This episode is a victim of time and the adage that the character played by most famous actor is the guilty one. You know right away, you don't hire Misha Barton to just say hello once early in the show then to never show up again. His character's definitely involved. Collins was still pretty early in his career when this came out, but a lot has changed in 20 years and it affects the viewing. Plus Zeljko Ivanek has play a LOT of sleazy, violent criminals. He's probably a great guy in real life and a victim of being a good actor who got typecast. But the ending wasn't a huge surprise.
Also the script misdirects you in the way a real life investigation might not - mainly that it quickly focuses completely on Svetlana and draws you in to her story and various suspects. Only towards the end, I realized "wait, who is the second victim?" By that point, no one had even identified her. Do we even know early on if she was a woman? How was she connected to Svetlana? There's no mention of how she died, if any of the other suspects were around for the first murder. If this was Bones, they might do an isotope analysis of the teeth to show she was also from Eastern Europe and go from there. Her story is just tacked on in the end once the suspects were caught. So there's some obvious audience misdirection along the way to keep you focused on the red herring which feels like a cheat.
Unlike the other reviewer, I was always a big fan of Sarah. I don't remember this episode specifically so I don't think I ever knew what happened to her father. Whoa. Her mother's story does come up again later on. But I like getting more background to develop our main characters. I also like seeing this development in her relationship with Grissom. I didn't remember him taking the blame for her at work this way, or this exact friction between her and Catherine.
Now Sarah was totally out of line, lashing out, and cruel to Catherine. But I don't know if I buy how eager Catherine was to have her fired. I would think her attitude would be more like Greg's, who wanted to support Sarah through a bad time. Catherine doesn't strike me as the type who would be that offended after one (yes, really rude) comment. She's had a tough history herself. I can see her being angry, but more in a way she'd work through rather than resort immediately to firing. And I don't think enough has been shown with her character where it makes sense she'd be aligning herself with Ecklie. She was mouthing off to him herself the last episode. I wish there was more of a scene between Sarah and Catherine maybe having it out over some drinks one night. But for better or worse, this show always limited the personal drama of the main characters to where we just get hints of relationships here and there.
So in the end, this isn't what I'd call a great episode, but it's definitely not terrible, and not just because of the issue with Sarah, but also the misdirecting script, and the lack of development with Catherine. But I also wouldn't call this average because there's such a change in characters' relationships. Definitely worth watching.
Also the script misdirects you in the way a real life investigation might not - mainly that it quickly focuses completely on Svetlana and draws you in to her story and various suspects. Only towards the end, I realized "wait, who is the second victim?" By that point, no one had even identified her. Do we even know early on if she was a woman? How was she connected to Svetlana? There's no mention of how she died, if any of the other suspects were around for the first murder. If this was Bones, they might do an isotope analysis of the teeth to show she was also from Eastern Europe and go from there. Her story is just tacked on in the end once the suspects were caught. So there's some obvious audience misdirection along the way to keep you focused on the red herring which feels like a cheat.
Unlike the other reviewer, I was always a big fan of Sarah. I don't remember this episode specifically so I don't think I ever knew what happened to her father. Whoa. Her mother's story does come up again later on. But I like getting more background to develop our main characters. I also like seeing this development in her relationship with Grissom. I didn't remember him taking the blame for her at work this way, or this exact friction between her and Catherine.
Now Sarah was totally out of line, lashing out, and cruel to Catherine. But I don't know if I buy how eager Catherine was to have her fired. I would think her attitude would be more like Greg's, who wanted to support Sarah through a bad time. Catherine doesn't strike me as the type who would be that offended after one (yes, really rude) comment. She's had a tough history herself. I can see her being angry, but more in a way she'd work through rather than resort immediately to firing. And I don't think enough has been shown with her character where it makes sense she'd be aligning herself with Ecklie. She was mouthing off to him herself the last episode. I wish there was more of a scene between Sarah and Catherine maybe having it out over some drinks one night. But for better or worse, this show always limited the personal drama of the main characters to where we just get hints of relationships here and there.
So in the end, this isn't what I'd call a great episode, but it's definitely not terrible, and not just because of the issue with Sarah, but also the misdirecting script, and the lack of development with Catherine. But I also wouldn't call this average because there's such a change in characters' relationships. Definitely worth watching.