iscoffy

This show is still dumb, but I think the addition of Danson doing some actual on-scene sleuthing that doesn't make the writers think they need labored explanations along with silly CGI (as they do for basic cyber issues) is helping somewhat. Although you'd think he'd want to empty out the Fauxmba in case there was any trace evidence it had vacuumed up prior to dumping coffee all over the floor. Also, if my coworkers decided to take up an entire hallway to race roaches, I'd be pretty annoyed. Krumm's family issues got even more tedious. I wouldn't have believed it possible. And Bow-wow and Raven are... hm. I guess they now can effortlessly combine their lack of storylines into one. You'd think we'd have learned long ago from Talky Tina that talking dolls are never up to any good, but thanks, CSI: Cyber!

They almost blew up the poor guy twice, too! "Oh God, you put me back in? Could you try to blow me up a second time and just take me off screen for the remainder?" Maybe it's CSI: Cyber bleed, where there are apparently tons of people at the lab with nothing better to do than ooh and aah at the main characters. Thanks. I think I was so distracted by how the Beast-like it all was, I missed where they were even supposed to be. And I think Nick and the ghost of Warrick made a good choice to stay far away from this one.

Another thought: where the heck was Grissom docking his boat? Presumably not in the Bellagio fountains.

When Grissom built a replica of the casino bomb, he mentioned that he knew how to make bombs because they sometimes took out whalers that way (in response to which, Henry naively said, "That's legal?"). Which, hm. I saw an interview where apparently William Petersen had come to a meeting with a folder of Sea Shepherd information, so I guess he was interested in that angle. I personally am not a fan of Paul Watson/Whale Wars and his/their tactics, and I'm not sure why Grissom would be, either, but apparently the sea is lucky to have him. And Sara. (?) I would probably watch CSI: Pacific Ocean over CSI: Cyber, though.

The thing I initially loved about CSI was that it featured introverts, which Gil Grissom definitely is, doing something they really cared about, and doing it well. Not to say some of the characters aren't extroverts, but I think early Grissom was more an introvert who was great at his job but wasn't terribly interested in faking extroversion in his work or social life. That's not something we saw much on TV back then. The TV landscape has certainly changed since then, and CSI got more into trying to come up with wacky cases than just "following the evidence." I bought that Sara had a thing about Grissom, but if they were going to go there, I never was convinced by the writing why they came together, and this sunset ending didn't really help. On the topic of extroverts, as mentioned above, would Catherine even be eligible to lead the lab? Didn't she blow it up at some point, and there was a question of whether she interfered with a case on behalf of her dad, among numerous other unprofessional things she did over the years. I never really understood why she was such a boon to the FBI, either, but I guess a lab that would hire Finn would consider putting Willows in charge.

So Grissom became some kind of Paul Watson/Sea Shepherd/Whale Wars guy? And Sara is just going to sail off with him to do that? That's... something. I was never a fan of their relationship but since they went there, I didn't understand why it couldn't be two introverts who are passionate about their professions who meet up on occasion and that works for them... off-screen. Angsting it up was just ridiculous and this "wrap-up" didn't much help. I guess he's just always going to be a whale singing in the wrong decibel and she's going to have to hope to figure out what he's thinking through secondhand videos. Maybe they'll run into the giant angry squid from "The Beast" and that will be the end of that. The face scramble fingerprint was so ridiculous. I guess the guy wanted to be caught so he could threaten to blow up Grissom (although not sure how he planned to do anything to Grissom with his unattached handle thing), but what kind of ID hiding device would even offer the option to use your own fingerprint? I'm really bitter we didn't get to see Brass in the hospital or know what was up with Ellie or any of that. I had utterly forgotten Finn was hurt (died?), but that didn't exactly crush me. Unlike the crushed dreams of D.B.'s wife, who wanted to live in the perfect house in Seattle and instead she's going to be stuck in D.C., where one mopes at the Lincoln Memorial. But hey, Catherine is randomly picking up some new kids, so there's that. Sigh.

Did I hallucinate Scott saying to Stan that he wanted to kiss him, kick him to the ground and make love to him? And Alex telling him to get it together? I fully admit to only halfway paying attention to this show, and maybe even less with this uninspired grill masters version, but...

Well, the creative differences might have been his. It's not like the show bothered to do anything with his character.

Trigger was a deep web firearms dealer, who somehow ran his operation through the public library and by buying lots and lots of drills, apparently. Viper was a guy who apparently had lots of time to play some online first-person-shooter, hack said game, groom kids, and shoot the witnesses against his dad, using drill guns from Trigger's dark web operation. I unashamedly admit to not paying the greatest amount of attention to this show, but I do think it was not really explained. And I am not a journalist, but I don't think most online news pages would just accept a wall of code-- wouldn't they generally be putting stories submitted to them into their template? Well, if Krummy could have gotten in trouble for whatever technobabble thing he did that let him see that Lomis won a chess competition (illegal search), I don't see how infecting however many people with a super cookie would be any better. But of course, they are the white hats, so whatever.

What the heck was Togglefly even supposed to be? I think they must have just enjoyed saying "Goldenbeast," since it was said approximately 8,423 times. I kind of wish the name I saw on the top 20 of whatever that first-person shooter was called had been involved, because hearing Patricia Arquette say "Jefftastic" would have been amusing. By the standards of this show, anyway. Although I did get a laugh about her lecturing to Mundo about gamers thinking they can jump off tall buildings in a single bound. Did I understand correctly that they would know when Trigger clicked on the news story because he would do so from the Dark Web? Um, would a guy in a public library who had somehow been avoiding getting caught by our crack team for years not just use Google to look at a news story about himself? Unleash the SUPERCOOKIE! (And its amazing dialogue, too, which went something like-- "How about a super cookie?" "Super cookie!" "Yeah, let's do that." "What's a super cookie?" Such great writing!) Which apparently they can just do without authority from anyone, even though either they'd have to fake a news page (which you'd think Trigger would maaaaybe find suspicious), or involve a legit news organization, which probably would need to be aware of the super cookie. Local LE never exists, except to show up at the last minute. There's only Mundo and Avery Ryan, who must split up, except when they need to mill around with large FBI lettering all over them when they are trying to find someone in a crowded park.Did they ever explain how Viper had all the equipment in the game? He just raided other people's stuff and had a huge Ponzi scheme with one virtual katana, with drill guns as an end game going on? Apparently Peter MacNicol's character's son's punishment for participating in cyber bullying did not include losing his faux X-box Live. Oh my gosh, the ridiculous speech at the end with all the cheering and the list of names. Yes, your job is one of the most difficult EVER! So L33T.

Yes, Avery Ryan, who can tell if someone's lying about CYBER CRIME by staring at the corners of their mouths, can't figure out that if she tells a do-gooder that he's a) terminal and b) helped kill at least one person, that she shouldn't let him wander into a bathroom by himself. Apparently she can read micro-expressions, but macro ones are beyond her.

This is hilarious. I really think they simply have no idea how to make hacking seem interesting and/or compelling, so they are now adding extraneous cheering crowds to the high-fives and loud cries of triumph in a sad attempt to add tension and excitement. I would love to know the brief that was given to these actors to produce their amazing reactions. I also love that the black hat can figure out that he should use an algorithm (revolutionary!), but the white hats just have Krum manually doing stuff. And his cheering section, of course.

Do we know these onlookers were all hackers? Perhaps some were bean counters wanting to know where the 250K was going. Or online poker enthusiasts brought in to inspire Krumm to new heights. Really, anything is possible with this show.

ScrollMD. ScrollMD! I am still not over Friend Agenda. I'm hoping they do the dangers of Chirper next. I get these people were desperate, but who doesn't try an independent Google search for the site and reviews of it before buying something with a credit card, especially something important like drugs? But hey, we all got to whoop and high-five about saving lives. Obnoxiously, as always.

Didn't you know, if the perp doesn't get charged, you don't have to write a report! That's because it's not just crime... it's CYBER CRIME. On the dark web, and Friend Agenda, and the airport charging stations! I'm going to assume that Krum got the same level of training getting bumped up from the mail room as Avery got to effortlessly transition from psychiatrist to behaviorist to cyber crime expert team leader.

Why did they decide to do a show about cyber crime if they think we're too dumb to get it or they think it's too boring to show? One of the things about the original CSI that caught people's attention was that it was quirky and the science was interesting-- they found ways to make GSR or fingerprint comparison or blood spatter or whatever interesting. What they did not do (or almost never did) was loudly yell, "YES! GOT YA!" and start high-fiving and chest bumping all over the lab every time they figured out anything, in a pathetic attempt to make it seem like something happened that we ought to care about. My "favorite" part of the episode was Krummitz and his trembling lip explaining that he didn't want to let Avery Ryan down, so he... did something that would guarantee that she would be disappointed in him if she found out?

Under scrutiny in the light of day, I'm not convinced certain parts of this episode hold up, but it certainly was atmospheric and creepy, and kept me interested (if vaguely terrified). I've been watching CM out of a sort of sad sense of loyalty for quite some time, like when you hang out with an old, washed-up high-school buddy out of a sense of duty, but kind of wish you hadn't. While this episode was not perfect (what the heck kind of concoction of drugs are we talking about here? Even if the magic drugs worked on people who were kids he presumably set up somehow to trigger when he was a kid, or at least knew how to trigger them based on shared history, why would they work so well on the child psych and Hotch? How the heck did his hacking blow out the fuses at the FBI? Why would no one call local LEO rather than Hotch barging in by himself?), it kept my interest, didn't reveal the unsub too soon, had characters who were sympathetic, and let Thomas Gibson show his acting chops. Overall, I'm hoping my washed-up high school bud is turning it around.

Wait, maybe this explains everything! The backdoor pilot was about a program impersonating a person-- maybe the whole team are programs pretending to be real people. Quick, someone type some nonsense characters at Avery Ryan and see if her flesh disappears to show a green wire frame.

This show is so awful. What on earth is with all the bellowing and chest pounding whenever the mad skillz hackerz crew (all the cool hackers know l33t speak-- I hope they do an equally up-to-date Leroy Jenkins name check) finds out the simplest of details? What an annoying habit that would be in the workplace. And Avery Ryan's cringeworthy "out of the comfort zone" thing was probably supposed to be touching, but nobody in this show has earned anything yet-- why do we care about any of their feelings, let alone for each other? And then Ryan's psychology background somehow makes her some kind of elite behavioralist? I don't think it works that way. Maybe she had additional training in profiling (between bouts of pouting at the Lincoln Memorial), but I don't think they've said that. The case was ludicrous, their team is ridiculous and their use and attempt to show us tech is absurd. I am really only watching at this point in hopes it becomes as silly as the Caruso version, because at least that gave me a lot of laughs. So far, this thing is just awkward and bad.

That was so tremendously awful. So awful, I was almost hoping every episode would end with Arquette brooding (expressionlessly) about "the hacker that got away" (and destroyed her career!) on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. As one does.

Has she? I can't tell if she's smiling disdainfully now, instead of disdainfully smirking, or if that's the only expression she can make. But I do feel that Beth must be very desperate if she's letting creepy Jack in on her secrets.

One species (Dermatobia hominis) of parasitic botfly eggs/larvae can travel via mosquito and enter the flesh of humans, where they burrow until they are ready to drop from the host for their next stage. Of course, most people who discover they have a botfly larvae in their skin prefer to have it killed and removed. Try to imagine that delivered as obnoxiously as the talking head specialist guy on the show would say it.

So I saw "Santa Sent Me to the ER" and "Monsters Inside Me: Holiday" listed on the guide. I was too tired to make it through more than one of the special MIM scenarios, which wasn't really that exciting (seriously, I've seen the botfly larvae scenario a few times, it's not more exciting because it's happening over Christmas). I was expecting accidental tinsel strangulation or something more interesting. Yup, I said it. I'm bored of botflies.

Flashbacks to the furry episode. I'm not sure if that's a good or bad thing. I think D.B. overdressed a bit at the rubber doll ball.

I really can't figure out what they are trying to do with his character. I mean, McDermott's "acting" is probably not helping, but I feel like they want me to be sorry for him, but I'm not, because he's a weird, socially awkward stalker. I'm happy they are finally moving forward with the Beth/Stalker Boy plot, but somewhat irritated she had to see him with her friend to figure it out. You'd think that as an expert in stalking, she might have been a little more observant on that, but I guess not. I'm not even sure why I'm watching this show... maybe I just can't wait to see what song they've decided to slaughter in a slow, painful fashion at the end.