“I Heart New York” – aired on April 8, 2018
Written by: Michael Rauch
Directed by: Constantine Makris
Grade: 3,5 out of 5
Notice: All episode reviews contain spoilers
Following last week’s debacle, Instinct could have used an outstanding episode to move forward on a positive note. Unfortunately, “I Heart New York” was not that episode, largely due to its overly contrived crime-solving plot, although it had some of the show’s best character-building moments to date and a skilled guest star (John Doman) appearing as Reinhart’s father.
Instinct seems to have settled into a pattern.
On the one hand, when the focus is on the personal lives of Dr. Reinhart and Det. Needham, Instinct’s appeal increases. Character development emerges out of our two protagonists’ interactions with others around them, as well as out of their conversations with each other. Alan Cumming and Bojana Novakovic reflect onto the screen, with great success, the intriguing profiles of the two main characters. The more Dylan and Lizzie learn about each other, the closer they grow, the more we identify, and the more we root for them.
On the other hand, there is the crime-solving part, supposedly the driving force of an episode for a procedural, that lags behind the above in a conspicuous manner. The cases presented are uninspiring and recycled variations of what has already been used in the crime-show arena. Furthermore, the way Instinct has so far solved each week’s mystery barely challenges the limits of imagination.
Take for example, the scene with the subway thief coming out from the sewer system. Dylan and Lizzie are walking on a random sidewalk, away from the crime scene. A particular manhole cover is lifted, and a pickpocket climbs out right in front of Dylan and Lizzie. Naturally, Lizzie questions him, and naturally, he carries some objects – notably, the cell phone of one of the victims – collected from the dead bodies after the explosion.
One of those cell phones, again naturally, happens to carry a crucial text that eventually leads to a witness who had spotted the perpetrator. She remembers him in detail, mind you? He ran into her as he got in the subway car, spilling the contents of her bag. She describes him down to the tattoo – a marijuana leaf – on his forearm, a marijuana leaf. Yet, somehow, she cannot help the sketch artist come up with an accurate image, because, you see, that would lessen the impact of our genius Dylan’s “epiphany moment” to come later.
And what an epiphany it is! Dylan puts a ton together, even by his own standards.
It starts with Lizzie holding a bathrobe at the scene of the third crime and asking, “Why the kids’ robe?” The screen suddenly turns blue-ish, Dylan appears under an imaginary spotlight, and he has visions that help him conclude that all three previously unrelated crimes, including the subway explosion that Lizzie and Dylan had been told to leave alone, must have been committed by the same person. The dead bodies (all 14 of them) are apparently victims of circumstances and the perpetrator’s initial intention was simply to destroy locations.
Even Dylan’s explanation (of his epiphany) to Jasmine does not bring down to earth how much he put together in his epiphany. Dylan says that the perpetrator projects all the bad stud about himself onto these places, that those places bring bad memories, and that our murderer/destroyer “could be the Doogie Houser of murderers.” Cumming’s fabulous delivery of these lines cannot possibly hide the outrageousness of Dylan’s brain power during the two-second-long epiphany.
Other neat plot devices appear along the way. The perpetrator happens to be present on one of the scenes and gets questioned by Lizzie and Dylan. Lizzie also has her epiphany moment – albeit a little less forced Dylan’s – clearly injected to take rapid leaps in the crime-solving process. A picture happens to hang on the perpetrator’s horse cab and it shows him, as a child, with his dad at the precise carrousel that was blown up earlier. The clues, all along, are conveniently placed, but thankfully, the pleasant synergy between Lizzie and Dylan, as they brainstorm about these clues, helps alleviate the “come-on-now” feeling that invades the viewer.
As do the scenes between Lieutenant Gooden and Lizzie, as well as the ones involving Dylan, Andy, and Roger. These bring out the best of what “I Heart New York” has to offer. Riding those moments, the episode provides us an enticing peek into our main characters.
For starters, Dylan and his dad have a strained relationship. Dylan refers to him by his first name when Roger Reinhart appears for the first time on screen. The malaise between the two is immediately obvious, of that Doman and Cumming leave us in no doubt, thanks to their superior acting skills when it comes to depicting profound characters.
We slowly discover that Mr. Reinhart believes Dylan is “wasting time” since having ditched his CIA career – he later calls Dylan’s work “nonsense.” Dylan seems to be bitter about his father not having read his best-selling book. When Roger invites Dylan and Andy to dinner, he also invites Lizzie, unbeknownst to Dylan. “He likes to withhold things,” he says to Andy about his father. Lizzie and Andy appear to feel uneasy as Roger and Dylan bitterly take jabs at each other. All four actors excel in their performances in this meaningful scene.
Kudos to Michael Rauch here, for not using the trope of the father’s bitterness toward his son, arising from the latter being gay, among other things. Roger is nothing more than the customary dad who is disappointed because, in his genuine opinion, his son chose a professional path that under-utilizes his abilities.
Later in the episode, Dylan and Roger have a final dialogue that is sentimentally charged. Add the final scene that immediately follows, with Andy and Dylan kissing and walking away holding hands, and we easily have the most powerful ending to an Instinct episode so far in the series.
Kudos again to Rauch for getting John Doman to star as Dylan’s father.
There is also a praiseworthy subplot involving the friendship between Lizzie and Jasmine. In a cute scene, we learn that Lizzie’s colleagues are intimidated by Lieutenant Gooden and depend on Lizzie’s close friendship with her to get the scoop on what is going on behind closed curtains. The cuteness is interrupted when Lizzie enters Jasmine’s office and learns that her close friend sought the help of another in planning her wedding. Lizzie’s feelings are hurt (in a petty way, to be frank). The subplot leads to some substantial world-building within the precinct and highlights the depth of the comradery between Lizzie and Jasmine.
If only, the crime portion of the episode was a bit more ambitious and felt less artificial…
Even the denouement rests on a repeated trope, the one in which Dylan stalls the final criminal act of the perpetrator with some heart-to-heart words intended to reach the latter’s deep psychological pain. It has already been used in two of the previous three episodes. Make that three out of four now.
Last-minute thoughts:
– Convenient scene-setting at the precinct, when Lieutenant Gooden gathers everyone in the office to give the ubiquitous pump-up speech, ending with, “show the rest of the world, no one gets to do this to us, let’s get them.” While everyone stands in a U-shaped form to listen, Dylan and Lizzie happen to be the only ones sitting in the middle.
– Could you tell who the perpetrator was before the denouement? I saw several who did on social media, although I must admit, it took me longer than them.
– Another episode with no appearance by Naveen Andrews as Julian, not that he was given any substantial time during the two in which he did appear.
– I hope the show garners more loyal followers who like it for the stories it offers. I am getting the impression that people watch the show because they are big Alan Cumming fans, Naveen Andrews fans, or because they appreciate seeing a gay couple portrayed, very pleasantly I might add, by Cumming and Daniel Ings. I am all for that too, but the story-telling needs improvement for the show to prove successful in the ratings and survive beyond its first season.
– I am a little concerned by the potential that the craze for Cumming, and the media feeding into it, could relegate Bojana Novakovic’s Lizzie into a secondary role. Most of the headlines I read about the show highlight Cumming and his character, with Novakovic barely mentioned in some. I am so far delighted to see that Michael Rauch and his team have not fallen into this trap and given equal time to both characters. I certainly hope it remains this way. Lizzie deserves better than the often-encountered-trope of female lead following in the footsteps of the more brilliant male partner in previous crime shows. Proceeding in such manner would do great injustice to Novakovic who has performed wonderfully as Lizzie.
Instinct is off next Sunday. See you in two weeks.