Loveday Writing

After the opening credits, we find Grace doing some before-work morning yoga when she gets a phone call from Nichols. He asks her to go to the Bettie to find Harrow as he can’t get a hold of him. While reluctant, Grace complies, and goes to the Bettie to find Harrow’s and Tanya’s clothes on the floor, Harrow half-naked and Tanya in the shower. She tells him about the crime scene and hastily leaves.

We cut to Fern and Callan walking through a park, with Callan telling her what he found at the SWM office in the previous episode. Fern reminds Callan of their past homelessness and committing crimes to get by, she also tells him that if he doesn’t want to help James that’s fine, but he’s her brother and she is going to help him.

We then cut to Harrow and Grace arriving at the crime scene, with Harrow trying to explain himself to Grace, but she dismisses it as none of her business. Nichols tells them that the body is that of Jade Freeman, 35, found by her neighbour (Pat) and her boyfriend’s sister (Naomi), and it looks like she was strangled. Nichols thinks that she was killed around 4am and there were no signs of forced entry, and the neighbours said it was unusually quiet in the home, as Jade and her boyfriend, Aaron, used to fight loudly often. Another officer informs Nichols that Aaron is outside waiting, and Nichols tells the officer to bring Aaron in. When Aaron walks in, he doesn’t blink or say a word. Nichols asks Aaron to confirm that the woman is Jade, but the only thing he says is that “she smashed my boat.”

When Nichols, Grace and Harrow are outside, Grace asks if Aaron has said anything else, but Nichols says no and he’s taking him to the station for further questioning. Grace remarks Aaron seems completely unaffected, while Harrow comments that some people react to death differently. When they get back to the Institute, Harrow looks up Jade’s details and finds that she used to work as a hairdresser, but hasn’t worked in nearly a year, she has also been living with Aaron for almost two years, just bought a house and about to become engaged.

When Grace brings up scans of Jade’s body, she informs Harrow that Jade’s thyroid and larynx cartilage, as well as her hyoid bone were broken, suggesting death by strangulation. Harrow and Grace swab Jade’s wounds and scrape under her fingernails. Grace finds dirt under Jade’s fingernails but no skin or other kind of DNA, Harrow suggests she didn’t fight back. Grace also finds unusual bruises on the inside of her hands, and Harrow finds a large bruise on her abdomen, suggesting her killer pinned Jade down. Grace also informs Harrow that Jade had unprotected sex at some point within the last 24 hours. Harrow informs her that Aaron Sharp has no criminal convictions to his name. Grace suggests Aaron abused her, however there is no physical evidence of this.

Harrow then goes to see Nichols, and Nichols informs him that Aaron still hasn’t said a word to him or anyone else. Nichols informs Harrow that Aaron only partially completed his deliveries at his night job, and some of the female staff recently complained about him as his quietness freaked them out. Nichols also informs Harrow that Aaron has three jobs and works 18-hours straight, per day, and Jade was chasing a compensation payment for a neck injury she suffered in a car accident. Harrow asks if he can have a go at getting Aaron to talk.

Harrow goes into the room and talks to Aaron about French fleet ships. Harrow asks Aaron if Jade liked his model ships, Aaron tells him that Jade thought he didn’t have time to work on them. Harrow then asks him how he felt working 18 hours a day, seven days a week. Aaron says he did it by choice. Harrow then asks why Jade didn’t work, Aaron says she couldn’t due to her injury. Harrow asks Aaron if he was at the house when Jade broke his ship, and asks him if he hurt Jade. Aaron says he loved her but doesn’t actually answer the question.

Later, we see Renae angrily on the phone with the Deputy Coroner. After she ends the call, she goes to see Fairley and asks him to give her his reports on Harrow, as his supervisor. Meanwhile Grace goes to Harrow’s office to give him the scans he asked for, while he is looking through Aaron’s case file. He tells Grace he was wondering if Aaron had been diagnosed with some form of autism. Harrow wants to know why Aaron is not talking to the police, Edwina then comes in and tells them that the lab has found contact DNA in the neck wounds which matches the semen found in Jade’s body. The DNA was run in the national database and it’s not Aaron’s.

We then cut to Harrow, as well as Nichols and other police officers going to the house of Tony Palladino. Nichols and the other police officers are trying to apprehend Tony as a suspect in Jade’s murder, and he is doing so with back-up as, according to Harrow, Palladino has multiple convictions for GBH and assault. Before Nichols gets a chance to knock on Palladino’s door, Detective Brookes stops him, as Palladino’s dead body is in his garage, pinned under his car. Nichols and Harrow surmise that the car jack failed as he was trying to reach for a bottle of whiskey, and the car crushed him. Harrow finds a maggot in the corner of one of Palladino’s eyes, specifically newborn larvae of the green bottle fly, which take precisely 19 hours to hatch after the female has laid her eggs. This means that Palladino was dead before Jade was strangled.

We then cut to Nichols and Harrow back at the police station, they show Aaron a photograph of him with Naomi, Pat, Jade and Palladino together. Nichols asks Aaron to confirm that the other man in the photograph is Palladino, but he says nothing. Nichols then asks him if he knew that Palladino and Jade were having an affair, as the police found messages on Palladino’s phone showing the affair took place. Aaron asks why it matters if he did know. Nichols informs him that Palladino is dead and died several hours before Jade was strangled. Harrow then tells Aaron that they’re trying to find out what happened to Jade, but they can’t do that unless he tells them what he knows. Aaron tells them he knew about the affair. Nichols asks him if he confronted Palladino and then strangled Jade. Afterwards Harrow says to Nichols he doesn’t understand how Palladino’s DNA ended up in Jade’s neck wounds when he was dead hours before she was strangled. Nichols suggests he check the swabs again, and points out that Aaron knew about the affair, had no alibi at the time of the murder, and hasn’t denied killing her.

Later, as Grace is leaving the Institute for the day, she runs into Sage at the elevator. Sage gives Grace a bag of Ben’s stuff indicating that she and Ben have broken up. Grace meets Ben at a restaurant to give him the bag and asks him for an explanation. Ben tells her that he has never stopped loving Grace, despite his best efforts to move on with his life. Meanwhile, James informs Fern that the evidence box containing his phone (which has been switched with another, Fern’s idea from the previous episode) is ready to be picked up, and that he has made a fake ID for Fern to use, to claim to be the relative of the person whose name the box is under. Fern tearfully asks James if he is going to leave once he gets his phone back, James gives Fern his real passport for her to hold onto. He then receives a phone call from Tanya.

James meets with Tanya, she wants to know why he’s in Brisbane. He asks her why his reasons matter to her and scolds her for lying to him about Harrow. James admits he likes having a dad and half-sister as it feels right. He apologises for not telling her where he was going and what he was doing, and remarks that he guess he learnt that from somewhere.

Back at the Institute, Fairley is releasing Max Zoric’s body. Harrow asks why, Fairley informs him that he received the authorisation to do so. Harrow points out that the police are still investigating his death, but Fairley counters that they have collected the evidence they were required to. Harrow says he doesn’t understand, Fairley says that he doesn’t understand either, and asks Harrow why this matters so much to him. Harrow admits that he thinks his son has something to do with Zoric’s death. Fairley asks him if he thinks his son killed Max Zoric, Harrow says he hopes not and apologises to Fairley for not telling him about James sooner. Fairley says his hands are tied as Mila Zoric requested to have Max’s remains and the Institute had no reason to keep them.

Later, Harrow goes to visit Fern, Callan and James, but only Callan is home. Harrow asks Callan to tell James that Max Zoric’s body has been released to Mila. Callan says that Mila is into “dodgy shit” and that Max was involved in it. Callan tells Harrow he loves him but James is playing him, and he’s worried James is going to cause major problems for him and Fern. Callan tells Harrow he and Fern have to cut James off and he won’t have Fern go to jail for James. Harrow leaves with the mysterious delivery woman seen in previous episodes watching him in her van.

When Harrow goes back to the Institute, Naomi Sharpe is there waiting for him. Naomi asks him to check Jade’s body again as Aaron wouldn’t kill her and had no reason to hurt her or Palladino. Harrow tells her about the affair, Naomi suggests that maybe Palladino killed her, but Harrow informs her he died hours before Jade. Naomi says Aaron was shy and not a violent person, and tells Harrow that Jade was always on Aaron’s back, she liked not working and Aaron doing everything for her. Naomi tells Harrow that there must be some sort of mistake and to check everything again.

Harrow then goes in to see Fairley examining Palladino’s body. Fairley confirms Harrow’s findings on Palladino’s time of death. Fairley also tells Harrow that Aaron Sharpe’s fingerprints were found on the car jack that Palladino was using when he died. Fairley points out the inconsistencies in the forensic evidence, such as Tony Palladino’s DNA in Jade’s neck wounds and Aaron Sharpe’s fingerprints on the car jack.

Later, Harrow goes back to Jade’s house and finds Pat putting wine glasses back in one of the kitchen cupboards. He asks her about the yelling she heard from Jade’s house, and tells her that Naomi told him that the yelling was mainly from Jade. Pat tells him Jade was always going on about his work and model boats. Harrow asks him who lent her the wine glasses, Pat says Aaron did and would often lend anything to anyone who asked him. This leads to Harrow searching Aaron’s car for a car jack to find it missing, revealing that Palladino was using Aaron’s car jack the night he died, which explains the fingerprints that were found. Harrow informs Nichols of this, but he is still not convinced that Aaron didn’t kill her.

Harrow then goes to the Palladino crime scene and looks through his house, finding Palladino’s toothbrush missing from the bathroom. He asks the forensic team if they collected it as evidence, they tell him that they didn’t. Harrow then goes back to the Institute to re-swab Jade’s wounds to look for toothpaste in them. Harrow tells Grace he believes that Jade’s killer took Palladino’s toothbrush from his house to frame him for her murder, however the killer didn’t know that Palladino was already dead. This means that the killer knew where Tony lived and knew both victims.

Harrow goes back to the Jade crime scene and finds a bead on the floor, he realises that one of the bruises on Jade’s hand was from the bead, and realises that Naomi’s necklace was made of beads.

Harrow goes to confront Naomi, who has a bruise on the back of her neck, at a beachside café. He informs her about what he found. He asks her why she killed Jade – was it the fact that Aaron worked three jobs and it drove her mad, and the affair pushed her over the edge? Did she threaten to tell Aaron about the affair? Naomi tells him that she told Jade she was going to tell Aaron about the affair but Jade told her it was none of her business. Jade got angry and shoved her, and she lost it, strangling Jade on her couch, and Jade grabbed and broke her bead necklace when she tried to fight back. Harrow points out that she could have called the police and confessed, but she chose to frame Palladino, sneaking into his house to steal his toothbrush to replace her DNA with his. Harrow says she would have gotten away with it if Palladino hadn’t died before Jade.

Naomi tells Harrow he doesn’t understand, Jade didn’t love him, she was using him, taking his money, and sleeping with Palladino behind Aaron’s back. Harrow says that Aaron knew and encouraged the affair as he was treated for testicular cancer two years ago and the treatment made him impotent. Harrow asks Naomi if she knew about this, she didn’t. Naomi tells Harrow she was just trying to protect Aaron, Harrow tells her she took away the one thing Aaron truly loved. Nichols tells Harrow that all charges against Aaron will be dropped but he doesn’t understand why Aaron didn’t tell him anything if he didn’t kill Jade. We then cut to Aaron talking to Harrow and standing beside Jade’s body. Harrow tells him he doesn’t understand why he and Jade argued. Aaron informs him that Jade was worried about him and was worried that he was doing too much for her. She wanted him to spend less time working at his job and more time working on the boats he loved. He just wanted to take care of her, Naomi looked after him his whole life, for the first time he could look after someone else and he wanted Jade to be happy, even if that meant having an affair.

Later, Fairley goes to Renae’s office (with Louie in attendance) to give her his reports. Renae asks him why he has given Harrow excellent scores in his reports and if he finds no fault in Harrow’s work. Fairley tells her there’s plenty of fault in Harrow’s process, but he doesn’t want to be the one to decide the fate of Harrow’s career. He tells her Harrow is one of the best pathologists in the state, and while he breaks the rules and is difficult to work with, he gets results. Fairley tells her that if she wants to get rid of Harrow, she’ll have to do it herself. Renae accepts this and thanks him. On his way out, Fairley tells Louie that he is the President of the Science Squad Cosplay Society, a fan club of the anime series Louie is watching on his iPad.

We then see Fern going to the police station to collect the evidence box, calling James because she is nervous. He encourages her but Callan catches him in the act and asks him what he has gotten Fern into. Callan angrily grabs James and nearly hits him, but walks away.

Fern manages to get the evidence box without being caught by the police officer at the front desk and opens the box before going back to her bike. Mila Zoric’s henchmen surround her and force her to give them the box. She does without saying a word or fighting back. However when Mila gets the phone out, she discovers it’s Fern’s phone, not James’ – Fern switched the phones after opening the box. Meanwhile Callan goes to the Institute and asks Grace to run a DNA test on the hair on James’ comb.

The episode ends with Fern coming home yelling out to James that she got his phone back but they can’t stay at the house anymore. She walks in to find the house trashed and blood on the floor.

Overall I felt that the case of the week was a little predictable, I could see Naomi being the killer from a mile away as she, Aaron, Pat and Palladino, were the only suspects. Aaron was too obvious a suspect so he was clearly the red herring, Palladino was ruled out through his own death, and while Pat looked suspicious when she broke into the crime scene to return the wine glasses she borrowed, none of the evidence pointed to her, which leaves Naomi. In all honesty, as the case of the week in previous episodes have touched upon subcultures and other dramatic elements such as espionage and assassination, I found this suburban case of the week, although realistic, to be a little dull in comparison.

As the case of the week is different in every episode, the only springboard that this episode could provide for the finale was purely in the James story arc. A strong theme that was present throughout the episode was finding the truth. Although this was mainly a theme in the case of the week, it was also present in the James story arc. As I mentioned in my review of the previous episode, both Mila and James are not innocent, but one of them may be the lesser of two evils. Who this is remains to be seen, especially as James is still using Fern, and it appears that Mila’s henchmen have also kidnapped James, harming him in the process. I found the reveal of Fern switching out the phones to be predictable, but I appreciated that this showed her intelligence at work in that she had the foresight to do this before Mila Zoric’s henchmen ambushed her. I would rather see this side of Fern more often than her blind faith in James.

On smaller notes, I’m still not a fan of Harrow and Tanya hooking up and the way in which Grace was forced to find out about this, but as I said in my review of the previous episode, the writing of Harrow and Grace’s “relationship” has been so inconsistent that I have lost interest. That being said, I hope that the writers finally make a choice as to whether Harrow ends up with Tanya or Grace by the end of next week’s finale. I also appreciated Callan finally taking a stand against James by requesting Grace to do a DNA test on the hair on James’ comb, as he clearly can’t go to Harrow as he also has blind faith in James – like father, like daughter – and I’m guessing in next week’s finale this will prove to be to their detriment. I also appreciated Fairley standing up for both Harrow and himself to Renae.

Overall this was a good but not great episode, with the case of the week being predictable but the James story arc finally gaining much needed momentum, that being said this was only in the final moments of the episode.

I’m looking forward to finding the truth and resolution of the James story arc in next week’s finale.

Stray Observations:

Episode title translation: Quam Innocentum Damnari – An Innocent Man Is Punished

-Fairley casually warms up his vocal cords for a rehearsal in some kind of unnamed production, whilst he is scrubbing in.

-Fairley is the President of the Science Squad Cosplay Society – Australasian branch.

Best one liners and interactions:

• “He hasn’t even touched his sandwich! Mind you those vending machine sandwiches can be a bit iffy.” (Nichols to Harrow on Aaron Sharp not talking or moving)
• “What the hell are you doing here?” “I was passing by and spotted my favourite surly detective and thought, ‘I must stop by and say hi!’” (Nichols-Harrow)
• “Harrow! I didn’t know you had such a keen interest in maggots.” “Oh yes – maggots, slugs, cockroaches, bedbugs…my father didn’t let me have a dog.” (Fairley-Harrow)
• “Daniel Harrow is one of the finest pathologists in the state if not the country, but mainly the state.” (Fairley to Renae)