The Mentalist – Recap & Review – Blood Money

photo: cbs

The Mentalist
Blood Money

Original Air Date: Apr 22, 2010

Liz – Associate Staff Writer
liz@thetwocentscorp.com

Somewhere in Sacramento, a guy in a hoodie follows Grace down a dark alley. She addresses him as Mr. Black, but this is pretty obviously a pseudonym.

She wishes to engage him for a bit of business, and she pulls out a photo of Rigsby, and tells him that she wants Rigsby dead. Come on, Grace, I didn’t think the break up was that bad.

Turns out, just like most things are when the CBI team is involved, it is a setup. We are shown that thirty-six hours earlier, ADA Kelly Flower was found murdered in her home. Law enforcement is all over it, which Jane calls revenge, but allows that “can be very productive.” Of course he does. Then my homeboy Stephen Spinella shows up as ADA Mark Odenthal, who will be taking over the case Flower had been working on, against a man named Hank Draber, a smuggler who had also done things like conspiracy to commit murder.

Cho and Grace go to visit Draber, who points out that he knows killing cops is trouble, and he’s already in a mess of trouble. They meet his mother, for whom the height of life seems to be scratch lottery tickets. Meanwhile, Lisbon and Jane are speaking with Mr. Flower, and meet Cale Sylvan as well, who is a contractor (ha) working on their home. Jane points out that he is standing in the bloodstain left on the wooden floor, and Sylvan barely reacts. When they leave, Jane tells Lisbon that Sylvan is a psychopath and he did it.

After a little more digging, they discover that Sylvan has been connected to several deaths in the past — many of the suspicious, and that he has lived under several names. Unfortunately, as Lisbon says, there is nothing illegal about changing your name and they have to continue to investigate before they can arrest him. Jane is understandably annoyed by this, and takes off with Cho to do surveillance on Sylvan’s home. He leaves Cho, however, and says he’s going for a walk. At this point, Grace hits pay dirt as she discovers a website registered to one of Sylvan’s aliases, advertising that a Mr. Black will do odd jobs of any kind — and so that catches us up to Grace putting out a hit on Rigsby.

Jane is coaching her on what to say from a nearby location, and when he pulls Grace close and puts a blade on her, they nearly jump the gun to rescue her. But then he shows Grace video of Kelly Flower being murdered, and they bust him. Observing in court, Jane gets fined one thousand dollars for snarking out of turn but voluntarily ups it to two thousand for the privilege of telling Sylvan’s attorney to move it along. Almost as though she had planned it, the defense attorney then introduces into evidence a coffee mug with Jane’s fingerprints on it, found in Sylvan’s sink. This way, they are able to determine that the video evidence had been discerned through illegal search, and is therefore thrown out for lack of evidence.

Odenthal, who had been prosecuting the case, was understandably pissed with Jane, who is defensive in return. Lisbon keeps Odenthal from killing Jane, but is pretty displeased with him herself, not to mention the stern looks he’s getting from Hightower. Lisbon is suspended while a review happens. For whatever it’s worth, Jane says he’s sorry and looks it, too.

Lisbon leaves Cho in charge, who is also annoyed with him. Jane convinces Cho to go to a coffee shop near Sylvan’s place with him, to lie in wait. Lo and behold, in he walks, and Jane jumps behind him in the line. He makes an attempt at hypnosis, so that he can actually search Sylvan’s pockets and come out with a button, fluff, and some sand. Cho is not impressed. But as it turns out, it does help. In the video, Sylvan has a bag from Abs Gym, so they start canvassing the gyms to see if someone recognizes him and can give his second address. Because of the sand, they start near the river, which apparently works — by the episode break they have set up a sting, arrested Sylvan, and then Sylvan is shot and killed. The immediate suspect is whoever hired Sylvan, to avoid their name getting out.

Jane calls Lisbon to meet him at the docks at Draber’s office. It takes Jane all of three minutes, if that, to discern that Draber’s mother, Annabelle, is running the entire operation. This gets them shut up in a boxcar and dumped. Lisbon is panicking slightly, but she and Jane get some quality UST time. Then, when they’re having a moment, they spot someone approaching and get them to open up the boxcar — by a boy with a goat. Grace is rather bemused by the phone call she gets about it, (“Something about Jane and a goat?”) but here is where the real action starts.

Jane wastes no time or words in interrupting court proceedings to obtain a warrant for Annabelle Draber’s arrest. But his phone rings, which angers the judge, and then the defense attorney moves for a mistrial. Then when Odenthal gets angry, Jane tweaks his nose, all while racking up thousands in fines. The bailiffs take him in for battery.

Next in court, Jane acts as his own attorney. This turns out to be about as hilarious as you probably think it would be. He admits to tweaking Odenthal in the nose (and I echo Lisbon’s facepalm — I can’t even type the phrase without wanting to sigh), but in his cross examine starts asking the judge and Odenthal about guns and hunting, introducing the second gun theory that killed Sylvan. Jane manages to trip up Odenthal, and makes the point that he clearly knows his way around a gun.

Odenthal is arrested, and in his house they find the gun that killed Sylvan, which makes him the one who contracted the hit on Flower. He was very ambitious and the Draber case would have made him a lock for DA, but Flower took it instead, despite his seniority. Since everyone in the office knows how Jane operates, Odenthal took a chance on the fact that he would do something of the sort.

In the end, Hightower reinstates Lisbon and moves on from that. Jane owes the court $16,000 in fines, and Lisbon needs to shoot something. They leave for a shooting range which is, I suppose, sort of what they do. (It’s all very sweet in their way.)

This episode was great, even if it felt like it moved a little fast sometimes. Lots of action in this one. I am super excited for next week’s episode, but then again… Malcolm McDowell and like Jane said in the preview, “You had me at ‘cult’.”