CSI: 19 Down... (Episode 909)

Blue pill or red pill?

If this recap is late, it's only because it took me forever to figure out what was going on and who was who. Was it really necessary to jam-pack this episode with 502940204627482 interchangeable young white guys? Perhaps the Agent Smith-ness was a nod to Morpheus himself, Laurence Fishburne, but I would've preferred a Pee-wee's Playhouse homage instead.

Two guys watch a videotape that the audience doesn't see but the voice of a woman whimpering in terror can be heard. One of the guys, a total redneck who hasn't been acquainted with a shower in at least a month, remarks it's like the good old days and the other guy, whose face is hidden by the shadows, responds by strangling Redneck. The whimpering fades out and is replaced by an ethereal piano as the killer stuffs Deadneck in a trash bag, drags him out to his car, drives to a remote location, and pushes the bag down a ravine into a shallow creek. Time-lapse photography gives us an appetizing look at Deadneck's decomposing body until all that's left inside the bag are a few bones and soup. Delicious! Although, I am truly sad that Sara's not around for Greg to flirtily tell her she smells like death.

At the lab, Grissom is handing out assignments to his assembled team. We learn that Riley is a whiner about getting the n00b assigments and Greg is newly a CSI level 3. Catherine offers to buy breakfast for everyone after their shift is over, then snarks that it's good to be the king since Grissom didn't give himself a case. He doesn't joke back and she realizes something's up. Grissom announces to the room that he's been thinking a lot - "more than usual" - and he's decided to leave the department. Everyone's so astonished that they can't think of how to respond, although after the initial shock Catherine gets a look like she's really not that surprised. Grissom gets a page and after looking at it, says he's now got a case and leaves, while everyone remains frozen in shock, wondering what the hell just happened.

Grissom's case is Deadneck, of course, who has finally been discovered in the lush primordial forest where he was dumped. A cop approaches Grissom, who's kneeling by the body but not doing anything. Grissom, sporting his adorable straw hat, muses that he's thinking about flyfishing and he has that relaxed look of someone who's just had a huge weight lifted off his shoulders. Grissom tells the cop that with the heavy bag and environment there's no way to tell how long the body has been there. It's taken back to the morgue, where the bones and soup are dumped onto a table. Catherine and Nicky, who I guess have already solved their own cases, start sorting through the mess with Hodges' help. Hodges has heard the big news and thinks Grissom's just taking another leave of absense but Catherine says it's the real deal. Nicky wonders what Grissom's going to do and Catherine sharply snaps that he knows as much as she does. Methinks someone's a little stung that she didn't get the news before the rest of the team. I have to say, I can't blame her. Grissom owed her and their friendship that much, but it's not like it's a newsflash that Grissom fails at this sort of thing. Anyway, Nicky finds a Star of David and speculates the victim was Jewish. They also find some hair, blond and brown, and Catherine tells Hodges to separate them and get them to Wendy for DNA testing.

Doc Robbins examines the victim's skull and confirms that COD was strangulation, and the victim was a white male at least 25 years old. He brings up Grissom's departure and asks if it's true and Grissom says it is, then adds that Robbins will have a new guy to tell his old jokes to. "I liked the old one just fine," Robbins replies. Aw. Robbins asks if Grissom is running away from something or to something or someone but Grissom avoids the question. "The only place I'm running to is my office." He leaves and Robbins mutters to himself that he's never going to retire.

Grissom runs the information about the victim through the missing persons database and comes back with a possible match. Joel Steiner was reported missing in 1997 and its noted that he could be a victim of the Dick & Jane Killer. We get a voiceover of Grissom explaining the case to the team and the audience. The DJK was Nathan Haskell and he was suspected of killing at least 14 people in the '90s. He was arrested during a routine sobriety checkpoint because the officer spotted blood in his car. More evidence connected him to at least three victims. Haskell changed his plea to guilty in the middle of his trial and was sentenced to life without parole. Catherine chimes in that he was called the Dick & Jane Killer because he targeted couples. None of the female victims were found because Haskell refused to talk about them but seven male victims were found after he told investigators where they were. The first body had two stab wounds, the second had three, and so on, so it's still believed Haskell hasn't revealed who his true first victim was. Nicky notes that Joel Steiner and his fiancee were reported missing before any of the other victims so it's possible they've found the DJK's first victim.

In his office, Brass tries to get a positive ID from Joel's parents. He shows them the Star of David and Mrs. Steiner takes it and says she had it made it for Joel's bar mitzvah, and Joel had a matching one made for his fiancee when he got engaged. She tries to pocket it but Brass gently insists it's evidence and he has to hold onto it, but promises she'll get it back when Joel's ID has been confirmed. He says he needs DNA from both of them, since the lab that had Joel's DNA from 1997 has misplaced it.

Grissom passes Hodges in the hall and says he's been meaning to talk to him, but Hodges pissily replies, "A little too late for that. Hey, you gotta do what you gotta do. Have a nice life!" Hee! Grissom looks utterly perplexed, like he never thought he'd be missing the days when Hodges sucked up to and hit on him.

Science Music Video! Hodges puts together the remaining scraps of the victim's clothes and shoes and catalogs their brands. When he gets to the shoes, he realizes something. Out in the hall, Wendy tells Grissom that she used her familial connections to get speedy results on the DNA because she didn't want to wait until after Grissom was gone. After telling him that the blond hairs were a match to Nathan Haskell, she sincerely thanks him for all the support and encouragment he's given her. He simply replies that she earned it, which makes her smile. Hodges interrupts and says he's pretty sure the victim isn't Joel Steiner, because the custom-designed shoes the victim was wearing were made only two years ago. They wonder how Haskell's hair ended up on the body and who their victim is.

While looking through the shoe company's database to see who designed the victim's shoes, Catherine blathers a story about Lindsey insisting on buying custom jeans with her boyfriend's name on them but when she broke up with the boyfriend she never wanted to wear the jeans. When she finishes the story an awkward silence descends and Grissom knows he needs to offer an apology for the way he dropped the bomb. However, she lets him off the hook and says she knew, even before he did. She gets a little teary and smiles at him and, y'all, I think I'm really going to miss their friendship the most. The customer records come up and they identify Deadneck as Gerald Tolliver, who had a long record. He was registered as an informant by the Reno police about six months before he disappeared.

Nicky and Greg drive out to Tolliver's house and meet up with Detective Martz from the Reno PD. He's the cop who caught DJK and says it made his career, so he's always happy to help out on a DJK-related case. Inside the house, Martz points out where the Reno cops found some of Tolliver's blood, not enough to indicate murder, plus a partial shoeprint. Nicky looks around at all the junk in the house and speculates that Tolliver was a "murderbilia" collector, perhaps giving him the connection to DJK. Greg wonders how Tolliver got Steiner's Star of David if Steiner was never found. Nicky doesn't know but he's guessing Tolliver has all sorts of other morbid treasures hidden away. They start searching and find several items which Riley and Catherine connect to DJK's victims. The final item is a pair of Pearl Jam concert tickets, where Steiner and his fiancee were last seen.

Grissom tells Nicky and Catherine that until he changed his plea Haskell's attorneys argued that Haskell couldn't have acted alone, since it would've been impossible to subdue the males while killing the females. Nicky argues they could've been sedated but Grissom says tox panels showed no drugs in the male victims. Catherine thinks Haskell changed his plea because he didn't want to share the spotlight. Grissom wonders if Tolliver wasn't just a collector, but an accomplice. Greg dashes in with a new discovery: he's learned that whoever left the shoeprint at Tolliver's house was also involved in the murders of Ian Wallace and Justine Stefani. He adds that Wallace had nine stab wounds, which is consistent when DJK's pattern. Greg thinks they're dealing with a copycat but Nicky isn't so sure. "A DJK copycat who just so happened to kill a DJK accomplice that nobody knew existed 'til just now?" He thinks they need to question Haskell but Catherine points out that Haskell is such a narcissist that he pled guilty rather than admit he didn't do all the killings by himself. "All roads lead to Rome," Grissom muses speculatively.

Grissom and Brass walk down the hall while Brass explains that all of Haskell's correspondence and phone records have been brought over and the officers have been instructed to flag anything relating to DJK and Tolliver. It's a lot of boxes and Brass says Haskell is a media whore who likes to talk. And speaking of someone who doesn't like to talk, Brass says he heard about Grissom's decision. Grissom confirms and Brass says that's too bad but Grissom insists they'll stay in touch. Brass is all, "Sure, we'll barbecue on the boat every 4th of July!" Grissom obliviously says he didn't know Brass has a boat and Brass looks at him like, "Yeah, that's the point, dumbass." This reminds me of when Brass was in the hospital after he was shot and Greg asked Grissom what they did when they hung out and Grissom had to tell Greg that he and Brass don't hang out. Vartann (hey there, sexypants!) interrupts this uncomfortable moment of reality to say he's found something interesting in Haskell's records. He's been communicating with a WLVU professor and will be participating in a criminology seminar with a video feed so the students can ask questions. Grissom says he'd take that class and Brass thinks that's a really good idea.

Later, Brass explains that the class is open to professors so Grissom will attend as a visiting professor and they won't tell the professor leading the seminar. It would be too risky if he's not willing to play along. Grissom sits down amidst the other attendees and the professor, Dr. Raymond ("call me Laurence Fishburne") Langston introduces himself and begins explaining the basic premise of the seminar: what makes a serial killer? He explains the rules established by himself and the warden that the class needs to follow: orderly conduct, don't reveal any names or other personal information, and the women need to show as little skin as possible. Langston says a student once asked what the face of evil looked like and, turning on the video feed, he says here it is as Nathan Haskell appears. "Hello, class," Haskell says and I don't think it was coincidence that he kind of slurred it so it sounded a little like "Hello, Clarice."

Haskell immediately tries to derail the seminar by rambling about his abusive childhood and early animal killings but Langston snaps that he'll end the seminar if Haskell keeps wasting their time. Haskell promises to be good and Langston goes to the class for questions. One kid asks how Haskell chose his victims and Haskell says it's like buying a car; somehow he just knew which ones he had to have. A girl asks about premeditation and Haskell says he fantasized about what he was going to do, then totally creeps her out by comparing her to the first woman he had sex with, a hooker. Grissom wants to know if Haskell shared anything about his crimes with a "buddy" and Haskell says he pretty much only has fans, not friends. When Grissom asks his question, Langston shoots him a look like he knows something is up. So does Haskell, who asks what Grissom teaches. "Sociology," Grissom half-lies. Langston asks about Haskell's definition of fun and Haskell says it's taking something away from somebody.

Greg tells Catherine that Ian and Justine had tickets for three Paramore concerts and Nicky adds that they went to the first show and the tickets weren't scanned for the third, but someone used the tickets the night they died. Since Steiner and his fiancee went missing after a Pearl Jam concert, maybe that's how DJK found his victims.

Back at the seminar, a guy asks why Haskell never revealed the locations of his female victims. Haskell says nobody's ever asked him why before and Langston presses him to answer since he's got nothing to lose. Haskell disagrees, since the women stopped being whatever they were before they died and became whatever he wanted them to be. The girl from before asks if any of them resisted and Grissom is also interested in the answer to that. Haskell says a couple of them fought back at first. Another kid wants to know how Haskell controlled his victims and he replies that it wasn't with force. He tells a story about the Nazis controlling the concentration camp victims by promising they'd be put to work, so they marched peacefully into the showers. "You have to give them hope," Haskell says. He tells the class that if someone is brought to the brink of death and given a chance to survive, however slight, they'll grab on to it. That hope let Haskell do whatever he wanted to his victims. The warden calls, signalling the end of that day's seminar, and Langston dismisses the class. Grissom remains seated and looks disturbed. The first kid to ask a question asks if he can buy a drink for the first female questioner. "Definitely," she breathes, obviously thinking she'd like to shower the slime of Haskell's aura off her first.

Archie has found videos from the Paramore show the night Ian and Justine were killed, showing who sat in their seats. The two guys on the video are wearing matching hats and the logo traces back to a carwash. Brass questions the guys and they insist they just bought the tickets from a scalper and they can't give much of a description. However, one of the guys kept his ticket stub and Mandy is able to find a print that belongs to Curtis Keesey. Vartann and Nicky bust into Keesey's place and follow a trail of maggots to a decomposing body.

Morgue. Grissom murmurs sweet nothings to the maggots and beetles and determines that Keesey died at least a month ago. SuperDave says Grissom's going to miss the job and Grissom replies that there are bugs everywhere. Ugh, don't I know it. Grissom adds that he'll miss SuperDave and that makes SuperDave start sniffling and tearing up. Aww. Grissom looks like this just went to an awkward place he really wasn't expecting.

Nicky and Catherine determine that the tire treads on Keesey's car are the same found outside Ian's house, but none of the shoeprints match. They've found the likely wheelman, but not his accomplice. Back at the lab, Greg steals my job and recaps what they know so far. The unknown suspect killed Tolliver, an accomplice of DJK. The same man, along with Keesey, kills Ian and Justine, and they believe he also killed Keesey after Keesey sold Ian's concert tickets. Grissom wonders if their suspect could also have been a DJK accomplice and resurfaced after ten years because he was doing time. Catherine adds that he could've killed Tolliver after learning that Tolliver had become an informant, and killing once brought the old thrill back.

Seminar. Langston wants Haskell to talk about how he got caught. The kid who asked the girl out for a drink (I should have come up with shorthand names for these students) asks if Haskell wanted to get caught and he disputes that. Grissom thinks it's unlikely that Haskell made a mistake like getting pulled over with visible blood in his car and Langston agrees. Grissom pushes for more, saying he believes Haskell must have had help committing his crimes. Haskell tries to distract Grissom and the seminar by going into graphic detail about what he did to his victims but the bigger distraction comes from Mrs. Steiner, who storms in and hysterically demands to know where her son is. Grissom breaks his cover by saying he knows Haskell had accomplices and if he would reveal who they were it could help him. Haskell is gleeful but Langston is furious and cuts the feed to the prison. Later, he confronts Brass and Grissom, insisting he would've helped if he knew what was going on. Grissom promises to keep him updated as the case develops and Langston leaves, saying he knows a brush-off when he sees one. Brass notes that Langston is cranky for a professor and Grissom exposits that Langston used to be a research pathologist who left his hospital after failing to catch an "angel of death" killer.

That night, Langston is in the seminar room when his phone rings. It's Haskell, who pulls a "the call is coming from the parking lot" prank. It's kind of lame that Langston fell for it so easily but after all that's happened I don't blame him for being a little spooked. Haskell says he's ready to talk about Joel Steiner and Langston puts him on hold, pretending to close the door but really getting Grissom on the other line. Of course, Haskell knows the real deal but he doesn't care. He starts talking and we see cops race down the road as Haskell provides the precise location of Steiner's remains. Joel Steiner's bones are uncovered but that's not all Haskell tells them they'll find. Nicky calls Grissom and Brass over to another, fresher body nearby with ten stab wounds. The newest victim of DJK is the student who asked the girl out for a drink, at least I'm fairly sure it's him. It could be one of the other 502940204627482 interchangeable young white guys, though.

To be continued...until next month. Have a happy holidays and I'll be back in January! In the meantime, check out my pre-Recapist recaps archive where I'm putting up my old recaps as quickly as possible. Oh, and don't re-post any of my recaps on any other sites. To borrow from the awesomely sociopathic Parker on Leverage, that hurts me in my special angry place. Also, my boss's lawyers don't really like it.