A Televisual Feast

Another lackluster, plot-heavy episode… except not really. It just feels plot-centric, because so little’s going on and it’s not being handled particularly well. Beau and Kay are at court all day, whether Beau teases Kay about having a crush on ASA Danvers, which she (apparently) does. It gives Daniel Baldwin a chance to be funny and Melissa Leo a chance to be affected, but it’s not the best material at all. Munch and Bolander bicker about pot. It’s funny but useless. Bayliss is background, Frank has a career dilemma (the episode also introduces his wife), and Gee has words of wisdom to spout….

So what’s the big thing wrong with it? Well, the main case is Meldrick and Crosetti off in Washington D.C., getting shown around by Secret Service agent Ed Lauter and it’d be impossible for their story line to seem more unimportant. The case quickly takes a backseat to Crosetti’s Lincoln assassination obsession and, as the episode’s main course, it fails. Maybe if Kay and Beau’s court case seemed more important, but it opens with Kay talking about never losing one of her closed cases gone to trial… and there’s just no dramatic tension (false or not) to suggest she might. I mean, had she, it would have been awesome, just because it would have been so unexpected.

As for the last scene, which brings Frank into the fold with his fellows, having a drink at the bar… the less said about it the better. It’s a pointless scene, competently done, but without value.

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