Post by mlm828 on Oct 16, 2005 11:31:52 GMT -5
At the Dunbars’ apartment, another work day is beginning when Jim’s morning shave (sorry, ladies, I couldn’t find a screencap) is interrupted by his cell phone. Christie brings him the phone, but when he asks who’s calling, she responds, sarcastically, that she didn’t know she was allowed to answer his phone. It’s the squad, of course, notifying Jim to respond to a homicide. Jim asks Christie what she meant by saying she wasn’t allowed to answer his phone, but she says it was nothing, adding that she doesn’t want to have an argument or even a conversation, they both have to go to work. Jim persists, asking if they can have dinner and talk, but Christie says she already has dinner plans. (Didn’t he know her plans? These two really have communication problems). When Jim asks if she can cancel, Christie responds that she was just kidding about not being allowed to answer his stupid phone. Jim asks if Christie is crying. She says “no,” grabs her briefcase and practically runs from the apartment, leaving Jim standing in the hallway, calling out to her to wait.
Jim arrives at the crime scene and learns the DOA, Bud Cassell, was hit over the head with a baseball bat, and the neighbors reported frequent arguments with his girlfriend. Marty tells him the DOA’s cell phone shows calls to and from Jim’s informant, Sonny. Apparently sensing all is not well with Jim, Karen straightens his tie and asks if he’s okay as he takes out his phone to call Sonny. Jim tells her he’s “fine,” and Karen turns away, rolling her eyes as if to say, “Okay, be like that.”
Back at the squad, Sonny tells Jim and Karen the DOA was his cousin. He also reveals Bud had recently come into a quantity of cocaine, which he was trying to unload. Sonny says he has spoken to Bud’s girlfriend, Debbie, whom he’d be happy to throw under a bus, and all she was interested in was getting rid of the coke. When Jim asks if Debbie knows the cops want to talk to her, Sonny tells him he’s taken care of that by setting up a drug buy at a nearby coffee shop in an hour. They can bust Debbie for possession, giving them leverage to find out what she knows about the homicide. Jim apparently has been down this road before with Sonny and tells him this is a perfect example of his thinking too much; Jim asked him to look into the homicide, not “play sheriff.” But Jim concedes they could have a detective pose as a drug dealer. Sonny then reveals there’s a little “wrinkle”: he told Debbie the buyer is a blind guy. Karen asks, incredulously, “a blind drug dealer?” (The same question we’re all asking at this point).
Sonny argues a blind drug dealer is a great idea, because he can’t see his customers and can’t ID them to the cops. Besides, it’s all set up with Debbie. Jim shakes his head in disbelief and tells Sonny he’s an idiot.
Jim nevertheless tells Karen, “Let’s run it by the boss,” and Sonny looks pleased.
With Sonny in the holding cell, in case any of his lowlife friends show up, the squad discusses Sonny’s hare-brained scheme. (Why doesn’t Fisk -- or someone -- speak up and say, “This is crazy”?) Marty offers to take the dark glasses and the dog and pose as the blind drug dealer, but Jim points out that Marty will not be able to pull it off, because he’s not blind. Jim tells Fisk they can scrap the plan if Fisk is uncomfortable, but after saying he’s uncertain Jim should be doing it at all, Fisk leaves the decision to the squad, after Jim assures him he can handle it. Tom apparently has no reservations about the scheme, saying, “It’s all good,” but Marty and Karen go along reluctantly.
The squad and Sonny head down to the coffee shop, where we get our first look at
Jim as “Ted the Drug Dealer.”
While they are waiting for Debbie, Sonny asks Jim if he’s still married to the same lady. When Jim responds, “yes,” Sonny comments that it says something about her, that she stayed with him, and asks, “How’s that work? Day to day?” Since Jim is wondering at this point how his marriage is working and doesn’t want to get this personal with Sonny in any event, he tells Sonny, “Maybe some other time.”
Debbie drives up, and Sonny goes out to speak with her. Karen, sitting at the coffee shop counter as back-up, tells him they’re arguing. Apparently still doubtful about Sonny’s plan, Karen confirms that Jim will signal the squad by running his hand through his hair, as soon as he has the drugs. Sonny returns and tells Jim Debbie wants to make sure he can deal in “major weight.”
Jim, Hank, and Sonny get in Debbie’s car, and Sonny’s carefully thought-out plan starts to unravel. Contrary to expectations, Debbie has no drugs on her, not even a sample, but she will take Jim to where the drugs are, if he wants to do the deal. Jim agrees, and Debbie drives off. At that instant, a truck blocks the cab where Marty and Tom are waiting for the deal to go down. Doing a good imitation of the Keystone Kops, Marty, Tom and Karen persuade the truck driver to move the truck, but it’s too late – they’ve lost Jim.
Jim, Sonny, and Debbie arrive at the deserted industrial area where Bud stashed the drugs in some lockers. Jim leaves Hank in Debbie’s car. (No, Jim, don’t do that!) The drugs are gone. Jim asks Sonny if this is a shakedown, but Sonny passes the buck to Debbie, who insists Bud did not move the drugs, and no one else knew where they were. Another car drives up, and two scary bald tattooed dudes, Johnny and Luis, get out, with guns. Thinking his back-up has arrived, Jim runs his hand through his hair, but Sonny tells him the new arrivals are “two Latin gentlemens.” When Sonny tells Johnny and Luis the drugs are gone and they’ve been ripped off, Johnny is not pleased and asks Sonny if they look stupid. Sonny, wisely, responds that they look highly intelligent. Luis, referring to Jim, asks, “What’s his problem,” to which Sonny responds that Jim is blind, and there’s no need to mess with him. After looking into the empty lockers, Johnny still believes Sonny is lying and warns him: “You’d best not be messing with me, Sonny Boy.” (“Sonny Boy?” Does Johnny know Sonny? Is Sonny is cahoots with them?)
By this time, Jim has realized his back-up is nowhere around, the situation is going from bad to worse, and his options are limited. He’s been in some tight spots since returning to work, but nothing like this.
Luis waves his gun in front of Jim’s face, asking, “You’re blind?” Jim confirms he is in fact blind. After Sonny volunteers that Jim is blind and “harmless,” Luis sucker-punches Jim in the stomach. Luis, Debbie, Johnny, and Sonny drive away, leaving Jim on the ground, gasping for air. He hears Hank barking and realizes Debbie is driving off with Hank still in her car. Jim yells at them to leave the dog and runs after the car, but his pursuit comes to an abrupt end when he falls over some debris. He picks himself up and calls the squad. As his cell phone cuts in and out, he manages to get across that the deal went bad, it was a set-up, he doesn’t know where he is, and he’s not real happy about having been lost (“What do you mean you lost me?”).
In spite of everything, he has the presence of mind to tell them the drugs belonged to a previous tenant in Bud’s apartment. Karen assures Jim they will be able to locate him by tracing his cell phone signal, and he and Hank should sit tight. Jim tells her Hank isn’t with him, “they” took him. When Karen tells Tom and Marty about Hank, there is general consternation, and Marty kicks a desk.
(It’s interesting that Marty is the one who is the most upset. Perhaps after the “Can you imagine that?” moment at the sports bar, he is beginning to imagine what things are like for Jim). Jim’s cell phone signal is traced to a site in Hoboken, but this can only locate him within a three-mile radius of the site.
Meanwhile, Jim finds a fence and makes his way along it, periodically falling and cursing. (We have to imagine the curse words, as the public’s ears are deemed too delicate to hear them).
This is one of the few times in the series when we see Jim openly expressing his frustration at not being able to see. Then he finds a sign with (conveniently) raised lettering, which he is able to read. This pinpoints his location, and the Jersey troopers pick him up.
When Jim returns to the squad, Marty and Tom start to explain how they lost Jim, but he shrugs it off, telling them, “What happened, happened.” Marty seems especially concerned, asking Jim if he’s sure he’s okay. Jim’s first question is about Hank, and Fisk assures him they’ve alerted all the animal shelters in the area. Karen asks if he’s okay to interview Rory Glann, a suspect in the theft of the drugs. Jim assures her he’s okay, he just needs a drink of water before the interview. But as he walks toward the water cooler, his movements lack their usual assurance, and we can tell he is more shaken than he’s willing to admit.
In this episode, Jim is arguably at his most vulnerable. There isn’t much he can do when Johnny and Luis show up, and his back-up is nowhere to be found. Then he is stranded, without his dog or his cane (why didn’t he have the cane?), and he can’t even tell the squad where he is. These experiences surely must have brought back his doubts about his ability to do the job, even though he doesn’t articulate them. Or has he accepted Dr. Galloway’s advice not to beat himself up over what he can no longer do?
The other unspoken issue in this episode is the recurring one of whether a blind man should be a cop in the first place. However, no one in the squad is in any position to bring this up, because they all went along with the drug deal scheme, and they are the ones who lost Jim.
Jim is able to compose himself and, along with Karen, questions twitchy, jittery Rory, who is high on something. However, Jim betrays his anxiety by fiddling with a pen throughout the interview. After Jim asks Rory if he wants to spend the rest of his life in jail and, if he’s reborn, the rest of that life, too, Rory admits he stole Bud’s cocaine and stashed it in his refrigerator. However, he has an alibi for the time Bud was killed, having been “partying” in a strip club with “a Russian.”
When Karen and Jim return to the squad room after the interview, Tom calls Debbie’s cell phone, and Johnny answers. Pretending to have the coke, Tom sets up a meeting with Johnny. Johnny apparently asks if Tom is black, to which Tom responds, “No, I’m Scottish, what it sound like?” Tom meets up with Johnny, and they arrest him. While they are gone, Jim calls an animal shelter looking for Hank -- not for the first time.
When he is brought back to the squad, Johnny is questioned by Tom and Marty, who is looking especially good:
Despite having the chance to make a deal, Johnny claims ignorance of everything, including Hank’s whereabouts. Outside the interview room, Marty questions whether Sonny is playing both ends, pointing out that there are just too many coincidences. Jim assures him that Sonny will have answers, when he shows up.
Marty and Tom resume questioning Johnny, with Jim reprising his role as “Ted.” Tom tells Johnny he now has a competitor for the deal that is being offered. Marty escorts Jim into the interview room, where he identifies Johnny as the man who took his dog. Jim lunges across the table at Johnny, demanding to know where Hank is. Marty pulls him off and manhandles him out of the room. Johnny reconsiders and tells Tom where Debbie is, but continues to deny involvement in Bud’s killing, or any knowledge of Hank’s whereabouts.
Marty, Tom, and Karen find Debbie, bloodied and tied up, in an apartment. She tells them Johnny and Luis let Sonny go, and Sonny was in on it with them. She accuses Johnny and Luis of killing Bud. Tom and Marty take Debbie to the hospital.
While Marty, Tom, and Karen are gone, Jim again calls the shelters, looking for Hank. As Jim hangs up the phone, fumbling slightly with the receiver, Fisk approaches, looking sympathetic, and tries to encourage Jim by telling him Hank will turn up.
Karen returns to the squad and reports on finding Debbie. When Jim asks about Hank, she tells him Debbie heard him barking, then Luis took him outside, and that was the last she saw of him.
Shortly after Karen returns to the squad, Sonny shows up. “Nice of you to join us,” she tells him. Sonny says he spent the last six hours in a dumpster, it was a nightmare. Jim stands up, looking rather menacing, and tells Sonny to follow him. As they walk to an interview room, Sonny tells Jim it’s a good thing he’s blind, the “old Dunbar” would have pulled his gun out, and it would have been like the OK Corral. Once in the interview room, Sonny asks whether they found the coke. Jim grabs Sonny by the neck, slams him against the wall and demands to know what the hell Sonny got him into.
Sonny insists he knows only what Jim knows, and denies setting him up. He tells Jim they drove back to the city, with Johnny and Luis demanding to know where the coke was. He managed to jump out of the car and run, as Johnny and Luis fired at him, and hid in a dumpster. In disbelief, Jim asks, “For six hours?” to which Sonny responds (let’s all join in here), “Smell me!”
Sonny explains his theory about Johnny and Luis’s appearance in Hoboken: Bud told a lot of people about the coke; the word must have gotten back to Johnny and Luis, who killed Bud, then followed Debbie, Sonny and Jim to Hoboken. Sonny insists he doesn’t know where the coke is now. Jim asks, “It wasn’t you?” Affecting righteous disbelief that Jim could doubt him, Sonny asks if Jim is accusing him of double-dealing. Jim points out that the first words out of Sonny’s mouth were “Where’s the coke?” and he hasn’t asked about Debbie, or Bud’s murder, or Hank. Sonny responds that it should not be a surprise to Jim that he’s interested in his “finder’s fee.” Sonny insists he doesn’t know what happened to Hank, he was in the dumpster. “I heard barking, then I didn’t hear the barking no more.” Jim starts to say, “If anything happened to him. . . ,” but Sonny interrupts, pointing out that he almost got killed. Unable to deal with Sonny any more, and appearing rather disgusted, Jim tells him to get out.
After Tom and Marty return to the squad, another scary bald dude, the Chief of Ds, comes to the squad for an update. (We can only imagine the story of “the blind detective” being lost in New Jersey circulating over the NYPD grapevine. And I shudder to think of the calls poor Fisk must have fielded from the brass after the story got out). After Karen, Tom, and Marty bring the Chief up to date on the homicide and the drugs, he turns to Jim and asks, rather snidely, how Jim ended up lost in New Jersey. As Marty, Tom, and Karen look on anxiously, Jim explains what happened without revealing that the rest of the squad lost him. Apparently accepting Jim’s explanation, the Chief of Ds departs, to everyone’s relief.
Jim then has one of those moments when things come together in his mind. He asks why Johnny and Luis left him there, and why they didn’t just kill all of them. Tom answers: “Because they wanted the drugs.” Fisk asks: “Then why did they kill Bud Cassell, the guy who knew where the drugs were?” Tom again: “Because they didn’t.” After Jim points out that bludgeoning someone with a baseball bat would not be Johnny and Luis’s preferred method of killing, Karen puts it together, “Girlfriend. Debbie,” and takes off to question her at the hospital. Marty asks Jim if he wants to take a ride down to the East Village to look for Hank. Surprised but grateful, Jim accepts the offer, and they leave to search for Hank.
Instead of giving us the scene we all wanted – Jim and Marty searching for Hank – the writers take us to the hospital, where Debbie confesses to killing Bud, after he cut her out of the drug deal. (Was anyone else baffled by Karen’s statement to Debbie, at the beginning of the interview, that no one was looking at her as a criminal? Huh? They suspected her of beating Bud’s brains in with a baseball bat, to which she ultimately confesses, and they’re not going to prosecute her?).
We next see Jim arriving at home alone, without Hank. He makes his way across the room somewhat hesitantly, seeming to forget the location of the column in the middle of the room, and sits on the couch to regroup. He is surprised to hear Christie speak to him. She tells him she cancelled her dinner plans immediately after receiving his call. She assures him that Hank will turn up, but asks the question Jim has been asking himself all day, but not wanting to answer – what will he do until Hank is found? He answers Christie, however, and tells her he is not sure he can do his job without Hank. He then turns to her and asks what was going on with her that morning.
Christie says they don’t have to talk about it now, but Jim insists. She asks him what he thinks was going on, but he says he doesn’t know – he remembers asking her to cancel her dinner. Christie points out that he didn’t consider whether her dinner plans were important to her, to which he responds that he just thought it would be nice to have dinner and talk. Christie reminds him that she had been after him about Boston for six weeks and couldn’t get an answer, but when he wants to talk, he expects her to drop everything. Jim admits he didn’t see it like that. Christie goes on to say Jim’s job takes everything he has, and he has nothing left for their marriage. She has to fight for his attention, and she just can’t do it anymore. She has Jim’s attention now, and he bows his head, considering what she has just said.
He gives the response which, I think, Christie hoped he would give: maybe they should talk to a therapist. Looking hopeful, she tells him, “I’d like that.”
This seems to me to be a pivotal moment in Jim and Christie’s relationship. Christie is going to set aside her issues and feelings to deal with Jim’s immediate problem, as she did when Jim was shot, but Jim will not let that happen this time. For once, Christie is able to speak about her feelings without anger, and for once, Jim is really listening to what she has to say. And he knows she is right; his single-minded focus on the job is jeopardizing their marriage. When Jim suggests talking to someone, Christie’s response is immediate and positive and, I think, relieved. She probably has been thinking the same thing for some time, but knew the suggestion had to come from Jim. When Jim suggests talking to someone, she knows that he, too, is willing to work on renewing their marriage. In spite of all the time and attention devoted to Hank’s being missing, I think this episode is just as much about Jim and Christie. It starts with an all-too-typical exchange between them, in which they’re talking at each other, instead of to each other. Hank’s being missing is the catalyst which allows both of them to lower their barriers, begin to communicate, and take the first steps toward rebuilding their marriage.
After Christie goes to bed, Jim wanders around the apartment, no doubt exhausted but too anxious to sleep. He eventually crashes on the living room sofa. He is awakened by the long-awaited call: Hank has been found. He and Christie meet Artie for a happy reunion with Hank.
Artie asks about the reward offered for Hank’s return, which Jim is happy to pay. But when Christie hands Jim the leash, and Jim attaches it to Hank’s collar, Artie realizes Jim is blind. He declines the reward and, when Jim insists, simply says, “It’s on the house.” Jim gives Artie his business card, telling Artie he’s a detective at the 8th precinct, and Artie should call him if he ever needs a favor. Arm in arm, Christie and Jim walk away with Hank, past their parked car. . . .
Jim arrives at the crime scene and learns the DOA, Bud Cassell, was hit over the head with a baseball bat, and the neighbors reported frequent arguments with his girlfriend. Marty tells him the DOA’s cell phone shows calls to and from Jim’s informant, Sonny. Apparently sensing all is not well with Jim, Karen straightens his tie and asks if he’s okay as he takes out his phone to call Sonny. Jim tells her he’s “fine,” and Karen turns away, rolling her eyes as if to say, “Okay, be like that.”
Back at the squad, Sonny tells Jim and Karen the DOA was his cousin. He also reveals Bud had recently come into a quantity of cocaine, which he was trying to unload. Sonny says he has spoken to Bud’s girlfriend, Debbie, whom he’d be happy to throw under a bus, and all she was interested in was getting rid of the coke. When Jim asks if Debbie knows the cops want to talk to her, Sonny tells him he’s taken care of that by setting up a drug buy at a nearby coffee shop in an hour. They can bust Debbie for possession, giving them leverage to find out what she knows about the homicide. Jim apparently has been down this road before with Sonny and tells him this is a perfect example of his thinking too much; Jim asked him to look into the homicide, not “play sheriff.” But Jim concedes they could have a detective pose as a drug dealer. Sonny then reveals there’s a little “wrinkle”: he told Debbie the buyer is a blind guy. Karen asks, incredulously, “a blind drug dealer?” (The same question we’re all asking at this point).
Sonny argues a blind drug dealer is a great idea, because he can’t see his customers and can’t ID them to the cops. Besides, it’s all set up with Debbie. Jim shakes his head in disbelief and tells Sonny he’s an idiot.
Jim nevertheless tells Karen, “Let’s run it by the boss,” and Sonny looks pleased.
With Sonny in the holding cell, in case any of his lowlife friends show up, the squad discusses Sonny’s hare-brained scheme. (Why doesn’t Fisk -- or someone -- speak up and say, “This is crazy”?) Marty offers to take the dark glasses and the dog and pose as the blind drug dealer, but Jim points out that Marty will not be able to pull it off, because he’s not blind. Jim tells Fisk they can scrap the plan if Fisk is uncomfortable, but after saying he’s uncertain Jim should be doing it at all, Fisk leaves the decision to the squad, after Jim assures him he can handle it. Tom apparently has no reservations about the scheme, saying, “It’s all good,” but Marty and Karen go along reluctantly.
The squad and Sonny head down to the coffee shop, where we get our first look at
Jim as “Ted the Drug Dealer.”
While they are waiting for Debbie, Sonny asks Jim if he’s still married to the same lady. When Jim responds, “yes,” Sonny comments that it says something about her, that she stayed with him, and asks, “How’s that work? Day to day?” Since Jim is wondering at this point how his marriage is working and doesn’t want to get this personal with Sonny in any event, he tells Sonny, “Maybe some other time.”
Debbie drives up, and Sonny goes out to speak with her. Karen, sitting at the coffee shop counter as back-up, tells him they’re arguing. Apparently still doubtful about Sonny’s plan, Karen confirms that Jim will signal the squad by running his hand through his hair, as soon as he has the drugs. Sonny returns and tells Jim Debbie wants to make sure he can deal in “major weight.”
Jim, Hank, and Sonny get in Debbie’s car, and Sonny’s carefully thought-out plan starts to unravel. Contrary to expectations, Debbie has no drugs on her, not even a sample, but she will take Jim to where the drugs are, if he wants to do the deal. Jim agrees, and Debbie drives off. At that instant, a truck blocks the cab where Marty and Tom are waiting for the deal to go down. Doing a good imitation of the Keystone Kops, Marty, Tom and Karen persuade the truck driver to move the truck, but it’s too late – they’ve lost Jim.
Jim, Sonny, and Debbie arrive at the deserted industrial area where Bud stashed the drugs in some lockers. Jim leaves Hank in Debbie’s car. (No, Jim, don’t do that!) The drugs are gone. Jim asks Sonny if this is a shakedown, but Sonny passes the buck to Debbie, who insists Bud did not move the drugs, and no one else knew where they were. Another car drives up, and two scary bald tattooed dudes, Johnny and Luis, get out, with guns. Thinking his back-up has arrived, Jim runs his hand through his hair, but Sonny tells him the new arrivals are “two Latin gentlemens.” When Sonny tells Johnny and Luis the drugs are gone and they’ve been ripped off, Johnny is not pleased and asks Sonny if they look stupid. Sonny, wisely, responds that they look highly intelligent. Luis, referring to Jim, asks, “What’s his problem,” to which Sonny responds that Jim is blind, and there’s no need to mess with him. After looking into the empty lockers, Johnny still believes Sonny is lying and warns him: “You’d best not be messing with me, Sonny Boy.” (“Sonny Boy?” Does Johnny know Sonny? Is Sonny is cahoots with them?)
By this time, Jim has realized his back-up is nowhere around, the situation is going from bad to worse, and his options are limited. He’s been in some tight spots since returning to work, but nothing like this.
Luis waves his gun in front of Jim’s face, asking, “You’re blind?” Jim confirms he is in fact blind. After Sonny volunteers that Jim is blind and “harmless,” Luis sucker-punches Jim in the stomach. Luis, Debbie, Johnny, and Sonny drive away, leaving Jim on the ground, gasping for air. He hears Hank barking and realizes Debbie is driving off with Hank still in her car. Jim yells at them to leave the dog and runs after the car, but his pursuit comes to an abrupt end when he falls over some debris. He picks himself up and calls the squad. As his cell phone cuts in and out, he manages to get across that the deal went bad, it was a set-up, he doesn’t know where he is, and he’s not real happy about having been lost (“What do you mean you lost me?”).
In spite of everything, he has the presence of mind to tell them the drugs belonged to a previous tenant in Bud’s apartment. Karen assures Jim they will be able to locate him by tracing his cell phone signal, and he and Hank should sit tight. Jim tells her Hank isn’t with him, “they” took him. When Karen tells Tom and Marty about Hank, there is general consternation, and Marty kicks a desk.
(It’s interesting that Marty is the one who is the most upset. Perhaps after the “Can you imagine that?” moment at the sports bar, he is beginning to imagine what things are like for Jim). Jim’s cell phone signal is traced to a site in Hoboken, but this can only locate him within a three-mile radius of the site.
Meanwhile, Jim finds a fence and makes his way along it, periodically falling and cursing. (We have to imagine the curse words, as the public’s ears are deemed too delicate to hear them).
This is one of the few times in the series when we see Jim openly expressing his frustration at not being able to see. Then he finds a sign with (conveniently) raised lettering, which he is able to read. This pinpoints his location, and the Jersey troopers pick him up.
When Jim returns to the squad, Marty and Tom start to explain how they lost Jim, but he shrugs it off, telling them, “What happened, happened.” Marty seems especially concerned, asking Jim if he’s sure he’s okay. Jim’s first question is about Hank, and Fisk assures him they’ve alerted all the animal shelters in the area. Karen asks if he’s okay to interview Rory Glann, a suspect in the theft of the drugs. Jim assures her he’s okay, he just needs a drink of water before the interview. But as he walks toward the water cooler, his movements lack their usual assurance, and we can tell he is more shaken than he’s willing to admit.
In this episode, Jim is arguably at his most vulnerable. There isn’t much he can do when Johnny and Luis show up, and his back-up is nowhere to be found. Then he is stranded, without his dog or his cane (why didn’t he have the cane?), and he can’t even tell the squad where he is. These experiences surely must have brought back his doubts about his ability to do the job, even though he doesn’t articulate them. Or has he accepted Dr. Galloway’s advice not to beat himself up over what he can no longer do?
The other unspoken issue in this episode is the recurring one of whether a blind man should be a cop in the first place. However, no one in the squad is in any position to bring this up, because they all went along with the drug deal scheme, and they are the ones who lost Jim.
Jim is able to compose himself and, along with Karen, questions twitchy, jittery Rory, who is high on something. However, Jim betrays his anxiety by fiddling with a pen throughout the interview. After Jim asks Rory if he wants to spend the rest of his life in jail and, if he’s reborn, the rest of that life, too, Rory admits he stole Bud’s cocaine and stashed it in his refrigerator. However, he has an alibi for the time Bud was killed, having been “partying” in a strip club with “a Russian.”
When Karen and Jim return to the squad room after the interview, Tom calls Debbie’s cell phone, and Johnny answers. Pretending to have the coke, Tom sets up a meeting with Johnny. Johnny apparently asks if Tom is black, to which Tom responds, “No, I’m Scottish, what it sound like?” Tom meets up with Johnny, and they arrest him. While they are gone, Jim calls an animal shelter looking for Hank -- not for the first time.
When he is brought back to the squad, Johnny is questioned by Tom and Marty, who is looking especially good:
Despite having the chance to make a deal, Johnny claims ignorance of everything, including Hank’s whereabouts. Outside the interview room, Marty questions whether Sonny is playing both ends, pointing out that there are just too many coincidences. Jim assures him that Sonny will have answers, when he shows up.
Marty and Tom resume questioning Johnny, with Jim reprising his role as “Ted.” Tom tells Johnny he now has a competitor for the deal that is being offered. Marty escorts Jim into the interview room, where he identifies Johnny as the man who took his dog. Jim lunges across the table at Johnny, demanding to know where Hank is. Marty pulls him off and manhandles him out of the room. Johnny reconsiders and tells Tom where Debbie is, but continues to deny involvement in Bud’s killing, or any knowledge of Hank’s whereabouts.
Marty, Tom, and Karen find Debbie, bloodied and tied up, in an apartment. She tells them Johnny and Luis let Sonny go, and Sonny was in on it with them. She accuses Johnny and Luis of killing Bud. Tom and Marty take Debbie to the hospital.
While Marty, Tom, and Karen are gone, Jim again calls the shelters, looking for Hank. As Jim hangs up the phone, fumbling slightly with the receiver, Fisk approaches, looking sympathetic, and tries to encourage Jim by telling him Hank will turn up.
Karen returns to the squad and reports on finding Debbie. When Jim asks about Hank, she tells him Debbie heard him barking, then Luis took him outside, and that was the last she saw of him.
Shortly after Karen returns to the squad, Sonny shows up. “Nice of you to join us,” she tells him. Sonny says he spent the last six hours in a dumpster, it was a nightmare. Jim stands up, looking rather menacing, and tells Sonny to follow him. As they walk to an interview room, Sonny tells Jim it’s a good thing he’s blind, the “old Dunbar” would have pulled his gun out, and it would have been like the OK Corral. Once in the interview room, Sonny asks whether they found the coke. Jim grabs Sonny by the neck, slams him against the wall and demands to know what the hell Sonny got him into.
Sonny insists he knows only what Jim knows, and denies setting him up. He tells Jim they drove back to the city, with Johnny and Luis demanding to know where the coke was. He managed to jump out of the car and run, as Johnny and Luis fired at him, and hid in a dumpster. In disbelief, Jim asks, “For six hours?” to which Sonny responds (let’s all join in here), “Smell me!”
Sonny explains his theory about Johnny and Luis’s appearance in Hoboken: Bud told a lot of people about the coke; the word must have gotten back to Johnny and Luis, who killed Bud, then followed Debbie, Sonny and Jim to Hoboken. Sonny insists he doesn’t know where the coke is now. Jim asks, “It wasn’t you?” Affecting righteous disbelief that Jim could doubt him, Sonny asks if Jim is accusing him of double-dealing. Jim points out that the first words out of Sonny’s mouth were “Where’s the coke?” and he hasn’t asked about Debbie, or Bud’s murder, or Hank. Sonny responds that it should not be a surprise to Jim that he’s interested in his “finder’s fee.” Sonny insists he doesn’t know what happened to Hank, he was in the dumpster. “I heard barking, then I didn’t hear the barking no more.” Jim starts to say, “If anything happened to him. . . ,” but Sonny interrupts, pointing out that he almost got killed. Unable to deal with Sonny any more, and appearing rather disgusted, Jim tells him to get out.
After Tom and Marty return to the squad, another scary bald dude, the Chief of Ds, comes to the squad for an update. (We can only imagine the story of “the blind detective” being lost in New Jersey circulating over the NYPD grapevine. And I shudder to think of the calls poor Fisk must have fielded from the brass after the story got out). After Karen, Tom, and Marty bring the Chief up to date on the homicide and the drugs, he turns to Jim and asks, rather snidely, how Jim ended up lost in New Jersey. As Marty, Tom, and Karen look on anxiously, Jim explains what happened without revealing that the rest of the squad lost him. Apparently accepting Jim’s explanation, the Chief of Ds departs, to everyone’s relief.
Jim then has one of those moments when things come together in his mind. He asks why Johnny and Luis left him there, and why they didn’t just kill all of them. Tom answers: “Because they wanted the drugs.” Fisk asks: “Then why did they kill Bud Cassell, the guy who knew where the drugs were?” Tom again: “Because they didn’t.” After Jim points out that bludgeoning someone with a baseball bat would not be Johnny and Luis’s preferred method of killing, Karen puts it together, “Girlfriend. Debbie,” and takes off to question her at the hospital. Marty asks Jim if he wants to take a ride down to the East Village to look for Hank. Surprised but grateful, Jim accepts the offer, and they leave to search for Hank.
Instead of giving us the scene we all wanted – Jim and Marty searching for Hank – the writers take us to the hospital, where Debbie confesses to killing Bud, after he cut her out of the drug deal. (Was anyone else baffled by Karen’s statement to Debbie, at the beginning of the interview, that no one was looking at her as a criminal? Huh? They suspected her of beating Bud’s brains in with a baseball bat, to which she ultimately confesses, and they’re not going to prosecute her?).
We next see Jim arriving at home alone, without Hank. He makes his way across the room somewhat hesitantly, seeming to forget the location of the column in the middle of the room, and sits on the couch to regroup. He is surprised to hear Christie speak to him. She tells him she cancelled her dinner plans immediately after receiving his call. She assures him that Hank will turn up, but asks the question Jim has been asking himself all day, but not wanting to answer – what will he do until Hank is found? He answers Christie, however, and tells her he is not sure he can do his job without Hank. He then turns to her and asks what was going on with her that morning.
Christie says they don’t have to talk about it now, but Jim insists. She asks him what he thinks was going on, but he says he doesn’t know – he remembers asking her to cancel her dinner. Christie points out that he didn’t consider whether her dinner plans were important to her, to which he responds that he just thought it would be nice to have dinner and talk. Christie reminds him that she had been after him about Boston for six weeks and couldn’t get an answer, but when he wants to talk, he expects her to drop everything. Jim admits he didn’t see it like that. Christie goes on to say Jim’s job takes everything he has, and he has nothing left for their marriage. She has to fight for his attention, and she just can’t do it anymore. She has Jim’s attention now, and he bows his head, considering what she has just said.
He gives the response which, I think, Christie hoped he would give: maybe they should talk to a therapist. Looking hopeful, she tells him, “I’d like that.”
This seems to me to be a pivotal moment in Jim and Christie’s relationship. Christie is going to set aside her issues and feelings to deal with Jim’s immediate problem, as she did when Jim was shot, but Jim will not let that happen this time. For once, Christie is able to speak about her feelings without anger, and for once, Jim is really listening to what she has to say. And he knows she is right; his single-minded focus on the job is jeopardizing their marriage. When Jim suggests talking to someone, Christie’s response is immediate and positive and, I think, relieved. She probably has been thinking the same thing for some time, but knew the suggestion had to come from Jim. When Jim suggests talking to someone, she knows that he, too, is willing to work on renewing their marriage. In spite of all the time and attention devoted to Hank’s being missing, I think this episode is just as much about Jim and Christie. It starts with an all-too-typical exchange between them, in which they’re talking at each other, instead of to each other. Hank’s being missing is the catalyst which allows both of them to lower their barriers, begin to communicate, and take the first steps toward rebuilding their marriage.
After Christie goes to bed, Jim wanders around the apartment, no doubt exhausted but too anxious to sleep. He eventually crashes on the living room sofa. He is awakened by the long-awaited call: Hank has been found. He and Christie meet Artie for a happy reunion with Hank.
Artie asks about the reward offered for Hank’s return, which Jim is happy to pay. But when Christie hands Jim the leash, and Jim attaches it to Hank’s collar, Artie realizes Jim is blind. He declines the reward and, when Jim insists, simply says, “It’s on the house.” Jim gives Artie his business card, telling Artie he’s a detective at the 8th precinct, and Artie should call him if he ever needs a favor. Arm in arm, Christie and Jim walk away with Hank, past their parked car. . . .
