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RSSPremierwatch: 'In Plain Sight': gold coins, bikers, toxins, and PTSD
It's so good to have Mary, Marshall and "In Plain Sight" back. Even if Mary's on administrative leave after her kidnapping by drug dealers, and her PTSD is manifesting itself as heightened empathy and a remarkably positive outlook. And even if she's got to relinquish control of an investigation into the death of one of her witnesses to Marshall.
Spoilers, flowing like a river, right ahead...
Seventeen years ago, three bikers checked into a family's going-out-of-business motel in Arkansas. They stashed drugs and bags of gold coins in an air vent, and later that night the mother, Lily, ended up getting shot as the father tried to break up an argument. She testified against the leader, and the next day the father dropped dead. Lily and the kids -- Angela, Amy, and Henry, went into witness protection. And now Lily's been found dead in her home. She left a note -- she's begun to show symptoms of Huntington's disease, and she's decided to end her life. But investigators have ruled the death a homicide.
Enter Mary and Marshall. Marshall's put in charge of the case, and Mary's surprisingly eager to be his "helper." Maybe that is what 30 hours of sleep can do for you -- I'd like to find out. Stan's also brought in a new office administrator, and he and Marshall brace themselves for Mary's reaction -- which is calm, low-key and very un-Marylike. Except when she shoves her desk in a momentary tantrum. And when she finally does break -- sobbing, trying to catch her breath, and feeling like she's totally broken -- Marshall's there to talk her down off the ledge. It bears repeating: we all could use a Marshall in our lives.
Angela, Amy and Henry -- now grown -- are devastated by their mother's death. Lily died from a mix of carbon dioxide and a lethal alkaloid toxin. Angela gets sick and lands in the hospital with extreme cardiac distress, and after some initial fumbling, they connect the dots and realize it's the same poison in their mother's system. And there's a new red flag: the biker Lily's testimony put in jail did a 10-year sentence and moved to Albuquerque. But it's not what it seems. The guy tells Mary and Marshall an amazing story about how Lily forgave and befriended him, and help him settle in Albuquerque. She turned his life around, he says. After they tell him they suspect Lily was killed, he realizes she must have the gold coins. He and his biker friends had stolen them from a chemist who, we find out later, coated them with the alkaloid poison -- which ended up killing Lily's husband and Lily, as she divvied up the coins for her kids. It also nearly killed Angela and Amy, who both handled the coins when they went to get them from the storage lockers she directed them to.
In the end, Angela explains that she's the one who found their mother and read her note warning whoever was coming in the house that she had plugged the exhaust pipe from the stove to fill the house with carbon monoxide. She wrote another note explaining to Amy and Henry why their mother did what she did.
Back at Mary's house, both Jinx and Brandi are surprisingly much less annoying than anyone would have guessed -- they've dialed it way down in deference to what Mary's been through. It doesn't stop Jinx from getting obsessed with tracking down the source and location of the letters from Mary's dad. And Brandi needs to say goodbye to Chuck in the morgue. But in the end what comes through more than anything is Mary's ability to be thankful for the fact that they're all awake and alive.
Some quick additional thoughts:
- I love Marshall, I love Bobby D, and I really love Mary's reaction to their bonding: "And you've become black in the process?"
- Watching Marshall, Bobby D and Stan react to Mary's unexpected calm was both funny and touching.
- I'm eager to see what will happen with Brandi now. This season's starting just two days after last season left off, so everything's still very fresh -- but I was surprised to see no mention of what's hanging over Brandi's head.
What did you think? Did you find Mary's efforts to cope in character? And will this episode make you run the other way should you ever encounter stolen Nazi coins?
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Zap2it Twitter Talk 
I REALLY love this show.... Mary and Marshall are such wonderful characters!
Last night was a great ep. Mary McCormack was great showing another, weirder, side of Mary.
I'm guessing that we will see the Brandi repurcussions, but that the producers didn't want to make the first ep back about her.
Such a great show! And I love the shots of and interwoven involvement in Albuquerque. The only thing I HOPE doesn't happen is Brandi getting involved with gorgeous Rafael! He's Mary's!
Took me a while to get back into it, but the show will be okay if they focus mostly on Mary and also keep her great one-liners coming, and either come up with better storylines for her family or keep them in the background.
Distracted by the plot though, must have missed something. Did the mother commit suicide because she had started to show symptoms from handling the coins? Was the Huntington's thing made up or did she think it was symptoms of that rather than poisoning and she just gave up?
Okay, I'm still a little confused by the ending of this episode. Can anyone help me out?
- Did Lily actually have Huntington's disease, knew that she did and had intended to commit suicide by plugging the exhaust vent?
- If so, then why did the daughter write another note if the mom had already written one?
It was late and I was tired so if someone who saw this episode knows what happened, I'd appreciate the clarification.
Hi,
Sorry -- in trying to be brief I might've been confusing. Lily (the mother) was showing symptoms of Huntington's. Years ago she'd gotten tested, found out she had the gene, got the kids tested and found out they didn't have the gene. When she started having symptoms, she decided to commit suicide and plugged the stove, filling the place with carbon monoxide. She left a note for anyone who might be coming to the house. So she meant to kill herself, but because she handled the coins she was also poisoned -- it was a 1-2 punch, so to speak. The daughter found her and sat with her as she died, and wrote an additional note to clarify what had happened (that was a little confusing to me too) -- I got the impression that the mother's note didn't totally explain everything. I don't think there's any reason to think the Huntington's is a red herring or anything -- no one who'd handled the coins knew about the poison. It was just the presence of poison in her blood in addition to the carbon monoxide that made the police suspect murder.
Why did Mary keep identifying herself as Mary Shepard? When she first went to the house when the mom died, she did that 2 or 3 times. It was weird.
Ginnie, I think she hadn't seen the kids in years, since they were little, so she identified herself and asked if they remembered her. She was the agent in charge of their family's case.
i wanna have sex with mary and she should keep her gun strapped on
I loved this episode! Empathetic Mary was hilarious, or rather everyone else's reactions to her... I also really liked the case this episode, it felt very involved with lots of twists.. And of course i loved how concerned Marshall was about Mary after she and stan got in the argument, i want them to get together so badly!