RECAP: Beauty and the Beast – Episode 3 – All in

Where we learn that "garbage" is code for "GARBAGE" and that is the most valuable lesson of the episode

We open in a PARKING LOT where Judge Hanson is inappropriately flirting with his clerk or being friendly… I can’t decide. In the end he gives her some life advice about not ‘drinking too much’ which leads to him being rolled over by a car. He is OBVIOUSLY dead after the first hit, but just in case the murderer backs the car and rolls over him again to make sure he is… you know “dead dead” [or to frame someone, whatever…]

Then we get a nice shot of central park and a nice pop song, but most importantly you know what we DON’T get? The AWFUL VOICE-OVER! Yes it is finally gone! Good riddance! Cat is jogging through a COLLEGE CAMPUS, but don’t be fooled, this is not about a healthy life style… it is more about an unhealthy love life. The reason Cat is in campus is to talk to “Professor Forbes” [I wish I had a teacher as cool as JT when I was in college]. She is going crazy because she can’t go to the warehouse, call, e-mail or tweet Vincent [because he can’t have any followers]. She is running out of ideas and she doesn’t seem like the type of girl who reads ‘dating books’ so she probably doesn’t have a copy of ‘How to get a beast in 10 days’. On the other hand JT seems to be clearer about the dating rules because he reminds her that if she hasn’t heard from him in 3 days, he is just probably not into her. However, Cat is not backing down and she gives him a lame note (“Hi, How are you?”) to pass along to Vincent… because when everything else fails in your love life, it’s always a good idea to pretend you are in high school.

Cat goes back to her apartment and walks into her sheet-wrapped sister and her half-naked random boy friend. You are not on a Disney show anymore Nicole! After getting rid of the unimportant half naked guy, Heather reminds Cat to send the RSVP card for their dad’s wedding and to bring a Plus-one because he is worried she will be alone forever. Heather suggests bringing Evan, since Cat likes players anyway. Cat says she “doesn’t like anyone right now” yeah RIGHT… that’s why you tracked down a college professor to pass on a lame note a few minutes ago…Cat gets called down to a crime scene and normally it would be time for “CSI:Pretty People Edition” but this week the case feels a little more serious… more like: 

Law & Order: SEU (Special Estrogen Unit).

Case of the week: Judge Hanson an immigration judge who was ran over at the parking lot, also Joe’s squash partner [which is COMPLETELY irrelevant]

Suspects: Iris Sodkovic (the owner of the murderous car), Iris’s club owner boyfriend Dane, the bartender Sam

At the CRIME SCENE they discover Judge Hanson deported Iris’s brother a few weeks ago and Joe gives the case to another couple of detectives and estrogen squad must aid with the arrest and nothing else. Translation Tess and Cat should stay away… and we already know that is exactly what Cat won’t do. Our girlie cops go to CLUB VERBA, where Iris works. They spot her on the street and it is that time in the episode where Cat believes she is Vic Mackey and goes all ‘police brutality chase’ with hand held camera and everything. They arrest Iris and she quickly proclaims she “has a green card!” and she seems genuinely surprised to learn that the judge was killed… I am guessing she doesn’t know her murderous car did it either. It really sucks for Iris since her only alibi is that she was walking home alone and then was at home ALONE (that will be important later).

Cat goes back to her apartment and she notices someone has been in there. She is not used to hot guys walking in through the window yet so she understandably freaks out. However, the only thing she finds is a note from Vincent. The note simply informs Catherine that Iris didn’t kill the judge… it really is all work and no play with him. If you think about it, a basically strange man walking into your bedroom and leaving a note is pretty creepy, but just wait, it’ll turn from creepy to romantic before the episode is over. And right when we were trying to decide if Vincent was being a little creepy, we are back at the WAREHOUSE where he is doing some complicated pull-ups and we conclude that this man can walk into any bedroom anytime he pleases and it is NOT creepy. Other thing coming to mind is that Arrow does not have the monopoly on hot work-out scenes… but unlike Vincent, Oliver always seems to be shirtless… I guess the BATB costume supervisors didn’t get that budget saving memo.

Anyway, JT complains about being used as a carrier pigeon and right on cue Catherine arrives to the warehouse. Vincent is clearly excited to see her, JT rolls his eyes and she takes a few moments to look at Vincent’s post-workout hotness and go through the “no, he is definitely not creepy and yes he is welcome in my bedroom” train of thought. When she is done with that she asks about the note. Apparently Vincent saw Iris walking to her apartment at the time of the murder, so she has an alibi after all… too bad dead vets that turn into beasts don’t hold up too well in court. Meanwhile JT is at a complete loss about what is going. He is all “you are risking your life to help a stranger, at the very least you could be trying to get laid, dude”. Then Vincent explains he saw Catherine arresting Iris which makes Catherine realize he has been following her and we are back to stalkerish territory, which only makes Catherine wonder: “If he doesn’t call me in 3 days, but he follows me everywhere does that mean he is or he isn’t in to me?” JT is over the whole situation so he does what he does best: he has a nervous crisis accompanied by a CLASSIC snarky remark: “We are all gonna die, I am getting a tums” and I didn’t see it before but as Vincent and Catherine keep talking about Iris JT ACTUALLY gets a tums in the b.g. Catherine keeps pushing about the case, but Vincent just wants to be done with it. He informs Cat that he isn’t ‘Batman’ but he sure sounds a lot like him, doesn’t he?

And it is time to catch up with Evan who is DANCING IN THE MORGUE, yeah… it is sorta weird and morbid, but it is also cute. Oh, Evan… So, Evan is dancing and cleaning because a Muirfield Agent “M.E. inspector” is coming later to check out his morgue. Since things didn’t work out so well with beast-suitor, Cat decides to try her luck with British-suitor. Evan tells Cat he hasn’t been able to check Iris’s car yet but she finds [and takes without permission] a valet slip the judge had on him which places him around the vicinity of Club Verba, where Iris works. They don’t have more time to flirt because the Muirfield Agent pizza guy “M.E. inspector” arrives.

Cat goes to CLUB VERBA and she speaks with Bartender-Sam and club owner Dane, who is a pig… you’ll see. They hint that Iris and dead judge Hanson may have had a relationship although Dane seems to think she was just ‘working him’ to get her brother a green card. Then, without a warrant or anything at all Cat goes to Iris’s apartment and the landlady? lets her in. To make it even better Cat calls Tess and tells her about her illegal search. Cat is convinced Iris didn’t do it because Vincent said so, but Tess doesn’t know that Cat is a beast whisperer so she is pissed and she thinks it is sexist to assume cute girls can’t be murderers. Isn’t she the embodiment of girl power? I believe she IS. During her illegal search, Cat comes across a secret closet compartment which leads to the basement where she finds two little scared Bosnian girls (Iris’s sisters), one of which looks very sick… If only she knew an off-the-grid Doctor who could help her…

Now, I am pretty sure Cat could have talked Evan into secretly examining the girls; given that he is totally into her and all, but let’s be real she wanted an excuse to see Vincent again. So she goes to the warehouse to ask Vincent for his medical services. He reminds her once again that he is not Batman, he just “goes out at night and rescues people”… that still sounds a lot like Batman Vincent (Sidebar: all jokes aside Vincent is a vigilante/hero, but what I really like is that he is an accidental one. He didn’t ask, nor he enjoys his superhuman abilities and he considers himself a monster. He just helps people out of the goodness of his heart not because he thinks he can single handedly save the world. So he is really different from other characters like Oliver Queen and I like that, but I wouldn’t mind if he took up the ‘no-shirt’ dress code once in a while. End of sidebar). I have to give it to Vincent… he was really making an effort to push Catherine away, even though he was clearly into her. In the end, Catherine guilt trips Vincent into helping her with the poor Bosnian girls. So they go to the SECRET BOSNIAN BASEMENT where Cat gets to see Dr. Keller in action and she is totally into it. After the quickest and less thorough medical exam ever, Vincent decides to call JT to ask him to steal (I am assuming), some medication. None of this matters as Cat is more concerned with the fact that Vincent HAS A PHONE she didn’t know about! Cat is pissed and hurt and thinking that maybe he really isn’t into her, but then she is once again distracted by his doctorly charm.

Cat goes back to the PRECINCT and she runs into Evan who was kicked out of his lab by the Muirfield Agent “M.E. inspector” [yeah, that is not suspicious at all] and since he had nothing better to do (like taking care of two illegal Bosnian girls), he went to the car impound to collect evidence from Iris’s car. Cat also learns that Iris confessed to the crime she didn’t commit. Of course Cat confronts Iris to remind her that she DID NOT kill the judge. Cat tells Iris about her sisters, the secret doctor and promises to help. In return Iris tells her Dane-the-pig was her ex-boyfriend and that he was jealous because he thought there was something going on between her and the judge. This of course makes Dane-the-pig a likely suspect. Cat’s illegal interrogation is interrupted by Joe. He is mad because Cat is interfering with the case she is not supposed to investigate. He benches Cat AND Tess, which seems unfair… Tess is PISSED at Cat, with good reason, and her days of blindly covering for her are coming to an end... or maybe not.

After been kicked out of the precinct, Cat walks home and is intercepted by Vincent. He tells her the Bosnian girls saw a man come into the apartment and take the car keys on the day of the murder. Then, for some bizarre reason, Cat and Vincent decide to drive to God-knows-where just so they can finish this very short conversation. So…  a while later, in CAT’S CAR, Vincent explains the man the girls saw had a knife in his arm and I immediately thought tattoo, but Cat (the detective) figures it was an error in translation. Cat tells Vincent she is going back to Club Verba to investigate Dane-the-Pig alone, without a gun and without backup. If that wasn’t an invitation for him to follow her I don’t know what it was…

Cat sneaks into Dane’s office and he catches her. She confronts him about the murder, he denies it, he acts like the pig he is and then Cat leaves. After she leaves, Dane makes a phone call to the real killer and Vincent, who was in the rooftop, overhears it. He waits for Dane outside the club, once he sees him he pushes him against the wall and demands to know who he was calling, but he underestimates his strength a little and renders Dane unconscious. Cat shows up and she is upset by the display of accidental beast brutality. Vincent tells her that is why he didn’t want to get involved in the first place. She is upset about a lot of things, but mainly that everything in their relationship has to be on his terms.

She sorta realizes this ‘relationship’ is going nowhere and that she probably shouldn’t let her work suffer from it. So she decides to go by the book for the rest of the case, because you know… this was back when Catherine still cared about doing her job and not just about Vincent… it won’t last. After she basically tells Vincent to get lost she sees a picture Sam the bartender and oh, surprise: He has a knife tattooed on his arm. Cat leaves and Vincent decides to check Dane’s phone. And I really don’t get why Cat didn’t check it when he was conveniently unconscious, sometimes she forgets she is a detective. Anyway, Dane just got a message where the killer (A.K.A. Sam the bartender) tells him he is “cleaning up” which presumably means he is disposing of the poor Bosnian girls. Since Cat is too busy doing things by the book Vincent heads over to save the girls alone.

Meanwhile, Cat and Tess kiss and make up. Cat says she will never treat her as a “non-partner again” and she won’t… until next week. Cat tells Tess about the sisters and about Dane-the-pig and about Bartender Sam who apparently smuggled the sisters into the country. So he is a “coyote” or the Bosnian version of it. In summary, this is how it went: Judge Hanson prosecuted the Sam the soviet-coyote in ’09. Iris was cozying up to the judge and Sam got worried that she was going to give him up. As a convenient way to shut both of them up he killed the judge and framed Iris. It was a pretty clever plan, I have to admit. Cat can prove all of that comparing the illegally obtained DNA Evan got from the car with the illegally obtained DNA she lifted at the bar. Also Tess got a warrant on Sam’s phone, when exactly? I have no idea; I thought she found out about Soviet-Coyote like a minute ago. I guess she has some psychic link with whoever issues the warrants. So, the magic warrant lets them know that Sam-the-soviet-coyote is at Iris’s apartment. And what better way to follow a magic warrant than with a magic strike team which is ready in no time!

As EVERYONE knows, Sam is at Iris’s apartment, ready to kill the poor Bosnian girls. He goes down to the basement where Vincent knocks him down and ties him to a chair, all ready for the cops. Only problem is that the police are ALREADY THERE and Vincent is trapped in the basement. He learns that when he calls Cat in the middle of the raid… and I am not a cop or anything, but wouldn’t it be a good idea to put your phone on vibrate when you are in a POLICE RAID? Cat manages to divert the other cops attention and sneak into the basement alone where she finds Vincent in full beast mode and the soviet-coyote trying to flee. So SHE beasts out on Sam and beats the crap out of him. Then she turns to Vincent and tries to calm him back to normal. It is the first time we see the effect she has on him and she is neither scared nor repulsed. A moment later, Cat and Tess arrest Sam under odd circumstances which are merely explained [by Tess] as ‘female energy’. So the Soviet-Coyote is arrested, the poor Bosnian sisters are reunited and that is the End of the Case. Another win for the Special Estrogen Squad! However, Joe is not impressed by all the protocol violations. He thinks Cat should be demoted… to garbage… Yes he actually says that, I am not being snarky! And the way he says it, so serious is absolutely hilarious! Also, “garbage” is code for: GARBAGE in case you were wondering. He sort of forgives Cat on behalf of his friend Judge Hanson and all she gets is desk duty for a week. I actually didn’t hate the case of the week in this episode, it was sort of interesting and it did a lot for our characters.

At her apartment Cat is about to fill out the RSVP card for her father’s wedding but she is speaking on the phone with Evan first. They do their usual flirty thing, he tells her he passed the inspection and she tells him “who would I rope into my off-the-grid investigations if not you?” Eh… Vincent? She is such a tease. He reminds her that his door is always open and right when I thought she was going to invite him to the wedding she simply hangs up. Oh! and then we find out that the M.E. inspector is actually a Muirfield agent! Like we didn’t see that one coming. So he just went to the morgue to steal cross-species DNA samples to confirm Vincent Keller is alive. He relies this information to Ari from Nikita [yeah, I don’t remember his name] and they conclude that the way to get Vincent is through Catherine. Dun dun dun.

Cat walks into her bedroom and she finds a note from Vincent that simply says “Fire Escape”, she is pleased and as we go into the FIRST FIRE ESCAPE SCENE you’ll see how all the stalking goes from creepy to utterly romantic. Catherine peeks through the window and finds Vincent sitting on top of the fire escape. He simply says [in his amazing voice] “I am fine, How are you?” Aw… chills. Jump cut to Cat sitting next to Vincent on the fire escape. They talk about the case, helping people and JT’s ulcer. Cat tells him that she realizes she was unfair in wanting to control their relationship but that sometimes she wishes he was a “normal guy” to which he replies “Ouch” Aw, he can be SO eloquent sometimes. Cat tries to explain her point better. Basically what she is trying to say is that she is willing to stick to the rules as long as she gets to have a relationship with him, but that it is hard for her when she doesn’t hear from him. They decide to revise the terms in case he wants to “help again”. I guess that’s what the kids are calling it these days. The new terms include: speaking at least once a week, Cat getting his phone number and only going to the warehouse for “dire emergencies” (that so sounds like something JT would say).  Of course if we go by this, “dire emergencies” will include pretty much anything from: hooking up to just saying hello, but whatever... And that concludes the first fire escape scene, wasn’t it lovely? It was very simple, but it really worked, especially because they have such good chemistry and we are starting to see it.

And the episode ends with Cat FINALLY filling out the RSVP card and calling her dad to leave him a message about it (Thank God she made a phone call instead of getting the following through the AWFUL VOICE-OVER). With a lot of hidden meaning Cat tells her dad “no plus-one but that does not mean that I am alone in the world”. THE END. (Oh! and can ANYONE tell me the name of the song during the fire-escape scene??)

It was after watching this episode that I decided I would continue watching this show. I was not expecting to like it so much yet, but I thought the case was interesting and cute and I got a hint that they weren’t going to drag the Vincent/Catherine relationship for too long.

Episodes 2 -9 were well structured from the procedural point of view (which I am not crazy about). Later episodes will give up the ‘case of the week’ and focus on the serialized relationships and mythology. Thinking about this, I finally figured out what was wrong with the pilot. They tried to do both: a procedural pilot and introduce the main relationships and mythology all in one episode. Usually in procedurals the pilot episode is devoted entirely to one case and we only learn a few details about the main characters’ personal lives. However with Beauty and the Beast we needed a lot of background information + introducing the relationships and they tried to fit in a case in there as well. As a result it was very jumpy and as I previously wrote a little “all over the place”. I think if they eliminated or rather minimized the case in the pilot and expanded on the Vincent/Catherine scenes it would actually be pretty neat episode… OK, I just had to get that out there because I thought a lot about it.

As usual, thanks for reading and come back next Friday for Episode 4 Review. One more request, if you want to share this recap on another website/blog, please provide the link to this site instead of copy-pasting the whole thing. I would really appreciate it.

MORE RECAPS

QUOTES

JT: Yeah, no twitter either. You know why? He can’t have any followers!

JT: If you haven’t heard from him in 3 days he is not that into you

JT: Just sing all of our death certificates, “How are you?”

Wilansky: Hey it’s estrogen squad

JT: So now I am your carrier pigeon, passing notes like I’m back in high school

JT: So “carefully” means not careful at all, got it.

Cat to Evan: What would I do without you?/Evan: I am sure you’d survive

Evan: I take it you are not the pizza guy/Cat: Not that he would ever bring pizza in here

Evan: No, I went to the impound to check out last year’s models.

Tess: That’s female energy for you

Joe: She should be demoted… to garbage

Evan: I believe I am if drinking to excess in the privacy of my lab qualifies as a celebration

Cat: I just wish you were a normal guy/ Vincent: Ouch