S01.E07: One of Us

[chitowngirl]

Morgan agrees to show Ava around the LAPD, but things quickly take a dangerous turn when the precinct is held hostage by the friends of a recently convicted man. FALL FINALE

Edited November 10 by chitowngirl

[AnimeMania]

 
TRISTEN MACDONALD

ALLIE PEREZ

MERRICK MCCARTHA

MAURICE MARVEL MEREDITH

CHRISTOPHER MATTHEW COOK

MICHAEL TROTTER

ADDISON TIMLIN

DIANA JASTRAM

Next New Episode and Time: January 7, 2025     ABC     9pm       

[agathapenny]

Man, I could not love this show more.

I love Morgan and her family, I love the cases, I love Karadec, I love the supporting cast...everything is just top notch. 

Morgan's banter and flirting with the janitor is really fun, and I presume they'll have some kind of relationship going forward, but I confess I think she has great chemistry with Karadec and would love to see them move towards a romance in later seasons (because this will be renewed, damn it, I won't accept any other outcome). But I think there are a lot of other things that will come first, like finding out what happened to Ava's dad. And I'm here for all of it.

The previews for new episodes in the new year look great.

[Annber03]

Yay, Morgan got a desk :D! 

I liked how she connected with the woman this episode. I liked how the women in general got to be awesome and helpful here, from Morgan's obvious abilities to Daphne with that quick thinking kick to the leg to take the guy down to Ava doing her part to help out (and I like how Morgan used that as an opportunity to get Ava out of the building , too).

It was nice to see the janitor again, too. 

Also, while I totally sympathized with Karadec's plea to get information on that patient, it was rather nice to have a show where someone held to the strict rules of HIPAA and left it at that. 

Hate that we have to wait until January now for the show's return, but I look forward to seeing what the back half of this season has planned. 

 

[shapeshifter]

This was a good episode to lead up to the winter break. 
Last week's was the first real departure from the French scripts, and I thought it floundered a bit, whereas this one seemed to find its way. 

I watched the 7th episode of the French original this past week. It also had Ava hanging out with Morgan for the day with the police, but that was the extent of the similarity.

[dancingdreamer]

I usually  like all these episodes,  but this one was really  good. I loved how Morgan spoke to the woman who was pregnant one way( the hostage taking) and another  way when she saw her outside. I loved that momma bear! 

She has her own desk now, somehow  I do not think she'll  be sitting  at  it very long, if at all.

I love the janitor, he's  cute, and Morgan thinks he's cute as well! 

 

[shura]

I thought it was pretty bad if you like to watch things that make sense.  From that Risk game that you can win by moving your troops while nobody's watching because they are arguing about the tactics of 'Alexander the Blessed' to someone thinking that taking a bunch of hostages and threatening to shoot them is a good way to make the police find the 'real' murderer (like, today?) to Morgan mocking the guy for believing that his bomb is real while said guy is pointing a quite real gun at her (right after the murderer was caught and the guy knocked out his partner because... reasons).

And the dialog!  Good God...

"There are others in this building that are there to keep your brothers and sisters in blue at bay."

"The man who saved your life is behind enemy lines right now." 

"Seems to me you've got bigger worries than a mother hugging her daughter, considering the situation we are in." (like what? seems like the situation is what they've been planning all along, no?)

"That girl was our insurance policy... and you let her go!" (well, she was never part of the plan, so we are back to the good plan we had all along, no?)

My favorite part though was when Jeremy got pissed at having to sit like idiots in the room with the hostages after having taken those hostages and forcing them to sit in the room with him.

[EtheltoTillie]

I will handwave all of that as no procedural is realistic. This one is fun. I’m sorry we have to wait till January.

 

[shapeshifter]

8 hours ago, dancingdreamer said:

I love the janitor, he's  cute, and Morgan thinks he's cute as well! 

Really nice twist reveal that last week Morgan left a fake phone number and then great secondary twist that Janitor/Student bonded with the elderly lady whose phone number it was.

[DanaK]

Good episode

[DearEvette]

And for a second ep in a row the show begins with one of my favorite bangers.  The song that is playing when the guy is jogging and finds the dead guy in the trailer is 'Point and Kill' by Little Simz.  I had this song on repeat the Summer of 2022. 

For all that this was a tense episode, it still didn't feel heavy.  This isn't that show.  This is a show where even in the 'tense' moments there is still an undertone of a comfort show.  You know things are gonna be alright and in ep. 7 they are not gonna kill off anyone important.

I liked the structure of it, the idea of them re-solving a murder under these conditions. The people inside and the people outside working together. And the one last wild card guy for 11th hour drama. 

It was also cute how the janitor dude called the wrong number and became friends with the bowling ladies.  I would love to see that as their first date!

Bonus points for Morgan verbally slapping that woman down.  And extra bonus points for the last bit with Garrett Dillahunt's character unable to give her any outright praise but acknowledging it with the desk was fun.

[dancingdreamer]

3 hours ago, shapeshifter said:

Really nice twist reveal that last week Morgan left a fake phone number and then great secondary twist that Janitor/Student bonded with the elderly lady whose phone number it was.

Yes, that was fun.  Edna wasn't  it? 

[shapeshifter]

54 minutes ago, DearEvette said:

For all that this was a tense episode, it still didn't feel heavy.  This isn't that show.  This is a show where even in the 'tense' moments there is still an undertone of a comfort show.  You know things are gonna be alright and in ep. 7 they are not gonna kill off anyone important.

Yes, having Morgan's 3 kids be seen in each episode kind of signals this isn't going terribly dark, at least not on a regular basis. 
Often viewers complain about kids included in otherwise adult shows, but here they work as a sort of distinctive flavoring in the show's recipe.

[ams1001]

17 hours ago, Annber03 said:

Yay, Morgan got a desk :D! 

Which she will never, ever sit at. 😄

[iMonrey]

I still enjoy this show but I have to agree with @shura that this one stretched credibility, even for this show. I didn't really follow the case very well because they didn't really show us how the wrong guy was arrested or what he had to say, we saw snippets and heard references but I wasn't clear on why he was the accused let alone why the cops thought it was an open and shut case. Nor do I understand what the hostage takers planned to do even if they were successful in freeing their friend. I also didn't understand why Ava hid in the janitorial closet instead of getting the hell out of the building like her mother texted her, while everyone around her was heading for the nearest exit. You hear a gunshot down the hall, you get the hell out with everyone else when you have the chance. It just made her look really dumb. For all she knew her mother had already made her own way out of the building.

I can appreciate that they tried to do something a little different because this show is pretty formulaic and gimmicky and leans heavily on the appeal of the cast. But I do think the writing needs more attention going forward.

[seacliffsal]

It almost seemed like the hostage takers didn't realize that they would be going to jail no matter what.  Also, the portrayal of the Staff Sargeant hostage taker was inconsistent with his rank.  He seemed a rank amateur with no crisis training.  I didn't like the story line but I did like that they were able to piece together what had happened.  And, I so want an episode to feature the date between Morgan and Janitor and the bowling team.  THAT would be a great episode...

[shapeshifter]

1 hour ago, seacliffsal said:

It almost seemed like the hostage takers didn't realize that they would be going to jail no matter what. 

I don't know about real life, but that's Standard Operation Procedure for hostage takers on TV.

[kaygeeret]

Absolutely the best new show of the year so far.  (St. Denis Med needs some more viewing.)

GREAT episode

[KaveDweller]

I didn't understand why the hostage takers took such extreme measures.

They thought their friend was wrongly arrested, but that only happened a week ago. Why not try hiring a PI to investigate and bringing that information to the police? Or getting a really good lawyer? At least try both of those things before jumping to committing a pretty serious crime.

[SoMuchTV]

16 minutes ago, KaveDweller said:

I didn't understand why the hostage takers took such extreme measures.

They thought their friend was wrongly arrested, but that only happened a week ago. Why not try hiring a PI to investigate and bringing that information to the police? Or getting a really good lawyer? At least try both of those things before jumping to committing a pretty serious crime.

I thought maybe I’d missed something - it really was just a week later? They were acting like the suspect had been arrested, tried, convicted, and sitting on death row!  Goodness, put your efforts towards getting him the best defense team!

[preeya]

Didn't this guy play Stabler's younger brother on L&O Organized Crime?

[agathapenny]

9 hours ago, DearEvette said:

For all that this was a tense episode, it still didn't feel heavy.  This isn't that show.  This is a show where even in the 'tense' moments there is still an undertone of a comfort show.  You know things are gonna be alright and in ep. 7 they are not gonna kill off anyone important.

Yes! That's why I love this show. It's what I look for in my television viewing. The trend towards populating all the shows with unlikeable characters who do horrible things to each other and killing them off at random just to be edgy makes me tired and tune out. 

I watch TV to uwind, escape an increasingly depressing real world, and enjoy myself. 

[ams1001]

20 minutes ago, preeya said:

Didn't this guy play Stabler's younger brother on L&O Organized Crime?

I just looked up the episode cast; his name is Michael Trotter and he played Joseph Stabler, Jr. on L&O:OC (I've never watched that version).

Also saw that this episode was directed by James Roday Rodriguez (who I only really know from A Million Little Things).

[Yeah No]

Somehow despite all the unrealistic aspects I enjoyed this episode very much. I know that's very inconsistent of me as I often complain about episodes like this for their unrealism. But good entertainment always gets my vote.

I loved Morgan's desk. It's straight out of the 1950s. There was a desk like that where I worked in the 1980s. They were indestructible. I pictured them pulling it out of the basement, lol.

Too bad we have to wait until January for the rest of the season.

[CeeBeeGee]

9 hours ago, shapeshifter said:

Yes, having Morgan's 3 kids be seen in each episode kind of signals this isn't going terribly dark, at least not on a regular basis. 
Often viewers complain about kids included in otherwise adult shows, but here they work as a sort of distinctive flavoring in the show's recipe.

And my God, is that baby cute. I'm not even much of a baby person but I just love how she's always there, like she's part of a crew or something, goggling at everything the way babies do.

 

3 hours ago, KaveDweller said:

I didn't understand why the hostage takers took such extreme measures.

They thought their friend was wrongly arrested, but that only happened a week ago. Why not try hiring a PI to investigate and bringing that information to the police? Or getting a really good lawyer? At least try both of those things before jumping to committing a pretty serious crime.

Yeah, it did seem to happen a little fast.

[incandescent]

I've never liked a procedural main character's children as much as I like Morgan's. Any other show, my eyes would have been rolling into the back of my head that the kid didn't evacuate as told.

[possibilities]

I liked that she wanted to spend the day with her mom. What teenager wants that? I also liked that they decided to make her brave and loyal-- even if what she did was also reckless and stupid. Since they made the son to be the kind of smart that their mom is, I like that they gave the daughter something that echoes Morgan's personality, and showed that the two of them are also close and very bonded. 

Count me among those who find the family on this show to be really compelling, and to be very surprised that I do.

I wonder if the writers are all women or something.

[Annber03]

15 minutes ago, possibilities said:

Since they made the son to be the kind of smart that their mom is, I like that they gave the daughter something that echoes Morgan's personality, and showed that the two of them are also close and very bonded. 

That emotional moment between them was a perfect example of that in action. I really saw the similarities between them so strongiy in that moment. I thought that was  really well done and nicely acted. 

[peachmangosteen]

I haven't been that into this show so far but I loved this episode.

9 hours ago, possibilities said:

I wonder if the writers are all women or something.

You made me curious so I checked TVDb. Of the 9 episodes they have writers listed for, 4 are men and 4 are women.

Edited November 14 by peachmangosteen

[iMonrey]

On 11/13/2024 at 9:01 AM, EtheltoTillie said:

I will handwave all of that as no procedural is realistic.

But then you are just conceding that the writing is bad. There are fantasy and sci-fi shows that put more effort into their logic. Just because we like the actors and the characters doesn't mean we should have to hand-wave weak writing. The characters are well drawn, they deserve better than that. 

[DearEvette]

1 hour ago, iMonrey said:

But then you are just conceding that the writing is bad. There are fantasy and sci-fi shows that put more effort into their logic. Just because we like the actors and the characters doesn't mean we should have to hand-wave weak writing. The characters are well drawn, they deserve better than that.

I think this is a valid point.

But it is just as valid for a person to decide what their threshold is for enjoyment and engagement.

I have had this very same discussion in my various book  groups where we talk about technical writing skills vs. storytelling.  Some can't get past bad writing, but others argue that a well told story with vivid characterizations can camouflage bad writing.

I am somewhere in the middle.  Egregious writing and logic flaws that are apparent to me can derail a good story.  But no amount of excellent writing can make boring or tired story enjoyable.  Basically I go with vibes.

[shura]

18 hours ago, KaveDweller said:

I didn't understand why the hostage takers took such extreme measures.

They thought their friend was wrongly arrested, but that only happened a week ago. Why not try hiring a PI to investigate and bringing that information to the police? Or getting a really good lawyer? At least try both of those things before jumping to committing a pretty serious crime.

The more I think of it, even though the hostage takers demanded that the police find the real murderer and release their friend, they only needed their friend to be released.  They had no way of knowing anything about the reopened investigation or its results.  The police didn’t have to do anything but simply could have released the friend (keeping him under surveillance) and told them that the real murderer has been caught, so please release the hostages, thank you very much.

[Chit Chat]

On 11/12/2024 at 10:11 PM, Annber03 said:

Also, while I totally sympathized with Karadec's plea to get information on that patient, it was rather nice to have a show where someone held to the strict rules of HIPAA and left it at that. 

The lady didn't have to be so rude and just hang up on him though.  I would hang up on some random person calling, but if it's the police, I'd at least be civil and remind them of the proper procedure (although he already knew that.)

Morgan's skirts are getting shorter by the episode!  A mini skirt for an episode where she's getting up and down off of the floor.  How appropriate.  🙄

I love Judy Reyes, but they write her character in a way that sometimes she seems like she's 10 steps behind her detectives and doesn't quite know what to do.  I hope they'll do better by her and write her in a way that shows she knows what's going on.

It's a decent show, despite all of the ridiculous situations, but I'll keep it on my watchlist.  

 

[Sarah 103]

22 hours ago, seacliffsal said:

And, I so want an episode to feature the date between Morgan and Janitor and the bowling team.  THAT would be a great episode...

Same here. It would be entertaining if she can't focus on the date because they haven't solved the case yet.  

15 hours ago, possibilities said:

 also liked that they decided to make her brave and loyal-- even if what she did was also reckless and stupid. Since they made the son to be the kind of smart that their mom is, I like that they gave the daughter something that echoes Morgan's personality, and showed that the two of them are also close and very bonded. 

That's a really great point. There was an earlier episode where Ava felt like she didn't have any of her mother's qualities, and as it turns out Ava was wrong about herself and she does have some her mother's positive traits. She has her mother's bravery and courage.  

[Raja]

16 hours ago, Yeah No said:

Somehow despite all the unrealistic aspects I enjoyed this episode very much. I know that's very inconsistent of me as I often complain about episodes like this for their unrealism. But good entertainment always gets my vote.

 

If everything was realistic but then they drop it for a single story then I get annoyed. My first example being the first TV modern gunfighter that I remember Starsky of "and Hutch" fame suddenly firing a warning shot straight up in the air on the very special episode where he is investigated for shooting a juvenile gunman 

[EtheltoTillie]

18 minutes ago, Sarah 103 said:

Same here. It would be entertaining if she can't focus on the date because they haven't solved the case yet.  

That's a really great point. There was an earlier episode where Ava felt like she didn't have any of her mother's qualities, and as it turns out Ava was wrong about herself and she does have some her mother's positive traits. She has her mother's bravery and courage.  

She actually has plenty of ordinary smarts, even though she might not have the eidetic memory "genius" thing.  She knew to text her mother about what was going on.  That was very smart. 

Edited November 14 by EtheltoTillie

[chaifan]

3 hours ago, Chit Chat said:

I love Judy Reyes, but they write her character in a way that sometimes she seems like she's 10 steps behind her detectives and doesn't quite know what to do.  I hope they'll do better by her and write her in a way that shows she knows what's going on.

I agree.  I like what little of the character we've seen, I like Judy Reyes.  I think she's being underutilized so far.  I was hoping that we'd see her each week solving a little more of the puzzle about the ex's disappearance.  The first two episodes (I think) had her finding small bits of info, and I don't think it's been mentioned since. 

On the discussion of "realism" in these shows...  reality, for the most part, is boring, at least from an outside viewer's perspective.  And in the world of cops, hospitals, lawyers, etc., reality is very very slow moving.  We have to accept tv versions of these environments where lawsuits go to trial in a week, murders get solved in a few days, and weird shit is always going on in ER's.  (OK, maybe that last one is true, I really don't know.)  So I don't always chalk it up to bad writing.  Not to say there isn't a whole lot of bad, or what I call lazy writing, out there in TV land.  I also think that there are so many changes made to scripts during the process, not to mention post-filming edits for time, that a well written script can turn into a jumbled mess by the time it hits the air.  If everything else in a show clicks for me, I'm much more willing to handwave that type of stuff away. 

Oh, and on that note... I SO knew that the dog in the beginning of the episode was Chekhov's dog.  I knew he'd come back in play somehow.  I really thought he would end up biting one of the hostage takers, or something like that.  But I like how Morgan knew the dog would have reacted to bomb chemicals.  It's stuff like this that makes me like this show - new twists on old tropes, I guess.

 

[possibilities]

I think we all nitpick or don't nitpick different things at different times. I think that's fine. I don't even know why some things do or don't bother me, some days. It's all part of the gestalt.

[Yeah No]

4 hours ago, possibilities said:

I think we all nitpick or don't nitpick different things at different times. I think that's fine. I don't even know why some things do or don't bother me, some days. It's all part of the gestalt.

Sometimes it depends on my mood. I've been a little on edge lately and actually more inclined to nitpick shows but somehow this episode didn't bother me. So I find that significant. I liked how it drew me in and put me on the edge of my seat. I don't watch too many shows that can do that to me anymore. And Morgan's interactions with her daughter were truly touching and well acted.

[gibasi]

On 11/13/2024 at 9:47 AM, shura said:

I thought it was pretty bad if you like to watch things that make sense.  From that Risk game that you can win by moving your troops while nobody's watching because they are arguing about the tactics of 'Alexander the Blessed' to someone thinking that taking a bunch of hostages and threatening to shoot them is a good way to make the police find the 'real' murderer (like, today?) to Morgan mocking the guy for believing that his bomb is real while said guy is pointing a quite real gun at her (right after the murderer was caught and the guy knocked out his partner because... reasons).

And the dialog!  Good God...

"There are others in this building that are there to keep your brothers and sisters in blue at bay."

"The man who saved your life is behind enemy lines right now." 

"Seems to me you've got bigger worries than a mother hugging her daughter, considering the situation we are in." (like what? seems like the situation is what they've been planning all along, no?)

"That girl was our insurance policy... and you let her go!" (well, she was never part of the plan, so we are back to the good plan we had all along, no?)

My favorite part though was when Jeremy got pissed at having to sit like idiots in the room with the hostages after having taken those hostages and forcing them to sit in the room with him.

A million times this! This episode was my least favorite so far. I like the show and I am already giving it a pass on a zillion things but this plot line was really bad. And it was just so disjointed. Morgan and her group in the squadron. Karodec and the lieutenant in the trailer except when Karodec is dashing all over the city to investigate. A show can't rely totally on cast chemistry to keep me coming back. The take my kid to work day and everyone is taken hostage is a tired old story and they didn't even attempt to make it make sense. 

[Shelbie]

I am really glad they didn’t end on a cliffhanger like I expected them to. The case was wrapped up and the main characters were safe.

[ams1001]

3 hours ago, Shelbie said:

I am really glad they didn’t end on a cliffhanger like I expected them to. The case was wrapped up and the main characters were safe.

Me, too. I was hopeful because they so far have not done that, but also it's the fall finale or whatever so I was afraid they'd leave us hanging to bring us back next year.

[shura]

19 hours ago, chaifan said:

Oh, and on that note... I SO knew that the dog in the beginning of the episode was Chekhov's dog.  I knew he'd come back in play somehow.  I really thought he would end up biting one of the hostage takers, or something like that.  But I like how Morgan knew the dog would have reacted to bomb chemicals.  It's stuff like this that makes me like this show - new twists on old tropes, I guess.

The thing about that special additive to plastic explosives that dogs are supposed to react to is that, well, it’s an additive and can be left out when you are making those explosives.  It would be illegal to do that, per the Montreal Convention Morgan mentioned, but certainly not impossible.  So if we have an untrained dog that is not barking at something, that in itself doesn’t mean that there is no bomb there.  Maybe that particular dog was a trained bomb-sniffing dog, I don’t know, but in that case Morgan’s info would be irrelevant since they are trained to sniff out the explosives themselves.

Here’s a great article on training bomb-sniffing dogs - https://science.howstuffworks.com/bomb-sniffing-dog.htm

[TV Anonymous]

Genuine question, do they call convenience store 'bodega' in Los Angeles?

[AnimeMania]

42 minutes ago, TV Anonymous said:

Genuine question, do they call convenience store 'bodega' in Los Angeles?

I think "bodega" is more of a Spanish language thing than a region thing.

[Raja]

1 hour ago, TV Anonymous said:

Genuine question, do they call convenience store 'bodega' in Los Angeles?

I have never heard it used except on TV, but then I grew up in a Black and Japanese neighborhood with limited Latino residents. But Latinos tend to be the first or second largest ethnicity in most neighborhoods countywide. Mini market would be the term I have always heard, especially after the Rodney King riots when the general stores attached to liquor stores got burned out and the mini market with a lower percentage of liquor sales replaced some of them. But mostly the gas station linked stores as a smaller mini market took a big chunk of that market.

[chitowngirl]

I’ve never heard the term used in Chicago…but a lot in NYC, Brooklyn in particular. It’s the borough I’m most familiar with.

[possibilities]

On 11/15/2024 at 2:21 PM, shura said:

Maybe that particular dog was a trained bomb-sniffing dog, I don’t know, but in that case Morgan’s info would be irrelevant since they are trained to sniff out the explosives themselves.

Didn't she say that the dog not reacting meant no explosives? I assume it was a trained dog and not some random pup who just happened to be in the police station.

 

I totally missesd that the wrongly accused friend had only been arrested a week ago. I thought he was in jail, false,y convicted, on death row and on the verge of being executed, from the way his friends were acting.

It takes a lot of money to hire a PI, and usually also to get a really competent, dedicated attorney to take your case, so I get not going that route. But I also thought the friends were basically of the school of "we're trained for military action, that's what we do in all situations"-- i.e. off their rockers, and using the same skills in every situation.

[Annber03]

11 minutes ago, possibilities said:

But I also thought the friends were basically of the school of "we're trained for military action, that's what we do in all situations"-- i.e. off their rockers, and using the same skills in every situation.

Yeah, that's kinda how I saw them, too. They were desperate and already prone to reckless behavior as it was, so they just weren't going to bother going the legal route to get what they wanted anyway. 

[shapeshifter]

4 hours ago, possibilities said:

…But I also thought the friends were basically of the school of "we're trained for military action, that's what we do in all situations"-- i.e. off their rockers, and using the same skills in every situation.

4 hours ago, Annber03 said:

Yeah, that's kinda how I saw them, too. They were desperate and already prone to reckless behavior as it was, so they just weren't going to bother going the legal route to get what they wanted anyway. 

Maybe they’ll get off on some sort of mental duress plea with a diagnosis of PTSD?