Vicki starts the new season with a new client. Paul
Deeds, an undercover cop who wants her help in a murder investigation since she
has a reputation for handling odd cases. Whose murder? Why that would be his –
he says as he walks through the door.
I love how the interact within 5 seconds – he’s a ghost
but she’s mocking him for his marital problems. Rarely do actors have that kind
of instant chemistry. I also love how they poke fun at that classic ghost
depiction – how can he not pick things up but he can still sit down?
Back to investigating, Deeds doesn’t know how he died nor
does he know where his body is, but he does know that he was undercover in a
bike gang and his supervisor was Fry – but for some reason he can’t remember
the last time he check in with him. Coreen, alas, cannot see him – but is
excited about the whole thing (of course she is) and not skeeved about the fact
the ghost proves his existence by spotting her red thong and passing the info
onto Vicki (I was skeeved, thank you).
Vicki has 2 methods of dealing with a mystery – ask Henry
for help or ask Celluci for help (and yes, I am tired of that) and this time
it’s Celluci’s turn, to go ask the nice undercover police people to spill all
their information to someone not involved in their case. Because that’s going
to go down well. She tells Celluci all she knows (he has his obligatory sceptic
moment, but at least it only lasts a couple of seconds); makes it clear he
didn’t like Paul “dirty” Deeds since he has a reputation of securing his
convictions “no matter what” (that sounds ominous. Even worse on a detective
programme, since most TV detectives wouldn’t know proper law and procedure if
you beat them about the face with a legal ethics book). But he agrees to speak
to the undercover guys who are sure to be forthcoming.
Next step in the investigation is to talk to Henry (yes,
really. This hereby concludes Vicki’s investigative skills) learning not much
except that Henry is suspicious and also can’t see Deeds. But Deeds does
remember the biker bar he was last in before he died, one of Henry’s hunting
grounds. Henry and Coreen do some research but we largely see Henry’s worry –
sure it looks like Deed’s ghost, but there are plenty of creatures
Celluci talks to a woman from the undercover unit who
happily spills that Deeds was undercover with the Wolverines bike gang who were
importing drugs. The Wolverines have had a lot of bad luck, drugs being stolen,
gang members killed and this makes the more extreme – so there’s a lot of
pressure on Organised Crime to get them in the court and into prison. She does
let slip a past tense referring to Deeds – he “was” a good cop – but not
because she think he’s dead, but because he is being investigated by Internal
Affairs- and that the information he has been giving for months has been
useless. But everything is scuppered when Celluci looks out the window at the
biker gang and sees… Deeds. Alive and in the flesh. Ah, a twist!
Celluci “arrests” Deeds so they can question him without
breaking his cover and brings him to see Vicki. Already I think the ghost Deeds
is the real one, since Alive Deeds cracks his neck – what is it with
supernatural programmes using the neck crack as a sign of possession? You ever
see someone with a crick in their neck, exorcise them just in case. He’s also
considerably less pleasant than his ghostly equivalent, taking annoying lechery
to a much less pleasant level. He’s also running a massive fever which is
probably indicative of something. Celluci questions Deeds about the Wolverine
murder and talks again to undercover lady – revealing that, again, Deeds’
information is poor, which leads them to suspect a conspiracy of some kind
Henry makes his way to the biker bar and uses his special
vampire persuasion to ask about Deeds (so if he was undercover he probably
isn’t now) learning that 2 nights ago, Deeds went into the bathroom with a
woman, when he came out he left and she collapsed and died.
Which brings us to Vicki talking to Deeds’s ghost about him being possessed and having his spirit evicted (that was the last twist folks, we’re back on the predictable train). They discuss how ruthless they both are and the many people who want Deeds dead (he’s been possessed, not murdered, why assume killing him is the motive) before Vicki takes a trip to the morgue to see the awesome Dr. Mohadevan about the woman who died in the bar (who was, no doubt, possessed before Deeds by the same entity). Just in case you hadn’t put 2 and 2 together, Mohadevan reveals that not only has the body worn out on the inside, but also she had a diet of raw meat (earlier we saw Deeds eat a rare meat sandwich. In case you missed it, Vicki expressly pointed it out in conversation once with him and once with Ghost Deeds and then points it out again now. Bright flashing lights and the word “clue” may have flashed up on the screen as well, but the writers wanted to be subtle).
Alive/possessed Deeds shows up at the morgue, as you do, just
to throw some creepiness around to convince us how wrong he is (and the actor
is really not pulling this off) before he leaves to go make a very public and
obvious contact with a member of a rival gang, the Dragons (yes, it’s an East
Asian gang and yes, his contact is an attractive Asian woman, a “Dragon Woman”
and yes she fits the stereotype as well) who is he giving information and help
too both from the Wolverines and from the police. Thankfully, by doing all of
this in a very public place, Celluci gets to photograph everything while
providing explanatory notes in case your brains have leaked out your ears and
you can’t follow the very obvious events on screen.
Celluci decides it’s time to talk to Chuntao Fang, the
woman in question (because the whole concept of “undercover” escapes him) in
which he… does nothing except warn her that he’s on to her. Which I’m sure is
very helpful.
Vicki, meanwhile, has found out that dead woman has a
dead boyfriend who died shortly before she did. And, again, in case your brain
has been reduced to porridge, she posits the theory that some entity is jumping
bodies. Thankfully there is flirting with Henry so I don’t have to focus on the
appalling lamp-shading going on. That jumping entity in Deeds, by the way, is
shooting his fellow Wolverines with an uzi and doing more of the neck-cricking
as well.
Celluci’s office is jumping with activity with the fresh
murders and, just in case you’ve fallen asleep, Vicki lays out her entire body
hopping theory to Celluci again. Celluci lets slip that Deeds was being
investigated by Internal Affairs (did I mention how bad he is at secrecy?) and
has another warning about Deeds being crooked (after all, IA has been
investigating him for longer than the few days he’s been possessed). He also
points out that “cutting a few corners” quickly goes into worst things as police
do worse and worse and then claim the “end justifies the means” and he wants
Vicki to confront Deeds’s ghost (remember that undercover thing?)
She does confront him and presses him masterfully about
his corruption – but he refuses to give and insists she’s trying to smear him.
He storms out and Vicki returns to flirting with Henry and continuing her chain
of petty criminals who have been possessed and murdered and they see that it is
moving from petty criminals and steadily climbing the chain to more and more
serious criminals. Henry names it an Ikimu from his research – a Babylonian
critter that thrived on chaos and loves raw meat. They need to catch it mid
jump so they can trap it and allow Deeds to return to his body.
Vicki and Celluci go through the records to see that
months of information on the Dragons is missing – they decide this means that
Deeds must have been working for them from before being possessed (they
actually present it as the only option – not even considering that the file
could have been tampered with after the fact as we know happened). Then
Possessed Deeds shows up, neck crick and all but she fights him off before the
nasty tentacle thing inside him gets her
Henry goes to Chuntao Fang’s massage parlour and has a
dual monologue with Deeds’s ghost – him lecturing Deeds’ on morality (assuming
he is there) and Deeds responding despite being inaudible. Yes it’s slightly
contrived.
But what he says moves Deeds to go see Vicki in her office where she is working out (seriously, she has nothing better to do?) She confronts him about Chuntao Fang and he says he gave some information from the Wolverines to the Dragons, got paid and got some gang members killed – which he considered a win-win situation for getting results. He justifies it under “ends justify the means”. Before the argument advances further, Henry arrives with a cedar dagger, designed to kill Ikimu and it’s time to move out.
And they arrive in time to see the Ikimu moving from Deeds’s
body to Fang’s – but Henry splits them up and Vicki makes with the stabbing.
Allowing the ghost to return to his body – and an apology for being so corrupt,
before he dies (for real) as a result of the demon possession.
Ok, as can probably be guessed, I’m not a big fan of this
detective show showing and telling then showing us again then drawing attention
to the showing with a big neon sign in case you missed it. It’s contrived, it
break the flow and removes the mystery from the mystery
I’m also not a fan of Vicki’s entire detective arsenal
being summed up with “which man should I ask to help me?”
This show did, however, redeem itself massively in my eyes
by calling out the endless “end justifies the means” we see on detective
programmes (even if we did have a rather weak “redemption” scene). It’s a
staple of police, detective and mystery programmes to repeatedly have the
protagonists break the law to get their convictions – and this is generally
seen as a good thing. I’m glad to see at least a partial refutation of it.
