This new season 7 episode opens where it left off last season, with Shane Casey (Edward Furlong) holding Danny (Carmine Giovinazzo) and their baby at gun point in their home. This was Lindsay's (Anna Belknap) attempt to play 'macho woman', now that Stella (Melina Kanakaredes) has gone. No, really, Lindsay has even taken to wearing high-heeled stilettos (one of Stella's traits in the show.) Anyhoo, moving on - this cliff-hanger from last season, wasn't so much a hanging-off-cliff moment, waiting for Lindsay to fire the bullet and put us out of our misery in not having to watch her macho posturing and inflating nostrils, for too long, and kill Casey. This was CSI:NY's attempt to give this bland character some backbone and make her interesting, failing miserably. It'll never work, Lindsay's not your average Cat (Marg Helgenberger) or Sara (Jorga Fox) from CSI who can portray bucket loads of gumption and emotion in one blink of an eye.
As my friends and family will attest to, as soon as season 6 was over and even before the end credits rolled, I opened my big mouth and told everyone it was Lindsay who fired the gun, and that's all that happened. Okay, I hate being right, but what can you do! It was the only logical explanation, since in TV world, none of the regulars get shot, fatally, only wounded, but never killed off, unless they're leaving or it's a radical move on the part of the writers.
Careless Lindsay then drops the gun to the floor, it could have gone off, or misfired, that was mind bogglingly clumsy with a baby in the house, and she calls herself an officer. Of course Lindsay would shoot Casey with his taunts. Mac (Gary Sinise) arrives on the scene to provide comfort for her, as she and Stella were his obvious favourites.
5 months later and bland Lindsay is being awarded the Combat Cross (officers do more in the line of duty, than she did here! Hey Flack (Eddie Cahill) never even received so much as a thank you, when he was injured by the bomb in season 2, when he tried to get that man out of the building before the bomb exploded, making him the last one out, bearing the full brunt of the explosion!! And his life hung in the balance. Okay, I'm biased.
Whilst receiving her medal, she has more flashes to the night in question and the shooting. Mac, unofficially shutting down the lab, since the workers wanted to come down for her. Most of them wouldn't even have met her, let alone know who she is.
New recruit, Jo Danville (Sela Ward) arrives arrives to find the lab deserted and a DB (dead body) to boot. Danny hopes this doesn't become a regular occurrence, i.e. finding bodies in the lab before they've read the paper. Jo comments she thought the crime lab was "BYOB: bring your own body." (Yes we guessed that before it was spelled out for us.) Since there's no Stella, someone had to carry on the comedic proceedings (even if they are distasteful a lot of the time). Mac has time to play pleasantries with Jo, but orders the workers abruptly to their duties: "Hey, what the hell are you doing - incase you missed it, we have a murder victim in the lab!" Er, that's what they were looking at. Wouldn't find Horatio (David Caruso) or Gil (William Petersen) treating his staff like that, or even shouting to them either! To quote Abby (Pauley Perrette) from NCIS "Bite your tongue!" Mac.
It's ascertained that the murder victim, Sarah Nelson, (Katie Boggs) doesn't work in the lab, but in the same building, since she pressed the button in the lift (elevator), which was to their floor, she knew where to come. Mac tells Jo they usually greet the new recruit with a practical joke, not a real murder. Since when, didn't see any pranks being played on Lindsay when she arrived in season 2.
Rigour suggests the DB's been there for 8 hours. She was choked before she died and there's strange peticule hemorrhaging in her eye. Mac's impressed with Jo's initial findings and questions how she got to their floor, er, in the lift. CS (crime scene) analysis, with flashbacks, shows how Sarah could have arrived on their floor. She doesn't have a bag or jacket, so she must've worked in the same building and since she pressed that button in the lift, she knew this was a crime lab. (Thought the crime lab would be a crime lab, i.e. have an exclusive building, just like they did in season 1 not share with others.)
Flack introduces himself, no one introduced Jo, they had to do it for themselves, or she introduced herself, that was rude. Flack: "they don't usually murder people in the lab - this is new to them." (Eddie's let his hair grow, thus the action had to move on 5 months too, since everyone's got a new or different style. Preferred Eddie with his shorter style myself.)
Lindsay attempting to play tough guy, as in not needing to be analyzed by the Department shrink, routine in all officer-involved shootings. (Lisbon (Robin Tunney) in The Mentalist did a much better job in season 2 of protesting and not wanting to open up!) Lindsay was just downright rude, especially when she tells her she doesn't need to know her personal life history, Well I don't either!
Adam (AJ Buckley) fingerprints Jo and she accuses him of coming onto him, for fun, she's read his 'thick' FBI file - which Adam being Adam, makes him nervous.
Jo finds a tissue with lipstick in the office where Sarah worked and deduces she was ready to go out, or to meet a man. Danny finds she was pushed against the window but not stabbed there. Hawkes (Hill Harper) finds gravitational blood drops indicating where she was stabbed. Flack tells them the security cameras were tampered with. Sarah was killed whilst Mac was still at work.
Sid (Robert Joy) analyzes her eye to find thread-like strands in her eye was not peticule hemorrhaging. She was also pregnant, which provides them with a motive, though they haven't worked this out yet. The murder weapon was something with double blades and Sid suggests it could be scissors. Jo analyzes Sarah's expensive clothes and surmises she was seeing a rich, married man. Adam accesses her phone and discovers she had 'Enemy X' programme on there, which indicates the location of people she wanted to avoid.
Lindsay receives a gift from Stella to congratulate her on her bravery award, she's the boss in New Orleans now. Probably throwing her weight around at the NO crime lab now! She sends her a frame with a bravery quote. Oh how thrilling (not.) Since Stella was a main character, it was left for an ancillary character, like Lindsay to tell us where she's gone and that took a while coming. Mac consoles Lindsay by telling her she's a warrior and "can't be broken." He wouldn't do that to any of the guys on his team, he'd be ordering them back to work ASAP. Danny returns the medal she threw away.
Flack's got his jackets back, so when do the suits and ties return. That's what I'm holding out for, ha, (amongst other things) that and the appearance of David James Elliott!!
Sarah's phone leads to their first suspect Rudy Aronika, (Lawrence Monoson) who couldn't have been the father of her baby since he had a vasectomy, so she was seeing someone else. Flack comments on Jo's interview methods with the box of tissues on the table as an added touch. Mac bet her a steak dinner the tissues wouldn't work, well they did, but no mention of the dinner later. Odd they had Flack ask Mac what he thinks about the suspect, since usually he'd give his own opinion.
There's a hit on the blood from Sarah's blouse, indicating the victim of a mugging, Teddy Westwick. (Brett Tucker) he has a pet tarantula and is married. Big clue when he tells them his wife and daughter are everything to him. His arm was cut when he was slashed in the mugging and he claimed not to know Sarah. Flack tells him scissors are a strange form of weapon to be used in a mugging. (See later when Jo also says this.) Flack wonders what the mugger could have wanted from his office, if he came to see him here and then attacked him on the street. So, if Teddy was walking home when he was attacked, then why was there blood only on his shirt and not on his jacket etc.
Lindsay gets a hit on the mystery prints belonging to burglar, Alex Brodevesky (Sean MaGuire).The scissors were used on both victims.
Cue chase time: one of my favourite bits are the Flack/Danny chase scenes! That's what we live for! Danny jumps down from the balcony after Alex and lands on the sofa, Flack telling him it's his turn to jump. Flack takes a flying leap onto Alex and gets punched in the face for his troubles. Ouch. Why was Danny jumping from a height when he's just recovered from his shooting. Also the Flack/Danny interrogation scenes make this show. Alex saw Teddy kill Sarah, that's why he attacked him in he street, Alex was stabbed in the back and used the scissors on Teddy in self defence.
Jo concludes the burglary was premeditated and the scissors were grabbed in the heat of the moment. She conducts an experiment in the lab on how the blood was found on Teddy's shirt cuff. She knows they can't decide whether a suspect is innocent or guilty, but she's going to see if the "science proves my theory." She's attempting to create new rules - this gives her the quirk to her character.
Adam finds Alex pushed against the wall in the struggle and Hawkes explains the arterial spray from Teddy's wound was on the newsstand, nowhere near where Teddy was stabbed, so Alex was stabbed first. Jo: "know every answer - leave no questions." Another one of her mottos. She's not sure how the blood got inside the cuffs of Teddy's shirt, it could only get inside from a 'stabbing motion'. So Teddy stabbed Sarah. The strands in her eye are identified as tarantula hair.
Teddy realizes he's been busted, but how did he know this, what he heard the sirens several floors down! As he's already on the ledge of the building, unless we didn't get to see him run when Mac turns up. Sarah was going to ruin his family's life with the baby. NB note Flack's hair is combed down by the time he reached the outside of the building. Also Mac fires his gun even before Teddy got his gun fully out. Trigger happy there. How did he know Teddy would actually fire?
Mac tells Jo all of his cases are like this and welcomes her to the New York crime lab. Jo: "She's still a beautiful city." Nice to have a parting comment about the city since the show is set in New York.
CSI:NY is guilty of hiring Aussie soap rejects as guests, first it was Holly Valance from Neighbours, Sharni Vanson from Home and Away (whom AJ Buckley dated for a time) and then Brett Tucker from Neighbours. British viewers will recall Sean Maguire from Grange Hill and London's Burning.
No comments:
Post a Comment