Burn Notice Quotes

Michael: [V.O.] When you realize that an operation is compromised, that your enemies are on the move, you're on the clock. You have to move as fast as you can to contain the damage and harden your defenses before it's too late. Sometimes you make it in time, and sometimes you don't. When you work in intelligence, the worst feeling in the world is knowing nothing. Being caught in something you don't begin to understand, because it's not the enemy you see that gets you. It's the one you don't.

TV Show: Burn Notice
Sam: Operation unburn Michael Westen is officially off.

TV Show: Burn Notice
Michael: [Voiceover] The day that the cell phone call log was invented should be celebrated as a national holiday for spies. Even a cautious cell phone user who uses dialback systems or switches phones often, leaves behind a lot of information you can use.
Fiona: Still going through that thing?
Michael: Strickler used this phone. Chances are he used it to talk to whoever it is that's torching hotel rooms to say hello to me.
Fiona: Have you considered turning this over to Homeland Security? They get paid for this sort of thing, you know.
Michael: For all I know he could be working for Homeland Security.

TV Show: Burn Notice
Fiona: What are you worried about? So your mom becomes friends with the county records lady. So what?
Michael: You just never know how things are going to go! She's an asset. Things can get very complicated.
Fiona: I was an asset of yours once.
Michael: And things got complicated and people got hurt.
Fiona: True. In my experience, people get hurt and things get complicated no matter what you do.

TV Show: Burn Notice
Fiona: I'm working on a listening device for your meeting with Ryan later. Would you care to join me?
Michael: I would love to.
Fiona: You know, after the other day I never did get the chance to say— well, not that I have any doubt in my mind that I would have saved myself eventually, and I still think that your tactical approach was a little iffy, but you and Sam, you did come back for me. You gave up a lot to come back for me, whether I needed it or not.
Michael: You're welcome, Fi.
[Silence; they nearly kiss]
Fiona: Watch it. You're getting solder on my transmitter.

TV Show: Burn Notice
Michael: [As cover ID Alex, to arguing thugs] Girls, girls, girls, don't fight; you're both pretty.

TV Show: Burn Notice
Gilroy: I had to see you in action and I have to say you've lived up to your reputation. Such panache! Love the suit, who are you wearing?
Michael: You know, you're awfully confident I won't shoot you right here. Don't be.

TV Show: Burn Notice
Fiona: Those are some grade A sons of bitches in there. [looks through the glove compartment] Where's your gun, Sam?
Sam: I moved it, Fi, for your own good. Look, if it'll make you feel any better, I think your trick with the bug gave us something we can use.
Fiona: Yeah, if we can use it to bludgeon Lynch to death I'll feel much better.
Sam: One step at a time, Fi.

TV Show: Burn Notice
Fiona: Ooh he called him a 'pendejo', it's like idiot but ruder.

TV Show: Burn Notice
Michael: Leave no trace. Leave no teeth.

TV Show: Burn Notice
Larry: Michael Westen back in action? I wouldn't miss it.

TV Show: Burn Notice
Fiona: You know, some guys take girls to the beach, concerts, farmers' markets. Ugly Polish military intelligence offices, not so much.
Michael: Believe me, I'd rather be at a farmers' market than bribing a bureaucrat to tell me what's on a spy plane.
Fiona: I have an idea. [Michael nods for her to continue] Instead of working with Gilroy the psychopath, instead of sneaking around to try and figure out what he wants to steal from the plane, shoot him and be done with it!
Michael: I considered it.

TV Show: Burn Notice
[Sam is undercover as a Miami Police Department CSU tech, at the site of a fashion designer's killing.]
Sam: Looks like murder... [takes out a pair of sunglasses and puts them on]...is in style this season.
[Later, under the same circumstances]
Sam: Looks like the killer's plan... [takes out the sunglasses again and puts them on] ...is coming apart at the seams.

TV Show: Burn Notice
Fiona: For your sake, Michael, I hoped you were dead. I can put up with a lot, but four calls without so much as a text back?! That just puts me right to the edge!

TV Show: Burn Notice
Simon: I want my life back!
Michael: Fine. It's yours. Take it.

TV Show: Burn Notice
Michael: [V.O.] Work in intelligence long enough, you hang on to phone numbers. No matter who your enemy is there's a chance you'll need them tomorrow. Churchill and Stalin weren't chummy in 1941, but once the Nazis marched on Moscow they got past their differences.

TV Show: Burn Notice
Sam: It's funny. You never really know a car until you drive it through a wall.

TV Show: Burn Notice
Agent Callahan: Look at the file! You saw it already! Everything's there! It's documented!
Madeline: And these are all lies!
Callahan: I saw it with my own eyes! I saw your son attack a police officer, Mrs. Westen! He nearly killed a man! Your son shot at me! He tried to kill me! You live in a fantasy world, lady! You have no idea who your son really is!
Madeline: I know this: if Michael wanted to kill you, you'd be dead. I know exactly who my son is!

TV Show: Burn Notice
Simon: It's only a matter of time, now, until you're just like me. [laughs] Just like me. Just...like...me.

TV Show: Burn Notice
Madeline: Hello there, Michael.
Michael: Hey, Ma.
Madeline: To what do I owe the pleasure?
Michael: Well, I thought we should talk. I know that, uh, it wasn't easy while I was away.
Madeline: Having you gone is something I've gotten used to. You know what was hard? Having an FBI agent in my house telling me that you're a monster. I still don't know what's going on.
Michael: I was chasing a man named Simon. He started off, years ago, as someone who did what I did. Something happened, he changed and he hurt people and a lot of things he did got blamed on me.
Madeline: Now, how is that possible, Michael? If you weren't there?
Michael: I spent my entire career officially being nowhere. So it's not hard to pin things on someone who's job is to never have an alibi.
Madeline: Well, there other things that he said, you blew up a bridge? You shot at police? You didn't do that?
Michael: Yeah, I did. I had to get Simon. He was going to hurt more people if I didn't stop him. So, I broke the law. I worked with bad people. I did it because I had to.
Madeline: That's it? It's as simple as that?
Michael: [starting to tear up] I don't know... [pause] He laughed... When I caught Simon, he laughed. He said it was just a matter of time before I was just like him.
Madeline: [hugging Michael] He's wrong, honey. That isn't the son I raised.

TV Show: Burn Notice
Lee: So when we find Jesse we're suppose to just, what, share him?
Michael: [as cover ID Mr Turner] That's what we learned in kindergarten.

TV Show: Burn Notice
Michael: [V.O.] First contact with the police is critical: it can mean the difference between the start of negotiations, or the start of an armed assault.

TV Show: Burn Notice
Michael: Good news. I think Kendra just found us. Grey sedan right behind you.
Fiona: Do you think she's been sitting on this place?
Michael: She probably figured we'd have to bring the tape drive at some point. Which we did! Still think this is a dead end?
Fiona: It is if she kills us.

TV Show: Burn Notice
Kendra: Why are you after me?
Michael: And here I was think it was the other way around. Why don't you come back down so we can have a nice little chat?
Kendra: A little chat with a guy who tried to grab me in an alley?
Michael: A couple of days ago you tried to kill me.
Kendra: Touché.

TV Show: Burn Notice
Michael: [V.O.] Interrogating a hostile witness is like proposing marriage. You want to get it right the first try. So you don't settle until you find the perfect spot. You take special care to set the right ambiance and set the mood. And then you wait for the best moment to pop the question.

TV Show: Burn Notice
Jesse: [dragging a trunk with a captive in it] Even a day at the beach isn't a day at the beach with you people.

TV Show: Burn Notice
Fiona: [after Jesse hits Russian spy with pistol] This was my idea! I should have gotten to hit him!

TV Show: Burn Notice
Sam: Where there's smoke, there's Fi.

TV Show: Burn Notice
Fiona: Sometimes you have to be your own white knight.

TV Show: Burn Notice
[Fiona enters, very disheveled]
Michael: Fiona...
Fiona: You should see the other guy.

TV Show: Burn Notice