Wednesday, May 12, 2010

Mrs. Amanda Recaps CRIMINAL MINDS (Episode 5x20 "A Thousand Words")

This post is a little late because we were celebrating Kyle's birthday last Wednesday!  Although I guess it comes just in time to get you amped up for this week's new ep.

Before we begin, a word from my beautiful sister, the Casting Associate on CM:



I guess the most entertaining of it all were the auditions for the two women. I've said before that the most awkward auditions are death scenes, but right after those are birth scenes. The screaming and breathing and crying and such... oy. After reading 5 women for that kind of role, you feel like you need to take a shot of something. So, of course, this is one of our most intense/brutal birthing scenes and not only for the mom, but for the girl delivering the baby. If you can imagine, we read about 8 women for each role... that is 16 women screaming at each other and crying (and for the moms) wriggling around on the floor. And they were LONG scenes. Some women came in with fake pregnancy bellies which is great, but when you (you being the actress) know that it's fake, you aren't as careful with it as a real mother would be in protecting her belly. So by the end of some of these scenes, the fake bellies would be a little cock-eyed or poking out of the bottom of their shirts, upping the awkwardness all the more. Fortunately, we had a female director for that episode because all the other producers/writers in the room for those reads were men; if you can imagine how uncomfortable/exhausted she and I were, you can't even BEGIN to wonder how badly the guys wanted to cast those roles and be done with it. We were all very happy when that day's auditions were over. 

I (Amanda) wonder where you get a fake pregnancy belly?  Is that a normal rental item?

And now, the recap:

The show opens at a 911 call center in Florida.  A bearded gent (John Thaddeus, who gets a lot of dead guy airtime) calls in and tells the dispatcher that there is a body in a warehouse.  He gives the location, and then promptly shoots himself.  When the police arrive on the scene, they find our unsub, along with pictures of 10 women, all of whom were found murdered...all but one, that is.  The women's pictures are in alphabetical order, and he has their faces, names and year of death tattooed on his body.  Time to call the BAU to find the missing girl.
I recently joined a gym so that when I get a bunch of women's faces tattooed on my body and then call 911 from a warehouse, the police won't have to see my love handles.  How embarrassing would THAT be???

The murdered girls represent a ten-year period of time.  The unsub will kidnap them, keep them over a year, and then wait until their bodies have been found before taking the next woman.

HOTCH: "JJ, gather as much information about the prior victims as you can."
JJ: "Okay."  (She walks over to the wall of clippings.  Three seconds pass.)
HOTCH: "Did you find anything?"
JJ: "Yep, I found this wall covered in information that we already know."
HOTCH: "Good work.  Take a break."

The unsub is entirely covered in tattoos, minus two spaces.  One is for Rebecca (the missing girl, played by Holland Roden), and the other is a mystery.
When you cover your body in tattoos, it's called a bodysuit, just like the 90s cotton garments that snap under your crotch.  Both send a message to potential mates: WARNING.

Our heroes decide that the unsub has staged this whole death scene, but they don't know why.  He has provided everything in one room - the photos, the articles, his journals, and himself.  Reid speed-reads the journals and uncovers a slip-up; the unsub mentions that "we found our latest guest."  The team realizes he has staged this room in order to throw the investigators off the scent and protect his partner in crime.
Dr. Reid is so excited to get down to business that he can't even waste the time to walk out into the fresh air and away from the stench of a dead body, and instead pops a squat on an egg crate in the middle of the crime scene.

Meanwhile, a super-pregnant lady (Juliet, played by Jolene Andersen) is interrupted from her gardening by a delivery man, who brings her a certified letter from the unsub.  The letter explains that he had to kill himself so that she could take care of their baby.  He tells her to kill Rebecca.  She is upset, and goes into a back room to tell Rebecca (who is chained to the floor next to a dirty mattress) that it is all her fault.
You can tell she's evil because of her choppy bangs and the pitcher of flowers on her table.  If you have a neighbor who fits this description, you should probably call the police.  I do, and did.  You're welcome, society.

By the way, Mayor Menino, this guy is also a football player (it's Greg Jennings from the Green Bay Packers).

They profile the partner: she is submissive, but not a competitor to the dominant unsub.  They think the tattoos might be the key to uncovering the partner.  They check out some of the local tattoo artists, and one helpful fella tells them that the rose tattoo on the unsub's wrist is covering up something else.  He tells them that this type of crappy work is usually done in prison.  Guess who has the ability to search through a database of prison tattoos, narrow the list to rapists, and then find the one guy who was released 10 years ago? Garcia!
Reason #683918 to stay out of prison: it's really tough to cover up a bad tattoo.

Dr. Reid gets a notion in his head that the suicide has something to do with the empty space on the unsub's back.  Turns out there is such thing as invisible ink tattoos that only show up under a black light.
This is why men don't get pregnant.  Babies grow in TUMMIES, dude.  Not on backs.  Double-duh.

Juilet goes to rid herself of all evidence pertaining to Rebecca, who is understandably unhappy about this.  As Becks fights for her life, Juliet begins to bleed from her lady parts.  Ruh roh.
I must have skipped this chapter in Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret.

Juliet tells Rebecca that if she helps save the baby, she will set her free.  The baby arrives, and Juliet asks if its a girl because "it can't be a boy."  You see, our little Juliet met her future baby-daddy in prison while visiting her father - who was incarcerated for raping her.  She has some well-deserved issues towards men.  When she discovers her child is a boy, she literally dies.  Now Becky is left alone with a newborn baby, still chained up.
I don't have anything to say about this image.  I just thought it was a dramatic screencap.  Plus, it narrates Erica's anecdote well.  I guess I do have something to say: I'm awesome.

The find the house, save Rebecca, and take care of the baby.  Once again, all of the killers are dead, which leaves things nicely wrapped up and leaves a few minutes for pithy jokes and sexual zingers.  Cue credits.

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