Look! It's an aerial view of Boston! Now we know we must be watching Rizzoli & Isles.
I love an aerial view of Boston in the morning.
Things start off in an uncomfortably similar way to the last episode - an unidentified man walks into a basement. Uh oh. However this particular man is soon identified (at least, we see his face) and he keeps calling out for someone named Leroy. Whoever Leroy is, he isn't answering. Strange noises echo through the basement, and the man walks into a trip wire with cans strung on it - making an effective warning noise. The man sets down a parcel and says that his name is Daniel. He wonders if Leroy needs help, and then somebody hits him on the back of the head with a baseball bat. Well, if that was Leroy doing the hitting, I'd say he certainly does need help.
Oh look! It's Jane's apartment! Long time no see. Maura (Sasha Alexander) is double parked and getting annoyed because she's been waiting for Jane (Angie Harmon) for many secs. That happens to me a lot, only I always seem to wait for ticks. Anyway, it turns out Jane has a flat tire and her apartment has no running water, so she hasn't showered or had a cup of coffee. This seems to be more of a disaster for her than it would be for me, since I inevitably have no time to shower in the morning and don't drink coffee. Jane, though, is pissed (angry, not drunk) at her apartment and the world. Her building manager lets himself in and is surprised to see her there. She's angry because he is late and she has no water. Jane turns on her tap as a demonstration and black sludge comes out of it. Um, ew! That's disgusting. Jane thinks so too, but her building manager says she is his last priority. He's clearly an annoying sleazebag, who takes some time out of his day to ogle Jane a bit. According to Maura, 47% of men look at a woman's breasts during a conversation. That statistic seems a little low to me.
It's clearly walk-right-into-Jane's-apartment day, because Frankie Tommy (Colin Egglesfield) comes in carrying a dog, a bag of dog poo and singing. He stops when he sees Jane, who berates him about bringing the poo inside (where are you supposed to put it, then?) and stares awkwardly and longingly at Maura. Jane wants him to make sure Gilbert-the-building-manager doesn't go through her underwear and Tommy waves a bag of poo in her face because he's insane he's her younger brother and younger brothers do that. I never actually had one, but I assume. I am a younger sister. I might not wave poo around, but I'm highly qualified to be as annoying as possible all the time.
Cue title credits!
Worst. Day. Ever.
At the coffee place, Jane's day continues to suck as a bunch of people who ordered after her get served before her. A random lady loves Maura's outfit. Is this relevant? I don't know. Jane's phone rings, and she bemoans how long her latte is taking. The barrista is unnessecarily rude in response, and mutters loudly about how some people are so grumpy. Finally, Jane gets her coffee. She walks towards Outfit-Loving-Lady from before, who is talking about how first she's freezing and then she's sweating. Does she have a fever? A contagious disease? Lock down Boston? Nothing so dramatic - Outfit-Loving-Lady (or OLL, as she's known in professional outfit circles) is just sad about global warming. Oh dear. Jane asks her to move twice, and then a third time in an equally polite but slightly louder way. OLL tells her off for being so rude and complains about grumpy people. Jane, understandably very annoyed, attempts to get past OLL to get to the milk, but OLL can't seem to move out of the way like a normal person, and instead, believes she can go straight through Jane. She can't, because Jane is solid, and the coffee (which moments before had a lid on it but now does not) spills all down OLL's shirt. Ouch. I wonder how hot that was.
While everyone rushes over with napkins and Jane apologises profusely, OLL decides to handle the situation maturely by saying that Jane threw coffee at her. Jane apologises yet again, and adds that it was an accident. "No it wasn't, it was on purpose!" OLL yells, sinking to the level of a five year old having an argument on the playground. I'd say that this was an unrealistic response from any mentally sound adult, but hey, I've never been to Boston. For all I know it could be culturally normal there to revert to childhood when confronted with a painful situation. OLL and Irritating-Barrista from earlier gang up on Jane and Irritating-Barrista calls her a bitch. Well, that's not rude at all, is it? The acting of OLL and Irritating-Barrista are so incredibly unrealistic that it's comical and yet also sad. Irritating-Barrista, in particular, seems to feel the need to say everything in the same monotone voice. Thankfully, Jane and Maura leave the coffee place and its freaky customers behind. Jane is depressed that after all that, she didn't actually get any coffee, but Maura pitches in like a good best friend should and gives Jane her latte instead.
We move to a house in the suburbs, where a bunch of policemen are standing around with what look like very useless hunting rifles. But hey, what do I know about guns, right? A news reporter delivers some exposition as the camera moves past him. Apparantly the police are involved in a very tense standoff with... an elderly man. Ok then. Frost (Lee Thompson Young) and Frankie (Jordan Bridges) are on the scene.
Hey Frankie. I like your suit.
I like Frankie's suit too, although I can't help wondering if ties aren't a little impractical for dangerous situations. I mean, it's giving someone a weapon that's attached to your neck. Sensible or silly? They both get distracted for a moment by a female cop who I agree is incredibly attractive. Korsak (Bruce McGill) is standing around at the end of the street. A man who lives nearby approaches, asking how long his street will be blocked, and the detectives ask him if he knows the man in the house. He does, and the man in question is Leroy from the beginning of the episode! Aha. Leroy is apparantly old and crazy, and spends a lot of time worrying about UFOs and government spies.
Korsak beckons over the attractive female cop from before. Oh, does this make her a new cast member? Possibly. Her name is Charlotte, but she introduces herself as Charlie (Kelly Rohrback). Korsak sends Frankie and Frost to take her around the back of the house and presumably show her the ropes a bit. I can't help feeling this is a foolish move, as hormones will doubtless cause everyone to be distracted at the moment of crisis. Jane and Maura finally arrive, and Korsak explains that all they know is there was a 911 call made from the house. He plays the call, and a man who we assume is Leroy says that people are watching him and Daniel is dead. He sounds quite distraught about it. Korsak delivers some more exposition about Leroy, who sounds fairly eccentric and just generally like an old man. He's probably less crazy than my grandfather, although Leroy is in his seventies, so give him another ten years and I'm sure he'll get there. According to Korsak, Leroy has a strange thing about refusing to talk to anyone but a female cop. Oh. Do I sense a reason for Charlie's introduction here?
Abruptly the Leroy in question appears in his front door and shoots wildly around. Korsak and Jane quickly notice that he's only shooting blanks, and so they and Maura approach slowly.
Go away, damnit, or I'll shoot you with my magic air bullets!
Jane says they want to help Daniel, and encourages Leroy to let them inside. She talks him down quite successfully, takes the gun from him and escorts him to go sit in one of the cars while Maura and Korsak check on Daniel.
Once Jane makes it downstairs to the basement, Maura informs her that Daniel has been dead for a few hours.The basement is a mess, and apparantly the power is off, no one knows why, and they're having a hard time restoring it. Significant? Perhaps. Maura says that the murder weapon had a sharp, jagged edge. Ok, so it wasn't a baseball bat. My bad. Frankie and Frost show up again. They spoke to the neighbours, who said that after the power went out Leroy started screaming about spaceships and little green men. Then he started shooting. Jane and Korsak are going to go back to the precinct and start the interrogation. Frankie and Frost are going to stay behind and search, only Frost doesn't want to. Maura has to get the body to the morgue, so for a moment it looks as though Frankie will be left all alone - and then Charlie shows up again and offers to stick around and help him. I like her. I hope she stays. Jane, clearly worried about what her brother will do alone with this attractive cop, encourages Frost to stay. Which he does. Men.
Back at the precinct, where Angela (Lorraine Bracco) and Tommy are watching a video of Jane spilling coffee on OLL. Apparantly it has 40,000 hits already and is going viral. Seriously? Who a) films someone spilling coffee and b) bothers to put it on the internet? Told you that coffee place was full of freaks. A brief shot of the computer screen shows that it's not on YouTube (of course not, no one uses YouTube, just like everyone does searches on Bing!) and the title is Mean Detective Jane. So the mysterious filmer knew her name and rank? Um... stalker alert.
In interrogation, Leroy is refusing to talk because he doesn't like it in there. He's only going to talk to the nice lady. As Korsak prepares to leave, Jane tries to talk. "Not you!" Leroy exclaims. "You took my gun!" He only wants to talk to Maura.
Worst. Day. Ever.
Maura heads into interrogation with an earpiece so that Jane can give her instructions. Unfortunately she doesn't quite seem to understand how earpieces work, and responds to Jane's instructions out loud. Poor Leroy is getting very confused. He goes on to say that his stuff had been disappearing, and he finally realised it was Them. We can tell this is a capital-T Them. It seems that They have been sniffing around for months, spying on Leroy. Luckily, Leroy used his bug zapper to take Them down. They came looking for him because he had capital-I It, but They got Daniel instead. Maura asks if Daniel got zapped, but Leroy says he didn't kill Daniel - they were friends.
Unfortunately, Maura and her inability to understand how earpieces work (just because he can't hear Jane talking, doesn't mean he can't hear you talking, Maura) spooks Leroy, who wonders who she's talking to and comes to the conclusion that she must be in cahoots with Them. The interview is over.
Aha! Maybe the reason for my sudden appearance is inside this drawer! Nope, wait... just more exposition.
Back in the basement, Frankie and Frost are making good use of their torches to blatantly ogle Charlie. Seriously? The power comes back on, killing their ogle-fest, and Charlie says "Yay!" adorably, making me like her even more. Please can she stick around? Frankie echoes her yay, but he's not as adorable. Brief argument between him and Frost over whether or not she's their type. Frost thinks she's his type. I tend to agree, but didn't Frost have a girlfriend, like, two episodes ago? Since no one seemed to care about her then, I guess no one cares now and she probably doesn't exist.
A conversation mostly consisting of useless and embarrassing flirting ensues. Charlie remains blissfully unaware, but she does have a Norwegian grandmother and she asks sensible questions about the murder weapon. A creepy dude arrives. Charlie tells him to go away because it's a crime scene, but he says it's ok because he lives next door. Frost tries to explain that's not a good reason to come to a crime scene, but Creepy Dude ignores him and instead offers everyone lemonade. Um what? Ahh he's terrifying! Run away! No one takes my very sound advice, and Frankie escorts Creepy Dude out, but not before he tries twice more to give everyone his potentially poisoned lemonade and ask for some items back that Leroy 'borrowed'. One of them is probably the murder weapon.
An aerial view of Boston, which I think is the third in this episode, signifies that we are moving to the morgue. Maura says that Daniel was struck at least twice, old news because we saw the attack, and whatever was used left a strange pattern in the wound. Jane points out that Leroy's house is full of weird junk. Maura elaborates - the pattern is a bunch of hexagons together, like a honeycomb.
Does anyone know where we got a computer from and why we're staring directly at the camera instead of the screen?
Frost and Frankie video call, and they're puzzled and confused. They get more puzzled and confused when Maura tells them they're looking for something approximately the size of a baseball bat with a honeycomb end. Frankie is disappointed that the robot he's found is not the murder weapon, and then the day just gets weirder. Using a robot and a stuffed toy bunny, Frankie and Frost act out the scene between Jane and OLL from earlier in the morning. Jane makes one of her excellent WTF faces and asks them how on earth they found out about that.
"Go on YouTube," Frost says. Jane does so, and finds the video.
I don't mean to alarm you, but this is not YouTube.
Again with the stalker issue! How does the video maker know who she is and where she works? Jane and Maura watch the video with incresing degrees of horror, up until the end, where someone has messed with it so that it looks like Jane called someone a bitch, as opposed to Irritating-Barrista saying it to Jane. Jane protests miserably that she didn't say that! Maura agrees that they must have edited the video. Frankie and Frost still just think it's funny, because they're children in the body of adult men. Seems to be a theme in this episode.
Back upstairs, another group of childish detectives are watching the video and laughing hysterically. Rude! Where's the camaraderie and support? Even Korsak is watching the video on an iPad and chuckling. Jane is depressed and also annoyed, and then her mother comes in with a pink cake and a pink balloon that says 'It's a girl!'. Jane tries to explain that she's not pregnant, but Angela said they had a party for someone in accounting and she thought Jane might need cheering up. Korsak thinks that if you slow the video down, it looks like Jane threw the coffee. Angela tells him he can't have cake. At least she's supportive.
Back to the actual case. Korsak says that Frost and Frankie haven't found anything yet. Neither he nor Jane really believe Leroy is capable of murder. They decide to send him to a psych evaluation, and Jane suggests removing Charlie from the house so that Frost and Frankie can actually get some work done. I think that's a sound idea, and so does Korsak. Meanwhile, Frost has found what seems to be an EMP gun. An electro-magnetic pulse gun? Sounds sci-fi, so they decide to test it. It takes out the communications system on the cruisers. Oops. Frankie says that could be expensive, so they hustle down to the basement again, presumably to hide. Poor Charlie is left alone to deal with her busted car.
Oh man... it's Mean Detective Jane!
Leroy wants to go home. Maura tries to explain that he needs to stay until he has been cleared by a psychiatrist, but Leroy isn't buying it. He says that They will be stealing his stuff back home. Jane is nice (see? She's nice. Enough of this Mean Detective Jane rubbish) and asks him for a list of the missing things. He mentions a circuit board, antique birdcage, and hockey stuff. I seem to recall that some of the things Lemonade Neighbour mentioned earlier involved hockey. According to Leroy, the hockey stuff came from his father, not from his creepy neighbour. Hm. Leroy apologises for not thinking Jane was the nice lady earlier. He says she is. Jane is grateful, but naturally her good mood can't ask. Cavanaugh calls for her in his office.
In Cavanaugh's office, he plays the Mean Detective Jane (only now it's a mash up, apparantly) clip again (like we needed to see it more) and explains that OLL claims she suffered second degree burns and is filing a police brutality claim against Jane. Great. I knew OLL was trouble as soon as she spoke. Jane is furious.
We're suddenly outside Jane's apartment, and it's night. Maura says that whatever lawsuit OLL is filing isn't the end of the world, but Jane isn't so sure. She's concerned about the 80,000 hits the video has gotten. Maura says they're probably all Europeans. Cue a meeting with an annoying, childish lady and her dog, who barks at Jane when she greets him and is dragged away by the lady, who promises she won't let Jane spill anything on him. Um, what? Is everyone insane in Boston today? Jane wasn't even carrying a cup!
Worst. Day. Ever.
In Jane's apartment, we learn that not only has the water not been fixed, the annoying landlord guy has knocked a hole in the wall for no obvious reason. Tommy turns on the news to reveal that they are running a story about Jane (seriously? No one has any actual important news to report?) and they interviewed Tommy. Like the sensible brother he is, he said that Jane had a temper and used to "...kick the crap out of..." people when they were younger. I can't decide if he's an actual imbecile or just really really stupid. This whole storyline of the episode is so implausible and awful it watches like a bad dream. Maybe that's what it is. Jane chases Tommy out of the house (understandable) and a man appears at the door giving her papers and telling her she's been served. It seems OLL is suing.
Now we're at Maura's house, where Korsak has showed up to read the lawsuit thingy. Angela lets him in, and tells him that she's sad for Jane. I am too. Luckily, Maura's house has running water so Jane can finally shower. Korsak says that the lawsuit looks pretty shoddy, and that OLL wants half a million dollars. Are you serious? My response and Angela's run along the same lines. Korsak says that hopefully the department will cover the costs, since Jane doesn't have that kind of money.
Upstairs in the... yoga room? In the yoga room, Jane is stressed and her back hurts. Maura sympathises, and tells her to focus on the present. Jane's trying but Maura's phone is ringing. It's Susie, who says that the bits of stuff found inside the head wound are a kind of polymer - used in high tech stuff from skyscrapers to aircraft, according to Maura. Jane wonders if Leroy found something and took it into his apartment. Maura reminds Jane that she is a good detective, and she mustn't let little things bother her. Jane tries to focus on the present again, but this time it's her own phone that rings. Someone's tried to break into Leroy's basement.
Really? They couldn't write the extra two letters needed to make a proper 'at'?
It's morning at the precinct and annoying jokers left coffee on Jane's desk. Whatever. It's still hot, so she drinks it, and chats with Korsak. He says they found something at Leroy's basement that matches the description of the murder weapon. Unfortunately they still don't know who was trying to steal what. Jane heads down to investigate the potential weapon in question. According to Maura, it's not the murder weapon, but it's made of the same material. They don't know what the object is, but it's very like and very unique. Jane suggests doing a search to find out what it is. I think she said patent search, but I had an accent moment so she could have said something else.
Meanwhile, Frankie and Frost have found a hockey skate. They think it belonged to some famous hockey guy, who I've never heard of because hockey or ice hockey or whatever is not widely televised in Australia. Sorry. Frost finally twigs to the fact that creepy Lemonade Neighbour was creepy (who brings lemonade?!) and suggests that he was trying to steal the valuable, famous hockey skate when Daniel interrupted him. They wonder if he murdered Daniel. Called it.
Back at the precinct, Frost and Korsak discover that Lemonade Neighbour sells a bunch of stuff on ebay, and he started selling around six months ago, when Leroy broke his hip. Lemonade Neighbour has been stealing Leroy's stuff. An aerial view of Boston provides the break between the precinct and the interrogation room. They confront Lemonade Neighbour about everything, and he admits he took a few things. When confronted with the murder, though, he denies everything. Oh well. Who expected a nice easy confession? Not me.
Worst. Day. Ever.
Yep, that's right, we're back to Jane's horrific day. Cavanaugh has found a clock in the background of the video which shows the coffee incident happened at 7:59 - one minute before Jane went on duty. Considering that Jane got a work phone call before the coffee incident and clocks can easily be wrong, I'd say they could get away with arguing that she was, in fact, at work and the clock is mistaken, but no. Cavanaugh instead tells her that the good news is, it's not police brutality anymore. The bad news is, now the city can't help pay. Now Jane's totally screwed.
Down in the precinct cafe, a few people are donating to the 'Defend Jane Rizzoli' fund that Angela set up, but it's not nearly enough. Maura went to talk to a lawyer, and she says he wants a $25,000 retainer. Jane doesn't have that money, because she says every cent she owns is tied up in her condo. Solution? Move in with Maura, I guess, although no one has suggested it yet. Back upstairs, and Jane is watching the video yet again. Suddenly, she spots something weird (which she hasn't seen in the past hundred viewings? Fail). OLL's blouse looks like it's repelling the water. Maura suggests it's made of a tougher, scald-proof fabric, and Jane realises that OLL set the whole thing up. Korsak spots a fingerprint on the camera lense and suggests they run it.
Suddenly, Frost does a triumphant dance. He's found the patent (ok, so it was patent) and the weird object is part of a rotor blade from a new drone. They suggest that Leroy shot the drone down with his EMP gun, or 'bug-zapper' and then dragged it inside. Jane wonders if the EMP gun even works. Frost says it does, and then realises his mistake, but it's too late. Korsak wonders how he knows that, and if it has anything to do with the two broken cruisers.
Hmm... I sense a conclusion approaching.
Everyone wonders what a drone would be doing spying on an old man, but then they look up the people who live around Leroy and find that a lot of them are engineers. The head of an Intelligence Gathering Division is the man at the beginning of the episode who said he was a neighbour. He's not. They think that the break-in the other night was because there's something in Leroy's basement which ties Jim the not-neighbour to the murder. Checking out the items in Leroy's pockets when he was brought in, they discover a miniature hard drive. Jane calls to check that Leroy is safe, only to discover that he's been released. Uh oh.
Back at Leroy's basement, where Jim is threatening Leroy with a gun. He wants his hard drive. Leroy says that the police have it, but Jim doesn't believe him. Luckily Korsak and Rizzoli are right nearby with their guns. Jim grabs his shotgun and threatens to kill everyone, but Jane's spotted something. She asks Leroy if he loaded the gun like he did before. "Sure did," he says cheerfully. Jane tells Jim he's a military man, and he should know the difference between live ammo and blanks. Recognising his defeat, Jim lowers the gun, at which Leroy promptly knees him in the groin. Jane checks on Leroy, but he's distressed that his stuff is gone. Korsak promises they will get it back, and then his phone buzzes. They have a hit on the fingerprint from the Mean Detective Jane video.
At Jane's apartment, OLL and annoying landlord are measuring cupboards and talking about decor. Jane and Maura come in to bust them. After a brief exchange of righteous anger, both OLL and landlord guy are arrested for fraud. Yay! Triumph!
Light-hearted ending approaching!
Maura shows Jane a new video she's put up on phony-YouTube, called Kind Detective Jane. It was the moment where Leroy called Jane a nice lady. Unfortunately, the video only has eleven hits. Maura suggests they could spice it up with rapping, but there's a fine line between rapping and spitting and she crosses it. Things are happy and cheerful and good again, the end! See you next week.