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“Rizzoli & Isles” Subtext Recap (7.04): Like Two Natural Women

Previously on Rizzoli & Isles: Zombies. Yes, zombies. Yes, really, zombies.

Jane saunters into a fencing club and sidles up to the back of a woman with mildly Maura-like hair. She whispers sweet nothings into her ear about which of the three musketeers they’ll be playing tonight in bed. But then the woman swivels around and it’s not Maura. Oh, Jane. Correcting identifying your woman’s butt in silhouette is just Girlfriend 101.

The misidentified backside is a little huffy about her misidentification. Geez, lady, don’t you know having your derriere compared to Dr. Maura Isles is the highest form of compliment? The misidentified backside tells her Maura is into “a whole different sword.” Yes, indeed. The detachable kind.

Jane watches with great interest as Maura wields her saber. And by “great interest” I obviously mean “increased horniness.” To cover for it she makes a Star Wars joke about fencers being rich people storm troopers. I guess some of Jane’s pop culture knowledge has rubbed off on Maura after seven years because she seems to both get and appreciate the joke.

Maura admits she is fencing not just because it is incredibly hot and will no doubt spawn 100s of swashbuckling fan-fics, but because it will help her build new neural pathways. Also, it’s good for the abs. Jane’s like, “Why fuss with a Michelangelo?” But then, you know, I guess it never hurts to polish the marble.

As Jane is ladyhandling Maura’s “sword,” her phone rings. Jane picks up her girlfriend’s phone because that’s what girlfriends do. The person on the phone seems equally unfazed that Jane answered. And then Jane says “we’ll be there in about 10 minutes.” These two are always a package deal.

But then Jane lets her jealousy shine through as she asks Maura if she has something less “full-body thong” to change into. Maura says it’s fine, but Jane doesn’t want to know where she plans to stick her phone. That way it’s more fun to find for herself later.

At the crime scene, Maura lists off all her new pursuits: tae kwon do, archery, watercolor and the piccolo. What I read out of those activities is she wants increased flexibility, accuracy and creativity. And, well, I’ve seen American Pie. I know what people do with flutes.

Jane suggests ice hockey, because after seeing how hot Maura looked fencing she wants to see her try her favorite sport. Maura says if Jane gives her a good mouth guard she’ll do it because, “I’ll try anything once.” Oh, Maura, girl. We know you’ve tried certain things so much more than once.

But Jane has other new things in mind and says, verbatim, “Really? I’m going to hold you to that. I mean, I don’t know if you’re going to have fun, but I know I am.” Again, verbatim.

The Victim of the Week is a dead mailman. It looks like a self-inflicted gunshot wound, but we all know it’s not. Well, unless they decided to go in a different direction with this show and solve the crimes in 10 minutes to leave the remaining 50 for an extended Big Gayzzoli Ending. I’m going on record as being fine with that.

Jane and Korsak go to check out dead mailman’s place and the door is open and someone is inside. They’re really squeezing in all the Angie Harmon brandishes a firearm shots they can in this last season, aren’t they?

And who do they find rummaging around inside? Community actress Yvette Nicole Brown. She is a postal inspector packing heat. So, already we know this episode is going to be awesome. Though, what does it say about a show when its guest star of the week doubles its diversity count? Again, so glad they replaced Senior Criminalist Susie Chang with Smug White Dude Kent.

CJ the Mail Cop tells them she is investigating an illegal operation that the dead mailman was involved in. He was going to meet with her to spill the beans, but conveniently ended up dead instead. But, have no fear, Mail Cop and her “Twin dragons” are on the case, whether BPD gives her the respect she deserves or not. She also calls Korsak a “silver fox.” Can we trade Mail Cop in for Smug Kent? Pretty please?

Speaking of the silver fox, his new wife Kiki stops by the Dirty Robber to chat with Mama Rizzoli. While there Mama R accidentally reveals Korsak’s super unromantic birthday gift to Kiki—a blender. Agreed, I don’t think men should give women kitchen implements as gifts. Though, if someone wants to buy me Vitamix I would accept it with open arms.

In the morgue, Maura is rocking out to some old-school Motown. Kent walks in and automatically has opinions because men. Maura is retraining her neural pathways with new music instead of her usual Mozart. She also confessed to Kent that she sings Aretha Franklin every morning in her shower.

This leads Kent to wonder aloud and ask, “What exactly is a ‘Natural Woman?'” Jane instinctively responds, “you’ve just got to feel it.” Yeah, you do. Kent makes some crack about being a “Natural Man” and let me say it once more for the cheap seats, ban men. Ban. Men.

With him finally, safely gone Jane asks if Maura is neural retraining or Kent retraining. Maura admits it’s a bit of both. Beard training is a never-ending and largely thankless task.

So it turns out the dead mailman’s death was a homicide. But this news is too late for CJ the Mail Cop, who has been suspended from her post for continuing to investigate. Her epic rant out the door includes the phrase, “All my life I’ve had to fight.” This, this is what Rizzoli & Isles has been missing. She then threatens to punch Jane, a.k.a. “a fellow hottie.” Like I was saying, more of this.

Back at the lab, Maura gets light headed in front of Smug Kent. Man, think how different all this would be playing out if it was still Susie. Siiiiigh. Kent reveals he has been checking over Maura’s work because, again, he is the worst. He found an error. One, single spelling error. Oh no, call the police. Alert the media. Hire a skywriter.

Kent then gets handsy and starts pushing surgical options on her. Also, please, there’s no way she almost cries in front of Kent. ZERO WAY.

At the Dirty Robber, Jane introduces Maura to her new (strictly platonic) BFF CJ the Mail Cop. They bond immediately over their shared philatelist tendencies. Jane gets excited because it “sounds dirty.” Poor Jane, still can’t get the image of Maura in that fencing suit out of her head.

Maura and CJ make plans to attend the stamp collector convention in Poughkeepsie next summer. Jane encourages her to go because a) she’ll obviously come with her and b) she still thinks philately sounds a little dirty. Then while Maura is in the restroom, Jane and CJ bond over being intense, intimidating women who sometimes want to punch people.

The team uncovers a plot to smuggle something through the mail. Then we learn more about postal barcodes than we probably ever imagined existed. She also tries to poach Nina for the postal service.

Meanwhile, Mama R is on a quest to make Korsak more of a romantic. He thinks nothing is wrong with a blender, but Mama R tells him a mammogram would be a more thoughtful gift. Again, if anyone wants to buy me a blender, I’m OK with that. Just saying, if there are spare gift blenders floating around out there.

CJ keeps calling Korsak a silver fox again back in the office, much to his chagrin. He confronts her because he doesn’t like romance or compliments. But she says it was a show of respect. So Korsak accepts Frankie’s offer of a chair even though there’s a perfectly good other empty chair in the room. Despite their inability to count chairs, they uncover a plot to mail packages to fake addresses.

Smug Kent smugly enters Maura’s office and drops off a “report.” But it’s really a list of neurosurgeons. He then keeps pushing the surgery on her. Maura gets mad because this isn’t part of his job or any of his business. She tells him to go back to work and he gets his man-feelings hurt and pouts off saying “I only wanted to help.”

So now the plan is to go undercover as janitors at the dead letter destination. Korsak and Nina get the assignment, which involves a lot of mopping. Jane is on stakeout duty with CJ and they get into a delightful conversation about Jane’s “tone,” what with its lower register and raspiness. At long last, someone addresses the sexy elephant in the room—Jane’s voice.

So it’s the branch manager. But the DNA doesn’t match because Maura says it showed the suspect was a woman. Uh, is her brain problem worse than we thought? Nah, just means there’s a bigger fish in this mail mystery.

Jane picks up the “report” to double check, but it is Kent’s list of surgeons instead. So then she gently gets into the topic of surgery with Maura because, unlike Kent, she has no desire to push her medical opinions on her. Maura confesses she isn’t afraid of the surgery, she’s afraid of what will happen if it doesn’t work. See, this is how you talk out important medical decisions—with the people who know you the best and love you the most.

Jane understands completely. Maura is scared of no longer being herself/the smartest person in the room. Jane gets serious, moves closer and looks deep into Maura’s eyes. She says, “You are always going to be you. Your intelligence is not what defines you. You are kind and generous and loving. And you are the best girlfriend that a person could ever ask for. That woman is always going to be there whether the surgery works or not.” I only changed one word of that quote. One. Word.

Maura grabs Jane’s hands and thanks her. Finally, you guys, the Totally Gratuitous, Totally Gay Touching we’ve been waiting for. Jane then says “Your brain is not what I love about you, Maura. What I love about you is you took my mother in and now I don’t have to. I love that about you. Deeply.” Oh, you crazy Life-Long Best Friends Forever, never change.

Just like Jane to cut the emotional moment with some light-hearted teasing. Maura slap fights her like you do your girlfriend when she’s being so adorable and annoying simultaneously you can’t stand it.

So the mailroom manager is trafficking in oxy. Jane and CJ get him to spill on the real big fish. And then it’s undercover time again. But this time the bad guy, or girl in this case, is packing heat. Call it a single dragon.

A gun battle ensues, and then CJ the Mail Cop gets to finally fulfill her wish and punch someone. And then she admits punching someone “hurts more than you think.” Come on, can all the remaining crimes please be about mail fraud? But Korsak ruins the fun by calling her “exhausting.” Like I was saying, ban men.

So now it’s Kiki’s party time. Does no one on this show have a wider circle of friends? Korsak brings out his romantic gesture gift and it’s a … tambourine. Work that inner Stevie Nicks, I guess. But wait, there’s more—she flips it over and there’s a necklace. Because all women just want jewelry.

Fine, the necklace is sweet. But then Smug Kent ruins everything by trying to sing Scottish classics. Luckily, the rest of the group got the Ban Men message and nix his performance. Instead, Jane encourages Maura to try those new things she was talking about.

Mama R says she hears Maura singing all the time around the house. Was it singing or some kind of other loud vocal noises? Maura relents and decides to show off her “Natural Woman.” But then she starts and Jane realizes she’ll need a little backup and recruits Nina.

So then, together, they sing a love song directly from Maura Dorthea Isles to Jane Clementine Rizzoli. Two things: 1) Idara Victor has a lovely voice, and 2) Jane has never looked so thoroughly in love.

And now, your #gayzzoli tweets of the week. Consensus: More fencing, please.

Find more from Dorothy Snarker visit dorothysurrenders.com or @dorothysnarker.

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