S2 E03: Story of a Gun

[LadyChaos]

The CSI team investigates after a group of teens discover a dead woman behind the wheel of an abandoned car in a Nevada ghost town.

[milkyaqua]

Didn't take long to figure out the murder was an accident.  Josh and his bad boy friend, which took Josh out of what he was supposed to be doing.  What's the point in that and why should the audience care?  Why was Maxine out in the dark, alone, looking for evidence?  Why were Josh and Serena in a locker room acting like bunnies?  Catherine was the only one who acted like they had some sense though I did like Serena telling off the husband at the end.

I'm with the folks who are wondering how long this version is going to lean on the OG team members to maintain interest.  Right now, I don't totally dislike this version but TPTB need to fix some things.  I'm not a fan of shows that rely on character quirks to make a character interesting.  The Allie character constantly mooning over Josh and having to be pulled back into doing her job.  Josh and seemingly inability to make a choice between Allie and Serena and now this back story of his with the childhood bad boy (which I have no interest in).  It'll take more than that to make Josh all that interesting.  The sister-brother medical examiners...what the heck is that about?  I'm okay, for the most part, with Maxine, Jay and Beau but that's less than half the cast and even Beau can go off the cliff.

So they need to tighten up the storylines and stop trying so hard to make their cast "quirky" and concentrate on making them more competent and ease up on trying to get everyone to hook up with the other one.

[HurricaneVal]

I did crack up at the "Bubba Gump of plastic" line.

[Snazzy Daisy]

COTW was not intriguing at all.

Last week, Josh said Trey is a helpful old friend. And now he thinks Trey is an idiot? That’s mean and ungrateful.

That kid didn’t feel anything with that big splinter embedded in his cheek? Ahh come on!

[emma675]

This one wasn't great. The CoTW was kind of a mess and sloppy. Why on earth would Max be allowed to wander around in the dark searching for evidence without a police escort? There were more than enough cops crowded around her when she was down, every CSI searching should have had a cop with them. 

Josh and Serena bug me (just like Josh and Allie would bug me) and sexing it up in the work locker room is tacky and unprofessional. They don't need team relationships, it's distracting and unnecessary. 

What was the deal with Josh's friend? He lied about why he needed the prints but what was Josh talking about when he said Trey needs to stop going after meth dealers?

[edhopper]

Hot Detective had no right to blame the husband. That was completely unprofessional.  So he wasn't a great husband. It was not his fault she was shot. She should get reprimanded for saying that to the victim's husband.

I also suspected it was an accident early on.

[Poohpoohpooh]

This was definitely a starring-Folsom episode. Why not? He's the leading man of the show (Cath and Max are for sure above him on the cast list though).

I wonder how many minor season arcs the writers will simply drop and forget: Allie's Jeff Bezos stalker? Folsom's meth childhood buddy could be a small arc, or not. Nice touch that Allie told him to value childhood friendships.

I enjoyed the COTW. Slightly similar to a CSI episode (season 4?): some Jackass was illegally shooting targets in his backyard, accidentally aims upwards, hits and kills a lady on the street who was with her ex-husband and boyfriend.

My main show in NCIS as Gary Cole is as intriguing as early Gil Grissom as a character imo. But cast nonwithstanding, I have to say CSI is the much better show.

Fancy shots, and good writing with the suspects/killers. This episode made me feel some way with the guilty teen and his grandma. Maybe this even mirrors Folsom's troubled upbringing (sorry writers, no one will dig that deep for this iteration of CSI). NCIS on the other hand, has... Forgettable squadroom cringey banter.

[CheshireCat]

14 hours ago, milkyaqua said:

I'm with the folks who are wondering how long this version is going to lean on the OG team members to maintain interest.  Right now, I don't totally dislike this version but TPTB need to fix some things.  I'm not a fan of shows that rely on character quirks to make a character interesting. 

I think the problem is that the original CSI shows relied on the case and not on character stories. Nowadays, many shows have more complex character stories which works for new shows but I don't think it works for revivals. At least not when one knows the original well as the added character stories take away focus from what used to make those shows. Sure, viewers had favorite characters and the characters had a background and all that but it wasn't very present in the show and viewers tended to tune on because of the COTW and not the character. Now, we're supposed to care about the COTW and the characters.

About the episode: did Allie really ask "who would do something like that" after they found Max? Seriously? Who on the writers' team thought this was a good line?

Uh, would they really smash all the concrete with a hammer? Wouldn't they rather check if something's in the concrete and then be much gentler? I mean, how could they know that they wouldn't accidentally smash the rifle?

Why was everyone calling the woman T(h)eresa like they all knew her? I thought that was weird.

I think it was wrong of Serena to put the blame on the husband. It takes two to tango. He's not solely responsible for the marriage falling apart, he did not tell her to leave him that night, at that minute and he did not tell her to drive that way. She made that choice. It was bad luck that she was where she was when she was there. That's not on the husband and neither is the wife's death. That blame falls on Cash and Cash only. He fired the gun.
I also don't think that a cop should guilt-trip anyone. That doesn't seem ethical.

[Cotypubby]

I don’t care one bit about the personal lives of the CSIs and who is sexing who. WTF was with that stupid scene of the two going at it in the locker room? I started to FF through that. I want interesting cases with weird twisty murders, not soap opera romances. Serena was a bitch to the husband from the very start, blaming and accusing him just because the wife was leaving. I didn’t hear anything about him abusing her or anything so big deal, a couple split up, happens all the time. Doesn’t put one iota of her death on him. Yeah he should have called 911, he still wasn’t responsible for her death. These new CSIs are just written and acted so terribly. I could never imagine Gil acting in such an unprofessional way as these people do.

[UncleChuck]

What was up when someone was talking to Catherine about the problems with children, and she made a reply about her own daughter?  I remember that in the original early seasons, Catherine's daughter was a bit of a handful, but she showed up at the end as a CSI level one--just starting her forensics career.  Are we supposed to forget all about CSI daughter or did something happen to her that has Catherine parent-worried all over again?

[illdoc]

10 minutes ago, UncleChuck said:

Are we supposed to forget all about CSI daughter or did something happen to her that has Catherine parent-worried all over again?

I believe last season (first episode) Brass (?) commented that Catherine was  (a) in London (b) enjoying her grandchild (maybe granddaughter). And that was the only reference (before the last episode) we've had to Lindsey. However, the synopsis for the next episode (Oct 20)

Spoiler

makes reference to an estrangement. From the synopsis: Catherine leads the team through the emotional case, which intensifies her own longing to reconnect with her estranged daughter, Lindsey. 

[Bookworm13]

It took two viewings for me to get through this ep. I just didn’t care about car crash lady, and it was quite obviously an accident. 
 

I had thought it was a writing problem with this show, but now I’m starting to think it’s just that none of the characters are super strong actors who can make bad writing watchable. I don’t remember if they said how much time had passed from the end of season 1 until now, but everyone is mostly still acting like rookie CSI’s and each case is their first. It’s sad that what was once must-watch tv for me has dwindled down to this, although there were a few seasons of OG CSI that were unwatchable as well. 

[GreyBunny]

Terrible writing, much worse than last season. Don’t they have anyone on the writing staff that has a clue about police procedure and investigation? I couldn’t care less about any of the new people and I don’t care about Catherine’s history with the casino or her creepy obsession with her student.

Shut up, Serena, you’re unprofessional and a moron. Please kill her off.

[Raja]

On 10/14/2022 at 4:49 PM, emma675 said:

This one wasn't great. The CoTW was kind of a mess and sloppy. Why on earth would Max be allowed to wander around in the dark searching for evidence without a police escort? There were more than enough cops crowded around her when she was down, every CSI searching should have had a cop with them. 

Josh and Serena bug me (just like Josh and Allie would bug me) and sexing it up in the work locker room is tacky and unprofessional. They don't need team relationships, it's distracting and unnecessary. 

What was the deal with Josh's friend? He lied about why he needed the prints but what was Josh talking about when he said Trey needs to stop going after meth dealers?

With the detective bringing up the why don't you carry at the very beginning and then the bookend of it wouldn't have mattered in this case I guess Max will be kicking in doors with her weapon drawn in front of the SWAT team soon enough.  As it seems as if the Sheriff makes them all go around armed except the boss, be it max or Grissom.

I was thinking the friend is putting his hand in at Dogg bounty hunting rather than a rival dealer's muscle or vigilante