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“Rookie Blue” recap (5.10 & 5.11): Dropping Bombs

Previously on Rookie Blue, Gail and Holly officially for real for sure broke up, Andy and Sam for real for sure got back together, and our friends at 15 Division met two people who seemed insignificant at the time but surely weren’t.

We begin with McSwarek sexytimes. Not my favorite way to open an episode, but it could have been worse. It could have been better, but it could have been worse. Andy mentions that there is a Commissioner’s Gala tonight, though Sam couldn’t possibly care less about the event. What he does care about, however, is a key, which he presents to Andy like a proud kid presents his macaroni art project. Andy smiles politely and says, “Why don’t you keep that, sweetie?” She then adorably calls herself an untamable stallion and scoots before Sam can point out that actually she’s more like a stuffed pony. After Oliver sends everyone off on their tasks for the day, Andy storms up and demands to know what Duncan is doing there. The rookie is back on duty, and has actually requested to ride with Andy, to which Andy says not even SHE’S that naive. Nick steps in and offers to ride with him in her stead, partly because he’s just a nice guy, partly because he’s already had to help Chloe pick out a dress color for the Commissioner’s Ball five minutes into the shift, and probably partly because he’s still holding a bit of a torch for Officer McNally.

Gail is walking down the hallway when she hears her name. She stops and turns and lo and behold, an angel appears. Holly walks towards her and Gail says, “Hi,” cautiously like maybe this is a trap and BitchTits is going to pop out of door number two. Holly hands her a folder and she says she needs help with a case Gail worked, that there were inconsistencies in the report she needed clarification. Holly says they should probably speak in private and pulls Gail into an interrogation observation room, not unlike the room where they had their first makeout session. Gail starts to point out that she never worked the case on the file when Holly grabs the file out of her hands, tosses it aside, and pulls Gail into a passionate kiss. When they pull apart, Holly realizes that there’s someone interrogation room, but Gail assures her that he only wishes he could have witnessed what we just witnessed. Gail asks for a little clarification, just to make sure that this is really happening, and Holly says that she missed her. (We missed you too, Holly.) Gail asks about her ‘someone else’ that kept her from being able to accept Gail’s beautiful and heartfelt apology last time they spoke, but Holly says that they broke up because she just couldn’t get in the way of this ship any longer. Gail accepts that this is happening for real and pulls her in for another long-overdue kiss. Gail eventually pulls back and says, “Wait,” sounding somewhere between mad at whatever stupid reasonable part herself made her do it and confused as to what is actually happening. She puts physical space between herself and Holly, as if to try to avoid falling Holly’s magnetic pull, and Holly smiles understandingly. They have a lot to talk about, she just wanted to skip to the “can you just be kissing me now” part of the make-up. Holly asks if Gail is free tonight to talk, but she says she has a thing tonight, but how about tomorrow night? Holly heads back to work, smiling like everything’s finally falling into place, but as soon as she leaves, a conflicted look falls over Gail’s face. That conversation seemed all too much like Paige and Emily’s talk on Tuesday, so I hope against all hope that Gail’s “thing” isn’t a date.

Meanwhile, Chloe and Andy are doing work like the most beautiful ship didn’t just set sail back at 15 Division. Chloe, the girl who kissed her ex-husband while wearing a body camera, is telling Andy she’s stupid for not accepting Sam’s key offer when they pull up to the scene of an angry parking attendant shouting after someone who fled without paying. A moment later they hear a boom crash and take off toward the sound of the blast looking for people to save. Andy cuts her hand and way too much attention is put on it for me not to add Andy’s name right under Chloe’s on my “I Fear For Your Life” list.

When Oliver gets to the scene he asks if Chloe’s okay and she mentions Andy’s cut again and says she’s fine but the more she says she’s fine the more I fear for her life.

The boom crash was a bomb, as expected, and Andy thinks that the car that zoomed away right before the crash looked familiar. Wes shows up for backup and starts flirting with Chloe. She starts to nip it in the bud but he gets the point before she even finishes her sentence. He starts to leave but can’t resist one more touch and wipes something off her chin before walking away. And Dov saw the whole thing.

15 Division finds out that the bomb was on a timer, and that the car was a company car, but the girl driving, who thankfully survived the explosion, was a college student. Duncan tries to joke with McNally about his business cards were misprinted so they say “Ducan” when clearly they should have said “Gerald” but Andy is not having it. He tries to defend himself, but she is so beyond done with him, so she storms off.

The squad is talking about the fact that the car belonged the Irish mob and the woman who was driving it was the head of the mob’s daughter when they get a report that another explosion happened across town but this one has fatalities. BroPeck is going to run some suspects in case it’s mob/gang-related and they’re all given people to interrogate.

Andy finally remembers where she recognized the car from; it was from the housing unit they evacuated on Moving Day. Nick remembers they were wearing body cams that day, so they ask Dov to pull up some of the footage to see if they can get eyes on this guy.

In the bullpen, Dov is giving Gail a hard time for checking her phone obsessively but is distracted by the fact that some of the bodycam footage is missing. Luckily, he knows just the guy to get it back. When he steps away to make the call, Gail’s phone goes off and she pounces on it like a lioness on a gazelle. She tells the caller that she’s still on for tonight and looks awfully happy. Which, on one hand, I love seeing Gail happy. On the other hand, this is terrible timing, caller! Holly is back!

Andy finds the car she was looking for on the footage and it turns out the car belongs to the angry orange bike guy. Duncan gets an anonymous tip and follows it, deciding not to tell anyone since everyone is already mad at him anyway, and finds himself at the bike guy’s house. The man rants about the cops a bit, much like he did last time we saw him, and then bonks Duncan right in his Gerald-shaped head. He cuffs him, muttering something about stomping on snakes all the while.

Nick and Andy find out that the man’s name is Theodore McDonald and that the car belongs to his mother. Nick can’t find the rookie so he heads to Ted’s place with Andy. On the way, they look up Ted’s record, which consists of only one instance of disturbing the peace. However, they also find out that his 12-year-old son Brendan died in a bombing four years ago today.

They pull up to Ted’s house and find Duncan handcuffed inside a bomb-strapped car. They call for backup but the timer on the bomb says the rookie has ten minutes to live and the bomb squad is definitely more than ten minutes out. Andy goes outside to make sure the neighbors are clear of the house while Nick chats with Bomb Squad Bailey to try to defuse the bomb.

Duncan realizes that he might be dead in six minutes’ time so he radios Andy and apologizes, says he was coerced into recording her, etc. Before he’s finished, his radio battery really does die, which proves that either karma exists or the universe has a sick sense of humor.

Nick succeeds in stopping the bomb because he IS the bomb and backup arrives too little too late. Among the newcomers is Marlo Cruz, who will be acting as intelligence (and beauty) on the case. After shift, Gail heads to a park where she meets a girl who says it’s nice to meet her in person. They go back and forth and it definitely sounds like an internet date but before my heart can explode, Gail asks about Sophie, the little girl she’s taken a liking to ever since she met her in the laundry room where the girl’s mother died. It turns out, Gail wants to adopt Sophie! I could never in a million years imagined Gail as a mother, but only because I would have tried to imagine her with an infant, asking the wailing baby to shut up or something. But over the five seasons, the most consistent thing about Gail besides her sass has always been her protectiveness and kindness and softness towards children, so the fact that she wants to adopt an eight year old girl makes so much sense to me, even though I never would have predicted it on my own.

The woman warns Gail that the adoption process isn’t quick, and it isn’t easy, but Gail is ready.

The next episode begins with Andy showing up at the crime scene at Ted’s house with coffee for Swarek, but Marlo had already got him some. Marlo pulls Andy aside and promises she’s just here for the case, not to sink the McSwarek ship, but Andy just says they should focus on catching the bad guy, and makes Sam promise this won’t rocket them out of the honeymoon phase of their relationship. Diaz shows up, back from his “vacation” in the “desert” where it is very “dry” and I don’t know if that conversation was a cop thing or what but it was so the opposite of subtle. Diaz offers to take some court transcripts they found back to the station, and finds a picture of Ted’s son on the way.

Back at 15, Chloe is trying to cry in such a way that the tears fall off her face instead of run down it because she’s cute like that. Dov broke up with her because she lied about kissing Wes then tried to hide it instead of just coming clean, but it’s okay because she’s going to win him back at the Commissioner’s Gala. Andy asks if she’s okay and Chloe defends the act of crying, saying it’s perfectly natural, just like when you get cut, your blood clots WHICH ISN’T FUNNY COMING FROM YOU, CHLOE.

Andy asks Chloe to holster her weapon and then tells her that the Gala is cancelled while running out the door. Duncan finishes giving his co-cops his statement on what happened and his dad leads him out, demanding 24/7 security for his son, specifically asking for Nick and taking a dig at the white shirt Oliver hates so much.

NicklePeck are both assigned to the job and Gail is chewing on a popsicle stick pensively. She asks Nick if he’ll be her reference for something, but won’t give him details about it, then throws the popsicle stick out of the car and onto the ground. He tries to make her pick it up but Gail isn’t one to follow orders. So Nick gets out to get it himself…knocking his car door into a woman on a bike in the process. As they emerge from the mess of cake and limbs, Nick realizes the woman is the same girl who bought the toothbrushes for him at the convenience store. (Fun fact, she’s also the same girl who starred in Being Erica, which means she has made out with Anna Silk.)

The girl is pissed but Nick is taking this opportunity to try to flirt his way out of it, saying it can’t be a coincidence. He thinks it’s fate, I think she’s a serial killer. But then again, I think everyone’s a serial killer until proven otherwise. On TV. Mostly. Anyway, Gail is absolutely tickled by this entire awkward encounter, and is honking the horn and taking video and giggling her precious Gail Peck giggle. Dov and Marlo find out that there was something off about the case surrounding the bombing in which Ted’s son died, and it’s clear from Ted’s notes that he thought there were shady dealings going on behind the scenes. They decide they should probably make sure the judge on the case is safe, and come to find out, it’s her wedding day. They find the bomb in the car that was carrying her nanny and daughter to the big event.

Marlo spots Ted on some CCTV footage and sends Andy and Oliver to the cemetery where Ted’s son is buried, where they find him at Brendan’s grave. He is clearly a little off his rocker, rambling a bit, but he says goodbye to his son’s headstone and sings a party song about putting your hands up while Oliver cuffs him.

Swarek interrogates Ted, but Ted is teeming with contempt for Sam and his ilk. He says “pain must be matched by pain” which is a terrifying and sociopathic way to look at things, and starts to tell stories about his son. When Swarek tells Ted that they stopped the judge’s bomb before it went off, he just says he has more things up his sleeve.

Ted tells Sam that he’ll confess to the location of other bombs if they reopen the investigation, but warns him that the corruption is deep. Swarek starts to listen to him talk but Duncan’s commissioner dad comes in and smashes Ted’s face into the table, demanding to know where the bombs are. Ted just looks up at him coolly and starts beatboxing. You can’t reason with crazy.

Andy realizes that Duncan wasn’t a random vic, but that Ted is targeting the children of everyone he holds responsible for the people who murdered his son not being caught. Sam gets the names of the next kid off Ted, who is more than willing to offer the names of the people he thinks are dirty, and Sam sets off to find him, but the kid isn’t where he’s supposed to be because he happened to skip school on this, the day his life is in danger. What’s worse, the bomb isn’t even in the car that they HAVE located, but is in the kid’s backpack. Luckily, the kid posted a video of himself being not in school on the internet, and his father was able to identify the location and they manage to save him (and all his friends) just in time.

Swarek asks the commissioner about the suspicious things Ted pointed out to him, including his connections with the Irish Mob, but the commissioner is slick and slimy, and probably the Big Bad of next season.

Andy walks past a little Marlo side-eye and into the evidence room when BOOM. A bomb goes off and blows the room and possibly Andy into a billion pieces.

The lights flicker and an alarm goes off, so Sam cuffs Ted and goes to see what happened. He runs to the evidence room but finds Andy miraculously alive, though temporarily hard of hearing. She looks at him and realizes that he’s crying, but he insists that he just has smoke in his eye. Sure, Sam, right. And the courier was sick, right? Anyway, Andy is fine and walks away with her face in tact and now thinks she’s invincible. After shift, Nick runs into the toothbrush girl again, but this time it’s no coincidence. He noticed this bar’s sticker all over her bike. Which I hope means she works there and isn’t just a fangirl for a bar she frequents. Also, I almost want to think this is sweet because it’s Nick but it’s actually a little creepy and stalkerish? But she says she also has been thinking about him so I guess it’s alright. They end up kissing outside the bar, but when she finds out that he’s a cop, she hops on her bike and rides away faster than Paige McCullers in a rainstorm.

When Sam gets back to the interrogation room, he finds Ted dead on the floor from having slit his wrists with a little razor. Oliver calls Diaz into his room to find out how exactly Ted got hold of this little razor, and Diaz swears he searched him and didn’t see the razor, but is willing to admit he could have made a mistake and is willing to take responsibility for it. I guess rehab did him some good after all.

Chloe walks up to Dov wearing her red dress she was going to wear to the Gala, but Dov says that her beauty and cleavage doesn’t change anything, and unless she can hitch a ride in the TARDIS and go back and tell Dov right away when Wes kissed her, she’s pretty much out of luck. Gail is in the locker room gargling mouthwash when Holly comes strolling in, and they kiss all casual and cute. And I’m like 70% sure that this is the “tomorrow night” that they were going to talk, as in I’m pretty sure Holly is here to pick Gail up for said night and talk, which means they fell back into the casual girlfriend kisses with such ease, it’s enough to make my heart soar. They both have big news to share with the other, and Holly lets Gail go first. Gail starts off facing away from Holly and tells her that she wants to adopt Sophie, the little girl she’s been visiting every weekend since her mother died. She turns to face Holly, giddy with excitement, saying it’s a long process and she doesn’t want to get her hopes up, but she’s ready to be this little girl’s mother. Holly sits down, smiling a little, but also looking conflicted. She doesn’t seem all that surprised at Gail’s decision, but she’s struck by the timing of it all. She just accepted a job in San Francisco, and was going to ask Gail to come with her. She leaves in two weeks. Which is enough to make my heart sore. I do have one wee problem with this. If my aforementioned timeline is correct, they’re barely back together, so I’m not sure why Holly would think Gail would come with her to California. I know Holly and Gail are both a bit impulsive, but Gail loves her job, and she might not be close to most of her family, but they’re still here, including her brother, who she IS close to. So I’m not sure why Holly thought Gail would come with, though I am not surprised Holly took the job, since she’s smart enough not to make big life decisions based on a relationship that hasn’t had the forever conversation yet. I kind of need this to go one of two ways. I either need Holly decide not to go, even though I don’t think that is the kind of thing Holly would or should do, or I need them to have a clean break. I can’t have Gail being a single mom in a long-distance relationship, I can’t have Holly be an off-screen love interest. I need Gail to be as happy as her cynicism will allow her to be, even if that means being with someone other than Holly, even though Holly leaving would hurt her (and me) all over again. Also I’d miss Aliyah O’Brien’s face a hell of a lot. I guess time will tell.

Steve Peck had apologized to Nash earlier, but Bomb Squad Bailey has been telling her Grimm’s fairytales all episode, telling her not to live in fantasy, but to go for something real. I’m hoping he’s just acting as a fairy godfather to get Nash and BroPeck back together, though I wouldn’t hate it if his smooth, soothing voice was around a bit more next season.

Andy and Sam share another cute kissing-in-bed scene, much like the one that opened this two-hour season finale, but Andy’s a little sore. They do appear to be still in their honeymoon, phase, but I fear that might be about to screech to a halt. After telling Dov not to give up on Chloe, Marlo drops a sonogram.

What did you think of “Fragments” and “Everlasting”? Talk to me, friends. Help me process.

Thanks to everyone who tweeted #GailPlusOne this season! Hopefully next year, they will air on the same night in Canada and the US again so we can all tweet together and we can include a tweet roundup in the recaps.

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