SGRoA: Moonlight, S1 E14: Click

Third to last episode, Snowflakes! Very excited to move on to something different. I'm about 90% sold on doing GRIMM after this - branching out in my urban fantasy takes - but I am 100% open to suggestions all the time! (Obviously I'd prefer anything streaming, especially if it's available on one of the "big" services - Netflix, Hulu, Amazon. And obviously I pay for Paramount+, because Star Trek - hey, do y'all watch EVIL? I have been digging the crap out of that one....)

Anyway - let's get started!

Mick is ... street racing? with some girl in an Audi? Ooh, she's from a bunch of SFF stuff I've watched before, most notably FLASH FORWARD, which was so clever and so brutally cliffhangered. Sigh.

But of course, before we can get any context at all for what Mick is up to, we switch scenes to Beth and New Josh (what's his name again, Ben or something? fuck it, New Josh now!) having lunch at the lone restaurant this show seems to think exists in LA. They're just...chatting about work? Buzzwire's new editor has called a meeting about the site's "new direction" and Beth is trepidatious. New Josh compliments her stories.

Mick and OMG IT'S NARISSA FROM PICARD, can't belIEVE I forgot she was in that, wtf, Cate, get your shit together!

she's altered her ears for this little time-jaunt

Anyway, they manage to shake the big-ass black GMC SUV that's been ... chasing them? racing them? Again, zero context for any of this. Some dialogue: she's done this before.

New Josh wants Beth to help him process his trauma after being kidnapped and almost murdered by a plastic surgeon, but he says "get to know you" and "I can't talk about it with anyone else" and she never says "go to fucking therapy, my dude" because this is Moonlight. And before she can say anything else, Mick and Narissa and the Audi screech up to the curb, followed immediately by 2 GMC SUVs that disgorge an endless stream of ... paparazzi.

for a CRUMB of context, I am BEGGING this show

Mick gets out of the car and sees Beth, who's giving him a side-eye because she apparently can't stand Tierney, which is Narissa's actual name in the episode. She's too famous, I guess? Beth thinks it's vulgar, maybe? It's unclear *why*, just that Beth hates her. Anyway, Mick voiceovers about entering the world again, because he got a taste of being human and, I dunno, like, out of quarantine or something (that he certainly wasn't actually doing before). He says that Beth was right - he shouldn't let his vampirism define him. Mick is all about that vampire-first language, because of fucking course he is.

he carries his fangs in a little suitcase!

My guess? He's bodyguarding Tierney, but the writers fuckin' suck, so we had to get a lot of nonsense instead of just regular dialogue or visuals. I mean, he manhandles a photog, so yes, but also, we won't talk about it, so I hope you like assumptions. Also, Tierney is dressed super cheaply? Like, I don't usually notice how "expensive" someone's clothes look, a lot of clothes just look like clothes to me, but she looks straight out of Wal-Mart.

Anyway, she's eating lunch and the dude from Warehouse 13 shows up, saying he's a producer of her new movie, LUSITANIA. This episode has everybody!

Romulans and vampire cops and Secret Service agents who look for weird shit....

And yes, Mick is her new head of security. But instead of securing, he just makes eyes at Beth the whole time. So after lunch, they of course have to have a convo about whether or not they're dating, and the answer is yes, and then he's working again for a bit before going to see Josef in his still-bombed-out office. Rent somewhere else, you're a goddamn billionaire. Josef tells Mick to be careful hanging with famous humans, and that Tierney reminds him of Jean Harlow, and Mick should definitely bang her. Thanks for being disgusting as usual, Joe.

The new Buzzfeed editor - aka Kody Brown from TLC's scintillating SISTER WIVES, aka one of George's brothers on GREY'S ANATOMY - wants everyone to start intruding on people's privacy and chasing down tabloid stories. They're losing out to TMZ, for fuck's sake! And Beth has the inside scoop on Tierney's new boyfriend - Mick! To which Beth says, no fuckin' joke, "He's not her boyfriend, he's a private investigator." Girl. What? "He's not her boyfriend, he's type A negative." "He's not her boyfriend, he's neurotypical." "He's not her boyfriend, he's Digiorno!"

Y'all, we are only TEN MINUTES into this episode! Too much is happening! So

Many

Unnecessary

CUTS!

It's so awful, I might come back around to loving it, let's be honest. Hokay, so, Mick and Tierney are at the Queen Mary, which Mick calls the "Old Grey Ghost" ??, which he last saw when he was on it, going from NYC to Scotland during THE WAR. He's staring at it and monologuing when he's accosted by a pap he manhandled at the last place. Mick accuses him of stalking, dude laughs, you know what sort of weird, toxically masculine nonsense this scene is. Clearly the pap is our villain this episode - oR IS He?!?!?!?!? Typical Moonlight writers' room shenanigans are afoot, and I'm sure we'll have 2088437503428 other "suspects" for a vaguely described "crime" before this hour is up.

Tierney then gives Mick the night off, but points him at Beth, who I guess is... covering the party? trying to get close to Tierney like her editor told her? At any rate, she's supes bored and glad when Mick rescues her from a deadly dull convo with the film producers. Blah blah relationship talk, almost kiss, then Tierney is fighting with some dude who accuses her of "keeping secrets" and Mick is back on the case.

Tierney insists on going to her stateroom by herself, tho Mick offers an escort, and my money's on "ends up dead". Sure enough: Mick goes back to Beth in the bar, hears a weird noise, and then Tierney's in the water. Paps and civilians everywhere, but she was dead when she hit the water. Everyone's saying "drunk actress fell overboard", but then there wouldn't be a show, even if it only takes Mick like 5 seconds to make it all about him.

Mick figures out there's blood on an anchor in Tierney's room (like an antique thing, on display) and is on his way out to start investigating when New Josh shows up. The DA's office doesn't want the PD to screw up another high profile case, so they're overseeing. Mick tells New Josh about the anchor and he and Beth actually clear the scene.

Back at Buzzwire, new editor has a pic of Tierney in the water, got it from a Dean Foster (I'm guessing the pap we saw earlier, but probably not). He actually agrees to wait until they determine whether Tierney was murdered to run it.

Guillermo confirms that Tierney was dead before she hit the water, and the anchor is the likely weapon. We're just packing all the plot in here, are we? Wasted that first ten minutes, did we?

watched this twice over the weekend, cuz the air bnb only had cable

Mick runs away from a bunch of paps who think he's Tierney's boyfriend, and right into two vamp kids running as paps. This... is a choice. Mick asks the vamparazzi about Dean, who confirm that he's a stalker, send Mick his way, and tell Mick that no, they can't keep the other paps away, because Mick is the story now.

Jason tells Beth (over many, many more sentences than this) that the studio won't let him recast Tierney's role in his movie. Tierney's boyfriend tells Mick they were arguing about Tierney paying Dean to keep photos off the market. Tierney wouldn't tell him what kind of photos, though.

Someone hits Mick with their car; Dean now has photos of Mick being hit at speed and getting right back up. Calling it: Dean is a vamp, or knows about vamps, and is going to try to expose Mick.

if by "twist" you mean "has more signage than the entire state of Colorado", sure

Mick and Beth of course think they're close to figuring things out. But Jason is a dead-end: the film was insured and everyone gets their money back. The boyfriend is a wash, but did lead them back to Dean Foster. There's a weird digression about emo music and then an awkward bit about Beth staying on the couch, and I guess that's supposed to be character moments?

Marcia from the Brady Bunch saying "Sure, Jan"

Mick asked Logan (baby vamp computer guy) to look into Tierney's bank records. There's a check to Dean, $50k just like the boyfriend says, but also her biz manager is embezzling? So! Many! Suspects!

Beth brings the info about Foster to New Josh, who says they know, and Foster's stalked before. They haven't been able to find him to bring him in for questioning. Mick interviews the biz manager; the $20k checks he's been writing to himself every month are for Tierney's mother's long-term care, but she doesn't want the payments to be traceable. But it does turn out that Tierney had been shelling out big bucks for the Lusitania movie, and Jason shut the movie down - not the studio.

a chipmunk turning suddenly with dramatic sound effect

Beth receives an email with pics of Mick getting hit by the car. Foster calls her: he gets all the Buzzwire exclusives, or he goes public with Mick.

The only way the insurance for the movie kicked in is if it got canceled, and turned out, Jason spent all the money before production even started. He needed it shut down, and runs from Mick and Beth when they go to ask him about it. Mick gives us a voiceover about chasing people.

Mick scares Jason, Jason admits to the murder, paps get their photos, New Josh is pissed that they interfered. Beth asks Mick "what happens when a vampire is about to be exposed?" and he tells her they move on.

So Beth brings the problem to Josef, who says something gross about Greta Garbo. She basically asks Josef to kill the guy, and Josef basically says "sure". (This is actual subtext, not just assumptions. I'm so proud!)

And we end the episode with Mick and Beth on a real date, having dinner. Beth tells him she's quit Buzzwire, and the camera pulls back to reveal Foster still taking photos - only to be set upon not by Josef, but by the weird vamparazzi kids!

Oh, and one last scene: New Josh, sitting at his desk, watching Beth sign off from Buzzwire, looking down at his desk at... the photos of Mick surviving that crash.

Jesus, that was a long one! Only two more to go, kiddos, and I'll tell you what, I'll be shocked - SHOCKED! - if we get some closure on this paparazzi plot, but you never know! Tune in next week to see if everything gets dropped, or if someone actually knew how TV worked!