Everyone's heard of the Anthony Zuiker 'Digi-Novel' Level 26: Dark Origins and this is an episode which takes a character from that, Sqweegel, and is incorporated in a CSI episode. Very dark and creepy too.
The CSIs are called to investigate the brutal attack of Margot Wilton (Ann-Margret) in her own home by a masked intruder. Nick (George Eads) runs into Ryan Fink (Mitchell Fink) whom he saw on TV and calls him a "real hero" for saving children from a fire. Ray (Laurence Fishburne) comments on the photos on her wall being cut up and the scrapings are found on the floor. Catherine (Marg Helgenberger) notices the number of awards she's received. An award on the wall has also been turned upside down. Ray: "...up to us to turn it right side up." The case that is. Nick finds the glass on the French doors in the kitchen have been cut through. Ray notices blood on the walls, the bed and the headboard, as well as the cast off on the walls, indicating the attacker was on top of her. He also spots the trail of blood on the floor, the prints being unusual as they go from footprint, handprint, handprint, footprint.
Outside, Greg (Eric Szmanda) takes some scrapings on the window ledge for analysis. Nick tells him he's found the entry and exit, so too has Greg. All the other windows were varnished shut, and there's a dust void on the sill, showing he's been through the window many times. So they're looking for someone small. Or says Nick, a "leprechaun."
Nick has more questions than answers now and Ray wonders if Margot is "lucky to be alive, or left alive by design." Since all the messages he's left behind, show the attack was personal. There weren't any fingerprints so Nick posits they need to examine the evidence he didn't leave behind.
Margot describes her attacker as being 'slippery', wearing gloves and African American. She recalls his eyes and he had braces on his teeth. Ray removes her stitches so he can take photos of the cuts sustained during the attack. Her son died. She asks why the 'cute resident' stitched her up at all. Ray: "I'm not cute?" Tells him to 'gotta hell'. For all her philanthropy, she was a nasty piece of work, in the sense that even though her backstory is sad and you can sympathize with her, she appears abrupt. She would've preferred cute Greggie to have taken photos instead!
Catherine still checks the bedroom for prints and Greg remarks his Papa Olaf would say, "when the going gets rough, keep your chin up." Greg's so into looking up isn't he, especially since he did the same thing in the first episode of this season when looking for the remote controlled plane. Also looking up is clearly something these people don't do. He finds the attic, but Catherine tells him "I don't do attics - I'm dirty enough." Well, she did in Nick's stalker episode from season 2, entitled, Stalker. She joined Gil (William Petersen) in the attic then. I thought of this same episode here and then Catherine said it later. Great minds think alike! Ha. Greg finds a hole in the ceiling, her attacker was watching her and calls him a 'kinky rat' who can use a lipstick camera, and finds mouldy orange peels in one of the drawers. He was living up there. Nick walks in with Margot's mail, which the attacker had been reading and Catherine states: "You and Margot have something in common - stalker."
Nick: "That was a long time ago." He was very dismissive in tone about her remark, so he's clearly over that incident in his life and has put it behind him, otherwise he didn't want to bring that up again. I think he just didn't want to remember it, as it was a "traumatic memory" for him, to swipe Ray's phrase. Either way, it's good to see that he doesn't like to dwell on the past and particularly, bad things like that, since it would put him off concentrating on this case.
Nick says they were sleeping together; he would lay under her bed. We get Ray's new concept: 'the hourglass of evidence'. In the absence of evidence they must turn over the hourglass. Thus comments Greg, "the absence of evidence is evidence." They have to analyze everything they've 'found' and fill the bottom of the hourglass, eventually leading to the "truth." The evidence must be examined again.
Hodges (Wallace Langham) notices the attacker's void on the carpet from under Margot's bed smells like urine. Nick sniffs and says it's not urine. Hodges telling him that Grissom would've tasted that. EEww. But he's not Grissom. Lots of mentions of Gil lately. Just incase he may be forgotten, which isn't very probable. Nick tells him if it's sweat then they can get epithelials from it. After Hodge's analysis he finds the attacker has a fetish. The amylase stain was sweat with trace amounts found in latex fetish spray; slide on latex suits with a zipper on the back. Which made him sweat. Hodges: "time to get kinky." Just in time for Catherine to see his little dance.
Greg brought up the kinky rat phrase and next thing you know, Nick and Catherine visit a sex store. Catherine making particular reference to the Doberman mask being real. She tells Nick that all sex crimes begin with fantasy and she's been here purely in a professional capacity only. Nick tells her he had to ask and if she's okay. Catherine replies by asking Nick if he's okay. Hey this scene reminded me of the episodes of CSI:NY, whenever Flack (Eddie Cahill) and Stella (Melina Karakanades) were on a sex case, or a new-found fad craze, they'd come up with such comments and steely looks and Stella would always be one step ahead, knowing all about it. The store owner helps Catherine out on her cases and he recalls selling the spray 6 months ago, with some custom-made head-to-toe latex suits. He has photos from which can only be glimpsed the one brown eye and one blue eye of the attacker. Nick repeats here what Hodges said about him sweating because of his zipper. The man left his name as "Ian Moone." The obvious question to ask is why he'd leave his name behind if he hasn't left anything else.
This Ray deciphers as an anagram, to read "I am no one." A woman is attacked in the carwash with her daughter in the backseat., as she makes a call. This was the reason she was murdered. Catherine and Greg find traces of the woman's blood in the car and Greg discovers he was hiding in the boot (trunk) where the spare tyre was kept. Hey I said he was hiding in the car already. He left behind an 'A' on the windshield of the car in blood. Catherine shouts "a 425a: suspect on the premises" - which she was a little slow off the mark with.
Brass (Paul Guilfoyle) asks Alise (Emily Skinner) what happened and relays the questions as if he's talking with her doll. She tells him "Sqweegel." Her husband, Jason Jones, (David Julian Hirsh) tells Brass his wife, Carrie (Laurie Fortier) was appointed to the Family Values Committee and was another "hero." David (David Berman) finds old wounds on her body. Jason speaks of a break-in they had and she was cut. Doc Robbins (Robert David Hall) examines her as being cut twice. David identifies the weapon as box cutters or a straight razor. She had injuries to her neck and a severed carotid artery.
Ray stipulates she had identical wounds, all similar in length so it has to be the same attacker. Under Carrie's bed they find voids indicating the attacker was also here. Brass lets them know about the "Sqweegel" comment which he assumes was the noise from the squeegee on the window, but if Alise had her headphones on, how did she hear the sound. Greg's traumatic image being 'deja vu'. The same Mo. They look up to find a hole in the ceiling. oh come on, who cannot see that gaping hole in their ceiling, either that or they don't clean very often! Nick finds a DVD in the bed. This contains video of her having an affair with another man, which explains the 'A' on the windshield, Ray describes as a 'scarlet letter'. Jason remembers the attacker telling her, "I know, confess." Brass thinks she was hiding her dirty little secret and was given a chance to repent, as was Margot. Ray tells her the same line, but she insists on going home.
Also figured out she killed her son, even if she considered it a mercy killing and he asked her to end his suffering. Margot finds fresh orange peel in the drawer, whilst searching for her letters. Nick's called out to an abandoned car belonging to Ryan. He finds blood inside. The attacker chases Margot. The slimy slithering was creepy. She confesses to him and then shoots him but he gets away, having replaced her gun with blanks. Greg takes her letters and steams them open. Ray finds Ryan's DB under her bed, dressed in a latex suit. Ryan Fink has the same scars.
Brass hears on the tipline how Ryan started fires, just to save the children from them. Ray asks: "the biggest secret of all, who is Ian Moone?"
Who replies, "I am no one..."
The first CSI case where the killer leaves behind no evidence - other than some sweat on a zipper - which isn't much to go on, presenting the team with a dilemma. Also why would he reveal his different coloured eyes in a photo, when he's hidden/masked everything else about him. To throw them off track, provide them with false evidence of his true description.
For fans of the Digi-novel, or for those who haven't read it yet, you can still read it and watch this episode without there being any dangers of spoilers.
Personally I liked the allusion Catherine made to Nick's Stalker episode, not only to keep up the continuity for older viewers, but to alert the more newer viewers to such plots. Making sure some of CSI's best episodes aren't forgotten and also how some cases still have an impact on the CSI's personal lives; even though they don't like to admit it.
Sara was conspicuously absent this episode, just like Brass was last time.
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