DA VINCI'S CITY HALL REVIEWS-SEASON EIGHT

• Review of Episode 108: Gonna Cause a Ruckus

  A couple of corrections--it's "Dubreau" and "Century Club" and they both figure big in this one.

  Mick Leary and the Vancouver Fire Department both find themselves in a big, bright spotlight, due to the venality and amazing stupidity of others on the day of the dead Xena wannabe's funeral. Their only allies appear to be that the venality and amazing stupidity cut both ways. Rather like the L'il Abneresque ads that the Conservatives are putting out for the upcoming national elections.

  Inspector Arkin from Organized Crime (the guy who planted the grow-op notice for Charlie) comes back with his report, which blames the Fire Department and clears the Police Department. The report includes the testimony of a suborned witness whom, it subsequently becomes clear, nobody else believes. "It's probably gonna cause a ruckus," he says cheerfully to Bill and Charlie, uttering the title line a record three minutes into the episode. But none of them are smiling at the end.

  Charlie has a grand plan to force Constable PE out and shuffle everything else off onto Da Vinci's FD ally, Komori--a little convenient "housecleaning" on both sides that doesn't touch the real problem ( management--namely, Bill and Charlie). "Gotta correct some procedures," Charlie says smugly to the PD union rep. Unfortunately for Charlie, Constable PE threatens him when he steers her away from the funeral, insisting that he give her a job in Vancouver, not shuffle her off to Winnipeg. I laughed when the union rep got the "bright" idea of making her the coroner's laison. Oh, yeah! Put a disgruntled cop in close professional proximity to a bitter ex-cop with a similar story, a major grudge against the Police Department and a whole lot of new clout. That's smart! I see an unholy alliance in the near future.

  Meanwhile, the FD union rep absolutely refuses to admit any blame for his department whatsoever. "Someone's been 'working it [the evidence]'," he snarls at the Police Union Rep when Charlie sends the PD rep to calm him down. In fact, the entire FD erupts in an enormous rage, demanding an independent investigation.

  Dom tries to put them off by sending Mick over to explain to them that the Coroner's Office is making an impartial investigation--particularly since Mick agrees that it looks like a badly managed cover-up and should go to Inquest. There's a nice bit where Dom suggests over the phone that Mick call the FD Chief and Mick shoots back, "He's on the other line." He's a good choice for Coroner in that sense. He knows how to stay on the political ball. Let's hope he survives Dom's first term in office.

  Mick's especially displeased since the report makes conclusions he wouldn't have made and makes him look bad. But this only lasts a little while before the irascible FD Chief goes to the Police Complaints Commission in the last quarter of the episode. Half of the FD shift goes on strike at the end of the episode, convinced that Dom is covering for the Police Department, even as Dom is intent on kicking Bill out sooner rather than later. Oh, the irony. Well, Bob did warn him. But it could well be Mick left twisting in the wind.

  If you're a Chick fan, make sure that you catch the first fifteen minutes of this, where Chick neatly passes off the offending report to the male Dom minion at a Chinese diner the night before it's due out--and before Arkin hands it to Bill. He then gives Kurtz a scare by rapping on her car door as she's leaving work and giving her the report. "Not our best work," he sourly tells Kurtz. Good old Chick. Still the spooky CSIS pro.

  Lots of small fish who stupidly give information to bigger fish with no sense of the bigger picture and no apparent gain appear in this ep. Reminds me of that old WWII slogan: "Loose lips sink ships." One of the Xena wannabes, for example, calls up Charlie and tells him about Constable PE's plans to go to the funeral. She looks very uncomfortable with the ensuing scene that he makes, but really, what the hell did she expect? You have to wonder about people who don't think about the consequences of their actions before screwing up other people's lives.

  Speaking of dumb bunnies, Sandra Felinger balks as the two Dom minions scramble to bring the city council on board for the vote on the slot machines at the track. But she soon finds herself under huge pressure and, being the spineless, treacherous little worm that she is, caves and gives up her vote in favor of Dom.

  Also, the ex-partner from the Street Crew that Kosmo and Joe talked to a few eps back looks up Brian and tells him about that conversation. In exchange, she wants him to help her get into Homicide since she's sick of being on the Street Crew. Nitwit. Brian has to admit that he's back in Vice and didn't get into Homicide after all. He spins it as a voluntary thing, a bad fit, "too much work, not enough action", instead of the ugly story of collapsed cases and suspension that it really was. But he assures her that he still has connections in Homicide.

  And when we next see him? Waiting for Mick in the Coroner's Office. Oh, yes. This is apparently his idea of a "connection in Homicide". The scene screams with subtext as Brian tries to fish for information and Mick gives him very little. But the big deal is that Brian offers to hand Mick Dubreau on a platter. All during the scene, Bill is on the phone to Claire trying to reach Mick because Charlie has just found out that Homicide is on Dubreau's trail and Bill wants to blow it up into a big case to cover his own political ass. Suddenly, Mick is a hot property and everybody wants to give him Dubreau.

  Mick, obviously, has no intention of taking the call in front of Brian and clears his throat to give Brian a big hint to leave. Brian does, but not before offering his services to Mick. Mick enthusiastically agrees to meet with him later. They do so outside, after Mick has met with Kosmo, Joe and Kurtz. Mick and Kurtz discuss the possibility of cutting Brian a deal to get to Dubreau, right after Mick meets with Dom and sees, as he's leaving, Dubreau show up for a meeting to get Dom to support the Youth Center. Whoops.

  The meeting in Mick's office gets tense awfully fast once Kurtz agrees with Mick that Mick should play Brian down the line without trying to "get" him, while Kosmo and Joe back off. Since Mick has "established a dialogue", she wants him to continue playing Brian to get Dubreau. Only if they have anything solid on Brian is she interested in going after him (and even then, she'd probably try to sabotage it). Kosmo is angry about this, pointing out that Brian was being investigated for murder at one point (yeah, like all of seasons five and six). "I think Brian's just trying to get onside before we find out he was involved," she tells Mick. "He's just ass-covering." Nor is she very happy with Mick when Kurtz takes the opportunity to twist the knife and put her in her place. The scene ends with Mick staring at Kosmo with an unhappy look that asks, "Are we still okay?" We don't get the answer.

  But Mick isn't playing Kosmo. In fact, he's playing Kurtz. And Bill. And Brian, most of all. We watch Mick systematically get Brian to admit to knowing Dubreau ("a little") from Boystown back in the day, to having known Manny Zappata, to having known Garth and Dennis (he picks them from the polaroids), even to having been in the car when Dubreau attacked Manny. Brian casts himself as a concerned undercover cop who "had to drag Manny out of the car" to rescue him from the eeevil Dubreau. Mick doesn't contradict him with Manny's account, of course. He's amiable, calm, innocent-looking as a snake in the grass. He just about bats his eyes at Brian as he plays Brian like a violin. I almost felt sorry for Brian, who even tries to get a very reluctant young rent boy (who looks a lot like a young Manny Zappata) to say Dubreau had sex with him. The boy isn't interested, though he does mention going with two old men to the Century Club, where they both had rooms.

  We haven't seen Mick this closed or this ruthless since season two's "The Lottery", when he coaxed a sociopathic gambler into admitting to murdering his wife. The guy (and the audience) thought the game was poker, but it wasn't. No way in hell does he intend to let Brian walk.

  But his obsession with this particular case may cost him his closest friendships. This is where the show gets annoying. The pedophile storyline is great; the politics are okay. But dammit, I miss the personal stuff. A couple of scenes--like Mick's meeting with Kosmo, Joe and Kurtz in the office--seem to end deliberately early, just so we won't get a character's take on an important plot point. When Kosmo looks back at Mick after Kurtz leaves, you're geared up to hear some home truths between them--but the scene just cuts to Dom and Manning. Not that that scene isn't fun, but it's politics versus an emotional hoedown that's been coming for a while. I know which one I wanted to watch first.

  Also, it's withholding information that some of the characters have, but the audience does not, and feels a bit cheap. Just whose POV are we following here? There are so many. Right now, it's all political games, plot-driven storylines and subtext, subtext, subtext. I love subtext as much as the next girl, but once upon a time, these people had personal lives. Bring them back.

  That said, in Subtext Land, there is indeed much to savor this week. The chats between Dom and Lloyd Manning continue to be creepy and amusing in equal measure--mainly because we still don't know what Manning's long-term agenda is or how far he would go to further it. He's rich as Croesus and used to getting his own way. Who knows how this could blow up? This week, he wants more consideration from Dom, but Dom balks, sensing strings attached. Manning, on his part, is not thrilled with what he sees as the undue influence that Billie Simms appears to exercise over Dom. Dom has no intention of letting Manning know that his insistence on keeping Crab Park a park is making Simms a very unhappy camper. We see Dom's motives get misjudged a lot this week; we mainly know this because he's one of the few characters whose POV we get. We know he doesn't support the Police on the grow-op investigation or Billie on Crab Park--it's just that nobody else believes him.

  The scenes between Mick and Brian are also thick with subtext. We know that Mick knows that Brian is involved in the pedophile ring and we also know that Brian knows that Mick suspects him. What we don't know is how much Brian thinks his spin is working on Mick and how much it actually is working. Past seasons, though, indicate that Mick is most dangerous, and least gullible, when he is playing the dumb bunny. And boy, does he go hoppity-hoppity here. Reminds me of the good old days when he was partnered up with Leo. Those two were easily the most cunning and ruthless good guys on DVI.

  Finally, a few storylines are getting set up for next week: the hookers are getting pushed from pillar to post about the redlight zone and the Premiere gives Dom a call about his impending visit. Meanwhile, Bill plots to talk to the Premiere before Dom does. One can't help but feel with Dom's exasperated musing about why nobody seems capable of just working together.

  Next week: Gotta Press the Flesh: A murder in the redzone puts all of Dom's plans in jeopardy and both Brian and Bill try to hurry Mick along in his investigation of the pedophile ring (we all know how well that will go down).

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This page was last updated on 1/11/2006