It all comes down to the campaign, eh? Last week’s slam-bang episode of The Last Ship took place mainly on land, as the away team of the USS Nathan James infiltrated the Immunes to exfiltrate the man who may — may — be President of the United States, the former Secretary of HUD. Jeff Michener turned out to be a true believer of Sean and Ned, not held against his will, so Chandler and his team had to take him by force onto the Nathan James. Michener isn’t happy about it either, which means that Chandler has a tough situation. If Michener won’t budge, and if Chandler insists on maintaining and rebuilding traditional authority structures, he’s going to face an insurmountable conundrum when Michener orders him to stand down. The preview suggests that Chandler will opt for a kind of deprogramming method to reach Michener on a personal level. Will that be enough, or has Michener not seen the depredations of the two brothers clearly?

In a bonus, Patient Zero Niels got shot in the abdomen during the exfiltration after attempting to poison a broad swath of potential survivors. As I argued on Twitter during the episode, Niels has provided us with a handy cultural reference for doing something especially toxic: we can now say someone has “squeezed the bear.” Use it like this: Man, that Planned Parenthood technician really squeezed the bear with ‘Its another boy!’ Lt. Green destroyed all but one of the bears, and Tex brought it to Dr. Scott. Can they use it to derive a stronger air-based cure that can be sprayed over entire populations? And will anyone care if Niels survives? (Answer: No. Sorry, Ebon Moss-Bachrach, you’ve done your job portraying a villain too well.)

Finally, how long will the cat-and-mouse game go on with the sub? Slattery, played by our good friend Adam Baldwin, neatly averted an attack by going into a harbor, but that won’t last long as a defense strategy. Besides, we came here to drink beer and watch Adam kick some butt, and we’re getting mighty low on the brew, folks. Tick tock.

If you missed last week’s episode, “Alone and Unafraid,” you can catch up now through your system’s On Demand offerings (the YouTubes are not authorized, I’ve discovered). Like most of this season’s episodes, its best action comes in the final act, so have your popcorn ready. And, er … make sure all the forks are secured if Lt. Ravit is around.

Note: There will be no QOTD today, so consider this your open thread for the night, too.