Elementary: Over a Barrel (5x13)

A great episode of Elementary in many respects, although I do have some problems with it.

Cons:

Joan spends this episode as a hostage, trapped in a diner with twenty other people. The man holding a gun on them is a grieving father who has been trying to get Sherlock and Joan's help on finding the man who assaulted his son five years ago. Great concept, but there was very little exploration as to how our leads felt about the situation.

I praise this show for not going too melodramatic. Most of the time, the character beats between Sherlock and Joan are so small and subtle and just perfect in every way... but I'll admit that I would like to see something a bit more concrete sometimes. Joan has been kidnapped before, after all, and there's no mention of that here. Sherlock seems intensely focused on solving the case, sure, but we don't see a lot in the way of worry for Joan's life. When Joan is released from her hostage situation, she gets comforted by Gregson, but we don't so much as see Sherlock check in on her. I don't need big panicked declarations or total meltdowns, but some acknowledgement that this is a traumatic situation might have been nice.

This episode focused on Sherlock and Joan failing to come through for someone in a big way. Our "bad guy" of the hour really doesn't want to hurt anybody, and in the end he doesn't. We're told pretty explicitly that he was driven to this situation because nobody would help him find his son's assaulter and, in this man's mind, murderer. His son died less than a year later, his life having spiraled into drug addiction after his attack. I was really excited to see all that play out, and the moment when we realize Sherlock has missed the deadline for the statute of limitations was really intense and unexpected. But then we get an eleventh hour save, where we learn that thanks to a legal concept called "tolling," the statute of limitations had one more day. Sherlock and the others are able to arrest the bad guy.

I don't know... wouldn't this episode have been infinitely more complicated and meaningful if we hadn't ended it with a victory? This was almost a stellar and dark episode of Elementary, but at the last second it's like they couldn't go through with it, and needed to tie it up with a little bow. It's too bad.

Pros:

But the ending didn't totally ruin it for me, as the episode still ends on a downer. Our would-be shooter is taken away in cuffs, and we know through Joan that he's got skin cancer and might not be long for this world. He's also devastated by his son's death, and we don't get to see him get the closure he so badly wants, even if our protagonists do get that closure.

The episode began very cleverly, with this poor man going to Sherlock and Joan several times asking for help. They're always busy with something else, though, and each little snippet was a reminder of a previous case they've solved. It was clever to use existing episode stories instead of just making up cases, because it made Joan and Sherlock's mistake feel more realistic. We saw those other cases play out. We know why they were busy, and why they didn't have time to take on something else. And yet still, when it comes down to it, never giving this guy the time of day proved to be a big mistake. Sherlock hammers it in pretty brutally when he says: "I can only apply my talents where they are most needed." This episode proves that Sherlock, when properly motivated, can find the man responsible for such a heinous crime. The only reason he took so long is that he couldn't be bothered to try earlier.

The best acting in this episode came from Lucy Liu, in the final scene where Joan is trying to talk down the man with the gun from killing the cop who screwed up his son's case five years ago. She knows a sniper is outside waiting to kill him, and instead of getting him to move back, she tells him that if he does, he'll be killed. She saves his life, all while tearfully asking him to realize that killing somebody isn't going to make him feel any better. When the man says "you saved my life," it's a truly chilling moment, because you're actually not sure if he's grateful or furious. Earlier, he had talked about how much he wanted to die, and was hoping his skin cancer would kill him. You almost wonder if Watson really did him a favor in saving him, and you wonder if he's thinking the same thing.

Comedy moments were few and far between in this episode, and they would have felt out of place in any case. But I did love the moment when Sherlock is looking through all this classified information, and Bell asks him where he got it. Sherlock replies that it's an agent from the NSA and then says "shhhh." That made me chuckle.

I mentioned above that I would have loved some more attention to the Sherlock/Watson dynamic here, especially since the setup was so rife with drama. But I also mentioned above that this show is so good at its subtle portrayal of these characters. For example, when the instigator of this whole mess tells Sherlock that he has to solve the case, and that he'll be keeping Joan as a hostage, Sherlock immediately says that he needs Joan with him, since they're partners. Sherlock is able to call in to update them on the case at various points, and when the last call comes in after midnight, Sherlock's first words are "you're unharmed?"

And then there's the ending - Sherlock went to Everyone to help him find the information he needed to arrest the assaulter. Of course, this means he needs to be punished creatively. Sherlock has to sit in front of a webcam while Joan shaves his head. Joan asks why she has to be the one to do it, and Sherlock's response is: "partners in everything, I suppose." It's such a beautiful line. It could be an affirmation of their bond, or it could be foreshadowing some sort of schism to come. This simple moment of Joan shaving Sherlock's head was actually quite beautiful. It conveyed domesticity. It conveyed trust. It conveyed total understanding. I was really pleased with it.

So... there you have it. I wish this episode could have pushed things a little further. Just because Sherlock finds the bad guy doesn't mean justice will always be done. And Joan being held hostage probably should have been a little more dramatic than it was. But all that said, I still thoroughly enjoyed this one.

8/10