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Episode Name: Be Kind, Rewind
Episode Number: 040 (3.02)
MED-040 Summary | All Episodes
In many ways life is one big multiple choice test. A series of questions we answer through the choices we make. Sometimes our choices work for us. Sometimes they work against us.
A teenage boy takes his written driver’s test…and fails.
Most of the time it isn’t the choice itself that’s stressful but rather the consequence of the choice. A result we couldn’t foresee or didn’t quite imagine.
A young woman ecstatically says yes as her boyfriend places an engagement ring on her finger…then sits surrounded by six small children a few years later, looking harried.
A man chooses a line at the bank that turns out to be the slowest mover.
But what if when we made our choices, having realized we made the wrong ones, there was some way to go back. Some way to invoke a big do-over?
The man gets a second chance to pick a line at the bank, and this time he picks the one that moves the fastest and gets to the teller right away.
Wouldn’t that just be the best?
Just as the man reaches the teller, a guy in a ski mask grabs him and puts a gun to his head. Ack! We hear a gunshot as…
Allison wakes up (ooh, there’s a shocker) to find Joe also awake and wanting some nookie. (Noogie?) Apparently it has been a while but Allison is tired and cranky and says so.
Joe: Sex isn’t just sex. Sex is good for you. Sex releases endorphins and endorphins make you happy.
Allison: I know that. I do, and I fully plan on being happy tomorrow. Whether I feel like it or not.
At breakfast:
- Ariel doesn’t want to go to school because some girl plans to mess up her face. The boys at school wrote a note about who’s “hot” and who’s not. Ariel is “hot” and Amy Amsen is not. Amy got a hold of the note and has decided she will mess up Ariel’s face so she won’t be hot anymore.
- Allison explains to Ariel that she has to go to school and show Amy she will not be intimidated. She guarantees her nothing will happen. Besides, Allison has an important arraignment at work today and Ariel can’t stay home by herself.
- Bridgette wants to know what an arraignment is and has to ask three times, with increasing insistency, before she gets an answer.
- Allison tells Bridgette and arraignment is what happens when someone is being accused of a crime. Before they go to trial, they go to court where the court tells them what they are accused of and the person tells the court whether they believe they are innocent or guilty. (Bridgette wants to know why anyone would say they are guilty. Ha!)
- The phone rings and it turns out to be a carpet cleaning telemarketer. Allison calmly tells them no, she is not interested in having her carpets and drapes cleaned; no, she does not want a free in-home estimate; no, they do not have to call back in three months.
- Bridgette spills a glass of juice on the table.
Tags: be kind, rewind, liveblogging, medium recap, medium, medium nbc
At Devalos’ office, Allison comes in to tell him she thinks Krieger, the guy Devalos is arraigning this afternoon, didn’t kill all those people by himself. Devalos is a cranky-butt and says that’s really nice but Krieger’s lawyer has postponed the arraignment four times so he thinks they are having second thoughts and will come in and plead guilty this afternoon so it really doesn’t matter who else was there.
Nurse Dunbar calls Allison from the school to say Ariel is in her office and doesn’t feel well. As she drives to the school to pick up Ariel – OH MY GOD! – a big black sedan just plowed into Allison’s car! Her head and nose are bleeding profusely. She briefly comes to and sees the trunk of the other car has sprung open and there’s a body in it. Then she passes out.
We see everything through her eyes as she wakes up in the hospital with Joe and the girls standing over her. Joe tells her her face is all stitched up and has her blink to communicate. Ariel is bawling and saying it’s all her fault. Bridgette just looks like she doesn’t have a clue. Joe sends the girls to the vending machines and then gets all compassionate in a really scary there-is-something-way-more-wrong-than-just-a-face-injury kind of way.
He tells her everyone has been calling, including her brother. He tells her Devaos says the arraignment went fine. He tells her the asshole went right through the light and – guess what? – they found a body in the trunk along with a duffel filled with ammo, an automatic weapon, and blueprints for some building downtown.
Joe: I mean, we’re all reasonably sure he wasn’t rushing to church, you know? That’s my wife. Always out there stopping the bad guys, even when she doesn’t know she’s doing it. Here’s the thing. You got hurt really bad. Nothing that can’t be fixed with time and therapy. Okay this is ridiculous because they told me not to say anything. Not until you were fully conscious and they had weaned you off the drugs. I guess they’re right. … Just know that we’re going to get you everything you need. Whatever it is. Whatever it costs. I love you baby.
OH CRAP. It is definitely bad, whatever it is.
Later, Allison wakes up alone in her hospital room and has to go to the bathroom. She throws back the covers to get up and discovers…her legs end at stumps just below the knees! AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH.
Then she really wakes up, at home with both of her legs. THANK GOD.
Allison: I feel like I got the ultimate do-over. Like the universe gave me a get out of jail free card.
Weird. Joe just repeated the sex and endorphins speech he made yesterday.
At breakfast:
- Allison wants to know where Ariel is because she, Allison, is running late and has an important arraignment today.
- Bridgette tells her Ariel doesn’t want to go to school today and asks what an arraignment is. Three times. With increasing insistency until Allison stops to stare at her in a deja vu moment.
- Ariel comes in saying she isn’t going to school and Allison, still in her deja vu moment, asks if it’s because of Amy Amsen and the you’re hot, she’s not thing.
- Areil says it is so unfair she can do that.
- The phone rings and it’s the carpet cleaning company, then Bridgette spill her juice.
It’s Groundhog Day, only without Bill Murray!
Allison tells Joe about the dream and how she is going to have a horrible car accident in a little while. Instead, she takes a cab to the corner where it happened and has Scanlon meet her there. Before she leaves, she tells Ariel, no she cannot stay home from school and she had better not dare go to the nurse’s office and make Allison come get her or she will be grounded for the rest of eighth grade.
At the street corner, she tells Scanlon a black sedan is about to run the light and will have a body and a bunch of ammo in the trunk. Sure enough, a moment later a black sedan speeds through the light and Scanlon is excited he gets to use his siren. But after he pulls the car over, he lets the driver go without even looking in the trunk. The Honorable James T. Whitman’s trunk, a federal court judge. Dang! Scanlon offers to buy Allison lunch to appease her disappointment.
On the way to the restaurant, Allison gets a call from the school nurse saying some girl gave Ariel a black eye but she’ll be fine in about an hour and can return to class. Allison feels terrible for making her go to school and Ariel refuses to get on the phone to talk to her. Drama!
Meanwhile, Scanlon hears about a robbery on the police radio and detours to check it out. Some guy has holed himself up in a restaurant with fifty seven hostages. The weird part is he has made no demands. He just wants everyone to wait outside until 5:00 and then he’ll release the hostages and give back the money.
Allison spots the judge’s car parked next to the restaurant so she hangs around. Just before 5:00, one of the police snipers reports someone who fits the description of the bad guy coming out the back door carrying a blue gym bag. They shoot to incapacitate him but it turns out to be a hostage sent out as a decoy! The bad guy made all of the hostages put on ski masks, as we discover when they all come screaming out of the front doors. He also taped an automatic weapon to the decoy’s hand so he couldn’t drop the weapon even if he wanted to. Taped his mouth shut, too, so he couldn’t explain the situation to the police. Y’know, before they shot him.
When they untape his mouth, he tells them the bad guy’s gun jammed. Okay, that’s weird. Who did the bad guy try to shoot in the first place to discover the gun was jammed and why is that the first thing the hostage says when they take off his gag?
******
Allison wakes up Friday morning. Again.
Breakfast and cues happen. Again. Joe and sex and endorphins. Ariel and the bully.
This time, Allison gets all Rambo on Ariel and tells her to, “get yourself a little bad ass” at school and not let that girl intimidate her.Then she picks up the glass of juice and pours it out on the table before Bridgette can spill it. And then the unfortunate carpet cleaning solicitor calls. Oh my.
Allison: No, you listen to me you scum sucking, bottom-feeding, hide behind the telephone, headset wearing piece of garbage. You ever call my house again during breakfast, I will personally come to your carpet cleaning company, I will find you, and I will hurt you. And when I’ve finished with you, nothing and no one will ever be able to get your stain out.
Allison tells everyone to get their asses ready for work or school because she has an arraignment.
Bridgette: What’s an arraignm-
Allison: Too late!
They all stare after her in stunned silence as she storms off to get dressed.
******
Allison pitches her judge story to Devalos and Scanlon and they decide the easiest thing to do is go tell the judge a car matching the description of his has been used in the commission of a crime and ask him to let them confirm his car is still where he left it. Oh, and would he mind if they take a peek in the trunk?
BUT, they discover the judge isn’t the guy Allison saw in her dream so she and Scanlon head to lunch at the restaurant that got robbed. On the way, the school nurse calls, only this time she puts the principal on the phone, who tells her Ariel punched out Bully Girl.
Guess she got herself a little bad ass.
At the restaurant, Allison overhears someone ask about Judge Whitman, who is apparently very late. Just as Scanlon smugly tells her to look around because the restaurant is not being robbed, a guy in a ski mask shows up with a gun and says it’s a robbery. But then he starts handing out ski masks and tells everyone to put one on.
Scanlon gets busted reaching for his gun and the bad guy tells him to remove his holster. Allison tells Scanlon the guy’s gun is going to jam so he pulls out his own gun and shoots the bad guy three times in the chest. Bad guy’s license says he is Michael Williams. But don’t get cocky! Bad guy gets up and shoots Scanlon in the chest. Bullet-proof vest.
CRAP!
******
Allison wakes up on Friday. Geez, again? This had better be the last time.
This time she thinks the gunman killed Judge Whitman and put his body in the trunk. She calls the restaurant to finds out why it was packed and finds out every judge in the county is scheduled to be there to go over new court procedures. Before leaving the house, she:
- Tells Ariel to stay home from school (color Ariel shocked);
- Tells Bridgette an arraignment is when someone pleads innocent or guilty (“are you talking to me?”);
- Tells baby Marie to say hi to the nice man as she hands her the telephone and we hear the carpet cleaning solicitor’s revoltingly cheery greeting on the other end.
At Devalos’ office, Allison finds out the only thing that will happen if all judges in the county are held hostage between 1:00 and 5:00 p.m. today is the afternoon’s court proceedings will be rescheduled for another day. No big deal. Unless…
Unless the proceedings are time sensitive, like Devalos’ Krieger arraignment. If Krieger doesn’t get arraigned today, his due process will be violated and, by law, he must be released. Allison tells Devalos all she knows is the guy’s name from her dream is Michael Williams, and Devalos figures out he is Krieger’s brother-in-law!
I love it when a plan comes together.
******
Michael Williams enters the restaurant in full ski-masked regalia…to be greeted by Scanlon and a gaggle of boys and girls in blue waiting for him with weapons drawn. How nice they look all lined up in two rows like a class picture. Only with guns.
Scanlon: Boys. He’s wearing a bullet-proof vest. Aim for his head.
Aw, he gives up. That’s kind of a let down.
******
The next morning, which thankfully turns out to actually be the next morning, Joe and Allison produce endorphins.