An Explosive 'Case'

If you were able to ignore the obvious war parallels, tonight's episode of Cold Case was pretty good. I'm just not a fan of my favorite shows getting political, especially when the murder has very little to do with the political topic dujour. Jack and Sara died because they wanted to go to the police and confess to a murder they were involved in 10 years before, and the other participants did not. And when I say "other participants," I really mean Johanna, who refused to return to her humble New Jersey roots by allowing everything she had worked for fall to pieces around her as her husband and friend poured heir hearts out to the local authorities. Desperate times, I suppose, and we all know that people will resort to all kinds of things once desperation takes over. Still, I had a hard time seeing Johanna as anything other than a cold - hearted beyotch. Not only does she kill her husband and friend to protect her comfy Main Line life, but she then assumes her dead friend's identity and carries on her fairytale future without thinking twice about it. In fact, she pleaded with Lilly not to arrest her in front of everyone at her daughter's basketball game. On second thought, she wasn't a cold-hearted beyotch, just an immensely weak individual.


I'm a sucker for a good twist, and this one had a whammy. All along, I kept noticing little things that seemed off, but I just dismissed them (out of sight, out of mind if you will). Then when all was revealed and we learned that Sara had died in the blast and Johanna was pretending to be her, everything began to make sense. The writer made a point early on in the episode to tell us that Sara and Johanna resembled each other and were even confused for one another, Sara would never have landed herself a beautiful mansion on the Main Line complete with all the "capitalist," rich trappings (that was so Johanna) because she was against all of that, and the intimate conversation between Johanna and Porter that "Sara" seemed to know in such detail all stuck out at the time. And yet, I didn't figure it out until the fingerprint reveal -- not even the orchid remark turned on the light bulb. I watch so many of these crime shows that everything old is new again for me, so I'm always thrilled when one manages to pull the wool over my eyes. That, Stillman's cute grandson story line (complete with his juice box breakdown and Kat's help), and Louis' "Lookin' good" comment to Lil were enough for me to move Cold Case to 13-2 on the season.


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