
00:34:36
because the whole vet story was made-up.
00:34:38
You know they actually went to a vet, but they never you know
00:34:41
the. Vet said the dog wasn't sick.
00:34:43
No, he said. Go to the Kabul hospital.
00:34:45
I can't see what's wrong. I can't treat you yet, Rickman
00:34:47
started telling people. They put the dog down, Yeah.
00:34:50
And spreading the lie that the doctor did it.
00:34:53
Yeah. I think the gold one would be
00:34:56
really good but I just don't know how it connects to capture
00:34:59
or kill unless it's. It reminds me of like if there
00:35:03
if you could put like stingers in books, you know, like, you
00:35:06
know, you, you watch these Marvel movies and like at the
00:35:10
end of Captain America, there's just Thor's hammer like falls in
00:35:14
like in the, in the in the middle of the thing.
00:35:15
Or Nick Fury comes out. Remember the first one with Nick
00:35:18
Fury? Yeah.
00:35:20
Yeah, yeah, something like that. Was that Iron Man?
00:35:22
Did they do that in the? First one, Iron Man.
00:35:24
It was Iron Man. That was the first one.
00:35:26
Wow. Yeah, I, I think that'd be
00:35:29
really cool. I I think there is an
00:35:30
opportunity if Gould is assessing people's
00:35:33
vulnerabilities, if someone like contacts him about, hey, we have
00:35:39
a high value target that we're trying to protect and we want to
00:35:43
build a complex for them and we want to have security protocols
00:35:46
so nobody can get at this person.
00:35:48
How would you do it? And like Gould is advising some
00:35:52
anonymous organization on how to hide A protectee.
00:35:55
That would be kind of neat. Yeah, there's there's a lot you
00:35:59
can do. Super intriguing to see what Don
00:36:01
does, let alone what the story is.
00:36:03
But these little nuances to like connect to both the pre, the pre
00:36:08
book and the post book. We might not get any of it, but
00:36:13
it's nice. It's nice to sort of
00:36:16
prognosticate or, you know, guess.
00:36:19
You know, it would be an interesting one.
00:36:21
Stan's Cancer News. Oh, if he goes to the doctor,
00:36:25
Stan goes to the doctor. Something like that or we see, I
00:36:29
think it was Nash tell Mitch the news.
00:36:32
That was intense, that. Was in Afghanistan really
00:36:35
intense. So Mitch, obviously, excuse me,
00:36:38
Nash obviously knew, which means Kennedy obviously knew.
00:36:41
Do we ever see Stan breaking the news to Kennedy?
00:36:43
Because that that's got to be a moment knowing their
00:36:47
relationship, it's like a granddaughter to him.
00:36:51
You just get like a quick one liner about like I'll be dead in
00:36:56
six months, so let me smoke, you know, when they're all like
00:36:59
drinking drinks. We get a lot of that here.
00:37:01
Yeah, we get a lot of that here. But seeing where that begins
00:37:05
when he first tells Irene. Woof.
00:37:11
I don't know man. Don Don has his work cut out.
00:37:15
Yo, he sure does. He sure does.
00:37:19
Well, Don, if you ever need two Mitch rap nerds to dig in deep
00:37:23
and find some old clues and connections for you, you know,
00:37:27
you think I might know a guy? Think I might know a guy?
00:37:30
Might know two guys. You know, it's like if you ever
00:37:33
wondered what was Joel Wilson's driver name, you know, the guy
00:37:37
who drove Joe Wilson around, who was in the FBI?
00:37:39
Oh, that was Cal Patterson. Duh.
00:37:42
I know you're typing out these names of characters and I'm
00:37:45
like, wait, who the fuck are these people like?
00:37:49
What's the name of Joe Rickman's dog?
00:37:51
Oh, you mean Ajax? I knew that.
00:37:53
I knew that. OK, well, I don't know if you,
00:37:56
if you asked me, I don't know if I would have known the answer.
00:37:58
But when you said Ajax, I was like, Oh yeah, that's Ajax.
00:38:01
Yeah. If I didn't reread this book, I
00:38:03
would have never remembered that.
00:38:06
We, So in grad school we would have these trivia nights at like
00:38:12
our, the, the student union. And so I, I wrote all the, I, I
00:38:17
hosted a couple of them. So I did one for Game of
00:38:20
Thrones, I did one for Harry Potter, I did one for Star Wars,
00:38:26
I did one for Friends Office, you know, etcetera.
00:38:30
You think we could do one with our patrons for Mittrap?
00:38:33
I smell an episode. I smell an episode Calming.
00:38:36
There you go. We could have like a couple
00:38:38
people on like I'll be the, I'll be the commentator or the the
00:38:41
host. We could have like you, Brian
00:38:44
Costello, Don or I. Take Mark on my team.
00:38:48
Mark would be my. First, Yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:38:51
We well after after Ryan stack mark would be my next draft.
00:38:54
Pick. Yeah.
00:38:55
I mean, if you could draft anyone, you'd probably want to
00:38:57
draft. Draft the real books by
00:38:59
obviously. So that sounds like a good
00:39:03
episode. Well, we have nothing less left
00:39:05
to read this summer. We'll do that episode.
00:39:08
Well, we're kind of stacked on our reading list, Chris, for
00:39:12
2024. So yes, one other little nugget
00:39:17
while we're on these this deep trivia, you know what would be a
00:39:20
cool mention anywhere else in the Mittrap universe?
00:39:24
Whether you plug it in earlier, come back to it decades later.
00:39:28
Sitting Bull Sitting Bull was an awesome, awesome drop in the
00:39:33
Rickman video that was phenomenal.
00:39:36
How Rickman knew with one simple drop of a phrase, he can get
00:39:42
Irene Kennedy sweating and squirming in her chair by
00:39:46
letting out the name Sitting Bull, Who's the highest asset we
00:39:50
have inside the Russian government?
00:39:52
Who's working for us? And Rickman knew to hint at that
00:39:56
in one of his interrogation videos, kind of under his
00:39:58
breath, where no one else would really even hear it or probably
00:40:00
understand it. But he knew how that would upset
00:40:03
the applecart of the US government and U.S.
00:40:06
intelligence. That was phenomenal little
00:40:09
little thing to put in. And it reminds me of we have a
00:40:13
similar situation in in Brad's books with in Spymaster.
00:40:18
There's like this, the guy doesn't even know that he is the
00:40:22
the the I forget his actual name, but it's like a Sitting
00:40:25
Bull type character. His yeah, no, the the little the
00:40:29
little details with this novel, it just it makes it great.
00:40:33
Definitely. I, I think I want to, I want to
00:40:35
move it above lethal agent. Dude, this book, if it's not in
00:40:39
your top five, I let's, let's say it's got to be in the top
00:40:43
ten. That's like has to be for
00:40:45
anybody. It's got to be top five.
00:40:47
And it's got to be top five. I really think you can make that
00:40:49
argument. I'll even keep it in the three
00:40:51
spot. So no scorecard from us here
00:40:53
today. We talked about in our last
00:40:55
revisited how we're going to save the scorecard for other
00:40:58
series instead, the Mitch Rap series.
00:41:00
They're all great, right? They're all 50 out of 50 except
00:41:03
for Pursuit of Honor. So and maybe executive power, so
00:41:10
we're not going to do the scorecard, but we'll do these
00:41:13
revisited books. Who knows, Chris, maybe we'll
00:41:15
get through the whole series and do revisited.
00:41:18
But what we're going to do instead is, is kind of re rank
00:41:21
them. And I think my RE ranking here
00:41:23
is absolutely top five, but I keep it personally in the third
00:41:26
spot. Yep, Yep, Yep, Yep, Yep.
00:41:29
All right, so next time we're back on this feed probably won't
00:41:34
be till the book comes out. Maybe not.
00:41:36
Maybe we'll hop back on and do the survivor cause I've been
00:41:39
itching to read that, reread that one.
00:41:41
But in the meantime, you got to go check out our other two
00:41:44
feeds. Season 2 no limits, Brad Thor
00:41:48
podcast Scott Harvard podcast. Sorry, reading a lot of Brad
00:41:52
Thor hidden order or is a current novel we're on gearing
00:41:55
up for shadow of doubt coming out this summer.
00:42:00
And then we have a whole host of other books I don't have to read
00:42:03
list in front of me for the Mitrapod the Thriller podcast
00:42:07
are season three and beyond. Go check out those feeds coming
00:42:12
out to you roughly once a week. And Chris, since this is where
00:42:15
you thank our patrons, let's put in a plug for our newest patron,
00:42:19
Adam Kay. Adam Kay from across the pond
00:42:22
over in England, Thanks for tuning in.
00:42:25
Thanks for being our newest special agent.
00:42:27
And just in case we overlooked you, Jason C as well, our newest
00:42:30
special operator. Really glad to see you guys
00:42:33
getting involved with the Patron community.
00:42:36
Hope you're enjoying chatting us in the group chat.
00:42:38
We've got a patron only group chat going on.
00:42:41
We even did our vote for the next Patron book club book we
00:42:45
are going to read, The Kill Artist by Daniel Silva.
00:42:49
So listen for us to squeeze that into the reading list down the
00:42:53
road. And if you want to be part of
00:42:54
this amazing group of thriller readers, go ahead and sign up at
00:42:58
thrillerpod.com. Just click on the Patreon tab,
00:43:01
and we'd love to see you over there.
00:43:02
So thank you, Adam and Jason C thanks for joining up.
00:43:06
Yes, thank you and welcome to the family.
00:43:10
All right, Well, let me thank the rest of our patrons, our
00:43:12
other special operator, Sherry F, our special agents, Ben,
00:43:15
Darrell, Kevin, George, Matt, Don, Peggy and Mark.
00:43:19
Please subscribe for your review using your favorite podcasting
00:43:21
platform. You can find us@thrillerpod.com
00:43:24
or on Twitter and Instagram at Thriller Podcast.
00:43:27
And as always, just let Mitch you Mitch.
00:43:42
Just a disclaimer, this podcast is not affiliated with Vince
00:43:45
Flynn, Kyle Mills or Simon Schuster, but thank you to them
00:43:48
for bringing us the wonderful world of rap.
00:43:51
And the music soundtrack is Gorilla Tactics by Raphael Crux.