Last week Liv turned into Zombiemom after eating the brain of a pregnant girl, and she gained an appreciation for her own mother. She and Lowell got to know each other better. We saw lieutenant Suzuki in action as Zombiecop, and Major got more than he bargained for when he found the Candyman. Ravi conducted a clinical study on some rats with Utopium and MaxRager drinks, with an interesting - if gross - outcome. And one of the rats gets lost again.
This week, things heated up for Liv and Lowell. Major got beat up and released from jail, and Ravi saw Payton in a different light. A radio host was murdered live on the air. Liv found the lost rat, and Ravi believes for a moment that he's created a monster. I need to say how much I am loving the prop and make-up department on this production! Major's bashed up face... the delivery boy's flayed open head on Jackie's counter from episode 6... the dead rats... They can come decorate my house and do my make-up for Halloween - or anything - whenever they want!
Another of the things I am loving about this series is the continuity. While the general theme of the show is "crime of the week," there's more going on than that. It looks like Lieutenant Suzuki's story is about to expand and mingle with the storyline between Major and Blaine - did I mention there's a twist this week? Oh - and there's a really huge OMG, too.
There's been a lot of speculation about whether or not Suzuki is in Blaine's pocket or not, and this week we find out what team he bats for. And it looks like next week's episode will be a rev-up for the season finale, judging by the way this week's episode wound up at the end. My guess (and fervent hope) is that the last episode of the season will go off with one hell of a bang!
So far, the Livwell ship is still afloat. But is it me, or does Lowell seem really insightful about what's going on with Liv? I mean, he comes to the exact, correct conclusions about her behavior every damn time - even before she does. And I'm not so sure yet that bringing Ravi and Payton together is a good thing.
I really wanted to kick Liv's ass for how she treated Ravi about the whole issue, and I think I fell in love with Rahul Kohli's performances even more. That particular scene was an emotional moment that was very well played. I felt Ravi's pain. Hopefully all this shipping doesn't take the focus off the whole premise of the show - crime solving and zombie research with our new Scoobie Gang.
What do you think - too much shipping going on? Should they just stick to the storytelling, crime scene action, and brain eating? Hit the jump for the recap, and tell us what you think in the comments below!
Liv is in bed, a look of sheer ecstasy on her face. She's clearly enjoying herself, but her good time momentarily becomes painful. "oh..no.. no - ai - ow - I forgot the safe word! What's the safe word? Kelly Clarkson... ping-pong... oh, there... that's better... that's the ticket!" Lowell is giving her a foot massage. In a voice-over Liv muses, "I'd forgotten what it was like to be touched. This foot rub dessert is tasty!" Liv's phone rings. "Do you need to get that... very early phone call?" asks Lowell. Liv checks the caller ID - it's Major. She rejects the call.
Driving in to work, Liv listens to talk radio. The host is taking calls about dysfunctional relationships, and dishing out advice to a caller with a cheating husband. In a voice-over, Liv tells us how she has to spend every day of life ("or whatever we zombies choose to call the daily grind") being bombarded by reminders of the things they can no longer enjoy. Cheeseburgers... rosy complexion... progeny. "Sex, on the other hand, is back on the menu for this zombie."
Liv is engrossed in listening to the talk show. The caller on the talk show is telling the host, Sasha Arcani, that she caught her husband with another woman. Sasha advises the caller that she needs to cut the man loose. "Oh no. I'm keepin' my man. It's that slut he's hookin' up with I'm gonna murder." Liv is now fully entrenched in the drama of the talk show, and doesn't notice that the traffic light has changed to green until someone honks their horn behind her.
Ravi is at the precinct, in the waiting room of the intake area. He reads a newspaper that has a front page headline about the bodies of the missing teens being found. Looking up, he notices that the intake clerk is taking a personal phone call. He goes up to the window, and interrupts her.
"Do you have any information as to when my friend will be released?" "Oh, yeah. I'm just keeping it to myself because I really enjoy these chats we have every fifteen minutes. Maybe don't be friends with criminals?" she snarks as she resumes her call. Ravi returns to his seat, and picks up a kids' magazine and does some of the puzzles.
Payton walks in, and goes straight up to the window. She puts her DA badge up against the window, and tells the intake clerk to get Major released immediately. "Do you know what's missing from this?" she asks as she holds up the intake form from Major's file. "No - save your eyes," she says as the intake clerk starts to put on her glasses.
"The time stamp is missing - which means he's being held in violation of Habeas corpus statutes." "I could stamp it now," says the clerk. "Are you offering to commit forgery?" asks Payton. "No..." the clerk responds sheepishly. "Get him out. Now!"
Peyton notices Ravi with the kids' magazines. "I read it for the articles," he says. The intake clerk makes a call. She tells Payton that Major will be released - "fifteen minutes, tops." "Make it five," says Payton. Peyton sits, and waits. A few moments later, Major is released. He is escorted to the waiting room by two officers. His face is a mess - cuts, scrapes and bruises.
"What did they do to you?!" asks Payton, concerned. Major tells her that it was some lesson he was supposed to learn. Ravi comes over with paper towels and starts dabbing at Major's face. "Maybe you should keep me on retainer," he tells Major. "Excuse me, you are...?" Payton asks defensively. Major introduces them. He tells them that he tried to call Liv. Payton and Ravi both tell him that wouldn't be a good idea. "We'd have two messes to clean up!" exclaims Ravi.
Payton asks who he was fighting with this time. "Sons of Anarchy..." he says. "A little bit of advice - don't go to jail the day after you're quoted on the front page of the paper saying the police are indifferent about the disappearance of the underclass." "If you want to sue the city, I can put you in touch with someone," Payton tells him. "That would be a waste of my time," he says . "The only witnesses were the guards and guys whipping my ass..."
He tells Payton and Ravi that all he wants to do is find out what happened to Eddie and Jerome. Ravi gently tells him about the Emily Sparrow case - "she was kidnapped by space alien worshipping, sister-wife collecting crazy people" and they found the remains of some of the the missing kids from the skate park at their compound. Eddie and Jerome were among the remains found.
Ravi shows Major the front page of the paper with the story. Major admits that he knew in his gut that they were gone, but he just didn't want to believe it. "I know who killed Jerome and Eddie, and it wasn't these two. I've seen things... if I told you, you wouldn't believe me. Everything the police tells you in this town is a lie."
At work, Liv continues to listen to the talk show, streaming it on a computer in the morgue. Sasha makes a statement that she encourages self-empowerment but she would never suggest murder. The caller sounds triumphant as she asks for the listener's input - she describes a car, and gives out most of the license plate number. "No... No no no!" says Sasha as the caller gets cut off. She asks the caller to call back so they can talk about the problem some more.
Ravi comes in to the morgue, and apologizes for being late. "A friend had some legal issues," he says as Liv shushes him. "A caller just threatened to murder her husband's mistress, on the air! Sasha, the host, is trying to get her to call back in!" Ravi starts to say how he doesn't understand how Liv could possibly be into that kind of drama. "Zip it!" she says as she continues listening to the talk show.
The broadcast then goes horribly wrong. Over the air, there is static and electronic audio feedback. "What just happened?" asks Ravi. "I don't know," Liv says. As they continue to listen, they hear people screaming and calling for an ambulance over the broadcast, and then the station goes off the air. Liv and Ravi both look horrified. "I stand corrected... this is compelling radio!" says Ravi.
At the radio station, Liv and Ravi are looking over the crime scene. Sasha lays dead at the sound board. "The electricity entered her body through her hands," notes Ravi. "The current then pulsed through her chest cavity -" "Causing instant cardiac arrest," adds Liv as she gets a closer look at the body. "Electrocution is an extremely rare cause of death," Ravi says.
"It wasn't an accident," Clive announces as he enters the studio. "According to the fire inspector, someone intentionally spliced the victim's microphone into the station's generator. The moment she touched it after the break, bam!" he explains. "The first thing we need to do is find Cheated On in Chattanooga."
"The caller who threatened to murder her husband's mistress on today's show," Liv says. Clive gives Liv a weird look. "Uh... First time listener," she says with a shrug. Clive points out that the license plate that the caller gave out on air was registered to the victim. "Shocking," says Ravi with a grin. As Liv and Clive stare at him, he asks, "too soon?"
Liv and Clive are interviewing the show's producer, Jane. Clive asks if Sasha recognized her own license plate when she heard it on the air. "Yeah, she was terrified. She sent me downstairs to grab security," says Jane. "As the show's producer, you screen the calls and decide which ones go on the air?" Jane nods. "It's a local show, but was Cheated On in Chattanooga calling from Tennessee?" Clive asks. Jane says that the show is streamed nationally, but she could tell from the caller ID that Cheated On's calls all came from a Seattle area code.
Liv asks if the woman was a frequent caller. "Ten, twelve times in the past few weeks... She was high drama - a woman on the verge. She gave great radio," Jane answers. "We'll need those calls," Clive says. Jane calls in Kaylee (an intern), and tells her to get the audio files from the past two weeks for them.
Jane explains that the more recent files will be harder to get, but they'll have a lot to listen to in the mean time. She also says that they don't archive the show segments by caller, so if they want just those segments someone will have to go through thirty hours of audio files. Liv cheerfully volunteers to do that. "Who couldn't use a few hours of straight talk?"
Jane smiles sadly. "That was definitely Sasha's forte. She was fearless! I just... I can't believe she's gone. We made so many hours of radio together..." she says as she starts to tear up. "Excuse me, I think I'm going to need a minute..." "Of course," says Clive as Jane leaves. Liv watches her go, but something about the producer sets her Spidey-sense tingling.
Walking with the intern, Clive asks if Sasha and Jane were close. Kaylee explained that they've been close since college - "Sasha was the Psych major with the big personality, Jane was the RTF major with the radio skills." Clive asks if Sasha was seeing anyone romantically. "Specifically? No... I mean, she talked about her sex life all the time on the air, but her lovers always got code names. 'The All-Niter', 'Sir Cries-A-Lot'..."
"So there were a lot of lovers?" asks Liv. "From what she said, yeah," says Kaylee, rolling her eyes. "I don't know any names or anything, but everyone around here knows that she had a thing for guys who were already in relationships." Kaylee asks if they think one of her lovers did this. "We'll look into every possibility," says Clive as Kaylee directs them into the electrical room.
The station's engineer shows them how the killer ran Sasha's mic power line directly into the station's back-up generator. Clive asks who might have had access to that area. The engineer tells him that the broadcasting company owns five stations, and they all feed out of there. There were also public tours that came through there all day. "Last week, some clown got in during a KGOV broadcast. He took half a dozen calls before someone realized he wasn't really a city comptroller." "So basically, anyone could have gotten in here," states Clive. The engineer shrugs.
At the morgue, Liv is listening to one of the audio files of the Great. Morning. Sex. broadcasts on her smartphone while she prepares her lunch - dead talk show host brain salad. "Yes, manscaping is a thing! You can't expect a girl to go hackin' through the bush like Indiana Jones looking for the Lost Temple!" says Sasha through Liv's headphones. Looking up, she notices Ravi watching her.
"Did you need me for something?" she asks as she pulls out one of her ear buds. "No," says Ravi. But as Liv starts to put her ear bud back in her ear, he tells her he had some business at the courthouse that morning. "I met your roommate - Payton." "Oh?" says Liv. "Bit of a spitfire, isn't she?" says Ravi. "Do you know if she's seeing anyone?" "Oh, probably," Liv says with a smile.
Seeing Ravi's sardonic expression, Liv gets it. "Oh... you're asking because you might want to ask her out?" Ravi sighs. "For a minute there, I thought I might have to draw you a diagram!" "I'll check," Liv says. "But she's generally not lacking for male companionship." "I think we had a moment," says Ravi hopefully. Turning toward the refrigerator, she has a look of 'nope nope' on her face. Changing the subject, she says in a stiff voice that the early shift was displeased to find that the storage cabinet was padlocked.
"They'll get over it," Ravi says in a dismissive tone. "This is where we're curing Zombie-ism!" As he unlocks the padlock, he says "I'm mid-experiment. Our guinea rats are behind this door, rolling hard on Utopium and MaxRager. Right now, they're probably waving tiny glow sticks in the air!" As Liv takes a bite of her salad, Ravi opens the door. Going in, he says over his shoulder "I think somebody needs an escort to the chill-out room!"
Liv continues eating. A moment later, Ravi calls urgently from the storage room. "Liv!" She goes in, and they find that one rat is missing and the rest of them are dead - with their brains missing. "The Lannisters send their regards," says Liv. (Characters in the 'Game of Thrones' series, for those who don't get the reference.) Looking around at the cages, she asks "where's the fifth rat?" Ravi is worried. "I don't know, but I can't stress enough the importance of finding him!"
Liv hears squeaking, and she finds the missing rat sitting on the floor, it's tiny face smeared with blood. "Holy crap, Ravi - it's white and murderous! You did it! You made a zombie rat!" It starts to run at them, and Ravi jumps up onto a table. "Ooh! Where ya goin', little buddy?" Liv says as she scoops the rat up.
"Uh... I believe he was on his way to murder me and eat my brains," exclaims Ravi from the table. "Why isn't he tearing into you?" Liv coos over the rat. "It's a zombie thing, you wouldn't understand." To the rat, she says "Zombie brains are nasty! You wouldn't want those... no, you wouldn't..." "Uh... that rat you're doting on like a purse chihuahua could end civilization as we know it!" says Ravi. Liv giggles like a child playing with a puppy for the first time.
Back in the main room, Liv is finishing her meal while Ravi tells her about his findings. "The human genome is full of so-called junk DNA, right? Veritable sleeper cells of evolution, waiting to be called into action by a change in environment or circumstance," he explains.
"Enter the chemical cocktail of tainted Utopium and MaxRager! The cocktail wakes up dormant genes, which then transforms an ordinary human - or rat - into a zombie at the cellular level." "So you'll use antibodies from zombie rats to synthesize a gene-based therapy cure?" Liv asks. "That's the plan," he says.
As they look at the rat in the glass enclosure, Ravi muses. "Do you think this is how Oppenheimer felt staring down at the A-bomb?" "Like a drama queen? Or are you talking about his need for self-aggrandizement?" quips Liv. "Aww..." whines Ravi. "Oh, come on... Gentle ribbing!" she says. "Dr. Oppenheimer, you love me!"
Clive walks in. "Chattanooga's phone was a burner - totally untraceable," he says. "New development - check this out!" he says as he shows Liv an image on his cellphone. "Dear god! How about a heads up, or NSFW warning!?" she says, looking at the image. "Is that a... blow-up sex doll?!" she asks, incredulous. "Ooh - I wanna see!" says Ravi. "With Sasha Arconi's face pasted over the doll's," adds Clive. "There are a bunch of them," says Ravi as he scrolls through the images on the phone.
Clive tells them that Sasha was in a blood feud with the host of a rival drive-time sports talk show called The Morning Hurl. "The host, Chuck Burd, asked all his listeners - 'upchuckers,' they're called - to commit unspeakable acts upon a Sasha Arconi blow-up doll and post them online." "Delightful," says Liv sarcastically. "Sasha gave as good as she got," Clive says. "She was promoting a round-table interview next week with several of Chuck's past lovers." "Sounds like we should have a chat with Chuck," says Live. "Exactly my though," agrees Clive.
They get to the office building where the radio station is located. Clive reads the poster out loud. "Great. Morning. Sex. Isn't it enough for you ladies that you're having it? Why spoil it by talking about it?" "See, I find it fascinating that we never talk about your love life," says Liv. "Really? 'Cause I find it non-negotiable. Boundaries, Liv!" he replies.
"Stressing your boundaries - one of several signs of the classic distancer," says Liv with an air of authority. "Pair that with avoiding discussions of deep feelings..." "I'm going in now," says Clive as he walks away from her. "Pulling away when things get real," she pushes. "Look, it's nice that you want to get to know me..." "Sending mixed signals!" she points out.
"What's gotten into you?" Clive asks. "You listen to Sasha's show for one day, and now you think you're her?" Liv sighs and nods. "Something like that," she says, not able to explain about the brain thing. "I'm not the 'let's get real' type anyway," he tells her. "Ask Devore in Vice - she'll tell you." "Idealizing your past partner," Liv says nodding. "You are so text-book!" Clive turns and walks away from her, heading into the building. "Seriously - you can stop talking right now, because I know everything there is to know about you!" she says as she follows him.
They approach the studio where Chuck Burd is broadcasting. On the air, he is talking about a cheating spouse. "I'm not saying he should have done what he did. All I'm sayin' is that any guy who's been married for more than five minutes knew exactly how he felt. Ladies - Listen to this: Your mouths were not made for speaking!" Looking up, he sees Liv through the booth window.
"Upchuckers! Show of hands - who's screwed an albino chick? Anyone? Anyone? I think what they lack in pigment, they make up for in naaasty... am I right? We got a chick in the studio right now, beggin' for someone to bang a little color back into her cheeks! Ain't that right, sweetheart?" Clive and Liv both look disgusted. Clive puts his badge up against the window.
Outside the booth, they talk to Chuck. He tells them that the feud with Sasha was all for show. "The more PMS-y she acted, the more fired up my listeners got. That broad was ratings gold!" Chuck says with a laugh. Liv gives her analysis of Chuck's personality. "So... your relationship with your mother - I'm going with 'complicated.' Extreme narcissism with a tendency towards sexual deviance," she says as she looks around at the blow-up dolls surrounding them. "Mommy issues," she points out. "All I'm saying is, the inexplicable crying when you're cupping the carrot? There's a reason for that."
Clive interrupts her before she goes too far. "Mr. Burd - the show Sasha was supposed to be doing about you? A lot of men would feel threatened by their ex-lovers comparing notes on the radio." Chuck shrugs. "Yeah... unless all of your notes are just... " He kisses his fingers. "I was just worried she wouldn't be able to fit them all in the studio!" Liv is offended. "If I'm gonna puke in your trash bin, do I need to go through the basketball hoop?" she asks.
"What do I care?" Looking a Clive, he adds "You and I both know how women get when you... kick 'em loose." "You kick a lot of women loose?" asks Clive. "Not anymore. I'm a happily married man now," Chuck says as he grabs his tablet. He shows them a picture of his wife Oksana, and that triggers a vision for Liv.
Through Sasha's eyes, Liv sees Oksana confronting Sasha. "Stay away from my husband, whore!" she says with a heavy foreign accent. Then she throws a drink in Sasha's face. Liv gasps, and Clive gives her a concerned glance while Chuck goes on about his wife. "She's not the brightest bulb in the chandelier, but she is a former gymnast... power tumbler," he says, making the statement into an innuendo. "When your wife found out you were sleeping with Sasha, was she mad enough to kill her?" asks Liv. Chuck looks at her, wondering how she knew he had slept with Sasha. She looks back at him with a "know-it-all" smirk.
Chuck admits the affair. "Sasha and I bumped uglies a couple of times... I'm not the first guy to have a little hate bang on the side." "No, but you have an angry wife and a dead lover," Liv says. "You think Oksana is this Chattanooga chick!?" Chuck says, laughing in disbelief. "She's a mail-order bride! She knows maybe fifty words of English! The woman can barely order a cup of coffee, let alone fake a southern accent..."
Clive asks him where he was during the time window for the murder. Chuck says he was on the air, then excuses himself. "I got forty-two seconds to go take a leak... " "For what it's worth, I don't think his wife could have passed for Cheated On in Chattanooga... Maybe Cheated On in Chechnya..." Liv says after Chuck leaves. "That doesn't mean she didn't kill her," says Clive. "I'll check her out." "Where's a vat of bleach when you need one?" Liv snarks, looking around at several blow-up dolls as they leave the studio.
At home, Major is looking at pictures of human brains on the Internet. "Hello?" calls Karin as she walks in. She finds him in the kitchen with his laptop. "You missed our lunch date," she says, walking up behind him. He starts to apologize, and she goes around to face him. "Oh, my god..." she says when she sees his face. She asks him what happened, and he tells her. She looks at the laptop. "Why are you looking at pictures of brains? You know what - nevermind. This is so not what I signed up for..."
He tries to explain, but she cuts him off. "You keep getting into fights! You just got arrested! You're in a running battle with someone known as the Candyman... what the hell?! You were the dream combination...super hot, funny.. now you look like some whackjob who doesn't shower enough!" Major tries to interrupt. "If you'd just give me a second to explain -" "You should get some help," she says regretfully as she leaves. Ravi nearly bumps into her as she passes him in the hall. "I take it game night's off," he says.
Leaning against a crate at a warehouse, Blaine waits. As Suzuki walks up, Blaine starts clapping slowly. "Enter the hero! Why so glum, chum?" he asks in a Joker-esque fashion. "I can't do this anymore," Suzuki tells Blaine. "Moving those kids' bodies... It's too much!" "What, emotionally? Or physically? Because those bodies shouldn't have weighed very much - how heavy are bones?" he responds, being an asshole. "Dammit, you listen to me! You're not even trying to be careful anymore. The bodies are piling up, and you just... expect me to make them disappear!"
"What part of me having you by the short and curlies don't you understand? I'm literally your meal ticket," he tells Suzuki. "I understand that, but you nee-" Blaine interrupts him. "What're you gonna do, hm? You gonna mosey on down to the holding cell, pop open a couple of craniums a week and hope no one gets wise? You need to stop acting like you have options, and just do what I tell you to do!"
Suzuki tells Blaine about Liv. "There's a girl in the M.E.'s office. Pale... Looks like she plays for Team Z..." "Yeah. I know all about her. She has her own special role in all this," Blaine says. "Woulda been nice to get a heads up," Suzuki complains. "I'm sorry, dear. You know how I struggle with my communication skills. Now - run off and do your job. Protect and serve... me." Suzuki leaves with a resigned look on his face.
At home, Liv is listening to more of Sasha's sound files. "The guy is a bully, and you're just laying back and taking it! Act like his bitch, don't expect to be treated like his girlfriend. Don't make me play it..." In a voice over, Liv tells us that before this brain, her advice-giving M.O. was gentle... sympathetic. "Now I feel compelled to fix people - to take them apart, whether they want it or not." Sasha's caller is making excuses for her man. "He's meditating now... He's becoming a vegetarian!" "You asked for it! Tell her, Ms. Lynch!" Sasha says. "Bitch, get a clue!" goes the Jane Lynch sound-byte. That triggers a vision for Liv.
Sasha hits the button on the sound card to play the Jane Lynch file. She grabs cupcakes and throws them violently at the booth window. The show producer Jane is on the other side of it. "I'm sorry! I was gonna tell you!" "I don't want apologies! I want loyalty," demands Sasha.
Clive brings Jane in for questioning. "Any time you mix friendship and work, things can get complicated. But Sasha and I were fine," she says with a smile. "So you didn't mind when she yelled at you and threw things? You were cool with that?" asks Clive. "Oh... you heard about the cupcakes,' she says with a chuckle. "Yeah, Sasha could go a little psycho, but that time I had it coming," she says with a rueful smile.
"Why's that?" asks Liv. Jane explains that Sasha found out she was sending tapes to other stations. "We started as co-hosts, and then Sasha became this big star and I became just her producer... which was fine, for a while, but -" "But you would have rather been behind the mic," says Clive. "Anybody in radio who tells you differently is lying," Jane says.
Clive asks her if she got any offers. "No... It takes a certain kind of charisma to get people to tune in and listen." Liv seems to sense something is off about Jane. "Sasha had it. Judging by my lack of offers, well... I guess we'll never know." "Sasha was pretty angry when she found out you wanted to leave," Liv points out. "Only at first, but she got over it, and started fighting for a raise for me - to entice me to stay." She tells them that they got those last 'Cheated' files from archives, if they still wanted them. Clive acknowledges it.
When Liv gets back to the lab, Ravi shows her a metal glove. "Oyster shucking gloves. Watch..." He picks up a scalpel, and stabs at the table between his fingers, increasing the speed with each pass. As the scalpel comes into contact with the glove, Ravi cries out and drops it. "Ravi!" Liv yells, afraid that he's hurt himself. "Voila!" he says with a big grin. "Chainmaille for the hands!" "Enjoy hell!" she retorts.
"Have you heard from Major today?" she asks. "I missed a call from him yesterday, and I haven't heard back." Ravi hedges. "Oh... he's.. he's fine. He's got some stuff going on... romantically. There was a breakup, in that Karin dumped him." Liv is shocked. "Major doesn't get dumped. There are only two reasons to dump Major - being a zombie, and literal death. Wait- you don't think Karin - " "Is now a zombie? Seems unlikely. Speaking of roommate... Have you spoken with Payton yet?"
"Wow," Liv says sardonically. "All roads lead to Rome with you lately, huh?" She proceeds to try and distract him from the subject of Payton by using her newly learned psychobabble skills, and makes a lot of comments about his past with his parents. "Are you shrinking me?" he asks. "I'm just pointing out obvious behavior that could... potentially lead to you being hurt."
He gives her an irritated look. "OK - I guess I'm shrinking you! But you really need to learn from the past and not try to relive it," she says as she starts to put in her ear buds. "I can't help it, I'm filled to the brim with insight!" "Oh, that's what you're full of!" Ravi says sarcastically. "Just find out if she's dating anyone, OK?" he begs. "I live to enable," she says.
Liv goes to see Major. She knocks, but there's no immediate answer. "Major? I can see your mopey shadow! Let me in. Someone needs to tell you that self-sabotaging is not the answer! You're allowed to be happy!" Major opens the door. "Oh, Major!" Liv is shocked when she sees his beat-up face. "Who did this to you?" "I can't talk about Fight Club.... crap..." he says with a sigh as he lets her in. She demands to know what happened. "Would you believe shark attack?"
She asks if he went to the skate park again. "Rough night in jail," he says casually. "Turns out the police take umbrage when you accuse them of negligence." "You were in jail?!" she asks. "Why didn't you -" Major gives her a sad look, and she realizes she messed up. "You did try to call me, and I didn't answer," she says apologetically.
He says he's glad she's here now. "You made the police blotter," she says as she picks up a newspaper and sees his mugshot. Major says that one of the Helton Shelter kids brought it in to group. "My bosses weren't nearly as impressed with my street cred as this kid was." Major was fired. Liv expresses her regret at that.
Major tells her that he needs to talk to her about something, because he thinks she's the only one who might listen to him. "Those people in the woods didn't kill Jerome and Eddie." He tells Liv about Julien Dupont - the Candyman. Liv points out that they found the remains at the house. Major insists that it wasn't them. "This Dupont guy was wearing Jerome's shoes - he practically admitted to killing him!"
Major starts to get agitated. "The police are covering this up - I don't know why - " "The DNA was verified," Liv reminds him. "Just listen, please," Major begs. "I saw something in the Candyman's car. I know it's gonna sound crazy, but I know what I saw." He tells her about the brain in the cooler. "A human brain. I'm sure of it." Liv gets fearfully worried.
She tries to rationalize for Major's sake. "If the guy worked for a butcher shop like he told the police, then it seems logical that the brains came from an animal." "I've been looking at pictures of human and cow brains for hours - I know that sounds crazy. But a cow's brain is baseball sized, and that's not what this was! I need someone to believe me. I'd feel so much better if that someone was you."
"I know how close you and Jerome were. I think that holding on to this case is your way of holding on to Jerome," Liv says. " Major sighs. "You're right," he says. "I don't want you to be, but you are." "I know it's not easy to let go," she sympathizes. "I've gotta get my act together. This - this isn't who I am!" he says emphatically. "If I'm gonna get into a fight with a biker gang, it should be because I knocked over a row of their hogs outside a dive bar!"
"Just promise me you'll back off from this Julien guy," she says. He promises. "You're a good friend, Liv," he tells her as she leaves. Inside the house, Major puts in his ear buds and resumes his search for uses of the human brain.
As she walks down a hall, in a voice-over she says "every time he calls me his friend, I ache. I miss the 'girl-' modifier." She muses that she and Major were perfect for each other because they were besties from the start - underneath all the love and desire to rip each other's clothes off, he was the one person she wanted to share every detail of her life with. "Without that, it's not really even a relationship, is it? Is it just sex? Is that who you are? Is it just zombie bootie calls?"
She knocks on a door. Lowell opens it, with a towel draped over his shoulders. "Sorry - I instinctively take my shirt off every time someone knocks on the door," he says and goes in for a kiss. Liv pulls away. "What are we doing?" she asks him in a concerned tone as she walks in to his apartment. He says he just dyed his roots. "I don't know what you're up to but it seems to involve spiraling."
"We're not friends! Shouldn't friendship be the foundation of a relationship?" Lowell says he thinks it should be the foundation of year two of a relationship. "But right now, what I really want to do is spend epic amounts of time with you... naked..." Liv is exasperated. "Would we even be together if we weren't zombies?!" "Probably not," Lowell answers calmly. "The music scene was my world... you really are a doctor... I suppose if I OD'd I would have met you... but here we are... Zombies... together. What does it matter?"
"It matters," insists Liv forcefully. "It doesn't," disagrees Lowell, still calm. "We have nothing in common except the fact that we're half dead. That is not the basis of a healthy relationship!" Liv argues. "I have a feeling that the woman who's brain you ate never had a healthy relationship in her life." "How do you know it was a woman?!" Liv then realizes that her behavior kind of gave that fact away.
"She's exhuasting!" Liv exclaims. "I thought that being a relationship and sex expert would be fun, but - " Lowell interrupts her. "Sorry - a what expert?" Liv smiles. They head into the bedroom. They fall into bed and make out, and one thing starts leading to another. Liv looks up at the ceiling, and the fan triggers a vision - Sasha in bed with one of her boy toys. A young hottie named Sam. Liv says "Sam" out loud. "Either you're pretending, or... a vision," says Lowell. "A clue," Liv says. "Oh... then... where were we?"
When Liv gets home she tries to sneak past Payton, who's at the table. She hears Liv come in. "So... who's the guy?" Liv is caught. She smiles, and sits down with Payton at the table. "Lowell Tracey." "Oh! Pretty musician. Not your usual type, but you're not the usual Liv, are you?" "You're lookin' at the new normal, sister!"Liv says with a grin as she takes the cup of coffee from Payton.
"Well, if you're happy then I'm happy for you... Even though I think you belong with someone else," says Payton gently. Momentarily annoyed with the implication, Liv steers the topic of conversation to Payton's love life. "Enough about me - who have you been sailing with, and how big is his boat?" she asks. Payton snickers. "Wow.. a size joke... from you? Really? Gosh... you've changed," she says. "Actually, the harbor is empty right now." Payton tells Liv about the three guys that have been pestering her for dates, but she says she would rather kick ass in court than see any of them.
Later, in the morgue, Liv is listening to more sound files of Sasha's show. "Give a guy some direction!" Sasha is saying. "If you're too shy to tell him where you want him to put it, you can't complain if it goes where you don't want it to go!" Liv notices Ravi staring at her, and she quickly pulls her ear buds out. "What's up?" "We've been in here an hour and forty-one minutes! Do I really have to ask again?" Ravi whines. "Is she or is she not dating someone?"
"A tech wunderkind, a professional soccer player, and a future court justice," Liv lies. "So she's still looking," Ravi says with an understanding nod. "Straight talk? I don't think you and Payton work," she tells him. "Sure, you like a challenge, and Payton is certainly that. But she dates guys you would find in the 'Most Eligible Bachelors on the Planet' catalog... if such a thing existed." "Ah. And you don't think I'd be featured in the pages of House Quarterly," he says.
"Ravi, she's a lawyer who looks like a Victoria's Secret model." "Liv - I'm a tall doctor with fantastic hair and a British accent, but to hear you tell it she's out of my league! I don't even need to be this attractive - just icing! Besides... Payton and I - we had a moment!" Liv tries to convince Ravi that he's not Payton's type. Frustrated and hurt by Liv's lack of tact, Ravi withdraws. "I'm a grown man who knows a moment when he experiences one. And my 'distant' parents? I'm fairly certain that they think I put the moon in the sky. This brain you're on - she's a bit of an ass," he tells her. "Thanks for the straight talk," he says bitterly as he walks away.
Liv tells us in a voice - over that the one good thing about being forced to listen to hours of a relationship show is that it cuts down on the awkward silence after you've just done possible irreparable damage to a relationship of your own. She cleans up an autopsy table while Ravi works on something else. They avoid eye contact while Liv keeps sneaking looks over her shoulder at him. She hears a commercial in the saved broadcast, and she recognizes the voice-over artist doing the commercial. She pulls out her ear buds and tells Ravi she's going to go see Clive.
Upstairs, Clive is hanging up the phone as Liv approaches. "Chuck's mail-order gymnast has an alibi," he tells her. "A dozen witnesses saw her at a booty boot camp. You look like you got something..." Liv hands Clive one of her ear buds and plays the commercial for him. "This is from last week's show," she tells him. He recognizes the voice too - as Cheated On in Chattanooga. "They should be able to tell us who recorded it at the radio station!"
They go back to the radio station and talk to Jane. They play the commercial for her, and she recognizes the voice as the caller. They ask her who recorded the promo. Jane tells her that the intern, Kaylee, recorded it as a temp file - something to pitch to the customer. Jane says that the customer liked Kaylee's southern accent so much that they left it in. Clive asks where Kaylee is. Jane tells him that she assumes Kaylee is at home, since it's her day off.
At Kaylee's house, she seems confused and annoyed to find Liv and Clive at her door. She asks them what they want. Liv quotes the commercial that she did, but she doesn't understand what that is supposed to mean. Clive asks her where she was during the time the murder took place. She says she was out on a coffee run for Sasha. Clive asks if she has a receipt or if anyone saw her during that time, like maybe a barista. She says she never got to the coffee shop - she was listening to the show, and when she heard all the commotion she turned around and went back to the station.
"So you were driving around on an uncompleted errand, during which time nobody saw you," says Liv. "That gives you plenty of time to call in as Cheated On in Chattanooga." "What? What makes you think it was me?" A guy on a bike comes up. "Hey babe - everything OK?" he asks Kaylee. Live recognizes him from her vision. "Play it again, Sam," she says. Liv tells Kaylee that they have her voice on the commercial. The voice lab matched her voice to the recording. "We also have an eyewitness to the affair between Sasha and this man."
Clive tells Kaylee she had motive and opportunity. "You told the whole world you were gonna murder Sasha." "I knew you were never gonna let it go," says Sam. Clive arrests her for Sasha's murder, and all her husband has to say about it is "not cool, babe."
At the precinct, Liv and Clive are interrogating Kaylee. "Sam and I were going through a rough time last year. He got drunk at a work party, and Sasha seduced him," she explains. "Cheated On in Chattanooga seemed like a good way to mess with her head - get even, without ruining my career. That's all it was!" "You didn't think anyone would recognize the same fake accent you used in the ads?" asks Clive. "I'm from South Carolina," she says. "That fake accent? That's my real voice, y'all," she says, falling back into her natural southern accent. "And no, I didn't think anybody was gonna remember an ad for a bakery that ran exactly once before the bakery folded a year ago."
Liv tells her that the ad aired last week. "We've got it on tape." "For a business that doesn't exist!? I highly doubt that." Clive pulls out his smartphone to see if the bakery did actually close down while Liv continues to ask questions. "So while your boss and your husband were having these trysts, you said nothing? Why didn't you confront her?" "If I had said anything, she would have blackballed me like she did to Jane!" "Sasha blackballed Jane?" Liv asks. "When Sasha found out Jane was sending out tapes, Sasha ran her down to every station manager in every top hundred market in the country."
Clive tells Liv that Kaylee was right about the bakery being closed down. "According to Yelp, they shut their doors last year." Liv realizes something. "The only way that recording gets on the air is if Jane plants it there. She wanted us to put it together." "Sasha ruined Jane's career. Jane wanted to kill her. Kaylee's death threat gave her the perfect opportunity," agrees Clive. He asks where Jane is now. Kaylee tells him that she's at the station, doing Sasha's memorial broadcast. "She's finally getting her big break," says Liv. They head to the radio station with two other officers.
Jane has locked herself in the sound booth, and is doing the broadcast. The vibe is very mellow, like an NPR broadcast. (The first thing that came to mind for me was the SNL skit "Schweddy Balls." Good times.) Jane is saying some very nice things about the late Sasha Arconi. She opens the phone lines, and the calls she gets are people complaining. "You suck!" says the first caller. The second caller makes snoring noises and hangs up.
When Liv, Clive, and the other officers get to the studio, Jane sees them through the window. "Looks like my tenure here won't be quite as long as I hoped," she tells her listeners. Clive gets the station engineer to unlock the door. Before they can get in, Jane has an on-air rant about how Sasha didn't really care about the listeners, and how she would laugh at the callers.
She goes on about how Sasha ruined her dream. "She destroyed my chances with every station manager on the West coast! I was her biggest fan, and she killed my dreams. Well... I hope there's radio in hell. And I hope you're listening, Sasha, because you can go - " "Jane Bowman - you're under arrest for the murder of Sasha Arconi." Liv asks her if she has any last words for Sasha's fans.
At home, Liv yells to Payton that she's going to Lowell's. "Alright, I won't wait up," answers Payton. As Liv grabs a bottle of water from the fridge, Payton's phone rings. She sees that it's her work number, and knows it's Ravi calling. She contemplates ignoring it and leaving quickly, but Payton asks if the call is for her. Liv answers the phone. "Payton's phone!" Ravi hears Liv's voice, and is confused. "Liv?" Um.. Is.. I'd like to speak to Payton," he says. "Hang on a sec, I'll get her."
Coming out of the bathroom, Payton asks who the caller is. Liv hands her the phone. "It's Ravi," she says. "Who?" asks Payton. "My boss from the morgue!" Payton shrugs, still confused. Liv shows her a picture of Ravi from her phone. "Oh! Yeah, yeah... British guy!" Payton takes the call, and Liv heads for the door.
Liv's voice-over: It's bad enough that I spent the last few days dispensing the advice of a hypocrite. If I don't get out of here in the next three seconds, I'm gonna witness a train wreck. Let this be a lesson - stay out of people's business. Keep your advice to yourself!
Before she can get out of the apartment, Payton stops her with a question. "So... um... Your boss just... uh..." "You should say yes," Liv says encouragingly. "That wouldn't be weird for you?" asks Payton. "Do it," replies Liv with a smile. Payton accepts Ravi's date....
Liv's voice-over: OK, so my pledge to keep my advice to myself didn't last long. Maybe I'm too reticent on the advice front. What would I say?
Looking out the glass wall of the elevator, she sees:
I really wanted to kick Liv's ass for how she treated Ravi about the whole issue, and I think I fell in love with Rahul Kohli's performances even more. That particular scene was an emotional moment that was very well played. I felt Ravi's pain. Hopefully all this shipping doesn't take the focus off the whole premise of the show - crime solving and zombie research with our new Scoobie Gang.
What do you think - too much shipping going on? Should they just stick to the storytelling, crime scene action, and brain eating? Hit the jump for the recap, and tell us what you think in the comments below!
Driving in to work, Liv listens to talk radio. The host is taking calls about dysfunctional relationships, and dishing out advice to a caller with a cheating husband. In a voice-over, Liv tells us how she has to spend every day of life ("or whatever we zombies choose to call the daily grind") being bombarded by reminders of the things they can no longer enjoy. Cheeseburgers... rosy complexion... progeny. "Sex, on the other hand, is back on the menu for this zombie."
Liv is engrossed in listening to the talk show. The caller on the talk show is telling the host, Sasha Arcani, that she caught her husband with another woman. Sasha advises the caller that she needs to cut the man loose. "Oh no. I'm keepin' my man. It's that slut he's hookin' up with I'm gonna murder." Liv is now fully entrenched in the drama of the talk show, and doesn't notice that the traffic light has changed to green until someone honks their horn behind her.
"Do you have any information as to when my friend will be released?" "Oh, yeah. I'm just keeping it to myself because I really enjoy these chats we have every fifteen minutes. Maybe don't be friends with criminals?" she snarks as she resumes her call. Ravi returns to his seat, and picks up a kids' magazine and does some of the puzzles.
"The time stamp is missing - which means he's being held in violation of Habeas corpus statutes." "I could stamp it now," says the clerk. "Are you offering to commit forgery?" asks Payton. "No..." the clerk responds sheepishly. "Get him out. Now!"
Peyton notices Ravi with the kids' magazines. "I read it for the articles," he says. The intake clerk makes a call. She tells Payton that Major will be released - "fifteen minutes, tops." "Make it five," says Payton. Peyton sits, and waits. A few moments later, Major is released. He is escorted to the waiting room by two officers. His face is a mess - cuts, scrapes and bruises.
"What did they do to you?!" asks Payton, concerned. Major tells her that it was some lesson he was supposed to learn. Ravi comes over with paper towels and starts dabbing at Major's face. "Maybe you should keep me on retainer," he tells Major. "Excuse me, you are...?" Payton asks defensively. Major introduces them. He tells them that he tried to call Liv. Payton and Ravi both tell him that wouldn't be a good idea. "We'd have two messes to clean up!" exclaims Ravi.
Payton asks who he was fighting with this time. "Sons of Anarchy..." he says. "A little bit of advice - don't go to jail the day after you're quoted on the front page of the paper saying the police are indifferent about the disappearance of the underclass." "If you want to sue the city, I can put you in touch with someone," Payton tells him. "That would be a waste of my time," he says . "The only witnesses were the guards and guys whipping my ass..."
He tells Payton and Ravi that all he wants to do is find out what happened to Eddie and Jerome. Ravi gently tells him about the Emily Sparrow case - "she was kidnapped by space alien worshipping, sister-wife collecting crazy people" and they found the remains of some of the the missing kids from the skate park at their compound. Eddie and Jerome were among the remains found.
Ravi shows Major the front page of the paper with the story. Major admits that he knew in his gut that they were gone, but he just didn't want to believe it. "I know who killed Jerome and Eddie, and it wasn't these two. I've seen things... if I told you, you wouldn't believe me. Everything the police tells you in this town is a lie."
At work, Liv continues to listen to the talk show, streaming it on a computer in the morgue. Sasha makes a statement that she encourages self-empowerment but she would never suggest murder. The caller sounds triumphant as she asks for the listener's input - she describes a car, and gives out most of the license plate number. "No... No no no!" says Sasha as the caller gets cut off. She asks the caller to call back so they can talk about the problem some more.
Ravi comes in to the morgue, and apologizes for being late. "A friend had some legal issues," he says as Liv shushes him. "A caller just threatened to murder her husband's mistress, on the air! Sasha, the host, is trying to get her to call back in!" Ravi starts to say how he doesn't understand how Liv could possibly be into that kind of drama. "Zip it!" she says as she continues listening to the talk show.
The broadcast then goes horribly wrong. Over the air, there is static and electronic audio feedback. "What just happened?" asks Ravi. "I don't know," Liv says. As they continue to listen, they hear people screaming and calling for an ambulance over the broadcast, and then the station goes off the air. Liv and Ravi both look horrified. "I stand corrected... this is compelling radio!" says Ravi.
At the radio station, Liv and Ravi are looking over the crime scene. Sasha lays dead at the sound board. "The electricity entered her body through her hands," notes Ravi. "The current then pulsed through her chest cavity -" "Causing instant cardiac arrest," adds Liv as she gets a closer look at the body. "Electrocution is an extremely rare cause of death," Ravi says.
"It wasn't an accident," Clive announces as he enters the studio. "According to the fire inspector, someone intentionally spliced the victim's microphone into the station's generator. The moment she touched it after the break, bam!" he explains. "The first thing we need to do is find Cheated On in Chattanooga."
"The caller who threatened to murder her husband's mistress on today's show," Liv says. Clive gives Liv a weird look. "Uh... First time listener," she says with a shrug. Clive points out that the license plate that the caller gave out on air was registered to the victim. "Shocking," says Ravi with a grin. As Liv and Clive stare at him, he asks, "too soon?"
Liv and Clive are interviewing the show's producer, Jane. Clive asks if Sasha recognized her own license plate when she heard it on the air. "Yeah, she was terrified. She sent me downstairs to grab security," says Jane. "As the show's producer, you screen the calls and decide which ones go on the air?" Jane nods. "It's a local show, but was Cheated On in Chattanooga calling from Tennessee?" Clive asks. Jane says that the show is streamed nationally, but she could tell from the caller ID that Cheated On's calls all came from a Seattle area code.
Liv asks if the woman was a frequent caller. "Ten, twelve times in the past few weeks... She was high drama - a woman on the verge. She gave great radio," Jane answers. "We'll need those calls," Clive says. Jane calls in Kaylee (an intern), and tells her to get the audio files from the past two weeks for them.
Jane explains that the more recent files will be harder to get, but they'll have a lot to listen to in the mean time. She also says that they don't archive the show segments by caller, so if they want just those segments someone will have to go through thirty hours of audio files. Liv cheerfully volunteers to do that. "Who couldn't use a few hours of straight talk?"
Jane smiles sadly. "That was definitely Sasha's forte. She was fearless! I just... I can't believe she's gone. We made so many hours of radio together..." she says as she starts to tear up. "Excuse me, I think I'm going to need a minute..." "Of course," says Clive as Jane leaves. Liv watches her go, but something about the producer sets her Spidey-sense tingling.
Walking with the intern, Clive asks if Sasha and Jane were close. Kaylee explained that they've been close since college - "Sasha was the Psych major with the big personality, Jane was the RTF major with the radio skills." Clive asks if Sasha was seeing anyone romantically. "Specifically? No... I mean, she talked about her sex life all the time on the air, but her lovers always got code names. 'The All-Niter', 'Sir Cries-A-Lot'..."
"So there were a lot of lovers?" asks Liv. "From what she said, yeah," says Kaylee, rolling her eyes. "I don't know any names or anything, but everyone around here knows that she had a thing for guys who were already in relationships." Kaylee asks if they think one of her lovers did this. "We'll look into every possibility," says Clive as Kaylee directs them into the electrical room.
The station's engineer shows them how the killer ran Sasha's mic power line directly into the station's back-up generator. Clive asks who might have had access to that area. The engineer tells him that the broadcasting company owns five stations, and they all feed out of there. There were also public tours that came through there all day. "Last week, some clown got in during a KGOV broadcast. He took half a dozen calls before someone realized he wasn't really a city comptroller." "So basically, anyone could have gotten in here," states Clive. The engineer shrugs.
At the morgue, Liv is listening to one of the audio files of the Great. Morning. Sex. broadcasts on her smartphone while she prepares her lunch - dead talk show host brain salad. "Yes, manscaping is a thing! You can't expect a girl to go hackin' through the bush like Indiana Jones looking for the Lost Temple!" says Sasha through Liv's headphones. Looking up, she notices Ravi watching her.
"Did you need me for something?" she asks as she pulls out one of her ear buds. "No," says Ravi. But as Liv starts to put her ear bud back in her ear, he tells her he had some business at the courthouse that morning. "I met your roommate - Payton." "Oh?" says Liv. "Bit of a spitfire, isn't she?" says Ravi. "Do you know if she's seeing anyone?" "Oh, probably," Liv says with a smile.
Seeing Ravi's sardonic expression, Liv gets it. "Oh... you're asking because you might want to ask her out?" Ravi sighs. "For a minute there, I thought I might have to draw you a diagram!" "I'll check," Liv says. "But she's generally not lacking for male companionship." "I think we had a moment," says Ravi hopefully. Turning toward the refrigerator, she has a look of 'nope nope' on her face. Changing the subject, she says in a stiff voice that the early shift was displeased to find that the storage cabinet was padlocked.
"They'll get over it," Ravi says in a dismissive tone. "This is where we're curing Zombie-ism!" As he unlocks the padlock, he says "I'm mid-experiment. Our guinea rats are behind this door, rolling hard on Utopium and MaxRager. Right now, they're probably waving tiny glow sticks in the air!" As Liv takes a bite of her salad, Ravi opens the door. Going in, he says over his shoulder "I think somebody needs an escort to the chill-out room!"
Liv continues eating. A moment later, Ravi calls urgently from the storage room. "Liv!" She goes in, and they find that one rat is missing and the rest of them are dead - with their brains missing. "The Lannisters send their regards," says Liv. (Characters in the 'Game of Thrones' series, for those who don't get the reference.) Looking around at the cages, she asks "where's the fifth rat?" Ravi is worried. "I don't know, but I can't stress enough the importance of finding him!"
Liv hears squeaking, and she finds the missing rat sitting on the floor, it's tiny face smeared with blood. "Holy crap, Ravi - it's white and murderous! You did it! You made a zombie rat!" It starts to run at them, and Ravi jumps up onto a table. "Ooh! Where ya goin', little buddy?" Liv says as she scoops the rat up.
"Uh... I believe he was on his way to murder me and eat my brains," exclaims Ravi from the table. "Why isn't he tearing into you?" Liv coos over the rat. "It's a zombie thing, you wouldn't understand." To the rat, she says "Zombie brains are nasty! You wouldn't want those... no, you wouldn't..." "Uh... that rat you're doting on like a purse chihuahua could end civilization as we know it!" says Ravi. Liv giggles like a child playing with a puppy for the first time.
Back in the main room, Liv is finishing her meal while Ravi tells her about his findings. "The human genome is full of so-called junk DNA, right? Veritable sleeper cells of evolution, waiting to be called into action by a change in environment or circumstance," he explains.
"Enter the chemical cocktail of tainted Utopium and MaxRager! The cocktail wakes up dormant genes, which then transforms an ordinary human - or rat - into a zombie at the cellular level." "So you'll use antibodies from zombie rats to synthesize a gene-based therapy cure?" Liv asks. "That's the plan," he says.
As they look at the rat in the glass enclosure, Ravi muses. "Do you think this is how Oppenheimer felt staring down at the A-bomb?" "Like a drama queen? Or are you talking about his need for self-aggrandizement?" quips Liv. "Aww..." whines Ravi. "Oh, come on... Gentle ribbing!" she says. "Dr. Oppenheimer, you love me!"
Clive walks in. "Chattanooga's phone was a burner - totally untraceable," he says. "New development - check this out!" he says as he shows Liv an image on his cellphone. "Dear god! How about a heads up, or NSFW warning!?" she says, looking at the image. "Is that a... blow-up sex doll?!" she asks, incredulous. "Ooh - I wanna see!" says Ravi. "With Sasha Arconi's face pasted over the doll's," adds Clive. "There are a bunch of them," says Ravi as he scrolls through the images on the phone.
Clive tells them that Sasha was in a blood feud with the host of a rival drive-time sports talk show called The Morning Hurl. "The host, Chuck Burd, asked all his listeners - 'upchuckers,' they're called - to commit unspeakable acts upon a Sasha Arconi blow-up doll and post them online." "Delightful," says Liv sarcastically. "Sasha gave as good as she got," Clive says. "She was promoting a round-table interview next week with several of Chuck's past lovers." "Sounds like we should have a chat with Chuck," says Live. "Exactly my though," agrees Clive.
"Stressing your boundaries - one of several signs of the classic distancer," says Liv with an air of authority. "Pair that with avoiding discussions of deep feelings..." "I'm going in now," says Clive as he walks away from her. "Pulling away when things get real," she pushes. "Look, it's nice that you want to get to know me..." "Sending mixed signals!" she points out.
"What's gotten into you?" Clive asks. "You listen to Sasha's show for one day, and now you think you're her?" Liv sighs and nods. "Something like that," she says, not able to explain about the brain thing. "I'm not the 'let's get real' type anyway," he tells her. "Ask Devore in Vice - she'll tell you." "Idealizing your past partner," Liv says nodding. "You are so text-book!" Clive turns and walks away from her, heading into the building. "Seriously - you can stop talking right now, because I know everything there is to know about you!" she says as she follows him.
"Upchuckers! Show of hands - who's screwed an albino chick? Anyone? Anyone? I think what they lack in pigment, they make up for in naaasty... am I right? We got a chick in the studio right now, beggin' for someone to bang a little color back into her cheeks! Ain't that right, sweetheart?" Clive and Liv both look disgusted. Clive puts his badge up against the window.
Outside the booth, they talk to Chuck. He tells them that the feud with Sasha was all for show. "The more PMS-y she acted, the more fired up my listeners got. That broad was ratings gold!" Chuck says with a laugh. Liv gives her analysis of Chuck's personality. "So... your relationship with your mother - I'm going with 'complicated.' Extreme narcissism with a tendency towards sexual deviance," she says as she looks around at the blow-up dolls surrounding them. "Mommy issues," she points out. "All I'm saying is, the inexplicable crying when you're cupping the carrot? There's a reason for that."
Clive interrupts her before she goes too far. "Mr. Burd - the show Sasha was supposed to be doing about you? A lot of men would feel threatened by their ex-lovers comparing notes on the radio." Chuck shrugs. "Yeah... unless all of your notes are just... " He kisses his fingers. "I was just worried she wouldn't be able to fit them all in the studio!" Liv is offended. "If I'm gonna puke in your trash bin, do I need to go through the basketball hoop?" she asks.
"What do I care?" Looking a Clive, he adds "You and I both know how women get when you... kick 'em loose." "You kick a lot of women loose?" asks Clive. "Not anymore. I'm a happily married man now," Chuck says as he grabs his tablet. He shows them a picture of his wife Oksana, and that triggers a vision for Liv.
Through Sasha's eyes, Liv sees Oksana confronting Sasha. "Stay away from my husband, whore!" she says with a heavy foreign accent. Then she throws a drink in Sasha's face. Liv gasps, and Clive gives her a concerned glance while Chuck goes on about his wife. "She's not the brightest bulb in the chandelier, but she is a former gymnast... power tumbler," he says, making the statement into an innuendo. "When your wife found out you were sleeping with Sasha, was she mad enough to kill her?" asks Liv. Chuck looks at her, wondering how she knew he had slept with Sasha. She looks back at him with a "know-it-all" smirk.
Chuck admits the affair. "Sasha and I bumped uglies a couple of times... I'm not the first guy to have a little hate bang on the side." "No, but you have an angry wife and a dead lover," Liv says. "You think Oksana is this Chattanooga chick!?" Chuck says, laughing in disbelief. "She's a mail-order bride! She knows maybe fifty words of English! The woman can barely order a cup of coffee, let alone fake a southern accent..."
Clive asks him where he was during the time window for the murder. Chuck says he was on the air, then excuses himself. "I got forty-two seconds to go take a leak... " "For what it's worth, I don't think his wife could have passed for Cheated On in Chattanooga... Maybe Cheated On in Chechnya..." Liv says after Chuck leaves. "That doesn't mean she didn't kill her," says Clive. "I'll check her out." "Where's a vat of bleach when you need one?" Liv snarks, looking around at several blow-up dolls as they leave the studio.
At home, Major is looking at pictures of human brains on the Internet. "Hello?" calls Karin as she walks in. She finds him in the kitchen with his laptop. "You missed our lunch date," she says, walking up behind him. He starts to apologize, and she goes around to face him. "Oh, my god..." she says when she sees his face. She asks him what happened, and he tells her. She looks at the laptop. "Why are you looking at pictures of brains? You know what - nevermind. This is so not what I signed up for..."
He tries to explain, but she cuts him off. "You keep getting into fights! You just got arrested! You're in a running battle with someone known as the Candyman... what the hell?! You were the dream combination...super hot, funny.. now you look like some whackjob who doesn't shower enough!" Major tries to interrupt. "If you'd just give me a second to explain -" "You should get some help," she says regretfully as she leaves. Ravi nearly bumps into her as she passes him in the hall. "I take it game night's off," he says.
Leaning against a crate at a warehouse, Blaine waits. As Suzuki walks up, Blaine starts clapping slowly. "Enter the hero! Why so glum, chum?" he asks in a Joker-esque fashion. "I can't do this anymore," Suzuki tells Blaine. "Moving those kids' bodies... It's too much!" "What, emotionally? Or physically? Because those bodies shouldn't have weighed very much - how heavy are bones?" he responds, being an asshole. "Dammit, you listen to me! You're not even trying to be careful anymore. The bodies are piling up, and you just... expect me to make them disappear!"
"What part of me having you by the short and curlies don't you understand? I'm literally your meal ticket," he tells Suzuki. "I understand that, but you nee-" Blaine interrupts him. "What're you gonna do, hm? You gonna mosey on down to the holding cell, pop open a couple of craniums a week and hope no one gets wise? You need to stop acting like you have options, and just do what I tell you to do!"
Suzuki tells Blaine about Liv. "There's a girl in the M.E.'s office. Pale... Looks like she plays for Team Z..." "Yeah. I know all about her. She has her own special role in all this," Blaine says. "Woulda been nice to get a heads up," Suzuki complains. "I'm sorry, dear. You know how I struggle with my communication skills. Now - run off and do your job. Protect and serve... me." Suzuki leaves with a resigned look on his face.
Clive brings Jane in for questioning. "Any time you mix friendship and work, things can get complicated. But Sasha and I were fine," she says with a smile. "So you didn't mind when she yelled at you and threw things? You were cool with that?" asks Clive. "Oh... you heard about the cupcakes,' she says with a chuckle. "Yeah, Sasha could go a little psycho, but that time I had it coming," she says with a rueful smile.
"Why's that?" asks Liv. Jane explains that Sasha found out she was sending tapes to other stations. "We started as co-hosts, and then Sasha became this big star and I became just her producer... which was fine, for a while, but -" "But you would have rather been behind the mic," says Clive. "Anybody in radio who tells you differently is lying," Jane says.
Clive asks her if she got any offers. "No... It takes a certain kind of charisma to get people to tune in and listen." Liv seems to sense something is off about Jane. "Sasha had it. Judging by my lack of offers, well... I guess we'll never know." "Sasha was pretty angry when she found out you wanted to leave," Liv points out. "Only at first, but she got over it, and started fighting for a raise for me - to entice me to stay." She tells them that they got those last 'Cheated' files from archives, if they still wanted them. Clive acknowledges it.
When Liv gets back to the lab, Ravi shows her a metal glove. "Oyster shucking gloves. Watch..." He picks up a scalpel, and stabs at the table between his fingers, increasing the speed with each pass. As the scalpel comes into contact with the glove, Ravi cries out and drops it. "Ravi!" Liv yells, afraid that he's hurt himself. "Voila!" he says with a big grin. "Chainmaille for the hands!" "Enjoy hell!" she retorts.
"Have you heard from Major today?" she asks. "I missed a call from him yesterday, and I haven't heard back." Ravi hedges. "Oh... he's.. he's fine. He's got some stuff going on... romantically. There was a breakup, in that Karin dumped him." Liv is shocked. "Major doesn't get dumped. There are only two reasons to dump Major - being a zombie, and literal death. Wait- you don't think Karin - " "Is now a zombie? Seems unlikely. Speaking of roommate... Have you spoken with Payton yet?"
"Wow," Liv says sardonically. "All roads lead to Rome with you lately, huh?" She proceeds to try and distract him from the subject of Payton by using her newly learned psychobabble skills, and makes a lot of comments about his past with his parents. "Are you shrinking me?" he asks. "I'm just pointing out obvious behavior that could... potentially lead to you being hurt."
He gives her an irritated look. "OK - I guess I'm shrinking you! But you really need to learn from the past and not try to relive it," she says as she starts to put in her ear buds. "I can't help it, I'm filled to the brim with insight!" "Oh, that's what you're full of!" Ravi says sarcastically. "Just find out if she's dating anyone, OK?" he begs. "I live to enable," she says.
She asks if he went to the skate park again. "Rough night in jail," he says casually. "Turns out the police take umbrage when you accuse them of negligence." "You were in jail?!" she asks. "Why didn't you -" Major gives her a sad look, and she realizes she messed up. "You did try to call me, and I didn't answer," she says apologetically.
Major tells her that he needs to talk to her about something, because he thinks she's the only one who might listen to him. "Those people in the woods didn't kill Jerome and Eddie." He tells Liv about Julien Dupont - the Candyman. Liv points out that they found the remains at the house. Major insists that it wasn't them. "This Dupont guy was wearing Jerome's shoes - he practically admitted to killing him!"
Major starts to get agitated. "The police are covering this up - I don't know why - " "The DNA was verified," Liv reminds him. "Just listen, please," Major begs. "I saw something in the Candyman's car. I know it's gonna sound crazy, but I know what I saw." He tells her about the brain in the cooler. "A human brain. I'm sure of it." Liv gets fearfully worried.
She tries to rationalize for Major's sake. "If the guy worked for a butcher shop like he told the police, then it seems logical that the brains came from an animal." "I've been looking at pictures of human and cow brains for hours - I know that sounds crazy. But a cow's brain is baseball sized, and that's not what this was! I need someone to believe me. I'd feel so much better if that someone was you."
"I know how close you and Jerome were. I think that holding on to this case is your way of holding on to Jerome," Liv says. " Major sighs. "You're right," he says. "I don't want you to be, but you are." "I know it's not easy to let go," she sympathizes. "I've gotta get my act together. This - this isn't who I am!" he says emphatically. "If I'm gonna get into a fight with a biker gang, it should be because I knocked over a row of their hogs outside a dive bar!"
"Just promise me you'll back off from this Julien guy," she says. He promises. "You're a good friend, Liv," he tells her as she leaves. Inside the house, Major puts in his ear buds and resumes his search for uses of the human brain.
As she walks down a hall, in a voice-over she says "every time he calls me his friend, I ache. I miss the 'girl-' modifier." She muses that she and Major were perfect for each other because they were besties from the start - underneath all the love and desire to rip each other's clothes off, he was the one person she wanted to share every detail of her life with. "Without that, it's not really even a relationship, is it? Is it just sex? Is that who you are? Is it just zombie bootie calls?"
She knocks on a door. Lowell opens it, with a towel draped over his shoulders. "Sorry - I instinctively take my shirt off every time someone knocks on the door," he says and goes in for a kiss. Liv pulls away. "What are we doing?" she asks him in a concerned tone as she walks in to his apartment. He says he just dyed his roots. "I don't know what you're up to but it seems to involve spiraling."
"We're not friends! Shouldn't friendship be the foundation of a relationship?" Lowell says he thinks it should be the foundation of year two of a relationship. "But right now, what I really want to do is spend epic amounts of time with you... naked..." Liv is exasperated. "Would we even be together if we weren't zombies?!" "Probably not," Lowell answers calmly. "The music scene was my world... you really are a doctor... I suppose if I OD'd I would have met you... but here we are... Zombies... together. What does it matter?"
"It matters," insists Liv forcefully. "It doesn't," disagrees Lowell, still calm. "We have nothing in common except the fact that we're half dead. That is not the basis of a healthy relationship!" Liv argues. "I have a feeling that the woman who's brain you ate never had a healthy relationship in her life." "How do you know it was a woman?!" Liv then realizes that her behavior kind of gave that fact away.
"She's exhuasting!" Liv exclaims. "I thought that being a relationship and sex expert would be fun, but - " Lowell interrupts her. "Sorry - a what expert?" Liv smiles. They head into the bedroom. They fall into bed and make out, and one thing starts leading to another. Liv looks up at the ceiling, and the fan triggers a vision - Sasha in bed with one of her boy toys. A young hottie named Sam. Liv says "Sam" out loud. "Either you're pretending, or... a vision," says Lowell. "A clue," Liv says. "Oh... then... where were we?"
When Liv gets home she tries to sneak past Payton, who's at the table. She hears Liv come in. "So... who's the guy?" Liv is caught. She smiles, and sits down with Payton at the table. "Lowell Tracey." "Oh! Pretty musician. Not your usual type, but you're not the usual Liv, are you?" "You're lookin' at the new normal, sister!"Liv says with a grin as she takes the cup of coffee from Payton.
"Well, if you're happy then I'm happy for you... Even though I think you belong with someone else," says Payton gently. Momentarily annoyed with the implication, Liv steers the topic of conversation to Payton's love life. "Enough about me - who have you been sailing with, and how big is his boat?" she asks. Payton snickers. "Wow.. a size joke... from you? Really? Gosh... you've changed," she says. "Actually, the harbor is empty right now." Payton tells Liv about the three guys that have been pestering her for dates, but she says she would rather kick ass in court than see any of them.
Later, in the morgue, Liv is listening to more sound files of Sasha's show. "Give a guy some direction!" Sasha is saying. "If you're too shy to tell him where you want him to put it, you can't complain if it goes where you don't want it to go!" Liv notices Ravi staring at her, and she quickly pulls her ear buds out. "What's up?" "We've been in here an hour and forty-one minutes! Do I really have to ask again?" Ravi whines. "Is she or is she not dating someone?"
"A tech wunderkind, a professional soccer player, and a future court justice," Liv lies. "So she's still looking," Ravi says with an understanding nod. "Straight talk? I don't think you and Payton work," she tells him. "Sure, you like a challenge, and Payton is certainly that. But she dates guys you would find in the 'Most Eligible Bachelors on the Planet' catalog... if such a thing existed." "Ah. And you don't think I'd be featured in the pages of House Quarterly," he says.
"Ravi, she's a lawyer who looks like a Victoria's Secret model." "Liv - I'm a tall doctor with fantastic hair and a British accent, but to hear you tell it she's out of my league! I don't even need to be this attractive - just icing! Besides... Payton and I - we had a moment!" Liv tries to convince Ravi that he's not Payton's type. Frustrated and hurt by Liv's lack of tact, Ravi withdraws. "I'm a grown man who knows a moment when he experiences one. And my 'distant' parents? I'm fairly certain that they think I put the moon in the sky. This brain you're on - she's a bit of an ass," he tells her. "Thanks for the straight talk," he says bitterly as he walks away.
Liv tells us in a voice - over that the one good thing about being forced to listen to hours of a relationship show is that it cuts down on the awkward silence after you've just done possible irreparable damage to a relationship of your own. She cleans up an autopsy table while Ravi works on something else. They avoid eye contact while Liv keeps sneaking looks over her shoulder at him. She hears a commercial in the saved broadcast, and she recognizes the voice-over artist doing the commercial. She pulls out her ear buds and tells Ravi she's going to go see Clive.
Upstairs, Clive is hanging up the phone as Liv approaches. "Chuck's mail-order gymnast has an alibi," he tells her. "A dozen witnesses saw her at a booty boot camp. You look like you got something..." Liv hands Clive one of her ear buds and plays the commercial for him. "This is from last week's show," she tells him. He recognizes the voice too - as Cheated On in Chattanooga. "They should be able to tell us who recorded it at the radio station!"
They go back to the radio station and talk to Jane. They play the commercial for her, and she recognizes the voice as the caller. They ask her who recorded the promo. Jane tells her that the intern, Kaylee, recorded it as a temp file - something to pitch to the customer. Jane says that the customer liked Kaylee's southern accent so much that they left it in. Clive asks where Kaylee is. Jane tells him that she assumes Kaylee is at home, since it's her day off.
At Kaylee's house, she seems confused and annoyed to find Liv and Clive at her door. She asks them what they want. Liv quotes the commercial that she did, but she doesn't understand what that is supposed to mean. Clive asks her where she was during the time the murder took place. She says she was out on a coffee run for Sasha. Clive asks if she has a receipt or if anyone saw her during that time, like maybe a barista. She says she never got to the coffee shop - she was listening to the show, and when she heard all the commotion she turned around and went back to the station.
"So you were driving around on an uncompleted errand, during which time nobody saw you," says Liv. "That gives you plenty of time to call in as Cheated On in Chattanooga." "What? What makes you think it was me?" A guy on a bike comes up. "Hey babe - everything OK?" he asks Kaylee. Live recognizes him from her vision. "Play it again, Sam," she says. Liv tells Kaylee that they have her voice on the commercial. The voice lab matched her voice to the recording. "We also have an eyewitness to the affair between Sasha and this man."
Clive tells Kaylee she had motive and opportunity. "You told the whole world you were gonna murder Sasha." "I knew you were never gonna let it go," says Sam. Clive arrests her for Sasha's murder, and all her husband has to say about it is "not cool, babe."
At the precinct, Liv and Clive are interrogating Kaylee. "Sam and I were going through a rough time last year. He got drunk at a work party, and Sasha seduced him," she explains. "Cheated On in Chattanooga seemed like a good way to mess with her head - get even, without ruining my career. That's all it was!" "You didn't think anyone would recognize the same fake accent you used in the ads?" asks Clive. "I'm from South Carolina," she says. "That fake accent? That's my real voice, y'all," she says, falling back into her natural southern accent. "And no, I didn't think anybody was gonna remember an ad for a bakery that ran exactly once before the bakery folded a year ago."
Liv tells her that the ad aired last week. "We've got it on tape." "For a business that doesn't exist!? I highly doubt that." Clive pulls out his smartphone to see if the bakery did actually close down while Liv continues to ask questions. "So while your boss and your husband were having these trysts, you said nothing? Why didn't you confront her?" "If I had said anything, she would have blackballed me like she did to Jane!" "Sasha blackballed Jane?" Liv asks. "When Sasha found out Jane was sending out tapes, Sasha ran her down to every station manager in every top hundred market in the country."
Clive tells Liv that Kaylee was right about the bakery being closed down. "According to Yelp, they shut their doors last year." Liv realizes something. "The only way that recording gets on the air is if Jane plants it there. She wanted us to put it together." "Sasha ruined Jane's career. Jane wanted to kill her. Kaylee's death threat gave her the perfect opportunity," agrees Clive. He asks where Jane is now. Kaylee tells him that she's at the station, doing Sasha's memorial broadcast. "She's finally getting her big break," says Liv. They head to the radio station with two other officers.
Jane has locked herself in the sound booth, and is doing the broadcast. The vibe is very mellow, like an NPR broadcast. (The first thing that came to mind for me was the SNL skit "Schweddy Balls." Good times.) Jane is saying some very nice things about the late Sasha Arconi. She opens the phone lines, and the calls she gets are people complaining. "You suck!" says the first caller. The second caller makes snoring noises and hangs up.
When Liv, Clive, and the other officers get to the studio, Jane sees them through the window. "Looks like my tenure here won't be quite as long as I hoped," she tells her listeners. Clive gets the station engineer to unlock the door. Before they can get in, Jane has an on-air rant about how Sasha didn't really care about the listeners, and how she would laugh at the callers.
She goes on about how Sasha ruined her dream. "She destroyed my chances with every station manager on the West coast! I was her biggest fan, and she killed my dreams. Well... I hope there's radio in hell. And I hope you're listening, Sasha, because you can go - " "Jane Bowman - you're under arrest for the murder of Sasha Arconi." Liv asks her if she has any last words for Sasha's fans.
Jane hits the button on the sound card.
At home, Liv yells to Payton that she's going to Lowell's. "Alright, I won't wait up," answers Payton. As Liv grabs a bottle of water from the fridge, Payton's phone rings. She sees that it's her work number, and knows it's Ravi calling. She contemplates ignoring it and leaving quickly, but Payton asks if the call is for her. Liv answers the phone. "Payton's phone!" Ravi hears Liv's voice, and is confused. "Liv?" Um.. Is.. I'd like to speak to Payton," he says. "Hang on a sec, I'll get her."
Coming out of the bathroom, Payton asks who the caller is. Liv hands her the phone. "It's Ravi," she says. "Who?" asks Payton. "My boss from the morgue!" Payton shrugs, still confused. Liv shows her a picture of Ravi from her phone. "Oh! Yeah, yeah... British guy!" Payton takes the call, and Liv heads for the door.
Liv's voice-over: It's bad enough that I spent the last few days dispensing the advice of a hypocrite. If I don't get out of here in the next three seconds, I'm gonna witness a train wreck. Let this be a lesson - stay out of people's business. Keep your advice to yourself!
Before she can get out of the apartment, Payton stops her with a question. "So... um... Your boss just... uh..." "You should say yes," Liv says encouragingly. "That wouldn't be weird for you?" asks Payton. "Do it," replies Liv with a smile. Payton accepts Ravi's date....
Liv's voice-over: OK, so my pledge to keep my advice to myself didn't last long. Maybe I'm too reticent on the advice front. What would I say?
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| Ravi - don't ever listen to me again. You are too selfless.. too wrapped up in saving me. Chill out! Slow and steady wins the race. I wouldn't want you to burn out. Because without you... I'm nothing. Major - don't lose sight of who you are. You were sweetness, and light. That's who I fell in love with... who the next girl will fall in love with. Don't pile tragedy on tragedy. |
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| And what advice would you give yourself, Liv? Would you even take it? You don't need to know why you feel good... just enjoy the ride. |
Looking out the glass wall of the elevator, she sees:
That triggers this:
 |
| "Jerome!!" "Settle down, Jerome... it's not a long ride!" |
Then this happens:
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