Tuesday, December 5, 2017

Scorpion 4x10 Review: " Crime Every Mountain" (So Much for Boring and Uneventful) [Guest Contributor: Yasmine]


"Crime Every Mountain"
Original Airdate: November 27, 2017

In this episode of Scorpion, hilariously titled “Crime Every Mountain,” no one is having a good day at the garage. Tensions are high and everyone is stressed out because of Cabe’s approaching court date. Everyone is trying to deal with it in their own way while they all try to help with the mock trial. However, Walter’s way of dealing with it is anything but helpful, or healthy for that matter. He’s regressing to his old self and his old ways by pushing people away — especially Cabe, being harsh and antagonistic towards him to prevent himself from the pain of possibly losing him. Walter’s attitude only gets worse throughout the day, causing everyone to feel attacked and uncomfortable around him, not just Cabe.

Eventually, Paige has enough of his attitude and talks to him, in the way that only Paige can talk to Walter. She reminds him that instead of pushing him away, he should be savoring the possible last moments with him. Finally, Walter admits he cannot process the thought of losing Cabe. Paige shares something from her past, when her mother left, and tells him that pain is the price of love and urges him not to push Cabe away because if the worst happens he wouldn’t be able to forgive himself.

Walter’s attitude is not the only reason the mock trial is not going well. Cabe wants to take the stand but Sylvester does not think it’s a good idea. Cabe is not performing well in the mock version — especially not when Walter confronts him and is extremely hostile in his questioning. But in general, Cabe is not handling being questioned or the case against him well at all. And things only get worse as the day progresses.

While Happy, Toby, Paige and Walter head out on a job — for once something that is not about Team Scorpion trying to save the world — Sly and Cabe stay back to work on the trial. But their prep is cut short when the Collins tracking software Sly and Walter had secretly been working on, the C.L.A.M, gives them a lead. The software is an elaborate one that is more or less illegal in some of what it does, but it helps them track any activity that can be related to Collins. The clue they get has Sylvester excited, as it might lead them directly to him when they find out a pawn shop has just bought very advanced radio equipment that only someone like Collins could have, and another clue leads them to believe Collins may be taking his grandmother to a retirement home that same day.

But after a wild goose chase around the city, they realize that Collins had been stringing them along. And worse of all is, by the end of the day, they realize that Collins had deposited a large amount of money in a bank account under Cabe’s name, making it look like the Homeland Security agent had taken a bribe to help Collins escape, making Cabe’s legal situation that much worse.

In the meantime, the others had arrived to test Happy’s new winch, hoping to sell it to Search and Rescue in New Mexico, but their client never shows. Instead, a small plane crashes nearby, and the four find themselves trying to save its passengers — a father and daughter.

While the father makes it out of the crash unscathed, the daughter suffers a broken leg. Happy and Toby stay with the daughter, Jessie, to fix her leg while Walter and Paige go with the father to help him find his son, who he says had jumped out of the plane with a parachute just before they crashed. However, it does not take long for them to realize that it is all a scam. The “son” is actually three bags of cash that the father and daughter crime team need to pay to a drug cartel. Unable to carry the bags alone, the father enlists Paige and Walter — at gunpoint — to assist him while Jessie also holds Toby and Happy hostage in the plane. For once there is no actual case for the team to solve beyond trying to survive and outsmart these two criminals, which offers a nice change of pace for the show. It is fun to watch how each couple uses all their skills and their superior intellect to outsmart their captors.

And while they are way smarter than them, this doesn’t mean that they don’t manage to find themselves in uncomfortable situations. Paige and Walter manage to escape by throwing themselves off a cliff, but that only leads them to be caught in a cave in. Luckily for them, Happy and Toby have also managed to outwit Jessie and, using the walkie talkie that fell with them off the cliff, they make contact. While Toby goes off to rescue their holed-up friends, Happy stays back to set up the next step of the plan.

I have to admit, that next step was surprisingly dark for a show like Scorpion. When Jessie gets locked in the car and it starts to roll off with no brakes toward the edge of the cliff, I was really shocked. A part of me knew that nothing would happen to her — that the show wouldn’t have these four killing a teenager — I still felt a little uneasy that the risk was even taken by them.

Finally back at the garage, Happy voices the concern that had been bothering her all day.  As if the pressures and anxieties of trying to get pregnant are not enough, Happy and Toby had been made more so by a comment from Walter about their pasts, both having dabbled in some illegal things. Happy is worried that their child will end up being a criminal because that would be ingrained in their DNA, and during their ordeal while held hostage, Happy had gotten to talk to Jessie about how she’d so easily joined her father in the criminal life.

Happy opens up to Toby about her fears, and what he tells her to ease her concerns is probably one of the most beautiful things ever said on this show and the most perfect testimony to this family and how close they all are and how strong they are together – and I hope it is foreshadowing what will happen in Cabe’s storyline. Toby tells her, “Sweetheart, it's nature vs. nurture. Jessie was nurtured by a sociopath. Our children will be nurtured by you and me... We're gonna be great. I mean, all parents do suck, sometimes. But when we do, we got Super-Mom Paige to watch out for us. And Walter's already reading up on early-stage neurological development. Sly's gonna give that kid a daily sanitizer dip. And Cabe will put his foot up our ass if we so much as miss a violin recital. If anything, we got to worry about them screwing up our kid. We're gonna be fine.”

Once again, the doc knocks it out of the park with his husbanding skills. Who thought when we first met him that Toby was going to end up being such an understanding and attentive husband? I am not going to lie, the way the writers are writing this marriage and this relationship can serve as a lesson to any writers.

Finally, as the events of the day — especially what Collins had put them through — take their toll on him, Cabe breaks down in the most emotional, most vulnerable and the most raw moment we have ever seen. He finally opens up, expressing everything he has been holding in — his anger and frustration — and it so painful to watch him like this. And yet what Sly sees is something positive. He tells Cabe that this is what he has to bring to court. That this kind of brutal honesty is what the judge needs to see.

All this is leading up to a huge emotional showdown with Collins, and while I have faith in this family and their ability to support each other, I must confess that I am very worried about Cabe.

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