Well then. Elementary is throwing some serious shade about the prison system in this country. Not that I don't agree. Let's take a brief look at the plot.
Basically, the murder this week is motivated by the messed up privately owned prison system. Because companies can get cheap labor out of prisoners, it basically gives the entire system incentive to get more people in jail and keep them there longer. The case revolves around a girl who has apparently escaped from a correctional facility. However, Sherlock eventually finds her dead, revealing that somebody else is behind the whole thing. In the end, it turns out a company was getting tied up in a messy debate over whether to buy another prison, and the murders were to create a scandal so the prison would seem less desirable to competition.
The B-plot is about Marcus Bell. He has been dating someone, a woman named Shauna. They are having a good time together. Joan says something about her to Sherlock, and Sherlock reveals that she works for Internal Affairs. Joan tells Bell, and Bell angrily confronts Shauna about it, saying that she's a liar and a spy who turns her back on the people who would die for her. Later, Sherlock talks to Bell about it, saying that Bell is lonely, and maybe he should reconsider. Bell goes back to talk to Shauna, but Shauna is leaving the precinct where she worked undercover. She has decided to be open about working for IA from now on. Since this is a big change for her, she can't think about being in a relationship at the moment. Maybe they can make it work in the future. Bell comes over to the Brownstone to hang out with Sherlock. Sherlock offers to set him up with someone, but Bell says he's okay with what he's got for now.
There's also a brief C-plot. Sherlock buys what he believes to be the authentic Stanley Cup online, and spends the episode running tests on it to see if it is the real deal. By the end, he's determined that it is the genuine article, and he contacts the rightful owners.
In terms of complaints - the case itself had some serious political commentary in it, which was great, but the actual motivations of the guilty party, and the twists and turns that we took to get there, were sort of confusing and not all that interesting. It's a small thing, but since the topic itself really grabbed my attention, I wish we could have done a bit better with the specifics.
But the political commentary was actually wonderful. This is an issue that most people probably don't think about, unless they are personally effected in some way. But privately owned prisons are a real problem, in that they encourage arrests and discourage rehabilitation. It's a really harmful problem, and I liked the way we saw this kind of corruption brought to the forefront of the episode. Not a lot of mainstream shows tackle problems like this head-on.
I loved the B-plot with Bell. I always complain that Bell and Gregson are underutilized, and here we have an example of Bell taking a more central role. And, again, this was an excellent avenue for talking about a contentious topic - police corruption. Internal Affairs. "Brothers in Blue" vs. protecting the people. At first I thought Marcus' reaction was a little extreme, but ultimately I think it works. Cops do have very strong opinions about IA, and Bell was also responding to the fact that Shauna had been deceiving him this whole time.
Sherlock and Bell have a great conversation about the issue - Sherlock thinks he might be partially to blame for Bell's loneliness. The way he sees it, Joan has become more and more socially isolated as a consequence of her association with him. Maybe the same thing is happening to Bell, in a way. Bell reacts with skepticism, seemingly not believing the idea that Sherlock could break up his relationship with the power of his mind. But at the same time, what Sherlock says makes a certain amount of sense. It was really cute when Sherlock said that he thought Bell might be even lonelier than he was - because at least Sherlock has Watson. Aww. Then of course the episode ends with the two of them hanging out and tossing playing cards into the Stanley Cup. Their friendship has never been a main thread on this show, but I enjoy seeing the attention turned on them once in a while.
This episode, despite its heavy tackling of two different contentious issues, also had quite a bit of humor. I mean... the Stanley Cup thing was just so random! I loved it. And Joan and Sherlock had a running bit wherein Sherlock talked about how men were more likely to escape from prison than women, and how men were more likely to go on killing sprees than women. Joan, for a reason I'm not sure even she could fully explain, seems annoyed by these observation. Sherlock remarks: "would you rather women were the better criminals?" That was pretty amusing. And there was a coded reference to Orange is the New Black, when the prison ward starts to explain what SHU is. "We get Netflix," Joan says.
In terms of complaints - the case itself had some serious political commentary in it, which was great, but the actual motivations of the guilty party, and the twists and turns that we took to get there, were sort of confusing and not all that interesting. It's a small thing, but since the topic itself really grabbed my attention, I wish we could have done a bit better with the specifics.
But the political commentary was actually wonderful. This is an issue that most people probably don't think about, unless they are personally effected in some way. But privately owned prisons are a real problem, in that they encourage arrests and discourage rehabilitation. It's a really harmful problem, and I liked the way we saw this kind of corruption brought to the forefront of the episode. Not a lot of mainstream shows tackle problems like this head-on.
I loved the B-plot with Bell. I always complain that Bell and Gregson are underutilized, and here we have an example of Bell taking a more central role. And, again, this was an excellent avenue for talking about a contentious topic - police corruption. Internal Affairs. "Brothers in Blue" vs. protecting the people. At first I thought Marcus' reaction was a little extreme, but ultimately I think it works. Cops do have very strong opinions about IA, and Bell was also responding to the fact that Shauna had been deceiving him this whole time.
Sherlock and Bell have a great conversation about the issue - Sherlock thinks he might be partially to blame for Bell's loneliness. The way he sees it, Joan has become more and more socially isolated as a consequence of her association with him. Maybe the same thing is happening to Bell, in a way. Bell reacts with skepticism, seemingly not believing the idea that Sherlock could break up his relationship with the power of his mind. But at the same time, what Sherlock says makes a certain amount of sense. It was really cute when Sherlock said that he thought Bell might be even lonelier than he was - because at least Sherlock has Watson. Aww. Then of course the episode ends with the two of them hanging out and tossing playing cards into the Stanley Cup. Their friendship has never been a main thread on this show, but I enjoy seeing the attention turned on them once in a while.
This episode, despite its heavy tackling of two different contentious issues, also had quite a bit of humor. I mean... the Stanley Cup thing was just so random! I loved it. And Joan and Sherlock had a running bit wherein Sherlock talked about how men were more likely to escape from prison than women, and how men were more likely to go on killing sprees than women. Joan, for a reason I'm not sure even she could fully explain, seems annoyed by these observation. Sherlock remarks: "would you rather women were the better criminals?" That was pretty amusing. And there was a coded reference to Orange is the New Black, when the prison ward starts to explain what SHU is. "We get Netflix," Joan says.
I think that's all I've got for the time being. This episode isn't going to top the charts, but it did bring up some really important issues, had some great moments of character building with Bell and Sherlock, and also made me chuckle a few times.
8/10
8/10
No comments:
Post a Comment
I'd really appreciate hearing what you think!