Elementary: Rekt in Real Life (5x14)

This was not a good episode. It didn't really hold my interest, and Sherlock and Joan were pretty much swallowed up by the crazy plot monster. Too bad.

Cons:

The case of the week was so convoluted that it seemed like it should have been stretched out over multiple episodes. A guy who live-streams interactive video games and recruits players for sponsored teams ends up getting taken out during a live broadcast online. Gregson's niece was watching at the time. We're then led to a guy who signed a deal with a kid the victim had recruited, and then we learn that there are Czech women were are actually secretly prostitutes who have been rescued from human trafficking. Oh, and over on the side there's also a woman who hates one of the players because he kills seals as part of the traditions of his inuit tribe, and she's an animal rights activist. In the end, it's this woman's attorney who set up the crime.

Between the human trafficking, the commentary about professional video game playing, the overexposure of the victim's attack via the internet, the concern over indigenous lifestyles vs. commercial hunting... wow, was this episode crowded. Every time I thought we were on a path, things would veer off in a new direction. And not in a good way. Any one of these elements could have made for an interesting episode. I wanted to learn more about the professional world of video games. Or about this human trafficking scheme. Or about the seal hunting. Oh yeah and there was also a bunch of stuff about the ice caps melting and trade routes and stuff. All of these things piled up together? Yikes.

As I mentioned, Sherlock and Joan got basically no time to do anything. They were just along for a very long-winded and convoluted ride, and I didn't learn anything about either one of them or their relationship along the way.

While I enjoyed the subplot more than the case of the week, (shocking, I know) I didn't think it had enough time to really grow and develop. If we could just do a full episode focusing on Shinwell, that would be fantastic. Give his character the room to grow and change.

Pros:

The one moment in the main plot that I quite enjoyed was Joan getting to speak Mandarin as they worked out a part of the case. It's rare that we see Joan contribute something that Sherlock couldn't have done, so I rather liked that moment.

In the subplot, Shinwell was contacted by his daughter. When he goes to meet her after school, she says she needs help. A young gangster kid has been harassing Chivonne, and she asks her dad to help fix the problem. Shinwell tells Joan about it, and Joan convinces him that direct retaliation is not the answer. Instead, Shinwell goes to talk to this kid, offering to give the kid some territory for his drug dealing business in exchange for leaving Chivonne alone. After Shinwell tells Chivonne the good news, he asks to walk her home. Turns out, Chivonne just wanted her dad's unique set of skills to get rid of a creepy guy. She doesn't want a relationship with him from this point on, as she can't forgive him for his past.

While I think more time would have done this plot thread a lot of favors, I was still a fan of what we got. Shinwell has been trying to do better by his daughter this whole time, so for Chivonne to reach out to him specifically to help with a gang-related issue was really tough. But Shinwell didn't revert back to old ways, or at least not entirely. The end, when Chivonne said she didn't want anything to do with her father, was really hard to swallow.

I hope as we move forward, we can spend more time examining Shinwell's job as an informant. I think that might be an interesting avenue to explore. Is there a chance Chivonne might forgive him if she knows how hard he's working to take down the bad people he used to work with?

Until next time...

4/10