Lara's Review - Strangled

I liked this episode, it had an interesting premise to it and, for me it worked.

This episode took Max and Jordan’s murder solving role-playing games and adapted them to incorporate the entire cast and a whole case, and by doing this the writes hit a number of interesting character beats that were essential to future storylines.

The ‘time-travel’ case was not the strongest and most convincing case that has been written for Crossing Jordan, but it was interesting to have a different character dynamic being played out on screen, for example having Woody, play a tough, hard-nosed and cold cop (Moran), or Bug play a confident professor who flirts with Joyce (Jordan’s character), I have to say that Ravi Kapoor had a pretty convincing New Zealand accent. The character dynamic also enabled the Woody/Jordan fans to see the characters in bed together, granted playing different people, but I think the fans would take anything that is thrown at them. 

My favorite scenes in this episode were the ones in Max’s bar, where the characters were themselves and discussed the case. The bickering between Nigel and Bug was hilarious, the two characters always provide some of the best comic relief in Crossing Jordan and this episode was no exception, part of the reason they bicker and argue so much is that they believe in the same thing, they just have different ways of getting to the same point. And as we see at the end of the episode, they respect each other and are friends.

I think my favorite line in the whole episode was when Jordan and Garret call Nigel a ‘killer perve’ – poor Nigel, always gets a raw deal, yet Steve Valentine manages to pull off the most ambivalent of all the characters so well, the audience feels comfortable and safe watching him, even though you are not sure about who the character really is.

Lily was great in this episode, I liked being able to turn the clock back and see how the character has changed from the early seasons of Crossing Jordan to season 5, she is now a more mature and confident character, rather than the ‘weak’ character she was.

The Woody/Jordan mating ritual was further developed in this episode; it begins and ends with them doing their dance (quite literally at the end!). As with all episodes that suggest Woody and Jordan could be more than friends, it is a case of one step forward, two steps back, yet, at the end of this episode, rather than feeling frustrated with their relationship, I felt comfortable and satisfied.

The fact that Crossing Jordan is a more character driven crime-drama than forensically driven crime-drama, makes up for the weak storyline, the interaction between the characters and the development of their personalities made this a good episode.