Tru Calling/Recap/S1/E03 Brother's Keeper
Tru Calling Season 1, Episode 3: Brother's Keeper
Synopsis: Tru's brother may have killed his girlfriend's ex-husband, and it's up to Tru to make sure it doesn't happen again.
Analysis of the episode is below the recap. Recap by Korval.
Recap
We open with a hallway shot of a perpetually dark morgue hallway. Enter Tru, walking down the hallway. Spooky voices start coming seemingly out of nowhere. She looks around, faces one of the doors, and with great trepidation, starts walking to it. The highly inappropriate music that gets played when Tru time-jumps starts just as she opens the door to reveal...
Davis, hanging a lightbulb. They use lights in this morgue?
He asks Tru to hand him a bulb. While they're changing the light, Tru asks whether he likes working in the Morgue, whether the morgue gets to him. He says he doesn't mind. He then says that people are where they are for a reason, and they should just accept it.
Cut to Harrison getting out of his car in front of a strange house. He breaks the door open with his shoulder. A very loud song is playing when he gets in. He draws a gun and starts roaming the house, seemingly looking for something. As he gets to a brighter area, a guy with a crowbar jumps out from behind him and knocks the gun away.
The too of them fight for a bit, Harrison gets the upper hand, pick up his gun, and points it at the guy who then stops. We get a closeup on Harrison's face as he points the gun and...
Cut to the title sequence. Figures.
After the title sequence, we cut back to Harrison holding the guy at gunpoint. They look at each other for a bit, then we have a cut to outside the house where a gunshot is heard. Fade out.
A text box comes up informing us that we're now going back 14 hours. And we didn't even get a dead body this time ;) So, cut to:
Tru in bed, with her phone going off. It's Harrison, also in bed (not hers), who appologises for waking her up. He's calling to confirm brunch plans they have for today. Harrison hangs up as his cell phone's battery is low.
He rolls over and there's a woman in his bed with him. Apparently, their brunch plans are so he can introduce Tru to his new girlfriend. Harrison goes on about how Tru is kinda hard on the women he dates. She playfully asks about these "others" he's brought to Tru. He deftly parries with "None that matters."
They banter around for a bit. Pretty well written and acted overall. As she's getting up (naked back shot), Harrison notices something on her back and asks about it. She claims that she "slipped" while she was working out. Harrison intimates that it might be something else, but she cuts him off before he can fully explain, saying that she's clumsy.
Cut to brunch at Tru's. The girl (who's name has unfortunately not yet been mentioned) is in the middle of explaining how they met. They've apparently been dating for 3 weeks now.
Cut to Tru and Lindsay talking about Harrison and his girl. Tru says that Harrison's in love. Lindsay points out that it hasn't been that long, and Tru counters saying that he moves fast. Lindsay gets a bit crotchety here, saying that people in love act superior because they "found someone who will actually put up with them." Wow, bitter much? Meredith may be a callous bitch, but she doesn't hate people just because they're happy.
Tru segues this line into a question on Lindsay's current romantic liason with a man named James. Linday says that it's going well, and it's the third date, which apparently means that the "third date rule" is in effect. For those not in the know, the "third date rule" means that if you don't have sex by the third date, the relationship is going nowhere and should be dropped. So, Yeah.
Lindsay calls it one of the great inventions of our time. Um, if you say so, lady. Man, where is Meredith when you need her? Tru asks if she's going to sleep with him, to which Lindsay sums up the third date rule as "fish or cut bait." Wow, Lindsay's wussification back in Episode 2 (when she said that Tru should have embarrassed her boyfriend when she caught him cheating one day, and the next when Tru took her advice told her that she couldn't have done it) was one thing, but she's really not sounding like an altogether pleasant person to be around.
Lindsay asks if Tru believes in the 3rd date rule, but Tru is wisely non-committal, saying that she believes in Lindsay's personal judgment.
Having had about enough of Lindsay as human beings can tolerate, we mercifully cut to Tru and Harrison in a bar. She tells Harrison that she liked his girlfriend, who finally gets a name (Sara). He's trying to dig deeper, trying to figure out how serious she is about it, but she says that Sara's a keeper.
This segues into them talking about Harrison's previous liaisons, which apparently included the "stripper years". He goes back to his new girlfriend, saying how being with her makes him feel better.
Meanwhile a random waiter drops a tray of dishes. Back at the conversation, Harrison goes into Sara's ex-husband. That's right, Sara's been married and divorced. Harrison suggests that the Ex isn't a nice guy.
He drones on about Sara a bit more, when they are interrupted by some drunk bar patron who feels the need to yell out that he's in love with the woman he's with. Harrison uses this interruption to turn the conversation into finding someone for Tru.
Before she can find a way out of that, Harrison's cell phone goes off. It's apparently Sara (we only get his end of it), and Harrison's expression tells us that Sara's in trouble. He says he'll be right there, and leaves.
Cut to Lindsay on the phone with Tru. She starts whining about the bad sex she had with James, saying that it was awkward and fast. No shit, Sherlock. Apparently afterwords, he made an excuse and left, which led to her feasting on cookie dough, thus adding weight gain to her list of things that went wrong that night.
However, Lindsay has an epiphany. She has decided that the 3rd date rule is a male invention designed to get sex. Um, OK. Not quite the Aesop I was hoping for, but it'll help create the appropriate behavior, so it'll do.
Tru, btw, is at work apparently, as Gardez comes in with a corpse. Gardez starts running down the pertinent information. The body was apparently found at his ex-wife's house. Gunshot wound to the chest.
Tru starts fishing through his wallet, looking for info. The guy's name is Andrew Webb. While in his wallet, she finds a picture of him and Sara embracing. DUN DUN DUNNNN!!!!!!
She calls Harrison's cell phone several times, but gets voice mail each time. Gardez is too busy watching Jeopardy, seemingly very impressed with the knowledge of the contestants. Tru gets a call, not from Harrison but from Meredith.
She tries to get Meredith off the phone, as she wants to keep the line clear for Harrison, but it turns out she's at the scene of the crime, watching Harrison being escorted into custody. She's a lawyer, so "naturally" she'd be handling family legal matters. Harrison is being accused of murdering Andrew.
As Tru starts saying that Harrison couldn't have done it, Meredith suddenly starts spewing facts that nobody could possibly know yet. She says that his prints were found on the gun and his blood was in the house. Damn, CSI isn't that fast with turnaround time on processing a crime scene. Anyway, Meredith has to go with Harrison, so she hangs up.
Tru asks Gardez to cover for her as she starts to go to the police station. As she's about to leave, she stops suddenly. Cut to the Crypt, as Tru slowly enters.
So, the woman who has done the whole "dead body talks and goes back in time thing" twice (at least) only now realizes that, hey, there's a dead body here and Harrison could really use a do-over on this day.
Anyway, the inappropriate, entirely unscary music comes back as she opens the door holding Andrew. She looks at him, and starts talking to him, telling him that now's the time to ask for her help. He says nothing. Dejected, she starts pushing him back in, when he suddenly turns and says "Help me!" Nice fakeout.
Cut to Tru waking up again, her phone ringing. It's Harrison, but this time Tru starts to tell him about everything. Harrison's dying cell phone however cuts her off before she can make a fool out of herself.
Cut to the stupidest scene in the entire 27 episode run of the series. No, really, this is it. This is the dumbest scene ever. It's Tru, back in the Morgue, verifying that the body isn't there. It was over-the-top in the pilot, when she already had real, hard fact that she had gone back in time. But here? After she's done it twice before? It's patently ridiculous.
Anyway, Davis finds her there. He, in a call back to their last conversation, points out that she's there a lot for someone who doesn't seem to like it there. He asks if she belongs there, to which she says she'll have an answer in twelve hours.
Cut to Tru on the phone with Meredith. Meredith isn't exactly surprised about Harrison being in trouble, since that's his default state. Tru insists that today is different and obliquely asks if Harrison could kill someone. Meredith reacts incredulously at first, hems and haws for awhile, then admits that yes, she believes Harrison could kill someone. Tru stops in the middle of the sidewalk at that revelation.
Tru doesn't buy it, but instead asks Meredith to make herself available as Tru will need her. Meredith reluctantly agrees.
Cut to Tru arriving at her apartment, with Harrison and Sara already there. Apparently she's late for her own brunch, but Harrison had the spare key to her apartment. She goes to him and hugs him, which he seems kinda weirded out about, since nothing special has happened.
Over his shoulder, she sees Sara standing in the background, and Tru gets this incredible look of suspicion and near-hatred on her face.
After extracting himself from her embrace, Harrison introduces Sara, who compliments Tru on the apartment. Tru ignores this, asking to speak to Harrison alone. Harrison says that anything she can say to him can be said in front of Sara. Oh, this won't be good.
Tru starts by saying that she ran into Andrew yesterday, which is ironically half-true. Harrison then decides that now would be a good time to have a word in private.
Harrison starts chewing her out about bringing up the topic of former relationships, but Tru isn't having any of it. She says that he needs to stay away from Sara today, which Harrison apparently reads as "forever". He starts in about how she's always hard on the girls he brings around, but Tru just wants him to stay away from her for just today. She asks him to do this for her, just for today.
Cut to Tru at the dock, taking pictures of a boat. Andrew lives at the harbor, which explains why he stepped out of the boat. He's not particularly happy of someone taking pictures of his home. She lies, saying that she's taking pictures for a book about the harbor. He invites her in to see the inside.
Once inside, he starts putting moves on her. Tru points out a picture of him with a woman, who he says is Sara. Tru finds out that Andrew and Sara aren't divorced at all, just separated. DUN DUN DUNNNNN!!!!!
Cut to Lindsay calling Tru, asking where she is. In her rush to save Harrison, she forgot about her lunch with Lindsay. Before hanging up, Tru delivers Lindsay's Aesop about the 3rd date rule: invented by men for sex. Again, completely missing the crucial fact that it was Lindsay who invoked the rule in the first place. But, with the Aesop delivered, and Lindsay looking rather perplexed by the comment, Tru moves on.
Cut to Tru and Sara in, apparently, Sara's place. Sara isn't terribly happy about Tru investigating her life, but Tru's brother is very important to her. Sara says that not having divorce papers doesn't mean that they're married. When Tru asks if someone might want to hurt him, she starts in on a tale of young marriage and domestic abuse.
After Sara left him, she found that Andrew wouldn't divorce him. He also recently sent her pictures of her with Harrison. She apologizes for not telling Harrison that she's technically still married, justifying it by not wanting to scare him off. Tru says that he doesn't scare easily, and Sara responds that that's one of the reasons she loves him.
Cut to Tru and Harrison having an argument. Sara apparently called Harrison, thinking that Tru hates her. She says that he can only trust that she knows what she's doing. He then throws her apparent hypocracy about dating her professor at her, comparing it to him dating a separated woman. She tries to explain that it's not about that, but he points out that Sara's afraid to file for divorce.
Harrison then goes into attack mode, saying that Tru is jealous that he's happy and having a better life than him. No, Harrison, you're talking to Tru, not Lindsay. He twists the knife a little deeper, saying that Tru's been more selfish than Meredith. She tries to blow off the attack, but she looks hurt anyway. On that note, Harrison leaves. Tru looks like she's both holding back tears and wondering why she's bothering to try to save him to begin with.
Cut back to the harbor, where Tru breaks into Andrew's boat. It's not locked, so I guess he doesn't care about basic security. She finds a rather large camera, but he walks in on her. He immediately assumes the previous line about a book was a lie, instead believing that she's an investigator from Sara. He's also calling the police on his cell phone.
Tru dips back into the crazy well when she tells him that she wants to help him live to see the next day. Naturally, he takes this as a threat; I don't know how Tru expected him to see it as anything else. Hostilities opened, Tru decides to ask why he isn't granting Sara a divorce. He says that Sara married him for his money and if they divorce, she gets half of his money. But if they stay married, she gets what he gives her.
He realizes, from things Tru has said, that Sara's making him out to be the villain. He even guesses that she would say that he beat her, which is emphatically denies. Then he "asks her to leave".
Cut to Andrew going to Sara's place. He knocked on the door, asking for her, but Sara doesn't answer.
Cut to Sara in tears with Harrison. She said that he came to the house, out of control. He didn't attack her, but he threatened her. He apparently threatened her because of Harrison, because she loves him. She suggests that they shouldn't be together right now, but then she realizes that that'd just be giving him what he wants. She says that she's helpless against him.
Harrison tells her that she shouldn't be helpless. She takes this to mean that she should take self-defense courses or buy a gun, which Harrison points out would keep her from being helpless. He says that he can get her a gun this very day, and he asks her to trust him to help her.
Cut to Meredith and Tru listening to a 911 tape of Sara's, calling about Andrew beating her. When the police arrived, they issued a warrant, but she dropped the charges the next day. Meredith attributes this to battered woman's syndrome.
Cut to Harrison and Sara, with a random guy selling guns out of the back of his SUV. They eventually decide on a 9mm handgun, one very much like the one Harrison was using in the beginning. Suddenly, Sara starts chickening out, making various excuses to not get one. He suggests that he keep it for her, that he can call him if she needs it. And as we get a shot of the gun, we see it's the one Harrison was using in the intro sequence. DUN DUN DUNNNNN!!!!!
Cut to Tru on the street, calling someone. All we here of this conversation is, "I know you don't want to talk to me, but I need you to listen." Um, dun dun dunnn?
Cut to the bar. Tru's waiting for Harrison, who quickly arrives. Tru apologizes for her treatment of Sara, saying that she knows Andrew's a bad guy and so forth. However, she still says that he's in danger, which makes him start to leave. As she tries to stop him, she brushes aside some clothing to reveal the fact that he's carrying a gun, "Gangsta style" in his pants.
She asks him about it, remembering the conversation she had with Meredith about him being able to kill someone. She believes he committed the murder before, so she decides that she has to lay it all on the table.
She tells him that he is going to kill Andrew, which he finds rather odd. I don't know why, as the gun was purchased specifically to deal with Andrew. Anyway, she explains everything that's happened. That dead bodies ask for her help, the day restarts, and she saves them. She points out the things from previous episodes that she predicted. Then she points out the waiter, saying he'll drop his tray, which he does. She points out the drunk guy from before, predicting his outburst correctly.
Harrison isn't buying it, thinking it's some kind of con. She says that Sara's about to call him, in trouble, needing his help, and he'll go and kill Andrew.
As Harrison is saying how crazy it sounds, his phone rings. He looks at it. When he picks it up, it's Sara. She's in trouble.
Cut to outside the bar, where Tru is trying to intercept Harrison. He's adamant about helping her, saying that Andrew deserves what he gets. Tru points out the consequences of killing him. He says that he doesn't want to be like their father, helpless when the woman he loves was murdered. Tru tells her not to make it about saving their mother.
Tru then makes a heartfelt plea to him not to go. She says that she lost everyone she ever loved, one way or another. Her mother killed, her father neglected and ignored her, Meredith to her ambition and drugs. She says she can't lose him too. Harrison promises her that she won't lose him, that she won't be alone, but he still goes to Sara's. Leaving Tru alone on the street.
Cut to Meredith calling Tru. Apparently, at the time that Sara made her call to 911, Andrew was getting a speeding ticket... in California. We don't know where Tru Calling takes place, but the city has a very east-coast vibe to it. So apparently Andrew didn't beat Sara, which means that Sara made it up.
Tru realizes that it's some kind of setup, that Sara's trying to get Harrison to kill Andrew so that she can get all of his money.
Cut to Sara's place. Harrison's outside, but the door's locked. Andrew's there too; apparently, Sara called him because the security system was having some kind of glitch. Oh, and the music from the intro is not just regular TV show music, but apparently is what Sara is playing on the stereo. Which neatly disguises Harrison's knocking on the door.
But the security system goes off when Harrison breaks in. Andrew tells Sara to call the police, which she does not do, since they would interfere with her little gambit she's running. He goes to investigate, picking up a crowbar along the way.
And so we basically have a replay of the intro, only with a few scenes from Andrew's perspective thrown in too. They fight, Harrison gets the upper hand, picks up his gun, and points it at Andrew. Sara runs in, asking him to kill Andrew or Andrew will kill the both of them. After a long moment, Harrison decides...
not to kill him. She calls him a coward, which he retorts by saying that he's not a killer. So she takes the gun from him and shoots him herself. After which, she says, "You are now."
She then coldly details to him the story she's going to provide the police, about how she wrestled the gun away from him after he shot her husband. On the phone, she's able to provide a very convincing traumatized voice. But then again, her first 911 call showed that.
As Sara's going into her spiel, Harrison looking on in absolute shock, Andrew stands up [!]. Then Tru walks in with the gun that Sara put down. Um, Tru, don't tamper with evidence in a crime scene. Sara puts the phone down and asks for an explanation. Apparently, that phone call Tru made that we got like 2 seconds of was to Andrew, asking him to wear a bullet-proof vest. Which he did, thus explaining the whole "not dead" thing.
Then Sara actually tries to appeal to Harrison. Hey, weren't you stomping his heart into mush 1 minute ago. Harrison just tells her bye and leaves.
Cut to Sara being arrested. Harrison says that he doesn't buy her powers, but he wonders whether he killed Andrew the first time. Tru says "probably." Harrison then starts to realize the profit potential in Tru's abilities. Tru simply laughs it off, saying that she already profited from it.
Time to tie up the loose ends. Cut to Tru going to the Morgue and talking to Lindsay. Apparently, Lindsay and James talked for a while, but Lindsay found that too boring and just boffed him anyway. Only this time it seemed to go OK, so she's going out with him again. Wait, he was dull and boring, but you had nice sex, so you're going to go out with him some more? Um, OK?
Tru seems to be confused by this, but accepts it and hangs up. She runs into Davis, whom she tells she does belong there, thus tidying up that thread.
Analysis
This is, to me, one of the best episodes of the series. And while it certainly has the worst Tru Calling scene ever, it also has one of the best: the scene where Tru pleads with Harrison not to go to Sara's. Great acting by all involved, and one of Eliza's best performances ever. The scene with Harrison and Tru arguing in her apartment was also quite good. The only thing I would fault this episode for is the part at the end, where Harrison asks Tru if she thinks he killed Andrew before, and she says "probably". It just felt wrong for her to go that far at that point, especially seeing how easily Sara could just take the gun and pull the trigger herself.
Also, I would like to point out Sara as an example of crossing the Moral Event Horizon. She's the kind of evil that makes most Disney villains envious. She's this kind of personal evil that can look people in the face, play with their hearts, lie to them for their own gain, and then stomp their heart into the ground and grind their heels on them. It just goes to show that you don't have to be an Omnicidal Maniac to cross the Moral Event Horizon.
This episode is the kind of thing you need to watch twice, just so you can see the subtle genius of a true Chessmaster at work. The way Sara guided Harrison to buy a gun: she mentioned the gun first, but lets him pick up on it and thus lead her where she wanted to go. She then made him keep it, which a rational person would realize would make no sense (guns are for immediate protection. If you need a phone, and can wait for someone to arrive, it isn't immediate). But Harrison was in love and thus not thinking rationally, which she used for all it was worth.
Lastly, any analysis of this episode would not be complete without an evaluation of Lindsay. Something very interesting happened to her this episode. On Day 1, she screwed up and learned a valuable lesson. However on Day 2, Tru attempted to save Lindsay from her screwup, this preventing the learning of the valuable lesson. That's actually going to be a subtle running thing for much of the season. Tru using her abilities to interfere with Lindsay's life will almost always lead to Lindsay being worse off than before. In many ways, Tru's half-assed attempts to save those closest to her have negative repercussions (Harrison being a notable exception).