The Measure

Assigned to a government task force studying the string issue, Anthony decides to press his advantage. When the task force reports to the president, they recommend that disclosure of string status be included in the background check for powerful positions. One task force member points out the advantages of recruiting long-stringers for military duty, since they cannot die while their strings have not run out. The president pushes back on some of their recommendations, deciding that, for now, string status disclosure will only be mandatory for some government officials and current members of the military. Still, when Anthony tells Katherine about the meeting, they gleefully agree that this new direction will work out well for them.

Maura and Nina watch a cop show while waiting for a news conference about new string policy. On the show, the police pursue two violent short-stringers, and Maura worries about how short-stringers are being portrayed in the media. After the press conference, they are both upset by the announcement of the STAR Initiative, which mandates that short-stringers cannot apply for certain positions. Nina thinks the change is temporary, but Maura knows better. The support group is the only place she where she feels free to express her emotions, and her experience is complicated by being a Black woman, discriminated against whenever she expresses anger or frustration. At her support group, Maura draws the parallel between the string issue and racial, class, and religious discrimination, and they all see the truth of it.

When Javier and Jack hear about the STAR Initiative, they realize that, as military academy graduates, they will be forced to look in their boxes and will be placed in the military according to their string lengths. After deciding to open their boxes, they discover that Jack’s string is long, but Javier’s is short. Javier decides not to tell his parents, who are proud of his military career. Jack raises the idea of switching their strings; he doesn’t have the same commitment to military service that Javier does.

At group, one of the members shares his parents’ belief in reincarnation, and Ben wishes he believed, too. The group talks about feeling compassion for themselves, instead of feeling that they are guilty of something and being punished. After the meeting, Hank takes Maura and Ben to a golf driving range, where he goes to vent his emotions. While there, they see television footage of people in Europe burning their boxes, a symbolic act since neither can be destroyed. Ben is distracted by memories of his last night with Claire. She opened both their boxes without his knowledge, and when she saw his short string, she couldn’t bear the thought of waiting for his death and broke up with him. Now, he finally feels able to forgive Claire for her actions and for not having the strength to stay with him.

While Maura and Ben hit golf balls, Hanks sits on a nearby bench, thinking about something that happened at the hospital where he works. A woman had been waiting to hear whether her daughter, a young girl with pink-tipped hair, would get a lung transplant. She confessed to Hank that she had looked at her daughter’s string, and it was long. Now, Hank reflects that for every short-string story, there is another one that offers hope and reassurance in the face of fear.

The night that Jack proposes the switch, he dreams of his grandfather, Cal. Cal met Javier once, and he told them both about his experience of enlisting in World War II. He was stationed far from the men he trained with, and hadn’t looked them up when he got home, because he preferred to imagine them living long lives. Jack wakes from his dream thankful that Cal isn’t alive for the strings.

In their discussion about switching the strings, Javier brings up Jack’s father, and they decide that he will be the only one who to know the truth. His entire family, including Anthony and Katherine, will believe that Jack has a short string. Finally, Javier agrees to the switch.

Amie writes a letter to Ben, talking about the Van Woolsey building, a grand old apartment building on the Upper West Side that stands in her mind for her ideal future life. Because she hasn’t looked in her box, she can still imagine that her dream might come true.

Since Nina and Maura fought about her online research, Nina has stopped looking for answers online. She is meeting Amie at a new restaurant whose chef, having been denied a loan because of his short string, has crowdsourced the money to open. She remembers the first time she saw Maura, at a karaoke bar. She was the one who pursued the relationship, and she had liked the unfamiliar role. When Amie gets to the restaurant, she tells Nina about a new open-source spreadsheet online that tracks people’s string status. Anyone can edit their own string status or anyone else’s. She searched it, but no one had entered Maura’s name. They put their worry aside and try to enjoy dinner, and Nina is glad that she and Amie have each other.

Katherine is still pressuring Jack to attend Anthony’s campaign events. He hasn’t told them about his short string yet, but he is sure they will find out soon. He sees one of Anthony’s commercials and finds out that he was part of the STAR Initiative task force. Suddenly, he is furious about having to attend his uncle’s events.

Anthony and Katherine are on his campaign bus, pulling up to an event in New York. Supporters and protestors are there in equal measure, and they can hardly tell the two sides apart. Anthony hopes the protestors will cause trouble.

Hank is meeting the support group to protest at Anthony’s event. Once there, he is surprised by the show of solidarity for short-stringers. He sees a woman approaching the stage with her hand under her jacket. When she pulls out the gun, Hank throws himself in front of it just as she fires.

Anthony is pulled off the stage and secured before he even registers the gunfire. He realizes that it was an assassination attempt, and becomes frightened at having enemies until he remembers the length of his string. He sees the shooting as good for his campaign, and thinks about how to use it to his advantage.

Hank lies on the ground while the woman who shot cries and tries to staunch the wound. His friends all believe that he still has several years left, and that he won’t die from the bullet wound. Only Ben knows the truth, and Ben is the last person Hank sees before he closes his eyes.

Jack does not attend Anthony’s event. He can’t believe his family is at the center of all this violence and controversy, and that they only seem interested in the polls. He wonders about the man who jumped in front of the bullet, and why he committed to that course of action. He goes to Katherine’s house and tells her about his short string. When she begins to cry, he feels guilty about the deception and angry about how alone Javier is in this situation. When he gets home, he takes everything related to the military out of his closet and hides it under his bed.

In the wake of the assassination attempt, Anthony’s support grows, especially when it is revealed that the shooter had a short string. He continues to work this angle, drafting legislation about guns and short-stringers. When scientists discover a way to interpret the strings that narrows the window of death to within a month, he sees this as a way to further tighten legislation. Katherine, however, begins to second-guess their strategy, which he doesn’t understand until she tells him about Jack’s string. Anthony feels badly for Jack, but believes he had never been as strong as the rest of the family. Then he realizes that he can use Jack’s short-string status to his advantage.

After Hank’s death, Maura becomes preoccupied with how she will die. Feeling powerless, she understands why some short-stringers are choosing to end their lives deliberately, rather than waiting for death. She has decided not to use the new technology to update her time frame. When she goes to group, everyone is talking about Hank’s death and the woman shooter. Beyond the fact that she was a short-stringer, very little information has emerged, leaving Maura to wonder about her real motivation. However, she knows that the short-string narrative is the one that everyone promotes, and that it will contribute to the unconscious bias that is building against short-stringers.