Episode 100
Don't Leave Me This Way (05-07-06)
Let me start off by saying I liked this
episode—I more than liked this episode—I really enjoyed
it—I’ll even say I loved this episode. I’ve watched
this episode five times now. No I’m not that
obsessed. I was just trying to figure out my opinions
on the episode. My initial thought was we’d seen this
before, but the more I watched the more I realized this
was different. It wasn’t like any CJ episode we’ve
seen. Yes we revisited the ‘drugged-and-can’t-remember’
method of setting the story up, but that wasn’t what the
episode was about. There was a definite theme. And
this story really hasn’t already been told.
The title tells it all: Don’t Leave Me
This Way. I think it was perfectly suited to the
episode—and was the theme.
The
Theme:
Leaving. This episode was all about leaving—for each
character. JD leaving Jordan. Woody leaving Lu. Lily
leaving Jeffery. Jordan leaving the morgue and her
friends. Leaving always hurts someone. Just about
everyone in this episode was hurt one way or another by
someone they love/cared for. There was intentional hurt
and unintentional hurt—and it affected everyone.
I’m going to make the statement that this
episode wasn’t about Jordan. Yes it focused on her, but
this episode (in my opinion) was about the entire morgue
and all the characters that we were introduced to this
season and their lives all coming to a huge moment—to
a split in the road, where they had a choice to make.
Each decision (that each character will make) will
affect the others some way.
I think that will be the most fascinating
and primary story to be told in the season 6 premier—not
whether Jordan captures the bad guy (for we know she
will) but how the lives of each character will be
affected.
Jordan:
So we saw Jordan ‘regress’ to the state she was in, in
Secrets & Lies. On the surface anyway. All
similarities end right there. Jordan’s grown this
season…too much to totally regress to the ‘manic’ and
‘irresponsible’ state of season one. There is some
coherent thought behind the process of this ‘run’.
There’s a logic and reasoning in her motives this time
verses the blind revenge she was after in TNPLH.
The running part is easy and familiar for
her. She knows how to depend on herself. She still
hasn’t quite master the art of depending on and trusting
in others to help her. That said Jordan obviously wants
to be found…just not too soon. She dumps her phone with
it still on. She’s got to know it can be traced—this
is, to me, her way of reaching out for help from
others. She’s left them clues. Enough that they can
find her, but at the same time it gives her a head
start.
a) JD:
Jordan works up the courage to call JD. She tells him
she misses him and admits she screwed things up and
might have been wrong. JD comes back and things look
like they’re on good grounds for there to be a second
chance and then JD leaves her. Granted he wasn’t given
a choice this time—he was taken from her. Either way it
still has the same effect on Jordan—and it’s a
disastrous one.
And to
top it off she thinks she could have been the one to
kill him. Then she learns she was drugged and that
JD—on some level—used her to get access to morgue
files. Granted it was wrong, but I think he was trying
to keep her out of the mess he must have known he was
in. And as a last resort left the pictures for
her…incase something like him getting killed did happen.
He was leaving clues to help her. I’m sad to see JD
die. I came to love (and even understand!! Finally got
a hang of his accent!) him.
b) Her
friends:
Jordan leaves her friends. In the end she can’t sit
back and rely on them to prove her innocence. It’s too
much to ask of Jordan. She’s got them all worried.
They’re on her side—trying to help her every way humanly
possible—and she still can’t ‘let them do their job’.
(to quote Macy).
Woody:
Well Woody has proved you can be a jerk and a nice guy
at the same time. For the first time in a while I felt
we got the old Woody back—the Woody from before
Embraceable You. We got him back at the cost of Lu
though.
a) Jordan:
There’s no doubt that Woody cares for Jordan—more than
just cares for. That was clear as day. He’s willing to
help her, but there’s still a bit of tension/hesitation
between them. I think Jordan’s words that ‘he hasn’t
grown up’ are still with him. He’s there to help
Jordan, but that easy flow that they used to have is
missing. (Did that make sense?) Their
relationship/friendship is still on shaky ground. But
this definitely looked like a stepping block for the
start of rebuilding that friendship… Jordan hesitantly
reached out to Woody. It looks like we’ve started the
dance all over again.
b) Lu:
I was pissed at Woody for how he treated Lu. I wish Lu
had been the one to dump Woody, the poor gal. Woody was
a first class jerk to her in this episode. She’s not in
an easy situation. Like her or not she was treated
awfully. Lu was doing her job. And being pretty
lenient with Jordan. All the evidence pointed to
Jordan. As a cop it’s kind of hard to ignore that.
Lu's
developing as a character—and I think has potential to
be a strong character. My biggest gripe was the writers
hooking her up with Woody, but now that that is over I
think she'll be a much stronger character.
As for
her being jealous…if you didn't expect her to be
somewhat jealous then...well let me put it this way, I
don't get why everyone one is harping on her for being
jealous. Hell I'd have been jealous too. I don't think
she was 'out to get Jordan'. Granted she did get a
warrant for Jordan’s arrest, but by that point though
she'd been pushed pretty far—and had just cause.
Lily:
Lily has had an interesting season. She lost herself
this season. I think though that the events of this
episode might have actually helped set her back on a
path she’s happy to travel.
a) Jeffery:
I knew it wasn’t going to happen. After Lily’s speech
last week, you had to know. Lily’s been emotionally
lost this season. She’s not the only character that
reverted back to her season one self. From Death
Toll onward we’ve known Lily hasn’t been happy. I
think Jeffery was a desperate attempt to find something
to fill that void in her life. She convinced herself
that that Jeffery was what she was looking for. By the
time she realized she was going to marry Jeffery for the
wrong reasons and called off the wedding it was too
late. Too late to stop things without hurting Jeffery.
That doesn’t make what she did right. It was awful to
leave Jeffery that way. I am glad she didn’t go through
with the wedding though.
b)
Jordan:
It was nice to see the compassionate Lily we love come
out when she was dealing with Jordan. I wonder if this
will help persuade her to return to the morgue—that and
Bug. Speaking of Bug…
c) Bug:
Personal opinions aside on this…okay so maybe I’m not
going to be able to do that. I just don’t see those two
together. I wish the writers hadn’t brought this back.
I have to say they did build up to this point and
prepared me for it.
I
wonder how this is going to play out. I hope it’s not
focused on heavily next season. I think Bug will be the
‘factor’ that makes Lily decide not to quit her job. I
guess I’m going to have to just watch and see and go
with whatever happens.
Garret
and Nigel:
The two have huge hearts and are only looking out for
Jordan. Garret stood up for Jordan (and his staff).
Nigel refused to believe Jordan was guilty. He does
everything in his power to help her prove this. As
Garret said: They’re thick as thieves. Jordan’s a lucky
gal—everyone should be so lucky to have a friend like
Nigel. Of course I think she also hurt Nigel (and
Garret) by going on the run. You can bet they’ll still
work their asses off to figure out what happened. As I
said: Leaving always hurts someone.
New Characters of this season: So at the
end of last season our characters were all in
all—emotionally—doing pretty good. Things were peaceful
at the morgue and until the finale there wasn’t much
internal conflict going on. Perfect set up for some new
characters to stir up some trouble and cause some
tension. Slokum, JD, Lu and Jeffery brought it
(tension) in bucket fulls. Their purpose might have
originally started out at ‘tension-causing-devices’ but
I think each of them became much more. They each added
something and brought out new aspects in the other
characters. I have to say I liked them and what they
brought to the show this season.
Music:
When it works it works and tonight the music worked.
I’ve never love the music more—well okay I have, but the
cheesy wedding music theme was just awesome. I mean
where else do you get to have Don’t Leave Me This Way
playing and have it totally work with the scene and at
the same time mirror the theme of the episode. The
score was awesome as well. It was a dark feeling to the
happy music of the wedding and the two together played
off each other and worked as a whole.
Directing/Cinematography/Filming:
I know I never comment on this. I don’t have a huge
knowledge on it—for me the writing fascinates me more.
I do want to comment though on the
cinematography/filming.
Forewarning: I tried to explain this to Lara and did a crappy job.
I’m going to try my best to put my thoughts into
coherent sentences. Hopefully it makes sense.
To me it felt like I was being brought
back to season one in a way. I really enjoyed the
filming and flow of this episode. There was this tempo
to the episode. I’m not quite sure how to describe it.
It was like each character had a tune/note and when they
interacted with each other it played a melody. I guess
what I’m trying to say is the pace and the interactions
all flowed and worked in a way that wasn’t rushed, yet
wasn’t slow, but pulled you into the story. I couldn’t
help but get caught up in it all.
I LOVED the flow between the flashbacks
and present and the correlation of the ‘cheesy wedding’
music to the dark score (instrumental music). It worked
BEAUTIFULLY.
To
Conclude:
Was this the most suspenseful cliffhanger…No. In all
honesty though I don’t think this needed to work as a
suspenseful cliffhanger. Looking back at some of
CJ’s cliffhangers—those episodes worked as a means to
build up to one pivotal point. Don’t Leave Me This
Way worked to show the cumulation of nine lives
(morgue staff plus, Lu, JD and Jeffery) coming to the
same point on a road. The resolution will show which
path each takes (though we have a good clue which
direction some characters will be taking already). The
group will inevitably split up…some following similar
paths as others, some going on completely new routes.
Some won’t be given a choice, others will. Either way,
each character will have their life change in some way.
That said I think this episode worked and
qualifies as one of my favorites of this season. I find
there are few episodes I can watch at any time—this will
be one of those episodes I will be able to watch no
matter what mood I’m in.
A wild season huh? We followed chapter
by chapter until we got to the end. Each episode built
on the next. Overall the season was intense,
interesting, grueling, and full of surprises and
dilemmas. I have to say, not everything might have gone
the way I wanted it but I sure enjoyed the season.
So this episode earns 4 ½ out of 5 dead
bodies from me. I look forward to the start of season 6
(however far off it might be).
