Episode Report Card Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Murphy's Luck
By Owen | Season 2 | Episode 16 | Aired on 03.29.2000
Police Station. Detective Darryl "Less Is" Morris is trying to get St. M to enter the precinct room from the hallway. She's hesitant. Are there guns in there? Darryl makes a "duh" face. St. M explains that "they might go off," because "things like that" happen around her. Darryl says that he's more concerned about St M hurting herself than other people. Okay, then WHY IS THIS WOMAN NOT IN THE HOSPITAL GETTING A PSYCHIATRIC CONSULTATION? OR AT LEAST GETTING X-RAYS IN THE EMERGENCY ROOM SINCE SHE FELL FROM A SEVEN-STORY HEIGHT? WHATEVER! Darryl tells St. M to "trust" him, since he can help her. St. M says, "No one can help me." They sit down and Darryl interrogates her on her suicide attempt. (Which is actually not all that unreasonable; most areas have laws on the books citing suicide as a criminal act. But it's rare to be prosecuted for it. Also, there's no reason why this questioning couldn't take place at the hospital.) Darryl asks if there's anyone St. M wants to call. St. M wants her loved ones "away from" her, because they're "safer there." Then she tells Darryl that she would be dead, "if it hadn't been for that angel." Darryl is incredulous. St. M explains how a woman intervened at the ledge. Darryl gapes. St. M cries. Dorian Gregory milks his screen time by inquiring, "What . . . exactly . . . did . . . that . . . woman . . . look . . . like?" I'm not kidding. You could have watched Meet Joe Black five times between his pauses. But that's another suicide attempt.
Halliwell Manor. Foyer. Prue struts in with her camera bag. Phoebe accosts her and asks how the interview at the magazine went. Prue monotones that she got the job. Phoebe asks if she's okay. Prue fills Pheebs in on the Maggie Murphy situation. Phoebe assures Prue that she was "meant to be" at the apartment building, and "meant to save that girl's life." The phone rings. Prue answers it as she puts her photo equipment in this storage armoire I've never noticed in the corner of the foyer before. It's Darryl. He wants to know if she was St. M's "angel." Darryl suspects this because the angel's description "bears no resemblance to Della Reese." Prue concludes that the angel must resemble her. Darryl: "Bingo." Then he adds real loudly so everyone in the room and the rest of the state along with portions of Oregon and Nevada can hear, "BUT SHE'S NUTS!" Folks, this is why the psychiatric consultation should've taken place immediately, in a hospital, with understanding professionals. Meanwhile, Phoebe picks up a random undeveloped roll of 35mm film that's on an armoire shelf with the camera equipment and interrupts Prue's phone conversation to ask her, "What's on this roll?" The hell? I mean, it's like she picked up package of Wonder Bread and queried, "What's in this bag?" Prue glances at the roll Phoebe's holding up and tells her that those are just "some old photographs." Phoebe holds the film and contemplates it for a full four seconds (no hyperbole here), then puts it back on the shelf. Did we all get that? Because I think it might be important later. I know this because I watched a television program once before. Cut to Prue asking Darryl if St. M is "okay." Darryl says that he has to send her to psychiatric treatment for "a mandatory seventy-two-hour stay." And this signals the viewer's return from Bizarro Mental Health Ignorance World. At the precinct, we see St. M knock over a coat rack and generally make a klutzy nuisance of herself. Darryl ponders loudly, "POOR GIRL, it's like SHE'S SNAKE BIT OR SOMETHING." He tells Prue to steer clear of the precinct, in case St. M spots her. Prue ends the phone call. She tells Phoebe that she's going to the police station. Just to spite Morris. No. Actually, she thinks she just "stopped" St. M, but didn't "save" her. Phoebe wants to go with, because "maybe something from [her] psych class will be of use." Whatever.