Thursday, December 22, 2011

What I’m Watching: The Closer


The Closer: Season 7, Episode 14 “Road Block” (B+)

This episode was presented in a rather unconventional manner, putting Flynn at the center of the action as the crime was committed and then showing us who did it, how she got away, and how Brenda and the rest of Major Crimes planned to pin it on her. Elizabeth Perkins was a great drunk police commissioner’s wife, promptly ditching her car and cell phone and pretending that they got stolen. Brenda’s quick deduction that she was a liar didn’t have Will as worried as perhaps as he should have been, but given the way things played out, it wasn’t much of a problem. Maggie Wheeler, best remembered as Janice from “Friends,” appeared as her friend, and the dependable Mark Moses made for an initially manipulative and ultimately noble police commissioner, and Brenda’s manipulation of her daughter with Sanchez’s pieces of evidence was rather aggressive. Trying to get her convicted of murder by proving that she had a previous DUI and was drunk was quite an effort, and Fritz was right to point out that it could have been him before he met Brenda. Bringing Fritz’s alcoholism up in the middle of an interview was an unusual personal moment for Brenda, and it was obvious that it was hard on him, but it did prove to be highly effective in getting Gail’s daughter to realize that her mother had a problem. In an otherwise very strong episode, the question, for the third hour in a row, is where is Captain Raydor?

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