We have been waiting for it all season, girls, and last night, it finally happened--Lorraine Bracco, as Angela Rizzoli made the famous Bunny Pancakes. She did it to comfort both Jane and Maura--Jane, who sprained her ankle while jogging, and Maura, who had the trying task of attempting to examine Jane, urging her she should go to a hospital.
If that does not merit Bunny Pancakes, I do not know what does, darlings!!!!!!!!!!!!
However, this episode, entitled "All For One," while gong for something dark, was decidedly unsatisfying.
I think someone on the writing staff had seen the classic "Law And Order SVU" episode, "Mean," and was going for an inverted riff on that. But it did not work.
Things began well, with the runover murder, by car, of this obese looking guy named David Sutton. He was allegedly a popular science teacher in the local high school, especially encouraging of girls in the areas of science. Forget what I said the other day about school gender bias, this was not about that. This was about David Sutton, in the words of one student, being a "lascivious creep."
It turned out Sutton, along with the sciences, also taught Driver's Ed. He had his own little private shed/office for that, and guess what he did with it, afterwards??????? He lured his more academically and physically advanced students to this dwelling, where he parlayed grades for sex. If you looked at the actor cast as Sutton, you would see why he had to do this--who would go near him? The one I felt sorry for was his wife, who was widowed, left with four young children, one just recently born, because Sutton apparently was turning her into a baby machine--and she had no idea what a creep he was in the first place!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! So, that instantly killed off any sympathy I might have had for Sutton as a victim.
Things get even more complicated, when another of his students, Samantha Cole, is found to be hospitalized and in a coma, after attempting suicide by overdosing on her mother's prescription codeine!!!!!!!!! Now, girls, you know how much I love MY codeine, but too much is too much!!!!!!! Did Sutton have anything to do with this??????? You bet--the girl had character, as well as brains, and refused his sexual intimidation. But Sutton was real scum--he downloaded a photo of Samantha off of her cell phone, which no one was supposed to see, and , within the context of how it was made, was perfectly innocent, but he reworked it so that people were calling Samantha on line a slut!!!!!!!!!! Mr. Sutton was the REAL slut, darling!!!!!!! Pig, is more like it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Samantha was one part of a quartet of girls who were very close friends. Maura initially meets the other three at the crime scene, and, as the investigation goes underway, it becomes apparent that one or more of them may be involved in Sutton's death--that it was done to avenge Samantha, which I would not blame them for one bit. This was one group of girls who could not be broken; in cases like this, the teens often turn on each other. Not here. It was almost remarkable how each held to their own versions--the same one in each case--of the truth. However, and this where it gets unsatisfying, the episode ends, with no one able to prove anything. The DA says there is not enough for a case. No one can precisely determine if Sutton's death was a homicide, or an accident. Nor can it be determined how many girls were in the death car, and, most important of all, who was driving. So, the girls, basically get away with murder. This left a bad taste in my mouth; Sutton was a jerk, and deserved what he got, especially for what he did to Samantha, but let me tell you, if I had been those girls, I would have handled it another way.
I would have taped an encounter, then gone to Sutton's beleaguered baby machine wife, with the evidence. She would divorce him, he would be indicted, and place in jail, where they don't take kindly to pedophiles. The wife might have gotten some kind of settlement from the school board, in which case she would still be better off without Sutton, knowing now what scum he was!!!!!!!!!!!!! All of which would have been more satisfying.
As the credits rolled at the end, I could not help myself feeling cheated out of something. If the writers were afraid to nail the girls, they should have found some way, had he not been killed, of nailing Sutton!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Thank God for Angela's Bunny Pancakes!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
No comments:
Post a Comment