SPOLER ALERT: Do not read if you have not yet watched “Pulse,” the April 10 episode of “The Equalizer.”
Chris Noth was fired from CBS’ “The Equalizer” in December after being accused of sexual assault by two women. On Sunday, the drama revealed how Noth’s character, William Bishop, was written off the Queen Latifah-led show.
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The last episode of “The Equalizer” that Noth appeared in was the Season 2 episode “Separated,” which aired Jan. 2 and was filmed prior to him being dropped from the series on Dec. 20. Six episodes have aired since that installment, none of which featured Noth’s Bishop, including tonight’s “Pulse,” which gave the in-universe explanation for where the character has been and concluded with his off-screen death.
During Sunday’s episode of the second season of “The Equalizer,” former CIA operative Robyn McCall (Queen Latifah) learns that Bishop, her mentor and a former CIA director, has spent the past two months helping out with a CIA investigation into a flight that mysteriously went down.
Working with friends Harry Keshegian (Adam Goldberg) and Melody “Mel” Bayani (Liza Lapira), McCall discovers the situation likely involves her nemesis Mason Quinn (Chris Vance) and a scientist who works in electromagnetic pulses (EMPs), which create directed magnetic fields that can knock a targeted plane out of the sky without anyone realizing how it happened.
McCall and CIA handler Carter Griffin (Brett Dalton) head to a location where they believe Quinn and his crew are going to meet up with Daniel Blake (Denis Ooi) to test out an EMP on another plane. This is when Keshegian discovers that Bishop is currently on the plane that is being targeted by Quinn. He calls to tell McCall, who demands he hack into systems to get in contact with air traffic control and Bishop’s personal security in order to warn them.
Quinn and his men capture McCall and Griffin before they can stop them. The two are forced to watch and wait as Quinn and Blake get ready to fire the EMP at Bishop’s plane as it’s passing by. Though Goldberg is able to convince Bishop’s private security to change course, it’s too late, and the EMP has been fired at the plane. McCall screams as she watches the aircraft holding her mentor go down, knowing that Bishop has certainly been killed in the crash.
After that, Quinn decides to kill McCall and Griffin, but is stopped by Bayani who gets there just in time to fire at Quinn’s team, injuring some and scaring the others off — all except Quinn himself. McCall quickly runs to the EMP, and decides to fire it at the helicopter that Quinn is escaping on, but changes her mind when she realizes how many people will be killed on the ground by a falling chopper.
A defeated McCall shares a drink with Goldberg and Bayani, saying she knows that whatever Quinn is planning next, he’ll find a way to do it. She also is heartbroken to think that Bishop, who was targeted by Quinn for knowing too much and catching on to his plans, was only trying to do it to help McCall finally capture Quinn after all these years.
She then receives a call from Bishop’s number, only it turns out to be Quinn who tells her: “This is the second time you’ve gotten in my way. Don’t come after me because then I’ll have to come after you.”
Noth was ousted from “The Equalizer” in December, after a detailed investigation by The Hollywood Reporter revealed two women, under the pseudonyms of “Zoe” and “Lily,” had separately approached the publication months apart and shared their sexual assault allegations against Noth. They alleged that the incidents occurred in Los Angeles in 2004 and New York in 2015.
Noth denied the allegations, calling them “categorically false” and claiming the encounters were consensual.
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