S02.E12: When the Dust Settles

[Snazzy Daisy]

Synopsis:

Quote

Catherine’s day off with her granddaughter gets interrupted when a woman wakes up from a four-year coma and remembers details from the night her sister died.

 

Airdate: February 02, 2023 

Edited January 31, 2023 by SnazzyDaisy

[janeta]

I don’t care about Lindsey and yes, it was wildly unprofessional to have a two year old messing up a crime scene.

Someone remind me what Lindsey does for a living that she can just up and take two weeks off?

Weird but good case.

[Andyourlittledog2]

Not just a crime scene. That particular crime scene. Who would take a two year old that you claim to love and care about to a crime scene filled with gawd knows what in the air and where two women were apparently poisoned four years ago and the scene never cleaned up? Who knows what is floating in that air? Who knows what is growing there, just ready to be touched and fingers put in mouth by a tiny girl?  Not in a million years would I. Just no. NO. Babysitting services revoked, grandma.

Speaking of which, I realize that we need to see the full faces of all the pretty pretty actors but who would take samples of all that fungus and mold and unidentified whateverthehellthat is -- again in a place where two women were poisoned by who knows what --without any protective gear or masks?  Who knows what harm a fungal bloom or what spores some fungus or mold is wafting into the still air now that you are traipsing through there, taking samples and disturbing it all?  The whole premise of the CSIs processing the scene was just alarming to me and took me out of the story itself. 

[Raja]

10 hours ago, janeta said:

Someone remind me what Lindsey does for a living that she can just up and take two weeks off?

She was stripping and doing an Only Fans like porn. As a "hero" portrayed as soft core instead of full penetration.

[slowpoked]

So what was the best friend's motivation for killing (or trying to kill) the sisters again? I got it that she's pocketing money from the product sales, but did they say that she got caught and was going to get fired? If that was the case, wouldn't the surviving sister have said something to that effect after a few days of waking up. I missed her motivation. Why kill the sisters if she wasn't caught and was making good money on her "side hustle"?

[vibeology]

Catherine was so out of pocket taking Hannah to a crime scene. Lindsey was correct to be upset. Just brutal. And I watched the original series and Catherine tried but Lindsey did not have an easy childhood because of many of Catherine's choices. 

What I really love is the friendship between Maxine and Catherine. They work so well together. 

[emma675]

Some things I loved: Folsom and Park being cute with the kid, Max and Catherine's friendship, Beau being stumped by haircare products, Max being a secret hoarder, and the weird crime scene frozen in time.

I didn't like: Catherine taking her granddaughter to a freaking crime scene (Lindsay was right to be pissed), Catherine dumping the grandkid off on coworkers, how openly telegraphed the killer was (I guessed it was her really early on which never happens), how long it took the CSIs to figure out the monster was a person in a gas mask, and the lack of explanation of why the killer actually murdered the sisters. 

[Poohpoohpooh]

I feel sorry for CSI V as it looks like a candidate for cancellation because of its low ratings. It tries so hard: to make the new characters interesting/likable, to tell a multi-something (multi-twisty?), memorable crime case each week. I know this is subjective.

Objectively, the timelapses and other cool camera shots look awesome and takes lots of time and money to create. Compare this with the basic camera work of warhorse hit NCIS.

Marg H. is definitely expensive, I'm sure she's the highest paid cast member now, they're having her go away for that ridiculous Hawaii vacation reason since Greg Sanders will be showing up soon for the nostalgia viewers anyway.

[Snazzy Daisy]

This is a boring episode for me, mainly because the case is so meh and I couldn’t care less about Lindsey. I hope this will be the last time we heard about the mommy-daughter drama. Josh and Chris being playful with Hannah, that’s cute!

Allie’s hairstyle in this episode, it looks ridiculous. 🤦🏻‍♀️

[Linderhill]

3 hours ago, emma675 said:

how long it took the CSIs to figure out the monster was a person in a gas mask

this!  it was the first thing I thought of, especially when she mentioned a snout!

[slowpoked]

Max and Catherine’s friendship is definitely a highlight of the season. 

This would have been much more interesting if it was an actual open case covered in the original CSI that they couldn’t solve, and Catherine gets a second chance at solving it again. Talk about nostalgia.
 

Is it just me or does Chris and Penny rotate episodes? I don’t think I’ve seen them work together in the lab or field?

10 hours ago, Poohpoohpooh said:

Marg H. is definitely expensive, I'm sure she's the highest paid cast member now, they're having her go away for that ridiculous Hawaii vacation reason since Greg Sanders will be showing up soon for the nostalgia viewers anyway.

It could also be that a condition of Marg coming back is that she’s not in all episodes so she has enough time off, and not working too hard. They made her “go” to Berlin as part of the Grace Huang case. So she’s definitely been on and off on the series.

Edited February 4, 2023 by slowpoked

[Linda956]

I was a huge fan of the original series and have all the seasons on DVD.  My problem with this reboot is the characters. In the original series you had 7-8 CSIs out in the field and those in the lab, each doing their own specialty and that's not even including the autopsy area (Dr. Robbins).  The old lab looked smaller, yet it seems that more work was getting done.  In this series, there are too many females and not an even balance.  The lab looks huge, but it seems like it's always the same 2-3 people on the case every week.  You hardly ever see the lab rats doing their jobs related to the case.  The old series had Grissom, Willows, Sara, Nick, Greg, Hodges, Warrick, Wendy, etc.  And there's absolutely no police presence (Captain Brass) in this series at all.  You've got 2-3 women running this gigantic lab and seem to be going out in the field and doing all the lab work as well.  It makes no sense.  And have they ever mentioned whether or not there is a day and night shift? And just a side note, in the final season, Lindsay came to work in the lab as a CSI and gushed about how much she wanted to be there and just a few short years later, she leaves, has a kid and is doing soft porn/stripping?  Do the show runners even bother to check the show's history with regard to its previous characters and their relationship with the show.  Another gripe is that for 15 seasons, Catherine always called her father's hotel the Palermo (sp).  In this series, they've renamed it the Eclipse.  What happened? 

[illdoc]

29 minutes ago, Linda956 said:

Another gripe is that for 15 seasons, Catherine always called her father's hotel the Palermo (sp).  In this series, they've renamed it the Eclipse

Actually, it's always been the Eclipse.

[christie]

Who calls in someone so they can come to work on a four year old case on their day off? Why? Why do this? The case was already inactive for four years, it wasn"t urgent, one day wasn't gonna make a difference. And Catherine could have (and most definitely should have) said "no" but no, she preferred to drag a child to a dangerous crime scene. We need to stop normalising working 24/7. Other than that, I liked this episode (even if it was obvious whodunnit).

[Raja]

17 minutes ago, christie said:

Who calls in someone so they can come to work on a four year old case on their day off? Why? Why do this? The case was already inactive for four years, it wasn"t urgent, one day wasn't gonna make a difference. And Catherine could have (and most definitely should have) said "no" but no, she preferred to drag a child to a dangerous crime scene. We need to stop normalising working 24/7. Other than that, I liked this episode (even if it was obvious whodunnit).

Catherine gave the secret give me a break from this child look?

[christie]

3 hours ago, Linda956 said:

And there's absolutely no police presence (Captain Brass) in this series at all.  

I thought Chavez was the police presence.

[slowpoked]

3 hours ago, Linda956 said:

 In this series, there are too many females and not an even balance.  

I don't see why that's a problem. But just so we actually count the series regulars in the credits, rather than just relying on feels:

Men - Folsom, Park, Finado.

Women - Max, Catherine, Allie, Serena

4 vs. 3 doesn't seem to be "too many females" to me, but different strokes.

3 hours ago, Linda956 said:

that's not even including the autopsy area (Dr. Robbins)

There's a brother-sister tandem in the autopsy room. They're not series regulars, but recurring.

 

3 hours ago, Linda956 said:

You hardly ever see the lab rats doing their jobs related to the case. 

The lab rats are Penny and Finado, although they also go out on the field. Lab rats in the original didn't become series regulars until late in the series. They've always played smaller roles. Again, I attribute it to both pandemic and budget restrictions, especially when you bring back a Marg Helgenberger, who earned 375K/episode when Grissom left. Who knows  how much she was able to negotiate now?

 

3 hours ago, Linda956 said:

The lab looks huge, but it seems like it's always the same 2-3 people on the case every week. 

The original CSI had more characters, yes, but also they had the benefit of a lot of seasons, where they were able to cycle a lot of characters out. This series was started with pandemic restrictions. They're going to have less people than the original, plus salaries are more expensive now than when the original started  back in 2000.

3 hours ago, Linda956 said:

And there's absolutely no police presence (Captain Brass) in this series at all.

That's Detective Sanchez, and she's a series regular. Old CSI had a lot more detectives, yes, on recurring roles, but that's the benefit of a show that has run a lot of episodes over its life.

3 hours ago, Linda956 said:

And have they ever mentioned whether or not there is a day and night shift?

This batch probably works the day shift, since most of their cases are out in the daylight. 

3 hours ago, Linda956 said:

Lindsay came to work in the lab as a CSI and gushed about how much she wanted to be there and just a few short years later, she leaves, has a kid and is doing soft porn/stripping?  Do the show runners even bother to check the show's history with regard to its previous characters and their relationship with the show.

I believe Catherine addressed that earlier when talking to Max, and maybe even Lindsey herself, in an earlier episode when she confronted her mom. Yes, Lindsey used to be a CSI, but it was a career she didn't want, now she's happier with OnlyFans, because it earns her a lot  more money than a CSI. People change. 

 

3 hours ago, Linda956 said:

Catherine always called her father's hotel the Palermo (sp).  In this series, they've renamed it the Eclipse. 

Always been the Eclipse.

[Linderhill]

4 hours ago, slowpoked said:

That's Detective Sanchez, and she's a series regular. Old CSI had a lot more detectives, yes, on recurring roles, but that's the benefit of a show that has run a lot of episodes over its life.

Even in the early seasons there were other detectives besides Brass.  I was wondering why we only ever saw Sanchez when the original recipe had a rotating cast of recurring detectives and cops recurring.  But then I always liked Brass and Sanchez hasn't appealed to me.

[Cotypubby]

23 hours ago, Linderhill said:

this!  it was the first thing I thought of, especially when she mentioned a snout!

Yes, exactly! As soon as she described seeing a figure with a snout, I immediately thought “grey face with long snout in a room filled with poison gas. Gas mask anyone!?” It was really unbelievable that none of them thought that.

I also thought “the female friend did it” as soon as she was featured talking when the victim first woke from the coma. Just the way she was filmed when offering the mint and talking made it obvious that the mint will play a part later, which means she’s the killer. Like the camera was too focused on her or something. 

But my biggest issue was that the whole setup of this episode made no sense and was so dumb!  Every time they showed a print in the dust it was made by something stepping on the dust. Or the arm prints brushing aside the dust. The dust which wasn’t there at the time of the murder… And they tried to say that “oh the dust wouldn’t adhere there because of the oils in prints.” Um, just what kind of “oils” are supposed to be on the soles of shoes?!

God this episode made me so angry with all the levels of idiocy.

[Tachi Rocinante]

Lame, in all aspects.

[lh25]

On 2/4/2023 at 10:17 PM, Cotypubby said:

The dust which wasn’t there at the time of the murder… And they tried to say that “oh the dust wouldn’t adhere there because of the oils in prints.” Um, just what kind of “oils” are supposed to be on the soles of shoes?!

Yeah, I wondered about that as well.  Made no sense to me at all.  And add me to those who thought "gas mask" as soon as the snout was mentioned.

[GreyBunny]

So you take a small child to a fragile crime scene full of fungus and without respirators. Stupid writers.

“How old are you?”

”Pineapples.”

With Careless Catherine for a grandma, I’m not surprised the poor kid is dumber than a bag of hammers.

[Silver-hyren]

On 2/2/2023 at 11:00 PM, janeta said:

I don’t care about Lindsey and yes, it was wildly unprofessional to have a two year old messing up a crime scene

She’s supposed to be two?  Oof I thought she was older.  I haven’t been that interested in the Catherine/Lindsey drama but I was really rooting for Lindsay to turn down Catherine’s offer at the end and cut her out of her life (again?).  Cath was so manipulative begging/bribing her daughter to go on that trip, yet we’re supposed to side with her and think Lindsay was being unreasonable for being mad.

[Chaos Theory]

I’ve stopped posting on police show boards like CSI and Criminal  Minds because I tend to have the unpopular opinion and the stuff I enjoy tend to annoy other people.  I always kinda dug Catherine  Willows because she came from a different place than most people who do go into law enforcement.  She was at one point a high risk (possible) victim herself in several aspects of her life.  It was pure fate that spun her life in a different direction but all that being said she was never a particularly good mother to Lindsay.    Nowhere near horrible but I can see why Lindsay rebels and resents her.    Catherine couldn’t even take a sick day to take care of her own granddaughter.   But then if she did what fun would it be not having a young child at crime scenes?  And yeah a little manipulative trying to buy her daughters forgiveness with a big trip but that is exactly what her own father would have done so it kind of works.   And Catherine  may be a bad parent but she at least wants to be better or says she does.

I find that interesting and on a better show it might be.

Edited February 11, 2023 by Chaos Theory

[CheshireCat]

On 2/6/2023 at 1:27 PM, lh25 said:

Yeah, I wondered about that as well.  Made no sense to me at all.  And add me to those who thought "gas mask" as soon as the snout was mentioned.

I wasn't thinking gas mask but mask in general. The shadow looked like it could have been one of those Venetian bird masks.

I liked the episode, even Allie didn't annoy me in this episode! I thought the episode was well paced and everyone worked well together, except for the scenes with Hannah beyond the very first one. I can't quite put my finger on it but every time Hannah was involved, the scene seemed kind of awkward and not moving along well. Almost as if the actors themselves weren't quite comfortable with having the kid there and not sure how to act with the kid around. I don't know. It just felt like the kid wasn't supposed to be there and broke up the pace or the chemistry or both. (I guess, it's possible that she did break up the pace of filming or something due to the laws around having children on set).
It also didn't make sense to have the kid there. Other than the Catherine-Lindsay drama, it didn't add anything to the story and the Catherine-Lindsay drama doesn't add anything to the story either. I hope they have a nice time in Hawaii, kiss and make-up and that will have been the end of that.

I agree with everyone about Catherine and Maxine. They work really well together.