Cal (Tim Roth) is on the phone to his daughter, Emily (Hayley McFarland) and he realizes she's lying, when she tells him she's going to a sleep-over. Gillian (Kelli Williams) tells him she's at that age and she needs to have secrets. FBI agent Dardis (Anthony Ruivivar) contacts the firm to look into the murder of a judge's daughter. Judge Stark (Isabella Hofman) is a presidential appointee, so the case needs to be handled carefully. Yeah that's Dr Cal Lightman, really diplomatic and tactful!
Ria (Monica Raymund) and Cal meet with the judge, using their obligatory video recording of their meetings. Cal asks for her happiest memory of her daughter, Danielle (Grace Bannon). The judge doesn't know what he means and thinks him insensitive. He then questions her about Danielle's death and how she felt, it being the worst day of her life. Knew the question was coming when she asks Cal if he has children. To top it off, he also has a daughter, so he knows exactly how she feels, though he won't admit it.
Looking over the video tape, he asks how much importance Danielle placed on her friends. He also shows Gillian and Dardis footage of a woman who murdered her children, noting the judge's facial reaction and comparing them to the woman. Both their facial expressions are similar: they have no facial reaction at all. Emily is brought in by the police and looks worse for wear. She threw a party at her mother's house and invited over 100 people. Both Emily's action and Danielle's position shows how important friends and socializing are to teens. The lesson in Danielle's case being that friends can also harm. Something which Emily doesn't seem to grasp, and appears naive. Emily's punishment is to tidy one of Cal's store rooms after school.
At Danielle's funeral, Cal asks Ria for a piece of gum, which he chews and sticks on the bulb of the lamp, waiting for it to explode, garnering a reaction from the judge. Her forehead is devoid of any reaction leading Cal to conclude she has been using botox to mask her age, but her eyes showed emotion.
Gillian, who I think gets the menial, secondary storyline/cases, and Eli (Brendan Hines) look into the plane crash of a NASA pilot. NASA Director Schaumberg ( Matt Malloy) believes David (Sasha Roiz) is lying since his father is a Russian . He tells Gillian he didn't crash the plane on purpose and loves his country. At the funeral, Danielle's friends talk about her and one of them, Riley (Sarah Ramos) can't control her emotions. She looked like she was overdoing the tears, crocodile in her case. Ria calls her popular and Cal equates this with lying. The more popular the person, the better the liar. He later asks Emily when she became interested in being popular too.
Riley's face was asymmetrical which Ria believes shows her emotions aren't heartfelt. What if the person has an asymmetrical face anyway. Ria: "When a person's facial expression is not symmetrical across their face, it is likely that they were pretending to feel the emotion. Article in the Journal of behavioural Science 2001." Cal replies, "Sucking up's not your strong point." Riley wasn't shocked by Danielle's death. Cal asks if she's just plucked her eyebrows, signs are easier to detect. He then tells Ria he made that up.
Ria: "You never told me about the eyebrow plucking thing, where did you read about that?"
Cal: "Nowhere, because it's complete crap." Ria's taken to quoting Cal from his journal article and includes the date. Think he finds that a tad unnerving, but recovers soon enough. Especially coming hot on the heels of last episode's comment about her not having any 'scientific experience'. Danielle was apparently into drugs, as Riley tells them.
A visit to the exclusive prep school and a meeting with the headmistress, Jonas (April Parker-Jones) reveals the school has a zero tolerance policy on violations of the code. Cal wants her to announce a locker search, he doesn't actually want to search them; only to see the reaction of the pupils. Gillian tells the Director David isn't lying and he could have suffered a hysterical blackout: something associated with suicide. Watching videos of his other flights, she finds he was suffering from depression. Emily finds a photo of Cal on one of his research trips, where he appears to be stoned, or in her words, "baked." Eli tells her he cares for her and is worried.
At the school, Cal asks questions, whilst gaging the pupil's reactions, picking out one boy whom the others don't maintain any eye contact with. He tells Cal he's aware of his rights as his father's a lawyer and from his reaction, his elbow on the chair, Cal works out his father is a tax lawyer. He admits he sold Danielle ADD drugs to help her concentrate on her work. When Jonas asks them to leave, as she enters with Riley's father, Keith (Steve Flynn) Cal notices her rub her hand as a sign of keeping a secret. Ria later speaks with her and she tells Ria of the rewards system where the best students are given entry to the best schools/unis.
David's wife, Hillary (Christian Corp) says he was under pressure and he controlled it, but she's lying. Gillian says she means she controlled it and believes David was on medication. Eli asks NASA to perform a tox screen on David. Emily says sorry to Cal for lying - not for having the party. The judge's alibi is confirmed and from Danielle's academic record, Ria finds Danielle's SAT score improved, after she died. Her teacher admits she took the test for her, but they had an argument when she confronted Danielle about it. Cal doesn't think she's lying since a guilty person wouldn't admit to arguing. He needs to see the video footage from the cameras in the hall.
David tests positive for anti-anxiety medication which he knows nothing about. Hillary admits she was secretly dosing him and he admits he feels much better about her and the children. On the video, Danielle's reflection, seen in the trophy, is one of surprise about the test. The judge paid her teacher to take the test for Danielle so that she would get into a good school. Riley was also cheating and Danielle found about this. Riley's father admits he killed Danielle, but when he's shown photos of a clown and then Danielle's DB, he genuinely acts shocked. He doesn't want her to go to prison.
Riley was obvious as the suspect, being popular, she was the one they fully concentrated on from the outset. The same with Hillary. Both featured bouts of drug-taking, for different reasons. Yet there was something missing, a lack of cohesion, as the stories jumped from one to the other. Think it would have been better to concentrate on one story, than another ancillary one, which frankly wasn't that interesting.
Cal's reaction when Gillian tells him NASA thinks David is lying, "That's not surprising, since the whole space programme is based on lies."
Isabella Hofman likes playing judges, she also played one in NCIS season 7 episode, where she actually killed. Danielle Stark was a character name many years ago in Aussie soap Neighbours.
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