Larry Hull | Through the Shattered Lens

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, the murders continue and two detectives continue to obsess.

Episode 1.5 “A Shot In The Dark”

(Dir by Bruce Paltrow, originally aired on February 24th, 1993)

As I watched this week’s episode of Homicide, it occurred to me that I really don’t care about Stanley Bolander’s relationship with Dr. Carol Blythe.

Seriously, I really did try to give this storyline a chance. Bolander is played by the great character actor Ned Beatty. Dr. Blythe is played by Wendy Hughes. Both Beatty and Hughes are no longer with us but they were both very good actors and I’m always in favor of giving good actors a plotline. But, my God — Bolander is so whiny! I mean, I get it. He’s newly divorced and he’s unsure of himself and he’s a lot more comfortable investigating death than actually living life. However, Dr. Blythe obviously likes him and Bolander had a fairly good date with her during the previous episode so why did he spend this episode afraid to talk to her on the phone? During this episode, Bolander and Munch were investigating the murder of a drug dealer. The only witness was a high-class prostitute who ended up hitting on Bolander, largely because she wanted him to buy her some food. It was an interesting-enough case but instead of focusing on that, the whole thing was Munch telling Bolander to call Blythe and Bolander getting mad as a result. It got old.

While Bolander whined about his relationship issues, Lewis and Crosetti continued to investigate the shooting of Officer Thormann. Crosetti was convinced that Thormann had been shot by Alfred Smith (Mojo Gentry), largely because a man named Charles Flavin (Larry Hull) fingered Smith as being the shooter. Lewis thought that Flavin was a more likely suspect, especially after Flavin failed a lie detector. In the end, it was not superior police work that led to the arrest of Charles Flavin but instead his girlfriend telling Crosetti and Lewis that Flavin shot Thormann because he had a headache. When confronted, Flavin immediately confessed and then started complaining about his migraine.

(As for Officer Thormann, he survives being shot in the head but he is now blind.)

Everyone is happy that Thormann’s shooter has been arrested but Crosetti finds himself wracked with guilt and self-doubt over the fact that he nearly arrested the wrong man. In a wonderfully-acted moment, Crosetti tells Lewis that Giardello was right. Crosetti was too close to Thormann to work the case.

Speaking of getting too involved in a case, Bayliss continues to obsess over the Adena Watson case. After the incompetent Captain Barnfather (Clayton LeBouef) goes to a community meeting and reveals that a pipe was used to kill Adeena (and, in the process, ruins Bayliss’s plan to interrogate the man who he suspects is the murderer), Bayliss calls Barnfather and calls him a — cover your ears, if you’re young — “butthead.” Barnfather is so offended that he comes to the station to demand that Bayliss be taken off the case. Giardello tells Bayliss that he can either apologize or he can find another job. Giardello also acknowledges that Barnfather’s an idiot and Bayliss has every reason to be upset. Bayliss, who has a cold and is running a fever, apologizes and then tells Giardello that he’s willing to step down as primary and let Pembleton have the case. Giardello, who really is the perfect boss, tells Bayliss to go home and get some sleep.

While Bayliss is losing his temper, Felton and Pembleton are investigating a man who lived in the neighborhood where Adeena’s body was found. Felton’s theory is that the man killed Adeena and then kept her body in the trunk of his car before dumping her in the back yard where she was found. The man’s car has subsequently been repossessed and Pembleton and Felton spend a night searching for the car on various impound lots. When they finally find the car, they also find no evidence linking it to the Watson murder. The focus of these scenes was less on the search for the car and more on listening to Pembleton and Felton bicker. The two men sincerely dislike each other and Homicide deserves a lot of credit for acknowledging that working with someone is not the same thing as respecting them. Pembleton views Felton as being a racist. Felton views Pembleton as being a snob. As they look for the car, they argue about everything, from the renaming of a street after Martin Luther King to Felton’s belief that Pembleton takes everything too personally. Their argument is fascinating to listen to, largely because of the obvious disdain that each man has for the other. Neither man is portrayed as having a monopoly on the truth. Pembleton may be right about Felton’s prejudices but Felton is equally correct when he suggests that Pembleon is more concerned with showing up Bayliss than with investigating the case. It’s the type of thing that you would never hear on television today.

In the end, the neighbor and his car prove to be a dead end. But lab results come in that suggest that Bayliss’s suspicion that Adeena was killed by the local arabber may be correct. While the rest of the squad celebrates the arrest of Charles Flavin, Pembleton and Bayliss prepare to bring in the arabber.

(According to Wikipedia, an arabber is a street vendor who sells fruits and vegetables from a horse-drawn cart. Apparently, they’re a Northeastern thing and specifically a Baltimore thing. Having grown up in the Southwest, I have to admit that I had never even heard the term before watching Homicide.)

All of the Bolander nonsense aside, this was a good episode that took a look at the mental strain involved in being a homicide detective. Crosetti allowed himself to become so obsessed that he nearly arrested the wrong guy. Bayliss allowed himself to become so obsessed that he nearly lost his job as a result. Interestingly enough, Thormann’s shooter is captured because his girlfriend turned him in and not because of any superior policework. Meanwhile, it’s easy to laugh at Pembleton and Felton spending an entire day chasing down a false lead but, in doing so, they eliminate the neighbor as a viable suspect and help to make the case against the arabber even stronger. In the end, it’s a thankless job but this episode makes the viewer glad that someone’s doing it.

Next week, we finally meet the arabber!

This week, things get emotional on Homicide!

Episode 1.4 “Son of a Gun”

(Dir by Nick Gomez, originally aired on February 10th, 1993)

Officer Chris Thormann (Lee Tergesen), a patrol officer who is friendly with the Homicide detectives and who is a bit of protegee to Steve Crosetti, has been shot. While Thormann lies in surgery with a bullet in his brain, his wife (Edie Falco, in one of her first television appearances) waits for news from the doctors and tries to avoid the members of the callous press. Crosetti demands to be put in charge of the investigation into Thormann’s shooting and when Giardello points out, quite correctly, that Crosetti is too close to the victim to be objective, Crosetti strips down to his boxers and shows Giardello the scars left behind by every time that he’s been shot.

It’s an odd scene, one that seems to come out of nowhere in an episode that, up until that moment, had been pretty serious. Kotto does a great job of capturing Giardello’s horror as Crosetti drops his pants. It’s obvious that this is not the first time that Crosetti has shown off his scars to get assigned to a certain case. It’s a scene that shouldn’t work but it does work because not only is it well-acted by Yaphet Kotto and Jon Polito but it also captures the insanity of being a homicide detective. Just four episodes in, Homicide has already shown that it can be a funny show but the humor is rooted in the darkest corners of the human experience. To survive as a homicide detective, you have to harden yourself to the point of being callous and you have to be able to see the humor in just about everything. Crosetti, with his constant analysis of the Lincoln assassination and his inventory of bullet scars, may seem crazy but actually, he’s doing what he has to do to survive.

The episode ends with Thormann alive but in a coma and possibly brain-damaged. And it ends with the shooter still at large. Crosetti has received an anonymous tip from someone saying that the killer was a man named Alfred Smith. But who knows if that’s true.

The Adeena Watson case remains open, as well. Bayliss and Pembleton are still struggling to figure out how to work together. Bayliss is too obsessed with the case. Pembleton is too determined to show up the new guy. A raid on the apartment where it’s believed Adeena was murdered turns up nothing but more evidence of human misery. That said, a cheerful guy (played by Paul Schulze) who claims to be an agent for hitmen does give up several of his clients, allowing Howard and Felton to close even more cases. Even Calpurnia Church (Mary Jefferson), the “black widow” from the pilot, is finally arrested due to the agent’s testimony.

Finally, Stanley Bolander goes on his first date with Dr. Blythe. Before going on his date, he meets his neighbor, Larry Molera (Luis Guzman). Larry is a carpenter. He’s built a coffin that is currently sitting in living room. Bolander’s date goes well but the nervous Bolander turns down Blythe’s offer to go back to her place with her. Bolander returns to his apartment, where he discovers that Larry is dead and lying in his coffin. (Much, who was called when Larry’s body was discovered, is shocked to see Bolander. Bolander is not happy that Much now knows where he lives.) Larry’s death inspires Boland to return to Dr. Blythe’s apartment.

This was an emotional episode. Thormann is clinging to his life while his wife and Crosetti wait for him to wake up. The recently divorced Bolander finally found the courage to go out with Dr. Blythe. Bayliss appears to be so obsessed with the Adeena Watson case that he’s struggling to think straight. This episode takes a look at the mental strain that comes from dealing with crime and death on a daily basis. It’s well-done, even if it’s not quite as memorable as Night of the Dead Living. (The stuff with Larry and his coffin was a bit too self-consciously quirky to be as emotionally devastating as the show obviously meant for it to be.) If I took anything away from this episode, it’s that fate is random. Officer Thormann has been shot in the head but he survived hours of surgery. Larry seemed to be healthy but he suddenly died while Bolander was on his date. Adeena’s killer may never be caught while Calpurnia Church was caught because of an initially unrelated investigation. Some of the detectives are skilled. Some of them are not. But, in the end, they’re all at the random mercy of fate.