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“Rizzoli & Isles” Subtext Recap (5.08): You want I should whack him?

You know sometimes when you meet your girlfriend’s friends for the first time and you’re like, “Really, honey? Really?” Well Jane is having that experience, times 100. Prof. Beard is rambling on with a story about how he left his fly down in class one time and couldn’t decide whether to zip it up or leave it. Wow, dude. You really know how to talk to lesbians.

Jane and Maura do their polite laugh. You know the laugh. The one that says, “God, I wish guys would just take the hint and leave us alone.” But, alas, they both know this step is important. It’s the long-delayed beard introduction. From his nervous chatter to his clammy forehead, this guy is clearly trying too hard. I mean, you can’t blame him. You know Maura probably pays him an extravagant Beard Stipend.

Jane says — despite his inappropriate wardrobe malfunction stories — the meeting with Prof. Beard is going well. Except for one thing — Maura. So Jane splashes a little cold water on her to perk her up. Or at least annoy her with water spots to elicit some sort of human emotion. Poor thing, she is probably just exhausted from auditioning beards all these years.

Prof. Beard returns to the table and Maura decides to share her own funny story. Of course, it involves Jane. It’s about that time they went to the Adirondacks. Jane levels her eyes at her girlfriend and gives her a “Don’t you dare”-under her breath. And then Maura starts her story like this, “Jane and I had never tried it…”

Oh, honey child. Gather round. Bring popcorn. This is gonna be good.

The next day Jane and Maura arrive together at the crime scene. (Woman shot outside a nightclub when she took a smoke break — see, kids, smoking really does kill.) Maura is more interested in how Jane felt about Prof. Beard. She asks, for the millionth time, if Jane really liked him.

Jane finally gives her an honest, “No.” Because the first seventeen “Yeses” were apparently unconvincing. Jane knows in this complicated game of hide-and-seek there is no real right answer when it comes to whether you like the person your secret girlfriend is pretending to date so you two can carry on your closeted relationship.

The team tries to track down the victim’s husband — he is the head of a hot new start-up tech company so we all know we’re going to hate him immediately. Korsak and Jane go to check on him at his hotel and find a bullet hole in his door’s peephole. So I guess we don’t have enough time to hate him.

Meanwhile, Jane and Korsak chit-chat about his preparation for the lieutenant’s exam. One of the books goes into the behavior of cops. And Jane tells him it’s easy, “We’re pains in the asses.” Poor Maura, doesn’t she know it.

While it’s weird to say about someone who is bending over a guy with an eye socket that looks like hamburger meat, Maura looks lovely. I’m digging the Veronica Lake thing they have going on with her hair this episode. A lot.

Speaking of things going on this episode, they did it with such a light touch you might not have realized. But Lee Thompson Young’s replacement got introduced this week. She is Idara Victor, who joins the team as new homicide unit crime scene analyst Nina Holiday. In simpler terms, it looks like she is going to be doing all the computer stuff Frost used to do.

First impression, nice vest. Second impression, good idea making her a crime tech instead of a full homicide detective — at least for now. It would be very difficult to inject someone directly into the team and expect the chemistry to stay the same. Third impression, yay it’s another lady. Yep, that’s all I got for now.

In the lab, Maura and her amazing hair discover the same bullet — and a silencer — was used to kill both victims. So it looks like a professional hitman scrubbed them both. But why? I don’t really care, but I sure like to watch Maura as she refuses to guess.

In the office, Jane and Korsak are discussing the case when he hands her a package that has arrived. It’s a present — from the beard. Yes, people, this guy knows his place in this relationship. And he knows the way into Maura’s good graces run only through Jane. But, seriously, when has your “best friend’s” boyfriend ever given you a gift? Let alone an expensive gift. Ever? Never? Yeah, that’s what I thought.

Jane sees through it, and realizes Prof. Beard is trying to buy influence. But she plans to keep the signed “Grover Verben” baseball. Um, am I just not dykey enough to know who that is? Or is that an imaginary ballplayer? I’m thinking the latter given Jan Nash’s tweet.

We get some exposition about the start-up and how the wife was a gold-digger and the husband hated her. Cool, never get tired of the gold-digger stereotype about women. *sigh* *head shake* Moving on. Nina helps the team uncover large cash withdrawals the husband made to have his wife whacked.

Jane also gets a chance to meet Nina. I think it went well. Better than her awkward meeting with Prof. Beard at least. She helps them conclude that there was a witness in the alley who saw the wife get shot, so the hitman killed the husband to clean up any loose ends. I don’t really understand this rationale, but I’m just going to go with it because Jane looks hot in her bulletproof vest.

Speaking of that vest, um, what’s the deal? The team goes after HEAVILY ARMED END-OF-DAYS PREPPERS ACTIVELY HIDING FROM AUTHORITY with no vests. But go to an abandoned alley and they’re all suited up? They find a sleeping bag and some homework in an abandoned room off the alley and realize their witness is a kid.

Back in the office the new team gather to discuss the case. Afterward, Korsak tells Jane she is their new homicide hire. She is an ex-Chicago PD officer who transferred into the department looking for a change of scenery. Again, I think it was smart making her a homicide analyst instead of a full detective — for now at least. Jane does, too.

What Jane doesn’t think, apparently, is too much of her new “gift” from Prof. Beard. She has spilled coffee on the ball and signature, and now is begging Mama Rizzoli to fix it. Mind you, she isn’t worried about what Prof. Beard will think. She’s worried about what Maura will think. Oh, show. It can’t even help with The Gay.

Speaking of Maura, she walks into the Isles Estates in the middle of the afternoon. I bet in the back of her head she was hoping Jane would be there so they could have a little delight of their own. But instead she finds Mama R cleaning carrots and unsuccessfully cleaning off the baseball.

Maura, however, is excellent at cleaning herself and talks about her relaxing bath last night. And now we’re all just imagining Maura in the bath. Oh, dear. I’ve probably lost you guys to 20 minutes of daydreaming now. Anyway. *snaps fingers* This all leads us back to why she is back in the first place, because she left some files she was reading by the bath. But instead of her files she spies Jane’s baseball, which now is only signed by a Grover Ver.” Mama R insists the “-ben” in his name is silent, but Maura knows better.

Then Mama R confesses to not really being the cleaning genius Jane thinks she is and having fooled her years ago by just buying a new communion dress instead of getting the motor oil out of her old one. Wait, motor oil? How Mama R didn’t know about Jane being gay in the womb is beyond me. By the way, Maura totally knew the story of Jane’s communion dress because, duh, girlfriends tell each other everything. But, never fear, Maura isn’t upset — at Mama R or Jane. Hm, you’d think if she really cared about Prof. Beard’s feelings she’d be at least a little worried. But no. Telling.

Back on the case the detectives have tracked down the witness, a homeless student named Tasha whose parents both passed away. Hey, does she grow up to join the military and fall in love with a girl named Alice? The detectives realize the hitman also found out who she was and visited the school. Tasha is living on her parent’s social security checks so the team splits up to try to find out where she cashes them. Korsak tells everyone to wear vests because of the hitman. Militia, no. Hitman, yes. OK, I don’t get it, but OK.

Jane swears she’ll wear hers, but it’s in the car. Geez, nothing ominous about that. Of course, she isn’t when she goes to the check cashing place. But then finally remembers to put it on while following another lead into a totally sketchy, abandoned alley — alone. Oh, did I mention the cell reception there sucks, too? Yeah, this is going to end well.

She checks through an open door but doesn’t see anyone so leaves, only to have Tasha lock the door behind her. It takes a little convincing, but Jane finally gets Tasha to trust her enough to open the door and come outside.

Big mistake. Big. HUGE.

Shots ring out. Tasha is hit first. Jane is hit trying to protect her — albeit in her vest. Her gun flies out of her hand. Then the most patient hitman in the world lets them stumble back inside the building. They wind up in the elevator with the slowly walking hitman behind them. Jane stops them between floors, which I don’t actually think means they’re safe because couldn’t he pry open the door on either floor and just shoot down at them? Whatever, sorry — stop attaching logical to television. It just ruins everything.

Jane tries to triage Tasha’s wounds. And she does so in true Jane fashion, but telling a joke. “So there were three criminals and they were sentenced to exile in the desert…” Tasha is naturally like, “What the actual fuck, I’m bleeding out here, woman…” But Jane continues and tells her not to talk because it will mess up the rhythm of the joke. It’s an admittedly terrible joke. (Punchline: “I brought a car door so if I get hot I can just roll down the window.”)

But that’s not the point, the point is it distracted Tasha so Jane could pull her makeshift tourniquet. Tasha screams, but then calls Jane sneaky. It’s actually a really good scene, in character and taut. Oh, season, you continue to delight.

Tasha also realizes Jane was shot too, in the stomach. But Jane reassures her that her vest caught it. Hey, remember when Frankie’s vest caught a bullet but he almost died anyway? Just sayin’.

Compounding the problem is the lack of cell reception in the building and the broken elevator phone. But Jane reassures Tasha that her team will find her soon. And, indeed, they’re on it. They triangulate her position to a six-block radius and leave to search. They see the proverbial Rizzoli Bat Signal in the sky and saddle up.

Luckily, Jane took auto shop while she was in high school — to the surprise of no lesbian. So she knows how to hotwire a Volvo and the elevator phone. She is able to call out to the building security, but of course it’s never simple. The security guy doesn’t know what building she is in, so Jane goes all Rizzilla and tells him to cut the bullshit and just call Boston PD and patch her through to Maura — NOW.

Meanwhile, Maura is sipping tea while listening to The Least Interesting Man in the World — trademark pending. Seriously, I liked Enver Gjokaj in Dollhouse just fine. But he is so milquetoast here. Thankfully, Jane’s call breaks up the tedium. Though Maura ignores it at first — out of politeness and nothing more, of course. But then her cell also rings and she relents.

Bet you would have never forgiven yourself if you let Jane die in an elevator because you were listening to the most boring story ever told by your fake boyfriend, eh, Maura. Once she realizes who it is she springs into action. Prof. Beard does the only useful thing he’s ever done on this show and agrees to drive her so Maura can stay connected to Jane on the phone.

Jane decides to leave Tasha — and her vest — in the elevator to seek help. Good thing this hitman moves at a glacial pace, because otherwise he would have gone to the basement and overridden the elevator doors by now. As is, he’s just getting around to it. And the American workforce used to be the best in the world, pity.

Maura and Tasha chat about feminist heroes while they wait, because even death cannot dampen the accomplishments of the great women of history. Tasha confesses that she wants to become an oncologist so she can save someone else’s mother from cancer. So Maura tells her about Dr. Jane Wright, the pioneering cancer researcher who just so happened to be female and African American. I will confess I had to Google her and now I’m impressed. But Tasha knew who she was right away.

The hitman finally reaches the electrical room and restarts the elevators. Jane sees this and runs down, grabbing her stomach the whole time. Yes, we’ve reached critical This Doesn’t Look Good levels.

The team arrives — Nina with her iPad of Righteous Justice, too — and start to search for her. Maura does too, and dumb Beardy wants to come under the police tape with her. Sure, that seems like a good idea. A college engineering professor with zero police or medical experience will be super helpful in an active crime scene with a shooting in progress. Maura tells him no. Sit. Stay. Good dog. He gets a peck as a reward. Look, stupid animals need a reward to learn. (p.s. This is in no way a slam on canine intelligence. Dogs are smart, this guy — not so much.)

So while he’s standing around like a dummy, Jane does something crazy heroic because — of course she does. She’s Det. Jane Rizzoli. She cuts the power and then comes at the hitman with a pipe. They fight, he hits her in the stomach and back. And then just as he is about to deliver a death blow — bang. The detectives arrive just in time and shoot him. Look, we all knew she wasn’t going to die and this dude was the laziest hitman ever, but it was still a pretty tense situation.

Outside Maura is holding Jane’s hand because that’s what you do when your girlfriend nearly dies. The EMTs wheel Tasha up to Jane’s gurney and they pause to have a moment. Look, this is very heartwarming but shouldn’t they rush her to a hospital, STAT? Arterial bleeds aren’t cured by warm fuzzy feelings.

Case solved, damsel rescued — Jane stares lovingly at Maura. Yes, I think they deserve a little eye sex after a near-death experience. Maura leans over and tells her, “You did good, Jane. You did really good.” Wow, Maura must have been really shaken up. But we’ll let it pass because love means never having to say you’re sorry you used incorrect grammar in a moment of crisis.

Now on to your #Gayzzoli tweets of the week. Twitter was acting weird this week and wouldn’t let me search all your tweets. So I apologize for missing some of your brilliant insults for Prof. Beard. But don’t worry, I felt them all and they warmed my heart. And one more Bonus Tweet from Jan Nash heself:

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