From its gruesome opening to its heartwarming ending, Rizzoli & Isles 5×07 was filled with twists and turns. Read on for our recap of “Boston Keltic”:
Don’t you just love when a show opens with the sound of someone breaking someone else’s fingers? Welcome to the first scene of Rizzoli & Isles 5×07. Moving swiftly on…
As is customary on a weekday morning, Jane’s at Maura’s house before work, eating toast in her kitchen because their relationship is totally platonic. Maura looks her up and down, and Jane defensively says she’s “not playing What Not to Wear at 8:30 in the morning.” Why is her outfit so important on today of all days? Jane’s finally meeting Maura’s new man, Jack, and – direct quote from Maura – “I want you to look as good for him as you do for me.” This is like meeting the parents, except it’s the “Wait, are you sure you two aren’t dating?” colleague instead.
Maura’s so nervous, she only puts on one earring. Jane tells her to calm down and avoid talking about work during their dinner. But the human body is fascinating, Maura protests. Not so much the insides, Jane responds. Instead, Jane recommends she talk about puppies, because everybody loves puppies. Maura brings up their intestinal tracts, and Jane firmly amends her suggestion to “The outsides, Maura. Everybody loves the outsides of puppies.”
Books and doodles
Anyway, this week’s victim is a rare book vendor named Brandon who appears to have been tortured to death. Upon examining the body, Maura determines each finger was broken approximately five minutes apart. Ouch. Back in Autopsy, she concludes he died from shock. I don’t blame him. Just then, a wild Korsak appears with bad news: The officer guarding the bookstore was attacked and the crime scene was compromised, so dinner has to wait.
According to Maura, Jack takes the news about dinner well. Also, the delay gives her more time to bone up on dog facts. (Get it? Bone.) Did you know you can cross poodles with other breeds of dogs to make them hypoallergenic? Thanks to Dr. Maura Isles, you do now.
Back to the case. A background check on the victim’s only employee, Ricky, reveals he has a checkered history with the law and was caught two weeks earlier trying to sell a rare print he cut out of a book. Ricky says he was trying to cover store expenses, which had mounted up since Brandon lost interest in the business and started spending more time at church.
The investigators surmise that whatever the intruders were after is locked in Brandon’s safe, but it ends up being empty. However, Jane notices an anomaly in the baseboard behind the safe and pulls it away to reveal a 19th-century book that contains a note to a priest. According to the priest, Brandon instructed him to seek out a professor at a local university and tell him the book was a riddle. Maura, of course, is familiar with this particular professor, and calls him “a superhero in the world of illuminated manuscripts,” much to Jane’s amusement.
To Jane’s horror, Maura takes the book apart, but it turns out it’s not a 19th century original after all – it’s a fake that isn’t worth anything, and Jane can’t figure out why he was killed over it. Maura cancels dinner with Jack again because her girlfriend is upset and that’s more important than her actual date.
A father’s love
AFIS matches the fingerprints Maura found on a trash can lid at the scene with a man named Donald Maxwell. Frankie brings him in, but he refuses to talk and requests legal representation. Surprise: He shares a lawyer with Maura’s now incarcerated Irish mob boss father, Paddy Doyle. When Jane pays Doyle a visit, he tells her Maxwell is an “errand boy,” which prompts Korsak and Frankie to tail him in the hope that he visits the house of whoever wanted Brandon dead.
In exchange for the information, Doyle asks Jane for a favor – he’s being transferred to a facility in California and wants to see Maura before he leaves. When Jane passes on his request to Maura, she says she thinks there are a few things Doyle wants to get off his chest, and the phrase clicks in Maura’s brain. She takes another look at the book and realizes the book itself is the riddle – it points toward the 19th century, when a technique called fore-edge painting was popular.
Sure enough, on the edges of the pages is a confession: Brandon was involved in a bombing in Dublin that killed two people. He was apparently planning on coming clean, and the book was his way of ensuring the truth would come out even if his co-conspirators got to him before he had the chance to come forward.
A new chapter
The case in Rizzoli & Isles 5×07 centered on books, and ironically enough, the side plot involves Jane’s mother Angela beginning a new chapter in her life. She breaks up with Lieutenant Cavanaugh (who knew they were still dating?), quits her job and tries – and fails at – yoga. Jane’s nervous about all the changes, but Angela says she needs to get to know who she is without a man in her life, and the way to do that is to start over.
No sooner does she exit, Maura enters. Jane says she’s ready for dinner with Jack, but it turns out Maura canceled. Again. There’s something she has to do. Declare her love for Jane and stop trying to pretend she’s into this guy? Nope, go visit her father in jail – with Jane by her side, of course.
What did you think of Rizzoli & Isles 5×07?
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