Homicide Rewatch: Valentine's Day

 

Written by Tom Fontana

Directed by Clark Johnson

 

Looked with the distance of 30 years this episode seems most significance for its casting of Neil Patrick Harris in the very cast against type role of Alan Schack, the villain of the piece. Harris was still in 1997 best known for the innocent role of Doogie Howser MD so this role was a major get and gave him a chance to play against type.

One can't deny the significance of this role. Harris was in the process of transitioning from the teenage doctor to the more sleazy characters he is known for playing in the 21^st century, not long before he would come out of the closet at the turn of the 2010s and add a different level to it. Looked at in this sense, it's a clear progression of a superb actor in the making.

Less known at the time and definitely so today was the second guest role of Linda Dano, a prominent soap opera actress in the NBC franchise (though it would be canceled in a few years' time) Another World. But Dano's appearance as Dr. Miano, the marriage counselor that Frank and Mary see is the far more critical one for the series overall. Because this session finally lays bare the cracks in the Pembleton marriage and Frank, the man who is known for being able to talk people into revealing their most hidden truths, is now on the receiving end something he doesn't like from the start and very quickly finds that he has been as good at lying to himself as so many of the suspects he's gotten to confess in the box.

But first the cases. Pembleton leaves work for personal time and makes it clear he has Kellerman covering for him. For the first time Al asked Frank if he and Tim are speaking and Pembleton makes it clear that they're just not working together. Bayliss and Kellerman are called out for a bombing which leads to them working together for the first time since the death of James Douglas. Kellerman is back from his time off and he seems openly better for the first time since the grand jury subpoena came; he even jokes about how Bayliss was snarky to him the last time.

Once there on the bomb site of with the FBI on site (this is thought of as terrorism and we hear both Hezbollah and Waco mentioned) the jokes start coming when they find an ear. "Friends Romans Countryman," goes Bayliss. "Ear today, gone tomorrow," Kellerman. Yeah he's back to normal.

Things then get worse when there's a second bombing of a defense attorney named Allan Corcoran. Kellerman says he knows the name but can't figure out from where.  Then Kellerman ties to a previous case – Corcoran defended the man who shot Tommo Roh a few episodes back. (See 'Inconsistencies') Corcoran defended the man who shot Roh and acquitted him and Kuntz was the jury foreman. It becomes very clear that Ben Roh is trying to deal with how the honor of his family was destroyed and has been going on a path of revenge.

This leads to the tension with the fact that Ben has gone to the courthouse where Lewis and Juliana are there for the Middleton case. This leads to a good scene between the two where they discuss their personal lives: Meldrick discusses the state of his marriage; Juliana is dealing with the death of her father. We learned in an earlier scene that the headstone has just been delivered and she's been delaying having it set.

This ties indirectly the deaths of these two men to the actions of Luther Mahoney. When Kellerman asks why Ben didn't kill Luther, the son says he was saving him for last. Given what will happen in a few weeks' time one really wishes he had started with him rather than going through the criminal justice system.

Meanwhile Munch is called to the apparent suicide of Nick Bollaneterra. When Munch learns that he's the roommate of Allan Schack Brodie knows Schack as a bad dude and decides to talk to him, something that doesn't interest Munch.

This episode shows the lazy aspects of Munch we haven't seen in a while. He doesn't want to investigate a case that he's written off and he sure as hell doesn't want to listen to Brodie. Brodie goes over Munch's head to Howard (very reluctantly) and lets the investigation continue. To be fair there's something going on beyond Munch's instincts. Bollantera was coked up and there were two sets of fingerprints on the gun. Schack has joked about being there and playing Russian Roulette. (Munch says there were five bullets in the gun and you only use one to play Russian Roulette. Howard: "Is this is a game you play often?" The thing is, I can see Munch doing it when he was in college and high.)

There is something quite brilliant in Harris's work. Even as he grew into adulthood it would be rare he'd play someone who was so genuinely contemptuous of authority and outright sleazy to so many around him. His later characters would have oily politeness to them; Schack can barely refrain from bating Munch and Howard in the box and he openly threatens Brodie before he attacks him.

But this episode gives Melissa Leo a chance to shine in a way she's gotten to far less during the last two seasons, first as she interrogate Schack and then when she brings him into the box to trick him with a videotape. "What we have here his more brilliant then Apocalypse Now and more entertaining than America's Funniest Home Videos. (Ah the 1990s.) Brodie has recorded a tape which he has doctored to make it seem like the narcotics department was monitoring Schack's house and him entering his home. He adds the sound of a gunshot going off and this fools Schack into believing that's he been caught.

But for all that Brodie is still annoyed that no one in the unit seems to be treating him with the respect he thinks he deserves. There's a real sense of false entitlement here; Brodie has been more of a nuisance then anything; he's lived with every single detective save Pembleton during his housing crisis, and after a year and a half its still an open question whether he's been more of an asset to the unit then a detriment. On top of that he filmed a documentary on the unit and submitted it to PBS without asking permission of the department or anyone. Al is more generous and says its not his job to make them like you. You have to earn it. (One really wonders if any people Brodie's age could watch this show today and wonder why he didn't sue for a hostile work environment.)

The scenes with Dano as Miano are comic delights for multiple reasons because its clear that she's just as good at her job as Frank is at his. She sets Frank at ease with questions about how they met, eases him into a false sense of security, then starts talking about his and Mary's sex life. This makes Frank noticeably uncomfortable for the first time in almost the entire series and we see him being questioned in a way that has irony all around. You can see how frustrated he is at just how good Miano is at asking questions and never answering them directly, which is exactly how he does his job so well. Then she drops a bomb and tells him his wife is thinking of leaving him.

We've known about Frank's being from New York originally but we've never learned why he moved to Baltimore. Here he's very direct: he makes it clear 'Baltimore is a brown town run by brown people" and the NYPD was never going to give him what he wanted. This explains why he reacts so much to the perceived slights of Felton and the real racism of Gaffney as well as been so eager to correct Bayliss whenever he makes a remarks that hints of looking back with nostalgia. And he tries the suspect's trick of blaming everything that's going on on someone else, targeting Mary's parents and then the therapist. Frank has built his entire career on being infallible on the job and will not take criticism on it from anyone at work; we shouldn't be surprised when he's criticized on it as a husband and father – and worst of all, a sexual partner.

Frank is very honest about his problems about his sex life and how much he resented doctors told them about how when they were having so much trouble conceiving Olivia (back in Season 3) sex became almost a homework assignment. Mary then tells Frank that he's approaching sex like his job: detached. (She clearly doesn't know just how much effort he went into celebrating their anniversary but the larger point is the same.) When Mary tells Frank the very real possibility he disappeared from the marriage long before the stroke, Frank becomes the worst we've seen him in front of his wife – until he points out the very real sense of inadequacy he had after the stroke in a way we've never seen him to do even when he was at his worst at the start of the season. He may have physically recovered from his stroke; the psychological reckoning may not happened.

But Mary gets to the heart of Frank sins when she says: "Pride." And she makes it clear perhaps more than anyone what his being a fallen Catholic has cost him. We know upfront its bad to challenge Frank on faith (he says when he needed him "God was in the next county over making hurricanes and hunchback babies") but now we see it through a different lenses – Mary.

Ami Brabson has been superb all season but this episode may be her finest hour on Homicide as she makes it clear – without saying it directly – that she must have spent so much time by Frank's bedside and then his recovery praying to God. This is first time we see how much Frank's disdain for God might actually be harmful to those around him and it becomes a living thing when it comes to discussing that Mary wants Olivia to be baptized but has been afraid to do it because of Frank's refusal to go to church, something that has been canon on the show since at least Season 3. Frank lists his believes as justice and life and Mary cuts him off:

Mary: You believe in Homicide.

Frank: It's the same thing.

We know all too well that this is not something held by anyone that isn't a homicide detective (and not even some of them). And when Mary says: "Is it?" it cuts to the biggest question we've had. Frank has made it clear without the job he's nothing and Mary is telling him the opposite. It's telling that Mary chooses to end the session first, despite the therapist's advice. She's the only person Frank can't pressure into doing what he wants and its clear it stuns him.

He actually comes close to confiding in Gee, asking him if he was happily married and the very real question whether she might have gotten sick of him had she lived and he'd stayed at his job. Al says he never thought about it and he doesn't want to now. He thinks he was happily married and that his wife did the job of raising the kids. (We've already seen what his beloved Charisse thinks of him as a father; in the last season we'll get a chance to see what his son thought of it.) We learn that Mary is a lobbyist who is passionate for the causes she fights for "but she can leave her job on I-95." Frank considers Homicide 'a calling…we speak for those who can no longer speak for themselves." He makes it clear he was a cop when he met Mary.

He makes a real attempt when he agrees to have Olivia baptized but then he gets hung up on a case and he misses it. It's not clear if this is the final straw or if it would have happened regardless but Mary tells Frank she's leaving and taking Olivia with him.  She makes it clear he's more comfortable standing over a corpse then changing his daughter's diaper, that Frank cared more about getting healthy so he could get back on the street then be a husband and father "that you care more about dead strangers then you do about your own family."

When Mary leaves for the first time in Homicide's entire history we see Frank broken in a way we never have: weeping saying: "That's not true."

This episode does take place on the title day (it actually originally aired February 14^th 1997!) and we see multiple signs of it in the final montage. There's Cox with Kellerman at her father's headstone; Brodie hanging out with his roommate; Meldrick and Barbra kissing in front of his Teddy Pendergast painting, apparently happy. But all of this is intercut with scenes of Pembleton in his empty home, looking more lost then he ever has. For Frank this is actually rock bottom. The rest of Season Five will be about him climbing up.

 

NOTES FROM THE BOARD

"Detective Munch" In the opening scene Munch asks if there's anything that makes it look like this isn't a suicide Brodie responds: "Just because there's no sign that something isn't doesn't mean that it is." Cox responds: "Careful Brodie, you're starting to sound like Munch.

Munch: I resent that remark.

Brodie: So do I.

Just as brilliant is when Kellerman says he hates red balls and Munch says he can recommend a good urologist.

Inconsistencies: Guides to the show have pointed out that its been less than a month since the Roh case was opened with no suspects. Yet somehow in less then three weeks the shooter has been caught, tried and found innocent. That's somewhat unrealistic.

Nearly as unrealistic is that after Brodie is beaten severely with a lead pipe he's somehow in a condition to just not be discharged the same day but shoot the video of Schack's confession without any sign of injury. But honestly I've seen more inconsistencies between episodes of Law & Order and X-Files on a week-to-week basis during this period so I'll let it go.

Future Inmate: William Cote who plays officer Keane in this episode, would later be cast as William Cudney on OZ, a Christian evangelical who shoots the son of an abortionist and is sent to prison for life.

Hey, Isn't That…Neil Patrick Harris' career began at fourteen when he played David in Clara's Heart. He was cast as Doogie Howser MD in 1989 and would play the role for four seasons. During this period he began his career in voice acting starting as Max on the short-lived series Capitol Critters (I'll focus on TV though there's clearly a lot else.). Most of his work was in TV movies in the aftermath, such as My Antonia, A Family Torn Apart, and the Man in the Attic.

In 1999 he was cast as Henry in the comedy Stark Raving Mad which was canceled after one season and he did the voice of Spider-Man in a 2003 animated cartoon. Then he became legend – wait for it – dary! Legendary! as Barney Stinson on How I Met Your Mother for nine seasons. He eventually would play Dr. Horrible in Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog written by Joss Whedon and Count Olaf in the Netflix version of A Series of Unfortunate Events. He starred in Uncoupled which both Netflix and then Showtime renewed for a second season and then canceled.. His most recent TV appearance was Lowell in Dexter Resurrection.

He has to date won five Emmys, though none of them were for comedy. He won four of them for hosting the Tony Awards including three consecutive ones from 2012 to 2014 and Special class programs. He also won tow in 2010, one for hosting the Tonys and won for his guest role in Glee. He has also hosted the Emmys multiple times and the Oscars in 2015 and was nominated for doing so that year.

Linda Dano made her TV debut in Police Story in 1973 and had small part in many shows from Lucas Tanner to Harry O TO Matt Helm. She played Cynthia Haines in as The World Turns in 1981 and 1982 before appearing in 1548 episodes of Another World as Felicia Gallant between 1983 and its cancellation in 1999. She would then play Rae Cummings in All My Children and its spin-off series Port Charles as well in General Hospital and One Life to Live before playing Vivian Alamain in Days of our Lives in 2021. She would win a Daytime Emmy for her work in Another World in 1993 and be nominated for it four that show four other times and for One Life to Live in 2003.