The episode opens with the desultory establishing shots, and a melodramatic soundtrack. It sounds like a panicky movie dame, trying to talk her way out of an express ticket to the Pearly Gates with, "This won't help you! Don't you see? After me, there will be others! You'll keep on killing -- on and on, until they catch you! I won't be the last! There will be others after me!" Boy, talk about getting all meta about this show. The scene shifts from the Vegas skyline to the panicky dame in question, twelve feet tall in black-and-white on the silver screen, emoting at someone who's dressed like Mister Rogers. The woman on screen begins screaming, "You can't help yourself because you're mad! Mad! Mad!" and then we shift to the irritated film snobs in the audience sending the glares of death to whomever has been so thoughtless as to keep their cell phone on during the screening. Normally, I'd be rooting against the film snobs because my cinematic sensibilities are closer to Joe Bob Briggs than to Elvis Mitchell, but in this case, I share their pain. Cell phones in the theatre are the number-two reason I wait for most movies to come out on DVD; the number-one reason is parents who haul their screaming children to rated-R movies after dark.
But we're not here to read one of my "how other people always ruin all my fun" screeds. We're here to figure out why someone has been so foolhardy as to leave their cell phone on in an art-house cinema half-filled with passionate movie geeks. The answer becomes apparent in a moment when an usher comes in to chide the cell phone miscreant and discovers that he's bleeding dramatically from the mouth into his popcorn. The usher -- who looks extremely familiar, but damned if I can place him -- looks taken aback that a real murder took place during a movie about murders.
Cut to Catherine coming into the now-empty theatre and commenting, "[Movie] theatres are like nightclubs -- they should always keep the lights off." Well, those crappy AMC googolplexes, sure, but genuine art-house theatres are often lovely when the lights are on. Gil comments, "This is the last art house left in Vegas; I saw Baraka here, on a double bill with Koyaanisqatsi." Catherine asks, "Was anyone else there?" Gil replies, "Sure." Catherine persists, "With you?" Gil looks at Catherine and says matter-of-factly, "No." I'm not even sure Gil would ask anyone to go to the movies with him. Brass, meanwhile, reveals that he's been reading a lot of Raymond Chandler in his spare time: "Thursday night is noir night. The poor sap was slumped over like a sack of potatoes, oozing blood like a broken bottle of ketchup." Gil looks up, startled; he's probably thinking, "Well, it's not 'a blonde to make a bishop kick a hole in a stained-glass window,' but it's not bad for improv." Then the eyebrow hooks up, and Catherine joins in with a skeptical look of her own. Brass sighs and abandons the lurid metaphors of 1950s noir for his usual Captain Exposition spiel: "His name is Gus Sugarman. Runs a dental practice in Henderson. Cell phone went off three times during the movie, so an usher finally came over to shut him up." Catherine states the obvious with, "Yeah, somebody beat him to it." Gil notes the single puncture wound to the base of the skull; Catherine wonders if anyone saw anything. Brass points out that all the witnesses were watching the movie. Gil muses, "Dark room, loud music, four exits, everybody looking the other way." Catherine flings her hair back in a move last made by Veronica Lake in The Blue Dahlia and asks, "Professional killer?" Gil brings us to the credits with, "Movie buff."
The Who want to remind us that they made a movie too.
When we get back from the credits, David The Cinemaphiliac Coroner is arguing movies with Gil: "It was Build My Gallows High with Robert Mitchum in 1947." Gil corrects him: "It was Out of the Past, with Robert Mitchum and Jane Greer." David tries to get the last word: "And Kirk Douglas. Trust me -- the book was Build My Gallows High." Catherine couldn't care less about Mitchum, Robert and Mitchum deodorant, and interjects, "Mr. Siskel, Mr. Ebert -- may I have a cause of death, please?" Blunt-force thumbs down! David notes, "Puncture wound is small, not a knife. Seems like it penetrated all the way to the brain stem. There is some bruising around the mouth." Yeah, but really bad movie popcorn can do that to you. Who among us hasn't gone to the movies and gotten what is essentially a bag of Styrofoam packing chips soaked in axle grease? Gil says enthusiastically, "Well, someone could have stood over him, placed his hand over his mouth and stabbed him in the back of the head." David says flatly, "Telly Savalas did that in The Dirty Dozen." Gil points out, "Anthony Quinn did that too, in Guns of Navarone." Catherine, who's busy examining the neck, asks, "What movie did you see this in?" Interview with a Vampire? Behind the Green Door? Love at First Bite? David realizes Sugarman had something ripped off his neck; Gil theorizes it was a chain or something.
Just then, Catherine drops her flashlight and exclaims, "Butterfingers!" I take the opportunity to add, "Scharffen Berger!" Only a few more days until Lent is over and I'm back on the bean again. Catherine heads off to fetch her flashlight while Gil and David look at the body and mentally prepare for Round N of Forensic Nerd Movie Trivia. Gil discovers that the person who phoned Sugarman didn't leave a number. A few aisles down, Catherine discovers both her flashlight and the screwdriver that was used as a murder weapon. Lest she bask too long in the glory of her discovery, Brass comes in to dramatically announce, "I got a witness."
Cut to a kid wearing glasses that an East German ophthalmologist would have had on hand in 1986 and an Eraserhead t-shirt. I wonder if the person who costumed this episode simply wandered down to the New Beverly Theatre over in the Fairfax district of L.A. and watched people at they came out. He's saying flatly, "I only noticed because she got up during the best part of the movie, right before the gunfight." Gil asks, "Is the gunfight loud?" Film Kid answers, "Yeah. I mean, it's not THX surround-sound. This was 1950 and mono optical track. I like how loud this theatre keeps it." Gil and Brass exchange glances; Gil comments, "Good moment to do it. Cover up any noise the victim might make." Brass asks if Film Kid got a look at the dame, and Film Lad replies, "I drove fifty minutes to see this flick; my eyes were on the screen. But she was tall, not old, a redhead." Brass asks if Film Kid saw the woman come back in. He did not, nor does he see her milling among the patrons gathered in the lobby. Gil asks if anyone saw this mystery redhead come in; Brass answers that the manager had left for the night and the usher who found the body called it in and then bolted lest the LVPD arrest him for toking on the job. Film Kid interjects, "If you ask me, anybody who leaves their phone on in a movie deserves to get stabbed in the head." Brass shoots back, "That's why nobody asked you."
Meanwhile, in the light of day somewhere in the Pacific Northwest -- hey, all the lush old-growth trees confuse me sometimes -- a boatload of official-looking vehicles are parked outside an industrial garage. The Young Turks are together on the 2003 Reunion Tour; get your "The B Plot Rides Again" t-shirts from the Television Without Pity store. They duck under the tape to talk to Detective Ray O'Reilly (a.k.a. Buzz), who tells them, "First officers to drive up found the scene. Called in the world. I hope you brought extra supplies." "Why is that?" Sara asks. "You're going to be here awhile," he answers.
The camera then swoops to the perspective of the inside of the garage and the door slides up to reveal...The Young Turks! The cute one! The funny one! The mysterious one! The fat one! Or, left to right: Sara, Nicky, Warrick, and Buzz. We then switch to the Young Turks'-eye view: the walls are riddled with bullet holes, and a single body slumps on the floor. Cut to Nicky commenting, "Looks like a war zone." That was probably a much better line back when it was written, before we were all watching an actual war zone on CNN. Sara exhales in dismay at the sheer scale of the scene they've got to process. Then the Young Turks walk inside to get started. Warrick asks about ID; Buzz tells 'em the kid's got a driver's permit that names him as the fifteen-and-a-half-year-old Timmy McCallum. Tim-may! That name has been permanently warped for me by South Park. Warrick stares at the many, many spent shells on the floor and the thin trail of blood drops; he tells Buzz, "Tell [the coroner] to watch his step; there's casings and blood everywhere." Shouldn't that be "there are casings and blood everywhere"? I'm all for colloquial speech, but even casual conversations typically incorporate subject-verb agreement. Warrick then straightens up and looks at the slightly shocked Sara and Nicky. "Divide and conquer," he decrees. Sara calls outside perimeter. Nicky announces he's Dennis Rodman, then runs off to fetch his wedding dress. Well, he does say he's Dennis Rodman. What does that mean? He's going to be resentful of Michael Jordan? He's going to make the round mound of rebound look reticent by comparison? I have no idea. Warrick announces he'll take everything below the knees.
Back at the lab, Liam is telling Jacqui the print tech and Catherine, "The question isn't what we're going to find on your murder weapon. The question is what isn't on it." He holds out the tool for the two women -- and incidentally, why aren't there more regular chicks in the supporting cast? There's Bob, Archie, Hodges, Liam, and Emergency Backup David, but the distaff side is represented only by Jacqui and occasionally Leah the tattooed girl, and here I am getting all off track with my observation instead of focusing on the rare scene when an actual female lab tech is on the screen. Anyway, Catherine and Jacqui quickly identify soda and popcorn crumbs, Liam points out some carpet fibers, and Catherine sums up with, "It wasn't the cleanest theatre in the world; I just want to match some blood to our victim." Jacqui adds, "And you want to know if there's a recoverable print." Catherine does. Liam looks up at Jacqui and asks, "You want to race?" "What's the bet?" she shoots back. Catherine looks at Liam as if only now noticing that he's something of a goofball, and he smirks as the wager commences. Cue the montage wherein Jacqui fumes some prints off the screwdriver.
In another part of the lab, a computer screen spits out Sugarman's driver's license as Archie asks off-screen, "Is that our guy?" Gil gives him the look, and Archie realizes the answer's a resounding yes. Archie shares that the phone company unblocked all the private numbers for him, and Gil asks, "They can do that now?" Archie's thrilled to confirm that they can. Ha ha ha! It's funny when everything you do is logged in a database that someone can access any time they want! Archie and Gil go over the call log after Gil establishes that the movie started at 10:40 PM. Archie explains, "Last outgoing call your vic made was at 10:38 -- 555-0110. Twenty-six seconds." Gil figures that it's a no-answer call. Archie points out that 555-0110 is the same number that called three times in a row at 11:26, 11:27 and 11:28. Gil points out that Sugarman was already dead by then. Archie's astounded: "Dr. Robbins was that accurate with the T.O.D.?" Gil explains, "That's when the gunfire erupted." Archie's enthralled: "There was gunfire?" If Gil keeps this up, Archie will be nipping at his heels to go for walks outside the lab, just like Liam. Gil clarifies, "In the movie. I'll need an address on that number."
And then, because we haven't gotten cinematic enough, there's a very dramatic shot of light pouring in through the bullet holes which puncture the walls of the warehouse as Nicky stands there and contemplates them all, and the music swells as if we're about to swing into a Nike commercial. Over the minute or so, we go into an Air Science montage; all we need now is Derek Jeter collecting beer bottles as his sweat flies every which way to turn this into a commercial worthy of Superbowl ad time. As the time lapses, we see that everyone -- Warrick, Sara and Nicky -- is dealing with an embarrassment of evidence. As the montage winds down, Sara comes in with a long bamboo pole and asks, "Hey, guys? What do you make of this bamboo pole?" It's a prop in a tiki-themed strip act? Nicky brings the forensic funny with, "Bag it." Well, Warrick thinks it's funny. Sara, not so much. Warrick then notices some shards of glass mixed with black plastic; he heads over to look at those while Sara and Nicky discuss the square hole in the roof. When they're done with that, we learn that Nicky's placed 109 trajectory rods in the holes in the walls, and Warrick's laid down markers for 109 bullets. Nicky asks the question he thinks they're all thinking, "How in the world do trajectories occur 15 to 20 feet off the ground? Horizontally?" Sara asks the question they're really all thinking: "What in the hell went on here?" The camera fades out on their baffled mugs.
After a location shot of green, green suburbia -- if I didn't know better, I'd swear someone on the writing staff was reading this stuff and inserted this shot to show me that there are (artificial, heavily irrigated) green places in Las Vegas -- we go to a doorway of a house presumably set in one of these depressing cookie-cutter neighborhoods to meet tall redhead Audrey Hilden. Gil and Catherine are introducing themselves; it's kind of intimidating, as they're both wearing sunglasses and looking very official. Catherine asks if Audrey knows a Gus Sugarman, and Audrey looks taken aback in response. As a car pulls into a nearby driveway, she recovers with, "Why don't you come inside? Please?" They do. We get one more shot of Gil; actually, he looks like a bug in his sunglasses, which seems somewhat appropriate.
Inside, Audrey's sharing that Sugarman was her dentist. She explains, "He had asked me to go to them movies, and I had said yes, but it was a late show and I had to get up early for work." It's too bad we don't get a flashback to the asking-out, because I like to imagine it happening during a checkup --
Sugarman: Want to go to a movie with me?
Audrey: Wha? Du ooo athck me hoo tha oovies?
Sugarman: Yes. There's a noir at the Artypants Theatre. Want to go?
Audrey: Oh-thay.
Sugarman: Okay, now spit.
Catherine points out that Audrey didn't pick up when Sugarman called her two minutes before the movie started. Audrey rebuts that she was screening, and she figured he'd take the hint. Gil asks, "Then why did you call him three times in a row forty minutes later?" Because she's sending mixed signals, Gil. Audrey's all, "I felt bad for standing him up. I wanted to apologize. I figured I'd get his voicemail, but when I didn't, I tried again." Wow, that's both rude and cowardly. We go into the usual where-were-you-the-night-of-the-murder dance, and right then, the phone rings. Audrey is still screening her calls, and looking mighty nervous about it. Gil notices a schedule tacked on her wall -- featuring such classics as Rope, Vertigo, The Birds, North by Northwest, This Gun for Hire, Apocalypse Now, and : A Space Odyssey (yes, there's an extra "1" at the end) -- and asks Audrey if she sees a lot of films at the Art House Theatre. Audrey says she does; she loves old movies. Gil says, "I see they recently had a Hitchcock retrospective." Audrey's all, "I prefer French New Wave. If you'll excuse me now, I have to go to work." And she takes off before Gil can quiz her about Truffaut.
Back in the morgue, David's pulling the sheet off Tim-may, and Warrick sucks in his breath as he asks, "What, was this kid tortured?" David rattles off the injuries: "Couple of fractured ribs, deep purple contusions on the presternal chest wall, each one around two inches in diameter. I stopped counting around nine." Warrick wonders what could have made those marks; David's got no idea, but whatever it was had a great deal of velocity. David continues, "Cause of death: single gunshot to the chest. No gunshot residue." Warrick tells us that this means Timmy was shot from a distance. He whips out a slender metal rod -- and can I say that this is my least-favorite of all the CSI tricks they've whipped out this year? I really don't like watching people get skewered like fruit slices in girly drinks. Warrick pokes around some and deduces, "At a downward angle. It's about 25 degrees. He was shot from above." We flash back to Timmy having a beer with friends while someone shoots him from an alcove above. Warrick continues doing the math: "The rooftop is 45 degrees. This is 25. It's impossible." David's looking concerned; he adds, "If that's the case, he was shot by somebody 10 to 15 feet tall." Warrick decides to move on; we find out that Timmy also had a boatload of scabs. There's some badinage about the significance of the scabs, but nothing worth repeating.
In the scene, Catherine and Gil walk into the lab to encounter a purple-turban-clad Jacqui. How nice to see everyone recycling the props from "Abra Cadaver." Catherine exclaims, "Don't tell me: Liam won the bet." "No, I just like wearing flashy headgear. It helps me focus," Jacqui shoots back. Actually, she says, "The blood on the screwdriver definitely belongs to your victim. It's amazing how fast he got me back the results. I don't know how he does it. Now I gotta wear this stupid thing all day." There's a knock on the glass wall as Liam grins and Jacqui snorts, "Look at him -- hovering. Making sure I still have it on. Do us all a favor and get him out in the field, will ya, Grissom? He's making us all stir-crazy in here." "Not until Season Four, my pet," Gil soothes. Oh, he does not. Instead, he just looks queasy at the prospect of having to manage Liam (hint: try a whip and a chair) and asks pettishly, "Do you have anything for us?" She sure does -- a palm print. We soon find out that, unfortunately, it's a palm print as made through a smooth leather glove.
We also find out, courtesy of the just-materialized Brass, that Audrey Hilden had filed a sexual harassment lawsuit against Sugarman three months ago. Kind of puts that asking-out-to-the-movie conversation in a whole new light, doesn't it?
Sugarman: My, what a fine, big pair of bicuspids you have. Want to come over to my house for a private viewing in my home theatre?
Audrey: Thith ith maaakin thnee theel --
Sugarman: There's nothing to be ashamed of, sweet teeth. You look hot -- let's take off that plaque and stay awhile.
Audrey: Oour khreepthy!
Sugarman: Okay, now spit. Ooh. Just like that, you dirty girl! Floss for Daddy!
Audrey: [spits] You'll be hearing from my lawyers. And my HMO.
Anyway, Brass tells us that the lawsuit claims she was molested under anesthesia. Catherine says incredulously, "And she was going on a date with this guy?" Brass explains, "Sugarman countersued. He's represented by big-time attorneys, so she backed down." Gil points out, "Well, a screwdriver's cheaper than an attorney." Not for the Department of Defense, it's not. Brass adds, "Well, there's more. Remember the usher who likes to smoke the chronic? He claims he saw a redheaded woman make a phone call halfway through the movie, so I'm going to check it out. Want to tag along?" Gil and Catherine follow him, so evidently they do.
Back at the B-plot, Warrick ducks into the room where Sara's dusting the bamboo pole for prints, and asks, "Is this where the limbo party is?" He comes on it and gives her her one-to-ones. Get your minds back on the episode: it's all about the tire treads and shoe prints. Five suspects walked in and four people ran out. Sara's not doing so well: "Well, I have black lung from all the [fingerprint] powder, and not a single print. Nada. Nothing." Warrick asks if she's tested the pole for GSR, reasoning, "The place was riddled with bullets; it wouldn't hurt." Cut to the two of them testing the pole together. After that turns up nothing, Warrick suggests that maybe the pole is just a piece of debris left at the scene. Sara's not buying it, and she takes the pole down to Trace to give Hodges a crack at it. As she walks down the hall, she nearly takes out a coworker. The unnamed lackey manages to avoid losing an eye to the pole and comes over to tell Warrick that Timmy's mom, Mrs. McCallum, is with the LVPD. Warrick bids him, "Tell them I'm on my way," with a minimum of beleaguerment on his face. Our Warrick is growing up. Or growing into Gil. You make the call.
Over at the Artypants Theatre, the usher is explaining how he had gone to get a soda. That usher looks like he's a walking NIH study in "What happens when we put all the recessive genes in the human chromosome together?" He then recalls, "A tall redhead came out of the theatre, and then she made a phone call from over there." We flash back to a redhead doing so; she's filmed from the back so we can't see her face. Brass confirms, "From the pay phone." Before Gil and Catherine can mobilize, he cuts them off, "Right, right -- I'm on it." Brass takes off and Catherine asks, "Did you happen to notice if she was wearing gloves?" "Yeah, she was, actually. I thought it was really weird, because it's, like, 70 degrees in here," the usher replies. He is the most attentive stoner in the history of stonerdom. Wow. Gil asks if he remembers anything else, and the usher replies, "No. She just threw something in the trash, then headed out." Gil and Catherine check the trashcan and then, as one, turn to look at the usher. He explains, "The cleaning crew's in the theatre now. They got a late start because of you guys." I'll say. The chronology for this episode is all wacky -- are we to assume that the theatre's been closed for a day or two while the lab processed evidence? Or that the CSIs hit the theatre at night, got all the evidence in the wee small hours, then motored over to Audrey's house before coming back to the theatre? I've never gotten a good feel for exactly how much time elapses between significant steps in each case. Anyway, Gil rolls his eyes expressively; then he and Catherine go into the theatre where the two-woman crew is cleaning.
Catherine gets there first and asks what happened to the lobby's trash. As the first woman explains that the trash has already been bagged, but it should be around somewhere, Catherine notices the second cleaning in what appears to be a very nice pair of leather gloves. Gil asks, "Excuse me? Where did you get those gloves?" The first woman -- apparently the spokesperson for the duo -- says confrontationally, "If it's garbage, it's hers. They let us keep whatever we find as long as it's been thrown out." Gil promptly whips $60 out of his wallet and says, "I tell you what: I'll buy you a new pair of gloves." The women exchange a look, and then Maid #2's got a wad of cash. Well, that'll buy her something pretty at the Forum shops.
Meanwhile, Liam's working his way through "Ninety-Nine Bottles Of Beer On The Wall" Labitrail-style, with, "Ninety-nine bottles of beer on the wall, ninety-nine bottles of beer. You swab one down, run it through CODIS, ninety-eight bottles of beer on the wall." Whatever gets you through the shift, my man. Nicky comes over and asks, "Whatever happened to 'Take one down and pass it around'? That's the best part." Liam replies, "You know us lab rats have to do something to get through the day." He's reading my mind! Stop it, Liam! Nicky then asks Liam if he does dedications, and Liam brings home the biggest hits of yesteryear: "How about Harold Melvin and the Bluenotes? He ain't heavy -- he's my brother." Nicky's drawing a blank; his idea of classic is more about the Lynyrd Skynyrd. He says, "DNA? From the bottles?" Liam explains that there were five donors, two of them were related, and one of those two was Timmy, which means that Timmy had a relative at the scene with him. Or as Liam says, "Most likely a brother; no telling if he's heavy or not."
Well, we're about to find out. Warrick is meeting with Mrs. McCallum, and she's brought her other boy, Kevin, with her. Mrs. McCallum introduces young Kevin with a voice that can only be the result of a weekend spent gargling Clorox, or crying herself hoarse. Given the context in which we're meeting her, let's go for Option B. Warrick launches into the Q&A with a question about the driver's permit found at the scene; Mrs. McCallum tells us, "I know the law says you're supposed to have an adult present, but I work graveyard. Kevin usually drives with him." We find out that the McCallums have a minivan; Warrick explains awkwardly, "This is an ongoing investigation, so we are going to need to see that vehicle." Warrick asks if Kevin drives the van (occasionally, he does), then asks if Kevin was the one who drove them all to the warehouse. This gets Mrs. McCallum's attention; Kevin hastily denies ever doing anything so uncool as hanging out with his younger brother. Warrick busts him by pointing out, "We have his DNA on some beer bottles." Mrs. McCallum takes this about as well as can be expected. Kevin explains, "I bought it for Timmy. I don't do it all the time -- he begged me. He said he was going out partying with some friends." We flash back to the series of events as Kevin insists they are: he lectures little bro while a) swigging one of the bottles in a probable violation of Nevada's open container laws (NRS 484.448 -- Drinking alcoholic beverage while driving motor vehicle unlawful; unlawful to have open container of alcoholic beverage within passenger area of motor vehicle while on highway) and b) putting said bottle back in the twelve-pack carton so someone else can, presumably, drink his backwash. Warrick and Mrs. McCallum are both glaring at Kevin. Mrs. McCallum eventually speaks with, "Mr. Brown, I don't know what to say. I work nights. And you can't keep your eyes on your kids all the time. At a certain age, you just have to trust them." Warrick looks very sympathetic, but you just know he's thinking, "Why oh why is Catherine not here to handle this?" He manages to finagle keeping Kevin around for more questioning.
Of in his corner of the Labitrail, Hodges is looking up from the pole and breathing, "Spiral gouges." He bids Sara to check it out, and she does, noting, "From tip to tip. What do you think caused these marks?" "Give me more time -- I'm not a miracle worker," Hodges informs her acidly. After an almost-imperceptible pause, Sara replies, "That's...obvious, Hodges. If you were a miracle worker, you wouldn't be rude." Hodges snaps back, "I wasn't being rude, I was being curt. Rude would have been 'When I know, you'll know.' Friends?" He gives her a delightfully insincere smile -- it could probably curdle milk at ten feet -- and Sara tightly grins back, "Noooo." Oh, please, dear God, let this just be coworker friction and not the groundwork for some wildly incompatible and violently embarrassing coworker crushes. Warrick comes in right then and asks how the glass is coming along; in reply, Hodges taps another evidence scope and we find out that the glass is coated with crystallized calcium fluoride, which Hodges is sure is from a high-end optics source. Sara realizes it's from a camera lens. Warrick asks, "You think someone has this murder on tape?" It wouldn't be the first time that's happened.
Meanwhile, in Brass's office, Catherine and her office "so casual, it practically qualifies as comatose" casual tank top are telling Brass that the gloves found in the trash match the palm prints on the murder weapon and the pay phone in the lobby. She adds, "Unfortunately, there were no epithelials inside the gloves because the cleaning woman had ammonia on her hands." Brass takes it in stride, since the 11:25 phone call from the theatre lobby to Audrey's home adds a whole new wrinkle to the case; as Gil points out, Audrey called Sugarman's cell from her home at 11:26, 11:27, and 11:28. After Catherine adds, "Well, obviously, she didn't make it home in one minute," Brass concludes that they're looking for someone else. Or they're looking at the possibility that Audrey can teleport, but this show has not yet reached the realm of transporters and intra-species intrigue, so let's go with Brass's theory for now. Gil asks if they're thinking about the mysterious redhead in the theatre, and Brass speculates that Audrey could have hired a pro. Catherine shoots that down with, "Well, if she couldn't pay for a powerful attorney, how could she pay for a hit man?" Gil corrects Catherine: "Hit woman." Brass mediates with, "Why don't we ask her?"
So they do. Or rather, they try to: it's dark by the time Brass, Gil, and Catherine make it over to Audrey's house; maybe they swung by In 'n' Out and got dinner on the way, and while In 'n' Out is tasty, it is by no means speedy. And what on earth does it say about me when I'm filling in mundane details of pretend people's lives to justify the odd timelines in television episodes? Anyway, it's dark, and all three of the players from the preceding scene are standing on Audrey's front porch, knocking on the door of her darkened house and listening to the sound of a phone off the hook. Well, that had to have happened recently; those things turn off after a few minutes. I know this only because I come home to a phone the cats have knocked into the room a lot more frequently than I'd like.
Anyway, Brass reasons that there has to be another way in the house, and they head around toward the back patio door. It slides open easily, and as everyone enters the house, the only sound is the phone's off-the-hook signal. The phone is lying on the spotless white tile kitchen counter. Brass, Catherine, and Gil make their way through the kitchen and down the hall, flashlights bobbing in the blue-hued darkness, and as they enter the living room, they see Audrey's body hanging from the banister of hall above and dangling down. Catherine gives a first impression: "She used an extension cord, tied it to the railing, and must have jumped off." By this point, seasoned CSI viewers are already shouting, "Wrong!" Brass has the cell out, calling for a coroner, while Gil notices a chain on the floor by Audrey's feet. He flashes to the raw burn around Sugarman's neck and immediately intuits that this is the chain which caused that burn. Catherine, meanwhile, is still talking: "Our only suspect commits suicide. Convenient." Gil examines the chain and replies, "Too convenient."
After Gil's had a chance to examine the body -- he's alone with it now as it dangles down -- he calls out, "Catherine! There's a whole 'nother set of horizontal marks on her neck below the cord, and postmortem bruising. I think she was strangled first, and then hanged." Catherine replies, "[Muffle, muffle, murmur]," just so we're all reminded that Gil is indeed losing his hearing and still runs afoul of that reality in formerly-routine work situations. Or maybe she doesn't, since Gil's deafness comes and goes whenever it's convenient. Catherine comes in from wherever she was, and announces that there were no signs of a break-in, so Audrey was killed by someone she knew. Gil examines Audrey's shoes and concludes, "She was dragged. She's got carpet fibers on her heels." Catherine's up by the railing; she adds, "She was dragged over here, tied off, and shoved over." We see a flashback of all this, complete with crunchy sounds as Audrey's body begins swinging. That would be assorted things in her neck breaking, wouldn't they? Gil, meanwhile, has noticed something else. Catherine asks him what it is, and Gil replies, "When we were here earlier, there was a movie schedule pinned up there that had a handwritten note on it. I'm not sure she wanted me to see it. Now it's gone." Gil's off to figure out where it went: it's not in the trash can downstairs, so he heads up to the bathroom, checks that empty trash can, then notices a splash of water by the base of the toilet. Cue him taking out the plunger -- let us all hope he's right about his hunch -- and producing the sodden schedule, which he fishes out of the bowl.
Back in drier habitats, i.e. the Labitrail, Warrick is getting results off the minivan's tires; he matches them up to the pictures Sara had earlier and comments, "Venus and Serena --a perfect match." A more thorough examination of the minivan bears even more fruit: the torn twelve-pack case with a price sticker from Jenko Liquor, and a spattering of blood on the driver's side of the van. Warrick sprays it with reagent, and it turns bright magenta.
Cut to Buzz talking to Kevin, who still insists that he'd never do anything so uncool as hang out with his fifteen-year-old brother when he's got a posse of infinitely more mature eighteen-year-old boys to run with. Buzz is unmoved: "Evidence says you were there. You want to go down for suspicion of murder? Or do you want to stop digging your own grave? It's up to you." Off in the hidden compartment behind the mirror, Warrick is watching -- yes, he finally looks beleaguered -- when Nicky comes up to share that he's just come from visiting Bobby the ballistics tech without us, and all the bullets came from the same 9mm semi. Warrick fills Nicky in on his discoveries and notes the price sticker for Jenko Liquor. Nicky immediately volunteers to check the surveillance tapes to see if they can get footage of the kids. Back in the fishbowl, as Kevin readjusts, Nicky notices a stain on the sleeve of his shirt and asks sharply, "What is that on his elbow?"
Kevin insists, "It's just a scab." When Nicky asks to see it -- Warrick has to prod Kevin to peel back the bandage -- we see that Kevin's wound is just a scab in the same way that the Black Knight had "just a flesh wound." Warrick curls his lip contemptuously in, "Skateboarding? Take off your shirt." Kevin gets all panicky with, "Don't you guys need a warrant for that?" Buzz explains how warrants just make everything all complicated, and Kevin peels off his shirt to reveal a torso pocked with the same round contusions that Timmy had. Warrick notes the resemblance and presses for an explanation; Kevin clams up. Nicky adds, "Hey, listen, if you're the victim here, you can tell us, okay?" Kevin says nothing. Warrick's concerned now; he's all, "Kevin, who did this to you, man?" Kevin won't say.
Back in the A-plot, Catherine and Gil are examining the soggy pink cinema schedule. Catherine thinks that there's a lot of water damage, but she can see some kind of impression on the paper. Gil brings it into sharper focus using a sooper-dooper forensic version of Photoshop, and we see that something's written right above the promo for Strangers on a Train. Why, what an amazing coincidence. For those of you who aren't versed in your Hitchcock, read Catherine and Gil's conversation.
Catherine: Strangers on a Train. Hey, isn't that the one with the perfect murder?
Gil: Two strangers meet on a train, make a pact to get rid of each other's problems. They figure since neither has a motive for the killings, they won't be caught.
Catherine: Life imitating art?
Gil: In the movie, Robert Walker kills Farley Granger's wife. Granger didn't think he was serious, so when he refuses to kill Walker's father, Walker goes after him.
Catherine: So if Audrey is Farley Granger...
Gil: Who's playing Robert Walker's part?
Just then the machine beeps, and we have our first clue as to who is playing that part indeed. They're traced back to the Sphere hotel and the parking spot E4-117.
We go to an exterior shot of the Rio -- in my opinion, a casino that looks as though it was designed by twelve-year-old girls who had taken one too many design cues from the Lisa Frank line of school supplies -- and we see some total sleazeball telling Brass how he knows nothing about Audrey. He asks what this is about, and Catherine explains, "E-dash-one-four-one-seventeen. Your assigned parking space. It was written on a movie schedule we found in Ms. Hilden's home." As she talks, Gil stands there closemouthed, watching intently. I'm going to go into wild speculation territory here and guess that he's lip-reading because the club music has more or less wrecked any chance he has at picking this conversation up over the throbbing low tones in the background. The club guy smarms, "I meet a lot of women. She a dancer? She work for me before? Hey, Michelle. Mmm!" The mmm, by the way, accompanies a solid slap on Michelle's feather-clad rump. That's got to be a fun working environment. Catherine immediately gives this guy the hairy eyeball; he totally misses the cues and launches into a verbal inventory of Michelle's assets, finishing with, "All the girls want to be in [the show] and actually, they gotta go through me." Gil is now officially checked out of the conversation; he's been staring intently into the changing space the whole time and just quietly heads in there while Brass is asking if Manager Guy has ever been to the Artypants Theatre. As we hear Catherine asking if this mouth-breathing philistine has ever torn his eyes away from Vivid Video's latest offerings to watch Strangers on a Train, Gil is examining a showgirl station that has the same movie schedule found in Audrey's house posted beside it. Gil then raises his voice to ask whose station that is, and we find out it's Kelly Goodson's; her boss immediately characterizes her as a "royal pain in the ass." Gil is just hanging out in front of Kelly's station.
She comes sauntering in just as he notices the business card for Langly & Langly, Attorneys at Law, tacked to the corner of her mirror. Gil turns his head to look in Kelly's open locker and notices a curious mix of drugstore relics -- two tubes of ointment, three bottles of pills, and a small jar of ointment. He's startled by the redheaded Kelly, who asks, "Can I help you? That's my locker." Gil says, "It was open." As Kelly peels off her gloves and prepares to change for the act -- burlesque music blaring in the back, just in case we forget what it is showgirls do -- and she asks, "Do you always snoop through other people's things?" As Gil's about the answer, she pulls off her wig and we see some long, blonde hair spill down. Gil notes this, then answers, "I'm with the crime lab; I'm a professional snoop. Do you, uh, ever wear that wig when you go out?" Kelly responds matter-of-factly, "I never get to go out: two shows a night, three on weekends. Why? Do you have something in mind?" While she's talking, she pulls down the tube of ointment and begins applying it with practiced motions. Gil asks, "Do you like the movies? I, uh, noticed you have an Art House schedule on your mirror." Kelly cops to having gone there a few times. Gil asks if she's ever seen Strangers on a Train. Kelly pauses before saying slowly, "Noooo. Is it any good?" Gil says that it is, then notices Kelly rubbing another liniment on her legs; he asks, "You use a lot of creams, huh?" Kelly extends a leg so it's perpendicular to the floor and says matter-of-factly, "Sixteen shows a week in these shoes? Your legs would be killing you too." Gil then asks if the goop Kelly's slathering on is her own recipe. She gives him a hard look and asks, "What was it you said you do for a living?" Gil replies only, "I'm a scientist." Kelly will just have to fill in "with a CRIME LAB" on her own. Kelly then tries to get Gil out of there by saying, "I'm up in five minutes, so do you mind?" whilst indicating with her eyes that he should head out. Gil plants himself and says guilelessly, "I don't mind." The burlesque music finishes with a final bawdy blast as Kelly reaches behind her to unsnap her spangly bra top. I bet that's one perk that doesn't make it into the packet CSI Human Resources hands out upon hiring.
Back at the lab, Sara's logging data for all 109 bullets; Warrick comes sliding into a chair with uncannily convenient timing. Sara then turns to him, gives him a look halfway between irritation and take-me-now, and sighs, "This has been a very laborious shift." I half-expect her to finish, "So if you don't mind grabbing the massage oil and ducking into that empty ballistics cage with me, I'd like to unwind." Instead, she asks, "Are you in the mood for a light show?" Warrick's always in the mood for a light show. Sara taps a few keys on the computer, and we see the Unreal Tournament version of events. Warrick notes that, "the trajector[ies of the bullets are] all pointing in one uniform area. It looks like some kind of a pole." "Or a bamboo stick," Sara says, beating Warrick about the head and shoulders with the Told You So stick. Warrick sighs and admits, "The whole case has been like this -- it's like, you can't wrap your head around it, you know?" Sara muses, "A bamboo pole with black swirls descending downward, no GSR, 109 rods, 109 bullets all fired from the same gun..." Warrick tags in: "Camera glass, blood droplets everywhere, DNA that says five people were there, one boy's dead, one boy's injured, and he ain't saying nothing...is this the end of the road?" Warrick's expression has officially topped out the scale of beleaguered expressions; nothing on this show, short of his grandmother being blown to Kingdom Come by Gil during a staff meeting, will cause this expression to surface again. Sara concludes that, forensically, it is.
Ha ha! Sara's wrong, and Nicky's the one to prove it. He swings on by with the captured footage from Jenko Liquors, courtesy of Archie (who, regretfully, we don't get to see anymore. Sigh). The photographs are incriminating: as Kevin buys beer, Timmy and the three currently unindicted coconspirators are busy wreaking havoc in the store with the intention of unnerving the cashier to the point where he's willing to make a sale just to get the hoodlums out of the store. Nicky's all excited about this because "you know the camera glass Warrick found, right? That means someone has this all on tape. I say we track down the other three kids, see which one of them thinks he's Tarantino." Gasp. Did Nicky just piece together clues in a manner so as to break the case open? Did Nicky just behave competently? Someone mark this episode down; it may be a turning point toward a peaceful dénouement to Day of Justice: The Nick Stokes Story.
In another part of the lab, Gil's fresh from a trip to Walgreen's, where he's evidently stocked up on the assorted unguents Kelly was using to alleviate her leg fatigue. Catherine comes in and tells a head-down Gil, "So get this -- Slimy Club Guy had a sexual harassment lawsuit filed against him recently." Gil shakes his head and notes, "There's a lot of that going around." Las Vegas as a hotbed of men who think they're above the boundaries of legal and/or decent behavior? No! We quickly find out that -- surprise, surprise -- Kelly's the one doing the suing, and she's claiming that El Capitan De Slime would fire her if she didn't perform certain sexual favors. We also find out that Kelly and Audrey happened to have the same attorneys for their respective sexual harassment lawsuits. Gil muses, "So they liked the same movies. They had the same problem. They hired the same lawyer." Catherine nods, then asks about the over-the-counter creams Gil has with, "Knees bothering you?" Gil fumbles a bit until bringing out bagged pieces of evidence, explaining, "The extension cord used to strangle Audrey Hilden. Gus's chain. The murderer's gloves." Catherine calls him out with, "Any physical evidence on those gloves would have been compromised by the ammonia." Gil points out, "Only on the inside -- not necessarily on the outside. You use two hands to put on gloves." A light bulb goes off over Catherine's head: "You're looking for transfer." Gil whips out a notepad upon which he evidently has the lotion recipe as given to him by Kelly, and says smugly, "Special recipe."
We then see Liam testing the gloves for transfer.
Back in the B-plot, some kid who's apparently just come from one of those "for the love of God, don't do drugs or you'll end up like this kid" commercials is busy telling us how the boys go to the warehouse all the time to bond over booze, babes, and buds. Buzz asks the disaffected lad to lift his shirt, and we see that he, too, has the same contusions. We then see a slightly pudgier boy explain away his bruises with, "I ride BMX bikes. I play soccer. I wake up with bruises." A third kid, this one sporting a hell of a black eye, claims, "We were just messing around." Buzz shoots back, "I'm not. A kid is dead. Back to the question: how'd you get the shiner?" Kid #3 says, "JJ found a gun in north town. We were messing with it, shooting the walls. So one night, I brought my Hi-8 camera in, and one of the stray bullets shot my lens out." So some kid just finds a gun? I realize they've got to find a way to get a 9mm semi in the hands of a bunch of slack-jawed suburban spawn, but the whole "oh, I just found a gun" thing...the question I have is, under what circumstances did the gun get lost? Buzz does not have a similar question; he's more interested in finding out who the shooter was, and encourages the would-be auteur to squeal with, "You can tell us and save yourself, or you can let the tape tell us. It's your call."
Well, Buzz won't go down as a cop who can connect with today's young people; the tape's doing the talking. In very small words. Kevin, Timmy, and the rest of the idiot posse are busy introducing themselves to their imaginary audience and explaining to the enraptured Young Turks (who are watching on a monitor) what speedway surfing is.
Cut to Kevin explaining, "Timmy was a big fan of all those reality shows. You know, the 'don't try this at home' stuff. We all watched it on TV. So one day, we're bored. We started making up stunts of our own, trying to outdo each other. Speedway surfing...that was my idea."
Cut to the tape, where the kids are taking turns standing on the hood of a moving car while generic speed-rock plays. We see how the three CSIs react: Warrick is sadly riveted, and Sara checks Nicky's expression to see if this registers with him.
Back in the room with Buzz, Kevin continues explaining, "We all did it. Some ate it bad -- JJ bruised his tailbone. We were just messing around."
Cut to the segment of the tape where someone actually goes rolling off the car as it moves and barely misses being run over. Nicky drops his head in dismay; Sara and Warrick are both squinting at the screen.
Kevin explains, "Then Zach got the fever. day he came up with one."
The tape shows us the human 150-yard marker, which can be summed up as "The boys put on football helmets and let their friends hit golf balls into them." Sara's amazed; as a teenaged girl, she probably suspected teenage boys were idiots, and after all these years, now she has proof.
Kevin continues, "Then it came time for Timmy's turn. He stayed up all night, and by morning, he had it."
On the screen, Timmy explains, "This is my debut stunt, so I'm really psyched. It's called Bamboo Russian Roulette." Should anyone be interested in playing, all you have to do is collect a group of idiots, a long bamboo pole, and a loaded 9mm semi, then twirl the gun down the pole as it sprays bullets. Everyone left standing after the gun reaches bottom is a winner! Although now that I think about it, even if I accept the premise that someone just stumbles across a 9mm semi somewhere, where on Earth did they get the bullets? Did they stumble across a cache of ammo too? Is there a drug dealer named Tha Killa who's going to be looking for that?
Kevin glosses all over that and basically tells Buzz that they did the stunt several times: "I got shot in the arm, but we were drunk, so...we decided to try it one more time." A lot of people who play regular Russian roulette probably get dinged on that last round too. We see Sara and the boys watching Timmy collapse to the ground, struggling to breathe. Kevin's all, "I didn't know what to do. I came down from the roof, I went over to his side. I kept saying, 'Come on, breathe, bro.'" It figures -- he'd ask someone with a sucking chest wound to breathe, as opposed to doing something like, oh, I don't know...calling 911? Buzz raises the same question I just did, and Kevin's all, "I didn't want to get in trouble," because having the cops open an investigation on your dead brother and charge you with obstruction is a whole lot less inconvenient than just owning up to your stupidity immediately after the fact. Buzz shares this sentiment too with, "So you just left him for dead." Kevin protests, "It was an accident! It's not like we had a death wish." It's a good thing the Young Turks aren't in the room, because they'd all be too busy picking up their jaws off the floor to respond intelligently.
And now that we've wrapped up one ripped-from-another-source-of-amusement plot, it's time to wrap up the other. Catherine and Gil are hanging with Kelly -- and by the way, I can't believe it's taken me this long to point out how very delighted I am to see these two working together. I love when they do; there's a definite sparkle in their interaction that's just fun to watch, and their characters manage to convey a long partnership without resorting to obviousness. Anyway, Catherine and Gil are laying out the case for Kelly, and she's playing stupid for about thirty seconds until Catherine and Gil forget her and speculate on how Kelly and Audrey first met: was it at the lawyers', or was it at the movie theatre? Catherine closes out the conversation with, "Either way, you ladies had a lot in common." We flash back to them at the movie theatre. Gil, who is sitting backwards on the chair and leaning his chin down on the back, says happily, "Can't you see them watching Strangers on a Train together?" See? Even Gil is happy that he's working with Catherine. Catherine smiles back. Gil continues, "I'm thinking that Audrey told her everything about her dentist, and she told Audrey everything about El Capitan De Slime." We flash to that little tête-à-tête. Catherine concludes, "You needed them both dead, so right out of Strangers on a Train, if you swapped murders, no one could tie you to the murders. And then you started talking specifics. Where the best place would be to kill El Capitan De Slime. Someplace dark, secluded -- the parking lot right here at the Sphere." We flash to that, which gives Gil the perfect opportunity to transition, "After you stabbed Sugarman, you ripped the gold chain off of his neck as proof that you'd kept up your end of the bargain." Another flashback -- this one to the killing -- and Catherine says, "And then you walked out into the lobby and called Audrey on the pay phone to say the deed was done." Gil adds, "And then Audrey called Sugarman three times in a row to see if it was true."
Kelly finally speaks: "She was the one who picked the movie and made the date." Gil pegs the motive for Audrey's murder with, "But that's all she did, isn't it? Because just like in the movies, she had no intention of killing El Capitan De Slime. And that's when you started harassing her." We see a shot of this harassment, namely Kelly glaring at Audrey from across the street as Gil and Catherine stood on her doorstep, until a car pulled in and blocked her view and Audrey invited the CSIs inside. Catherine points out, "You'd killed for her, and now she wasn't holding up her end of the bargain." Gil adds, "You couldn't let her betray you, so unfortunately, she had to die too." We see how that happened in flashback. Gil wraps up with, "So you made it look like she'd committed suicide, and you planted Sugarman's gold chain in the hopes that we would think she killed him too." Catherine leads us all to the obvious conclusion that the only thing Audrey had on Kelly was a movie schedule, which she then tried to dispose of, only to be thwarted by Gil and his plunger.
After this narrative is laid out, Kelly says brightly, "Wow! That was a really good story. You guys must be movie fans yourselves." Gil says, "You're right. It's just a story. But the chemicals we found on your gloves and the extension cord that was used to kill Audrey? That's our proof." Gil rattles off the ingredients found, matches them to the drugstore products from whence they came, then matches those to Kelly's combination of balms. Gil finishes, "Yeah, it's a pretty good movie. The character that you've been playing, the character that Robert Walker played in the movie, he dies at the end." There's a pause while Kelly absorbs this. I take that to mean she'll be facing the death penalty.
In the shot, we see Gil watching another noir at the Artypants Theatre; Catherine soon slides down to him with her drink and her popcorn. Awww. She asks what she missed, and Gil deadpans, "Murder, seduction, deceit -- the usual." Catherine asks if this movie is one of Gil's favorites, and he pauses before answering thoughtfully, "Actually, I'm not a big fan of noir." This surprises Catherine. She collects her thoughts, then asks, "What do you like?" Gil answers all poignantly and symbolically, "I like silent movies." Oh, Gil, you coy deaf riddle wrapped in a mystery surrounded in soundproof nougat.