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Monday 30 July 2012

Without A Trace "Nickle and Dimed Part 2" Review


Sam (Poppy Montgomery) tells Jack (Anthony LaPaglia) about her plan to go undercover at Everymart, so she can find out about Colleen (Audrey Marie Anderson).  Jack tells her when she says she’s done she must leave there.  Sam rents Colleen’s motel room and sticks her gun under the bedside cabinet.  She finds one of Jake’s crayons.

Martin (Eric Close) lists the residents of the Glen Capri motel.  Danny (Enrique Murciano) finds that the drug mule Elizabeth used to work at an autopart store.  The supervisor Burdick (Tim Kelleher) doesn’t recall her.  She was found dead in the river.  He also finds bank deposits were made of large amounts of cash twice before she went missing.  She wanted to make more money so he told her about Barr.  She was to deliver a package for him but he hasn’t heard from Barr for a week now.

Sam talks with Amy, (Mary Matilyn Mouser) a girl who used to play with Jake.  She saw a man and heard him mention Deke Barr (Sung Kang).  John had a cell phone and called before Colleen went missing but hasn’t since then.  Jack thinks there must be other recruiters.

Sam now goes to work at Colman Dyecast where she meets Howie (Jerry Kirnion) and Joanna (Mo Gaffney).  She tells Jack about her work and he rubs her shoulders.  He gives Sam a pot plant, she’s to take it out of the window if she’s in trouble.  Sam sits with Amy.

Howie talks to Barr at work.  She gives Jack a licence number.  Joanna might be a mule.  Social services has put Jake with his father.  Sam asks Jack if he finds Colleen’s body whether he’ll pull the plug on this investigation? Barr’s alias is John Burns with a record for armed robbery, assault.  Jack calls him too low level to be picked up.  Sam asks Joanna to lunch.  She lives in a  trailer with her boyfriend and he takes her money for beer.  Sam calls Martin and tells him she’s tired.

Sam has a flashback to when she was little and wanted to catch fireflies at night with her mother, (Lilli Birdsell) who doesn’t let her.  Sam doesn’t want to sleep in the dark.
Deke and Niran (Boyuen) are connected to Burns.  Jack wants Danny to have their photo incase he runs into them.

Sam calls Viv (Marianne Jean-Baptiste) Joanna wasn’t at work today.  Viv and Martin find her at home beaten up.  Martin delivers pizza to Sam and gets a call.  They’ve found Collen’s body in the river.  He gets a picture message on his phone: an ink stamp from Colleen’s hand.  Jack wants Sam to come in now as he’s handing the case over to the locals and the DEA.  She must collect her things from work. She finds Howie is looking for a replacement for Joanna and on the pretext of needing more money asks Brian (Alex Skuby) for work.  Howie says he can help.  She meets Jack and tells him this case is just based on paper trails.  He tells her it’s not her decision to make.  She accuses him of not trusting her.
Martin is agitated over Sam going undercover.  Danny stakes out the bar.

Sam thinks of her mother when she found her at the bus stop after she’d run away and takes her back home.  She says it’s not up to her and Sam must come home.  Burns makes contact in 2-3 days.  She’s to make a delivery to Port Jeff for $800.
Danny watches a waitress at the bar: Meredith Kim.  Jack says Sam should’ve called last night and he's also angry.

Joanna turns up at Sam’s motel.  She takes her back to the trailer to pack and attacks her boyfriend.
Meredith says she was given $1,000.  She saw Collen at the bar and wants protection.  She was short and paid only $350.  She agreed to pay more later and with interest.  Keit has Colleen followed. Danny tells her Colleen also had a son.

Kiet takes Sam from the motel and she manages to knock the plant out of the window.  Danny gets footage from a convenience store camera which has footage of Sam being aducted.  Viv talks to Amy who tells her about Joanna.  Viv says Sam got made.  Sam is beaten up and insists she’s not a cop.
Martin and Jack question Burns.  One of his men was watching Kiet.  Martin gets angry and loses his temper.  He directs them to a warehouse where Danny and Viv find drugs.

Sam is taken to a car yard.  She hits Kiet with a piece of metal and runs for it..  Martin and Jack shoot Kiet.  Jack goes to Sam’s side whilst Martin can only watch but rides with her in the ambulance.  Danny goes to see Sam being taken away. Jack pats Viv on the  back. Sam gives amy her plant and calls her mother in Kenosha.
Sam: “If you really cared about me you wouldn’t have told the boss I could lift 80 pounds.”
Jack: “I didn’t, I told him you could lift 150.”

Jack: “Unfortunately don’t think Colleen’s coming back from this.”  Just like the other drug mule.

Sam: “Nothing to stop me from going to bed early.”
Martin: “I’ve been getting a lot of sleep too.”  Yes no surprise there then.

Sam: “Green peppers you remembered.”  He’ll remember all about food.

Sam: “You know if we didn’t have a history you would let me do this no questions asked.”
Jack: “This has nothing to do with our history.”  A lot about their past in this episode and about Sam and Martin too.  It would have been better if we could have had more about Sam’s past than just a flashback to her wanting fireflies. Also running away from home didn’t add anything to her character we didn’t already know from season 1 episode?? Victory for Humanity when she told Jack this, we just got a visualization of it that’s all.

The ink stamp was the Ying and Yang symbol.

Viv: “If you’re so concerned why didn’t you pull ther out when you had a chance?”
Jack: “because I don’t make decisions based on fear.”    Wasn’t his decision in the season 1 finale based on fear when he went in to trade places with Sam because he feared for her life.

Martin gets a chance to eat again in this season!
Sam should’ve known she was probably being watched to check if she was on the level or not instead of engaging in such an obvious display, but then again she could just be someone who knows how to look out for herself and not necessarily be a cop.

Martin: “I’m just worried about her.”
Danny: “I know you are.”  That’s an understatement, the entire office probably knows by now, well if not, Jack also suspects something especially when he so eagerly volunteers to ride in the ambuance with her.
Viv: “It was a tough call to make.”

So much for Sam going undercover in episode 6 and this one as she’s been on TV too.  In seaseon 2 epsiode 5 Copycat along with Jack when he feigned resignation from his job, only to get a transfer in the season and return.  You can’t say criminals have a short memory – what about those with high IQs, and intellect – or do only the dregs of society commit crimes and peddle drugs.

So Sam was telling the truth when she said she’s from Kenosha in season 2’s Doppelganger.

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