Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Sundays, I will be reviewing Homicide: Life On The Street, which aired from 1993 to 1999, on NBC! It can be viewed on Peacock.
This week, we begin the third season!
Episode 3.1 “Nearer My God To Thee”
(Dir by Tim Hunter, originally aired on October 14th, 1994)
The third season of Homicide opens with a disgusted Stan Bolander watching a relatively tame soap opera in the breakroom. He’s offended by the fact that two of the show’s characters are shown in bed. To Bolander, that’s the equivalent of pornography on network television. Lewis points out that television execs force showrunners to add sex in order to bring in ratings. Munch mentions that it’s strange that television is allowed to show sex but not nudity. Munch then goes on to predict that there will soon be hundreds of channels, a channel for every interest. There will be channels about animals and religion and politics and soon, anything you want to see will be at your finger tips and it will lead to people becoming dull and lazy. John Munch, super prophet!
Hmmm …. do you think maybe Tom Fontana, who wrote this script and was one of Homicide’s executive producers, was maybe venting some of his own frustration over the demands that NBC was making in return for giving a third season to the critically acclaimed but low-rated Homicide? Because the third season premiere of Homicide is a bit different from the previous two seasons. For one thing, Jon Polito is no longer in the cast. (Lewis mentions that Crosetti is on vacation in Atlantic City.) Isabelle Hofman, who is certainly more attractive than anyone who has previously appeared on the show, has joined the cast as Lt. Megan Russert, the second shift commander. And this episode features its share of nudity and sex.
At the same time, it’s still an excellent episode of Homicide. Isabelle Hofman gives a tough and no-nonsense performance as Russert and, by the end of the episode, she seems as if she belongs in the ensemble as much as her less glamorous castmates. And this episode has its share of sex and nudity but it’s all essential to the plot. This episode lets us know that, for now, Homicide is a show that can adjust without losing its integrity.
The episode’s case is a red ball (which is a term used to indicate it’s a case that’s going to get media attention). Katharine Goodrich, the 30 year-old founder of a shelter for battered women, has been found dead in a dumpster, nude except for a pair of long white cotton gloves, the type of gloves that you might expect to see at a royal procession but not at a crime scene. Russert’s shift has picked up the case and, to everyone’s horror, the incompetent and racist Roger Gaffney (Walt MacPherson) is the primary detective. The brass ask Giardello to keep an eye on Russert because they feel she’s too inexperienced to handle the investigation. Giardello (and let’s take a moment to acknowledge just how wonderful Yaphet Kotto was in this role) calls in his own detectives to help out the second shift. As you might have guessed, the two shifts do not have much respect for each other. It’s chaos, especially when Gaffney and Pembleton nearly come to blows over Gaffney’s racism, Russert defuses the situation and the scene, to be honest, is a bit overwritten. From the first minute she appeared in the episode, Hofman has been credible as a detective and a lieutenant so writing one heavy-handed scene just so she can further prove herself feels almost an insult to the strength of her performance. Hofman (and Russert) has already proven herself without having to dare Pembleton to shoot Gaffney and throw his life away.
That said, this was a strong episode. Goodrich was a devout Catholic and Pembleton and Bayliss discuss their own views on religion. Bayliss has tried out all the Protestant denominations (even the — *snort* — Unitarians) and is a bit of a cynic. Pembleton was educated by Jesuits and says at one point that, “There are two types of Catholics. Devout and fallen. I fell.” It’s a scene that could have been awkward but Andre Braugher and Kyle Secor pull it off wonderfully. Secor, especially, has really come into his own. Bayliss is no longer the awkward and earnest rookie from the first season. In fact, Bayliss has so come into his own that he agrees to invest in a bar with Lewis and Munch. They’re burying the Waterfront!
(Before Bayliss offers to invest, there’s a humorous scene where Much and Lewis try to convince Bolander to not only invest but to also be the bar’s mascot. “A big man deserves a big meal,” Munch says. Bolander — who I’m happy to say is far less whiny in this episode than he was during the previous two seasons — is not interested. It’s kind of funny how Munch basically hero worships a guy who really seems like he wants nothing to do with him outside of work.)
Kay spends the episode taking calls from Felton’s wife, Beth (Mary B. Ward). Beth recently kicked Felton out of the house because she thought Felton was cheating on her. Felton admits to Kay that he is cheating on her. When Kay isn’t running interference for her partner, she’s defending Russert when the other detectives insinuate that Russert must be slept her way to the top. Kay lists all of Russert’s qualifications and commendations. Yay, Kay! You tell them! Later, Russert sees Kay looking exhausted and snaps at her to get to work. “Bitch,” Kay mutters. Ouch! Still, I laughed.
Felton breaks into his house to retrieve a suit, just to be confronted by Beth. An obviously unstable Beth proceeds to take a pair of scissors to Felton’s jacket before then stripping down to her underwear, getting in bed, and asking Felton to leave so she can get some sleep. (I’m going to guess that rather disturbing and deliberately anti-erotic scene was Fontana’s subversive answer to the NBC execs who asked him to sex up the show a little.) Later, Russert finally goes home to get some rest and check in on her daughter. Felton shows up at her front door and, after he tells her the one of his leads on the Goodrich murder went dry, she responds by passionately kissing him. Now, we know where Felton has been going whenever Beth kicks him out.
As for the Goodrich murder, it turns out that, despite what everyone assumed, she was not raped. After a nun tells Pembleton and Bayliss that Katherine never wore gloves, Pembleton deduces the gloves were put on her body after she was killed. Gaffney insists that Katherine’s murderer was probably the boyfriend of one of the women at the shelter but Pembleton disagrees. (This leads to the fight that I mentioned earlier.) While Russert wants to keep the gloves out of the news, a smarmy reporter (Tony Todd) threatens to reveal their existence unless she agrees to come to him first with any developments. As the episode ends, Pembleton and Bayliss are canvassing the crime scene and it’s hard not to notice that they are now the ones wearing white gloves, rubber in this case. Bayliss says its pointless to keep canvassing the crime scene. But then he and Pembleton spot a storage shed with a busted lock. As they open the door, the end credits begin.
To be continued!
What a great way start to season 3. Yes, I realize that this case is pretty much the exact opposite of the gritty, pointless murders that the first two seasons focused on but still, I am now very much wondering who killed Katherine Goodrich and why they put the gloves on her hands. I hope this won’t be another unsolvable Adena Watson case. Fortunately, I have total faith in Frank Pembleton.
I can’t wait to see what happens next week!
