'The Bourne Legacy' Active Shooter

A Critical Analysis

Not gonna lie. I love the Bourne films, even the one that doesn’t have Jason Bourne in it (with the exception of a brief mention in a TV newscast). Friday afternoon a week ago, I was thinking that it had been a while since I’d seen the film. On Saturday afternoon, cable TV had the movie running.

I love that sort of happenstance.

The Bourne Legacy features a scene that is right in my wheelhouse. A scientist, Dr. Foite, works in a lab that specializes in behavior modification via genetic manipulation. In this scene, he goes off the rails and shoots his fellow scientists after blocking access to the lab to outsiders. Our heroine, Dr. Marta Shearing, is eventually the lone survivor of the rampage.

Here is the five-minute scene. Viewer discretion is advised for blood and violence.

For pretext, there is little indication in the film that Dr. Foite is becoming disaffected and hedging toward violence. The suggestion after the rampage is that Foite was somehow exposed to something in the lab that sent him into this violent tailspin.

As an exercise, I decided to analyze this scene as an active shooter situation and see where we can apply lessons from this fictional (however realistic) event.

The Beginning

Dr. Foite is seen working in his lab sorting specimen samples. Cool. One should wonder, however, why he looks so dour. I mean. this guy just looks pissed off…

Contrast this look with the Dr. Foite we saw earlier in the film when he was talking to Dr. Shearing about being approved for new research:

To her credit, Dr. Shearing appears to think something is ‘off’ when Foite meanders through the lab on his way to lock the back door. See her double-take towards Dr. Foite at 1:39 in the video. Still, everyone has bad days, so her apparently chalking up his current issue with RBF to having a stomachache or a migraine is understandable.

Where things really go south is in the next few seconds.

The Rampage

If you watched the video, this section is a bit redundant as a play-by-play of events. Feel free to skip down to The Analysis if you prefer.

Dr. Foite doesn’t start his rampage by shooting his nearest target, Dr. Shearing. Instead, he directs his attention to the presumed team leader in the lab. Without a word, he produces a handgun and shoots his colleague.

The first thing to note in this well-executed fictional attack is the problem of normalcy bias. The second scientist, the one standing to the team leader’s right, takes a couple of seconds to run after the first shot is fired. Dr. Shearing takes six seconds to duck under her desk. Scientists in the adjoining lab start with, “Did you hear that?” Everyone prairie-dogs at that moment. They slowly stand, turn, and stare in the direction of the door to the affected lab.

The third victim tries pleading with the shooter. She is experiencing ‘the freeze’ while repeating, “No, no…” As Foite approaches her to ensure her death, other scientists are scurrying around the lab for cover. One (the “second scientist” mentioned above) runs for the locked door, exposing himself to the gunman. He pleads for help from those in the neighboring lab. Standing at the door with his back to the gunman results in his being shot again.

Dr. Shearing first tries the locked rear door with no success, so she pounds the alarm button (smart!) and - keeping herself low to the floor (also smart!) - flees to another hiding place under a desk.

At this point, we see the scientists in the adjoining lab trying to gain entry to the lab where Foite is killing everyone. They ID the shooter (“Foite’s got the gun!”) while insisting they have to enter the lab. There’s a problem though: no one in the lab has a “red card” by which they can access the area.

Bounce back to the shooting scene: Foite spots another scientist ‘hiding’ behind a clear curtain. She too attempts to plead with Foite and is shot multiple times.

Outside, security has arrived one full minute into the rampage. The same problem persists: he doesn’t have a “red badge access card” either. More time is wasted as a card is tracked down.

After reloading his handgun, the shooter continues, this time targeting a scientist hiding near Dr. Shearing. His curiosity draws the attention of the shooter, who proves to us all that thin metal desks provide decent concealment (as long as one doesn’t prairie dog the hiding spot, as this victim did) but very poor cover. After being discovered, the scientist attempts to run but is wounded for his efforts. Foite follows him and shoots him multiple times, but not before he (the scientists) asks incredulously, “What are you doing?!”

Foite’s only response to the question is gunfire.

Meanwhile, in the hallway, our intrepid security officer is calling for Billy to bring him an access card. More time wasted.

As Foite is finishing off the aforementioned scientists, Dr. Shearing takes the opportunity to run to a secure storage closet. Foite sees her run, but he’s in no hurry. She can’t get out. Time is on his side.

Realizing she can’t lock the door, Shearing removes her lab coat and wraps it around the inside push release. Doing so prevents the door from being opened from the outside. It’s a brilliant play, actually, and it literally saves her life.

Outside, Billy has finally arrived with the door badge. New problem: the door to the lab has no handles. Dr. Foite removed them as he entered the lab. More time is wasted as they futilely try to open the door with their hands.

Meanwhile, Foite is moving in on our heroine. His attempt to open the door to her hiding spot is unsuccessful, so he tries to shoot her through the window. Awesome luck! The glass is bulletproof! Foite empties his gun into the window.

As he tries to reload his gun, Dr. Shearing makes a break from the closet, knocking Foite to the ground and sending his gun and full magazine clattering across the floor. She again runs for concealment behind a desk as Dr. Foite recovers, picks up the gun and magazine, and reloads. Just as he’s about to find her hiding spot, security finally breaches the lab.

After failing to comply with the officers’ commands to drop the weapon, Foite takes a round to the back, which drops him to his knees. His last glance is toward Dr. Shearing as he puts the gun to his chin and takes his own life.

The Analysis

The Shooter

It is safe to assume that Foite had been planning this rampage for more than a few minutes. His plans to isolate the lab took a deeper understanding of the space in which his colleagues worked. He knew that he would need time to kill some half dozen colleagues and himself. Ensuring that all relevant persons were in the lab (that is, everyone with a keycard with which to access the lab) bought him valuable time. More importantly, removing the door handles, a task for which he already had fabricated a tool (a paperclip, it would appear), bought him another minute.

Given Foite’s pleasant disposition earlier in the film, it’s hard to imagine him assassinating his colleagues. In the absence of leakage or other warning signs, preventing this shooting would have been all but impossible. As a result, his efforts were 88% successful. Dr. Shearing surviving the rampage is the gunman’s lone failure.

Security

Generally speaking, the security officers in this situation responded admirably. They were, however, slowed by their lack of access to the lab.

As a former security officer, I believe it is essential to have access to every part of the facility, even those areas deemed off-limits to anyone but essential personnel. Security is only as good as their ability to intervene in a crisis. Sterisyn Morlanta (the fictional lab where the rampage occurred) tied the hands of their armed security guards by not giving all of them access to the entire lab. This oversight (what they perceived as a precaution) cost lives in this event.

We don’t get to see how they overcame the lack of a door handle to finally gain entry to the scene, but they managed it with great haste and ended Dr. Foite’s rampage.

The Bystanders

The non-affected lab personnel (that is, the ones who weren’t being shot at) behaved in the typical human manner - a process I refer to as prairie dogging. They stand up to look around at each other and then the source of the noise. Slow realization sets in. Many of them went toward the sound of gunfire. Not the best idea, but curiosity is what it is.

When security arrived, they provided relevant information. “Everyone with a key card is in the lab.” “Dr. Foite has the gun.” They were good witnesses, which is the best anyone who isn’t a first responder can do.

The Victims

First things first: I do not victim blame. I observe what people do and offer an analysis of their behavior. I am only using this fictional event to inform what one should or should not do.

Vitim one (the apparent head of the lab) has no recourse. He is the unfortunate “victim zero” in this rampage. The second victim, who was standing beside his colleague (victim zero), tried to run. This is a logical response to someone with a gun, especially when there is a table between himself and the gunman. He is shot in the back as he runs away. More on him in a moment.

Victim three is an interesting study. As she shooter approaches her, she is frozen in place and repeating, “No… no…” as she holds her hands over her mouth in terror. She is shot where she stands. This is classic “freeze” behavior coupled with a bit of normalcy bias. It’s not that she believes begging the shooter not to hurt her will have any affect. She simply can’t reconcile what she is experiencing with what she typically experiences in that space. Untrained people do this All. The. Time. under difference circumstances, whether or not they are in danger themselves (watching a car accident unfold before their eyes, as an example). Her inactivity results in her death.

Back to victim two, who has sustained two gunshot wounds to the back. Rather than remain still on the floor as the shooter continues his rampage, he runs to the locked door, screaming for those on the other side of it to, “Open the door!” The fact that he is standing in place and being loud means he is again a target for the gunman. He eventually takes two more rounds to the back and dies. Typical advice under these circumstances: don’t do ANYTHING that will draw the attention of the shooter. I can’t count the number of people who say they survived an active shooter rampage by pretending to be dead. That would be the best option under these circumstances.

Victim four tried to hide, but picked a poor location hiding behind a clear curtain. This option provided neither cover nor concealment. When the gunman approaches her, she responds similarly to victim three: she pleads with him before being shot multiple times.

It’s worth mentioning here that the shooter has emptied his handgun and must reload to continue.

Meanwhile, victim four is hiding under a desk near Dr. Shearing. He wants to run for the door. She tells him that the door is locked. “He’s going to kill us all!” When he hears the mag drop as the shooter is reloading, he peeks around the desk. Again, this behavior attracts the attention of the shooter - something he should most definitely avoid. The shooter puts several rounds into the desk, but victim four is uninjured. It’s then that he makes a fatal mistake.

Victim four bolts from his hiding place and dashes across the lab into what looks like a pantry. The space has no door and has no other exits. In his desperation, he exposes himself to the shooter, runs in a straight line away from him, and corners himself in a confined space. As he is fleeing, he takes at least one round to the shoulder and falls to the ground. When the shooter approaches, he cries, “What are you doing?!” The shooter is silent as he fires another round, killing this victim.

Now, should this victim have remained where he was? No. His hiding place was already compromised when he peeked out during the shooter’s reload. It’s not WHAT he did that was a problem, it was HOW he went about it. In the absence of being able to disable the gunman, the next most important goal is to buy time, since that is what first responders need in order to stop the rampage. Staying small and running for another hiding space (that isn’t a doorless pantry) is best. He wants to keep the game of chase going as long as possible while throwing anything he can grab at the shooter. If he is given an opportunity to attack the shooter, he would be wise to do whatever he could to stop him

After all, he was the one who observed, “He’s going to kill us all.” Might as well go down fighting.

The Heroine

Dr. Shearing has a remarkable response considering she is not trained to respond to violent events. When the shooting starts, she reacts as most people would: look, pause, react (duck under her desk). Her process through the OODA loop is a bit faster than most, which is commendable.

From here, she gets a bit more precise in her response to the event unfolding around her.

When the camera returns to Dr. Shearing, she is crawling along the side of a desk toward a door. She tries unsuccessfully to open the door (which Dr. Foite locked before removing the key) as a way to flee. She never rises to stand throughout the entire ordeal, even when trying to open the door. It’s an interesting observation for me as an outsider: most people opt for speed (standing/running) over minimizing their profile (crouching/crawling). Dr. Shearing doesn’t follow what most people do.

When she realizes the door is locked, she crawls across the floor, presses an alarm button as she passes, and ends up under another desk. There she sees victim four - the pantry runner. He inadvertently ends up saving her life by sacrificing his own. When Dr. Foite pursues the victim into the pantry, Dr. Shearing takes the opportunity to scurry to the sealed room. This time, she DOES opt for speed and runs across the lab.

Dr. Shearing realizes the door is a problem, so she uses her lab coat to keep Dr. Foite from opening it. His attempts to shoot through the glass are futile, even after emptying his gun in the process. As he drops his empty magazine, Dr. Shearing makes her first possible mistake: she leaves an apparently secure space for another desk to hide behind.

Suffice it to say, if your hiding space is secure and unbreachable, stay there. Under the circumstances, Dr. Shearing had no reason to flee that room. The glass held up to the onslaught of several rounds, the door couldn’t be opened from the outside, and there were no other ways to get inside. Could the glass fail with a few more shots? Maybe. Maybe not. But she is below the line of sight for him to shoot her. Short of the window falling out, his ability to hit her is barely above nil.

Given similar circumstances, if the shooter is out there and you’re securely in here, it’s probably best to keep it that way.

Dr. Shearing is ultimately saved when security breaches the room and drops Dr. Foite. His failure is her salvation. For now, at least…

Conclusions

This scene from The Bourne Legacy is a compellingly accurate portrayal of a pre-planned active shooter rampage. While the plot of the film puts this shooting in the realm of government conspiracy, it’s a well-produced and acted scene that reflects a high degree of realism. From the way outsiders respond to the behaviors of the victims and attacker, everything about this scene offers instruction to those who watch it. How did the victims react? How did they die? How did the one survivor ensure her survival?

As I sit here in my local Starbucks finishing up this article, I look around at the people in my space. My wife is across the table, so her safety is top of mind for me. A doctor in scrubs identifying him as a gynecologist sits a few feet away. Three other customers (including a former coworker, whom I’ve known for more than 10 years) are drinking coffee and looking at screens. A couple are seated outside on the patio.

If this place were attacked, how would it happen (the two on the patio would most likely be the first targets)? Where would I go, knowing that it’s me and my wife together (there’s a door opposite the patio entry, so that’s our egress)? Who would freak out and do nothing (most likely the gynecologist and the woman behind me). Who would most likely attempt to confront the shooter (the muscular man to my left).

These are things to think about no matter where I go. I would suggest you form a similar habit for the spaces you visit - especially places you go frequently. The chances of things going this terribly wrong for you are extremely low, but being prepared hurts no one and can have life-saving consequences.

Be safe.