Line #69 Series/TheCloser


1	%%
2	%%Image kept on page per Image Pickin' thread: https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=1651066610079274300
3	%%Please don't change or remove without starting a new thread.
4	%%
5	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/closer01.jpg]]
6
7	->''"People may be'' created ''equal, but they do not'' die ''that way."''
8	-->-- '''Deputy Chief Brenda Leigh Johnson'''
9
10	''The Closer'' was a 2005–12 crime drama series on Creator/{{TNT}}, starring Creator/KyraSedgwick in an MediaNotes/{{Emmy\|Award}}- and UsefulNotes/{{Golden Globe\|Award}}- winning performance as Brenda Leigh Johnson, the former deputy chief of the Atlanta Police Department (and a former CIA interrogator), who transfers to Los Angeles, where heads up a special LAPD unit that solves high-profile murder cases (and "closes" them by obtaining confessions), under the supervision of Will Pope (Creator/JKSimmons), an ex-lover of hers.
11
12	Largely self-contained with several character-driven story arcs (most notably dealing with Brenda's romance with and eventual marriage to an FBI agent, among others), the series began with and maintained considerable popularity and helped TNT, after several high profile failures, successfully launch its own programming block of shows on the network.
13
14	The series aired every summer beginning in 2005. The last season aired in 2012, giving the show a seven-year run. It was [[AfterShow followed by]] ''Series/MajorCrimes'', starring Creator/MaryMcDonnell as Sharon Raydor. Most of ''The Closer'''s main cast returned for ''Major Crimes'', which took over its parent show's 9 pm timeslot.
15
16	This series has a [[Characters/TheCloser character sheet]].
17
18	For the short-lived Creator/TomSelleck sitcom, see ''Series/TheCloser1998''. Not to be confused with the 2004 film ''Film/{{Closer}}''.
19
20	----
21	!!This series provides examples of:
22
23	* AbortedArc: Brenda's pursuit of a rapist who used his power as an attorney to stay out of jail was seemingly dropped after a few episodes. [[spoiler: {{Subverted}} [[ContinuityNod when he's mentioned in Peter Goldman's list of cases where Brenda has allegedly violated suspects' civil rights at the end of the Season 7 summer finale]] before eventually being brought back toward the end of the series. He finally gets caught (and shot) in the finale, albeit non-fatally. A running subplot through ''Series/MajorCrimes'' is the preparations for his trial and he proves to be a recurring threat until that series' finale where he's finally put down for good.]]
24	** PlayedStraight with [[RichBitch Dennis]] [[KarmaHoudini Dutton]], who appears for two episodes before being completely forgotten. To wit, he first appears as a suspect in "The Butler Did It" for killing both his step-mother and later the family's butler before being cleared. He then returns in Season 2's "Aftertaste", where again he is a suspect in a murder before, again, being cleared; both times it's brought up that he was suspected of murdering his ex-girlfriend and escaped prosecution [[note]] It's implied and more or less confirmed he ''did'' kill her.[[/note]] He's also implied to be much smarter than anyone gives him credit for and shows an interest in Brenda, hinting that they would clash again and Brenda would nail him finally. [[WhateverHappenedToTheMouse He never appears again]].
25	* AmazinglyEmbarrassingParents: Johnson's. Let's just say "{{Culture Clash}}" and leave it at that.
26	* UsefulNotes/AmericanAccents: Particularly Johnson's very "Dixie" sound.
27	* AmoralAttorney: Philip Stroh [[spoiler: who turns out to be the serial rapist-murderer responsible for several deaths throughout the latter seasons.]]
28	** Peter Goldman, who's already an [[TheUnfettered unfettered]] [[JerkassHasAPoint jerk with a point]] when it comes to Brenda, crosses the line into this and {{Hypocrite}} territory when [[spoiler:he pays off Ann Mason to become TheMole by getting close to Gabriel, who he said was a dirty cop.]]
29	* AndADietCoke: An obese victim in the episode "Junk in The Trunk" had a last meal that consists of four triple burgers with extra cheese, six orders of fries, and a diet Coke.
30	* AndZoidberg: (Possibly) Inverted
31	--> '''Brenda:''' I was promised a crew of elite detectives, and what Captain Taylor here has given me is a bunch of junior varsity wannabes and Provenza.
32	* AngerBornOfWorry: In "Help Wanted", right after he kills a corrupt ICE agent who was in a standoff with (and about to shoot) Brenda, Fritz freaks out and yells at her to never do that again.
33	* ArtisticLicenseLaw:
34	** Brenda's interrogations often may violate the Sixth Amendment right to counsel. Once a suspect asks for a lawyer, the interrogation must stop unless the suspect initiates further conversation. Otherwise the entire interrogation may be tossed.
35	** Exaggerated in "Cherry Bomb" where Brenda acts as a minor suspect's lawyer in a date rape case to get him to rat on his buddy (who committed the rape and whose father is an L.A. County Sheriff's Commander) and uses his statement to locate another victim who is willing to testify. Whether "Fruit of the Poisonous Tree" was violated is questionable, since Brenda didn't use the suspect's statement against him or the rapist, but impersonating an attorney is still a felony; doing so by a law enforcement officer is official misconduct and could have gotten the case thrown out but no one calls her out on this.
36	** Played with in "Identity Theft". Brenda gets the confession, but Deputy District Attorney Hobbs panics because the suspect wasn't read their rights. Taylor and Provenza correctly point out that Brenda ''never actually asked a question,'' using only statements and a mockup of the crime scene to get the confession.
37	** Ultimately deconstructed since as of the seventh season (especially the finale) all of Brenda's enormous law mistakes [[SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome come back to bite her]].
38	* AsianAndNerdy: Lt. Tao. ''Dear God'', Lt. Tao. If he and [[Series/{{Mythbusters}} Grant Imahara]] stepped into a room, that room would explode. Or turn into a giant robot. Whatever. And that's before we learned in ''Series/MajorCrimes'' that Tao attended med school for a while.
39	* AssholeVictim: Seen in "Problem Child", among others.
40	** To be specific about the above, the victim in the episode was an adopted Russian [[EnfantTerrible 13-year-old sociopath]] in the making who terrorized everyone around him, including his sister, his only friend, and all of his neighbors, and got away with it since his adoptive parents refused to punish him due to his poor childhood in Russia, leaving Brenda with no shortage of [[RedHerring suspects]]. [[spoiler: He meets his end when his foster father, having overheard him plotting to rape and murder his sister and learned that he'd run over the neighbor's dog in cold blood, finally took matters into his own hands and beat the boy to death with a hammer.]]
41	** In "Tapped Out", the victim's total unlikability leads to a plea deal (Brenda says DDA Garnett couldn't get through three minutes of the victim's TV show) and avoids a trial -- which would have exposed Pope, Provenza and Flynn getting fooled by and handing evidence to a police impersonator.
42	** The victims in "Heart Attack" were all gang members who raped a 12-year old girl. Their killer is a surgeon who kills them and steals their organs to perform transplants.
43	* AttemptedRape: In Season 1's "Fantasy Date", Brenda goes alone at night to check something at a crime scene. She is attacked and nearly raped before she manages to draw her gun and force the would-be rapist to back off. Turns out he was responding to a sex ad and thought Brenda was playacting when she resisted.
44	* BackhandedApology: Brenda turns this into a TheReasonYouSuckSpeech towards the FBI, District Attorney's office, and Robbery-Homicide Division in the Season 1 finale.
45	** Pope gives one to a VictimOfTheWeek's abusive husband ''after he's been cleared.''
46	* BathroomBreakout: Happens to Provenza and Flynn in "Layover", when they allow two stewardesses they are arresting to use the bathroom before taking them down to the station. To add insult to injury, the stewardesses then steal Provenza's car.
47	* BavarianFireDrill: The gambit of [[spoiler:"Detective" [[ComicStrip/DickTracy Richard Tracy]]]] in "Tapped Out".
48	* BelligerentSexualTension: So gloriously averted. Fritz and Brenda's relationship begins with ''liking each other and enjoying each others' company.'' It's a shocking concept for television, no? Played straight with Gabriel and Daniels, however.
49	* BerserkButton: Sitting on Provenza's desk is a ''bad'' idea.
50	** Fritz is in AA. Disrespecting that, or trying to hand him "special" brownies, is liable to be hazardous to your health. (Keep in mind that he's an ''FBI agent''. Literally offering drugs to one regardless of their past sobriety would make most people TooDumbToLive.)
51	** See Sharon Raydor. See Sharon Raydor get played. See Sharon Raydor team up with Brenda Johnson and take the bitch down. See the birth of a dynamic duo that will one day undoubtedly rule the LAPD.
52	** Probably not wise to screw over Brenda. Her squad is... protective... of her.
53	** Crimes against children are a special kind of evil to Major Crimes, even though half of the team [[note]]Johnson, Gabriel, Sanchez, and Daniels [[/note]] don't have kids. Pope and Tao are the only ones with minor children (Provenza and Flynn have adult children, though Provenza also has grandkids.)
54	** Brenda's particularly sensitive to cases involving sexual assault or domestic abuse. And she has no patience for anyone who abuses the elderly or sick, as a crooked nursing home manager and a cancer drug salesman find out.
55	* BolivianArmyEnding: The end of "War Zone," with the suspect facing the Bolivian Army of his neighborhood.
56	* BoomHeadshot: Fritz gives this to a corrupt ICE agent in "Help Wanted", while he's in a MexicanStandoff with Brenda and her division. The moment his gun points at Brenda, Fritz takes him down.
57	* BookEnds:
58	** In the pilot, all the members of the newly-formed Priority Homicide squad turn in requests to be transferred to other departments because of their overly demanding new boss. Chief Johnson demonstrates her displeasure by dropping each form one by one into a trash can while giving each of her subordinates an assignment. In the last episode of the first season, when [[spoiler:an anonymous complaint puts Johnson's job at risk]], an almost identical scene occurs, but with [[spoiler:the team's letters of resignation, effective immediately upon Johnson's termination,]] being discarded instead.
59	** Also happens in season 3. The opening credits of the season premiere are interspersed with crime scene footage from Buzz's new camera. The same technique is used later, in part one of the next-to-last episode.
60	** [[spoiler:Used for ''the series itself''. We are introduced to Brenda Leigh Johnson standing over a dead body, holding a mask to her face and saying sarcastically, "It looks like love." As television says goodbye to Brenda Leigh seven years later, she ends the series finale holding a new handbag full of her favorite snack as a gift from her team. Tears in her eyes, she says with utter sincerity, "It looks like love." End show. [[TearJerker Cue blubbering]].]]
61	* BluffingTheMurderer: Practically OnceAnEpisode.
62	* [[BrattyTeenageDaughter Bratty Teenage Niece]]: Brenda's niece, Charlie. Emphasis on "bratty".
63	* BreakoutCharacter: Captain Sharon Raydor (Creator/MaryMcDonnell) started out as a walk-on role in 2009. In 2012, Sharon Raydor took over as the head of the Major Case Squad when Sedgwick (and Brenda) left the show and ''The Closer'' [[AfterShow became]] ''Series/MajorCrimes''. Apparently Mary [=McDonnell=] is just that good.
64	* BritishBrevity: While obviously not British, each season consists of only 15 episodes. [[note]] Except for the final season, which had a more standard-length 21. [[/note]] This can be attributed to it being a summer show produced by TNT.
65	* BunnyEarsLawyer: Johnson is extremely successful at work, but her personal life...
66	--> '''Pope:''' I'm sorry. She sometimes forgets there are other people. In the world.
67	* CallBack: All of Season 7 is one for Brenda, as every civil rights violation she's committed over the course of the series comes back down on her in a class-action lawsuit. Goldman even names the victims.
68	** A more specific one occurs in Season 5's "The Life". When gang members start turning up dead after a 12-year-old boy is killed, Brenda learns that the gangsters were gang-raping a girl over multiple days. When the squad starts brainstorming connections to the rape victim, Sanchez says "How about a brother?" (Two episodes earlier, in "Maternal Instincts", [[spoiler: a vengeful brother fatally shot his sister's boyfriend, who he believed had raped her.]] And about a season before that in "Sudden Death", [[spoiler:Sanchez's own brother was gunned down by the teen brother of a known gang member]]). This rape victim doesn't have a brother... but the slain 12-year-old ''did'', which leads to a break in the case.
69	* CatchPhrase: Johnson's distinctive "Thank yeeeww".
70	** The emphasis she puts on the "so" in "Thank you so much" is generally a clue as to how sincere she is about it.
71	** Also, "Uurrghh, ''that woman!''" whenever she shares an episode with Raydor.
72	** "Oh, for heaven's sakes!"
73	* ChekhovsGun: At least half the episodes have some seemingly irrelevant detail that ends up becoming the final lynchpin Brenda needs to close a case...
74	* ChekhovsGunman: ...and about half of these have a person of interest or the lead suspects themselves revealing said detail under interrogation, Miranda warnings and the Fifth Amendment be damned.
75	* ChristmasEpisode: Season 3's "Next of Kin", Season 6's "Living Proof", and Season 7's "You Have The Right to Remain Jolly".
76	* CloudCuckooLander: Fritz's sister, Claire. Played by Creator/AmySedaris.
77	** Dr. Terrence also qualifies.
78	* CollapsedMidSpeech: [[spoiler: Chief Delk collapses during a speech at the end of "Unknown Trouble". In the next episode, we find out he died of an aneurysm.]]
79	* ColorCodedForYourConvenience: As far as regards to Brenda. Characters who are helping her will wear colors that match or complement her clothes. A prime example is in season one, where she and Captain Taylor collaborate on an operation after several episodes of rivalry. There is a shot of [[TeamPowerWalk hem walking in beautiful matching blue]].
80	** Also especially prominent in Season 7's "Silent Partner". Brenda wears a blue blazer with a dark purple scarf while Sharon Raydor, who has increasingly had Brenda's back in Season 7, wears a lavender blazer with a blue shirt.
81	* ConflictingLoyalty: The entire squad is torn between Taylor and Johnson during Season One. Poor Gabriel tends to be the lightning rod for this particular clash, however. Johnson even sympathetically acknowledges this in a season one episode where he was especially torn. Naturally, all their loyalties eventually switch to Brenda.
82	* ConsultingAConvictedKiller: Brenda ends up having to do this with Bill Croelick in the Season 4 premiere.
83	* TheCoroner: Dr. Crippen, followed by [[StraightGay Dr. Morales]].
84	* CrammingTheCoffin: In "Saving Face", the funeral of a former police colleague of Flynn and Provenza takes an unexpected turn when the casket is dropped, revealing not only their friend's body, but that of a nude, blonde woman.
85	* CrazyCatLady: Brenda lives in fear of turning into one of these and, after her cat ([[YourTomcatIsPregnant who she thought was male]]) has kittens, she wonders how she became one of those single women with too many cats.
86	* CuteKitten: After Brenda's cat dies, her husband gets a new kitten, Joel. Joel's presence provides much needed "cute relief" from the horrific events of the episode's murder case.
87	** There's also the episode where Brenda and Fritz decide to stay in Mexico for a vacation after closing a case there. Brenda gets Sgt. Gabriel to look after a litter of kittens at her house. Getting a bunch of kittens to behave the way he wants goes about as well as you'd expect.
88	---> "That is ''not'' a litterbox!"
89	* CutenessProximity: Combined with CuteKitten. One Season 6 episode had Major Crimes working from Brenda's dining room, since Pope had taken over their office for a major operation. Brenda had to shoo Joel, the kitten, away before they could get any work done, since he was such a cute distraction.
90	* DaChief: A rare example of this archetype as a primary character, in the case of Johnson. Pope is this to her.
91	* DeadMansChest:
92	** In one episode, a morbidly obese man is stuffed in the trunk of his own car for several days. The decomposition and the sheer size of his body makes it impossible to get him out of there in one piece.
93	** In another episode, a cooler containing a body is left in a storage facility for five years. The owner of the facility has no idea what's in it but nevertheless thinks there's something [[GenreSavvy not quite right]] about someone abandoning a cooler sealed with duct tape, and tries unsuccessfully to get the LAPD to take a look at it. Finally, he has enough and ''mails'' the box to the Major Crimes Division. [[spoiler: The squad does the same thing to catch the killer.]]
94	%%* DefectiveDetective: ''Brenda''. Dear ''God.''
95	* DietEpisode: In "Blue Bloods", Brenda starts a diet that prohibits sugar and processed foods. Needless to say, [[SweetTooth it doesn't last very long.]]
96	* DidntThinkThisThrough: The wealthy parents of a perp in "Good Housekeeping" stand out. They helped their son flee to Mexico to avoid being tried as an adult for the rape and murder of a teenage girl because Mexico would refuse to extradite a minor who faces a life sentence. The father tries to use this as leverage to get his son a favorable deal. This rapidly turns into an EpicFail because neither the father nor mother had considered that their actions -- helping their son flee the country and interfering with the authorities -- puts them in very serious legal trouble. Because the mother was using easily-traced bank accounts and checked into a luxury resort, the mother and son were easy to find. Their son also didn't realize that he did have the right to ask for consular assistance no matter what Brenda said. Nor did he realize that he was confessing to the rape and murder of a Mexican citizen in front of Mexican police officers, while ensuring that he'll not get extradited to the US. So, all three of them face prison with the son ending up far worse off had he simply stayed put and got a lawyer or simply kept his mouth shut.
97	* DidYouJustHaveSex: Brenda becomes... very cheerful after rampant sex.
98	* DisasterDominoes: "In Junk in the Trunk", the car containing a decomposing body that could ''burst'' if not handled carefully breaks loose from the tow truck, rolls the hill, smashes (trunk first) into a power pole. And then a hot wire and transformer falls on it. And then the car catches fire.
99	* DoorClosesEnding: The last we see of Brenda in the GrandFinale is her eating one of her long-missed chocolate cakes as the elevator doors close.
100	* DreamingOfThingsToCome: Season 5's "Elysian Fields" opens with Brenda having a nightmare about Philip Stroh breaking into her home. [[spoiler: It happens in the SeriesFinale.]]
101	* ElephantInTheLivingRoom: Brenda and Fritz never directly discuss whether or not they want kids, picking their way circumspectly around the subject while house-hunting.
102	* EmbarrassingCoverUp: A version where Provenza takes one for the team and only embarrasses himself, in "Off the Hook". He's trying to conceal that he's talking to Brenda on the phone:
103	-->'''Pope:''' Is that Chief Johnson?\
104	'''Provenza:''' No, it's my proctologist.\
105	'''Pope:''' You're asking where your proctologist is?
106	* EmbarrassingFirstName: Lt. Provenza's first name is "Lieutenant" to you.
107	** It's Louis ("Louie"), but as that can also be short for Lieutenant, we ''still'' might not be sure.
108	---> '''Provenza:''' Call me that one more time, Flynn, and Georgette won't be my ''only'' ex-partner [[ToThePain without a penis]].
109	** When being served with a subpoena, his name is officially confirmed to be Louie M. Provenza.
110	** Buzz's real first name turns out to be Francis.
111	* EnemyMine: Brenda and Capt. Sharon Raydor. They ''loathe'' working together, but they just happen to be nearly unstoppable when they team up. Which completely baffles them both.
112	** In one memorable scene, [[AmoralAttorney Goldman]] pretty much declares war on the LAPD. [[SmugSnake Taylor]], [[DaChief Pope]], [[InternalAffairs Raydor]], and [[KnightTemplar Johnson]] remind him about the "Blue Wall" and stand shoulder to shoulder against him.
113	* EnhanceButton: Doubly subverted. When asked to "blow the picture up," Buzz just gives Chief Johnson a ''look.'' She corrects herself by asking him to make it bigger... only for the picture to come out perfectly anyway. Actually, Buzz's look when Brenda almost suggests he "blow it up" is because earlier in that same episode, Brenda's crime scene was blown up. This episode contained several explosive puns.
114	* EurekaMoment: OnceAnEpisode
115	* EvenEvilHasStandards: Murder the friendly old neighborhood shopkeeper and his grandson, and the local gang will kill you. [[spoiler:Brenda exploits this to do an indirect VigilanteExecution on the murderer, who had been given immunity in the case in exchange for his testimony.]]
116	** That's not the whole story. [[spoiler:The shopkeeper and his shop were under the gang's protection. Turell, the gang member who killed the shopkeeper, placed the blame on Reggie, a fellow gang member who went into the shop as Turell left. Turell subsequently gave Reggie's name to the police. Reggie tried to kill Turell in an act of revenge. The rest of the gang didn't get involved until Turell sold Reggie out in return for immunity. Reggie subsequently called the others and filled them on Turell's numerous betrayals.]]
117	* ExactWords: Brenda does this several times, letting a perp know that if he gives her the information she needs, she and the LAPD won't have any further business with them. Every time she says this, she's telling the truth... because this is ''always'' followed by Fritz and the FBI moving in to make their own arrest.
118	* FairCop: The show stars, among others, Creator/KyraSedgwick and Creator/MaryMcDonnell. This trope, of course, is in play.
119	* {{Foreshadowing}}: The Major Crimes Unit's first meeting with Peter Goldman involves him serving everyone involved with Terrell Baylor's death with subpoenas on Baylor's family's behalf--everyone except Sgt. Gabriel--who does finally get served by the end of the episode. After several episodes of legal ramification hell for Brenda, TheMole who had been feeding Goldman information was revealed to be none other than Gabriel's girlfriend at the time and she was the reason Gabriel didn't get subpoenaed since she had fallen for him by then, and had begged Goldman not to.
120	* FunnyBackgroundEvent: In the episode, "Mom Duty," Brenda's mother comes over to visit the station while they're discussing a case. After being grossed out by the case in question, she leaves the room, taking pictures of the rest of the station. The flash from her camera is visible and frequent.
121	** In another episode, when they receive a suspicious package, Provenza rouses himself from his CrosswordPuzzle long enough to call the bomb squad. As the bomb squad sniffs around the box, you can see Provenza in the background still casually working away at his crossword puzzle!
122	** "Relative Matters" has Brenda confessing to Chief Pope that her father has cancer. She wasn't sure if she could work the case and talked about how her father's sick and has massive mood swings and that she has to be there for him at home. While she was talking, Chief Pope saw her parents entering the Murder Room and handing out presents and smiling.
123	** In "Junk in the Trunk", while Provenza is on the phone trying to convince Johnson that she ''didn't'' just hear Sanchez at the crime scene when he's supposed to be on desk duty, the car with the body breaks free and rolls down the hill behind him with the rest of the squad chasing after it.
124	* FunWithAcronyms: Priority Homicide was originally called the Priority Murder Squad. The acronym went on their stationery. Brenda was not amused.
125	* GeekyTurnOn: Fritz's face has shown this more than once whenever Brenda does something particularly clever.
126	* TheGlomp: When Johnson becomes worked up, stressed out, upset, or emotional--in other words, {{once an episode}}--she has a tendency to fly at the nearest character for a {{cooldown hug}} or in extreme cases {{cry into chest}}. Her common targets are Fritz or Pope, but she's occasionally targeted others. On one or two hilarious occasions, a deeply uncomfortable Gabriel finds himself awkwardly patting his boss on the back.
127	* GreyAndGrayMorality: Mentioned several times as being the case in the intelligence world when Brenda is enlisted by the CIA to help them deal with a situation involving terrorists getting a hold of plutonium. Her former mentor expresses his feelings about being involved in a situation where this time was one of the few where it was a clear case of good guys versus bad guys and he was on the right side.
128	* HannibalLecture: Averted in most cases. Johnson is GenreSavvy enough to not answer the bad guy's questions unless it is advantageous to her. Which is how it actually works in real life. Of course, from their perspective, ''she's'' the Hannibal.
129	* HappilyMarried: Brenda and Fritz seem to be developing into this; a rare dramatic example. Not that they haven't had their ups and downs, but their relationship has been solid since season one. It is also most ''definitely'' of the passionate variety.
130	-->'''Durcet''': Piece of work. My opinion? [[YouNeedToGetLaid She needs to get laid]].\
131	'''Fritz''': ''[deadpan]'' I don't think that's the problem, really.
132	* HeelFaceTurn: Captain Taylor starts out as a stereotypical sleazy, underhanded cop looking to climb the ladder, especially unhappy about Brenda essentially taking over his division. Through CharacterDevelopment and mutual respect, he eventually becomes supportive of Brenda's position, even if he'll still point out her failings, and by ''Series/MajorCrimes'' has taken strong steps towards becoming a ReasonableAuthorityFigure.
133	%% * HeterosexualLifePartners: Flynn and Provenza. Also qualifies as VitriolicBestBuds.
134	* HowDareYouDieOnMe: Johnson to Sanchez in a mid-season {{cliffhanger}}. [[spoiler: He was wounded taking bullets for Provenza, and there wasn't much notion that he wasn't going to survive.]]
135	%% * IconicItem: Brenda's purse.
136	* IdiotBall:
137	** Don't try to run out of police headquarters, especially when Gabriel and/or Sanchez is around. You '''will not make it'''. Especially since Priority Homicide specifically is located somewhere on the middle floors of a high-rise.
138	** Additionally, as we learned in "Overkill", if you pull a gun in the murder room, you're going to die.
139	* ImprovisedWeapon: Flynn is attacked in a parking lot, and stabs the guy with a ''windshield wiper''.
140	* InconvenientlyVanishingExoneratingEvidence: Gabriel returns fire on a fleeing murderer but the gun isn't found and it appears he's shot an unarmed man. Brenda realizes that the shooter, the man's partner in the original murder, had been standing right by him and disappeared in the darkness after Gabriel returned fire.
141	* INeverSaidItWasPoison: Brenda's questioning of a suspect rattles him to the point of mentioning a detail of the murder he shouldn't have known in "A Family Affair".
142	** Also happens in "Problem Child". The police never established a time of death...
143	** Raydor tells Pope and Taylor she received a job offer and is considering retiring, knowing that would get back to Priority Homicide. When the lawyer who apparently has inside information on the unit, Goldman, mentions it, she tells him there was no offer and he's just confirmed he has a source inside the department leaking information to him.
144	* InternalAffairs: The '''F'''orce '''I'''nvestigation '''D'''ivision, with the ridiculously ObstructiveBureaucrat Captain Sharon Raydor.
145	* InnocentBigot: Johnson's parents show the faintest, most innocent shades of this, with their gift of maracas to the (hispanic) Sanchez, and their implied denial of a son's homosexuality ("I don't understand why he spends so much time with that roommate of his!")
146	* InnocuouslyImportantEpisode: "War Zone" seems like another episode in which Brenda uses less-than-lawful tactics to make sure that a killer gets his JustDesserts. However, the events of that episode end up being the catalyst for the final season's story arc, in which all of Brenda's actions are finally exposed.
147	* InsuranceMotivatedMurder: In "Speed Bump", a pair of women working at a halfway-house for ex-cons took out fraudulent insurance policies on several of the residents then murdered them.
148	* IntoxicationEnsues: Johnson delves into her niece's "special brownies" during Season 5. Fritz is [[BerserkButton not amused]] when he discovers this.
149	* IResembleThatRemark: In "Elysian Fields", Provenza complains when Detective Olin is brought in to advise on a case.
150	-->'''Provenza:''' "He wrote me up for using bad language, which is bullshit!"
151	* ItsAllAboutMe: Brenda says this word for word in "Forgive Us of Our Trespasses", but it's an [[AvertedTrope aversion]], as she's being literal -- she's trying to reassure the squad that the civil lawsuit the Baylor family has filed doesn't have anything to do with them.
152	* ItsPersonal:
153	** Priority Homicide are TrueCompanions. This makes the murder of Det. Sanchez's brother personal for the entire squad. That said, Sanchez, naturally, takes it harder than anyone else.
154	** The Season 5 finale gives Captain Raydor massive amounts of this in the central case.
155	** In the Season 7 summer finale, [[spoiler:Brenda asks the lawyer who's been hounding her if she personally offended him in some way. He says no; he simply thinks she is a menace, and he plans to end her, leaving her trembling.]]
156	* JerkassHasAPoint: Goldman, the lawyer prosecuting Brenda for every shady call she's made over the [[ContinuityNod course of the series.]] She, well, actually ''did'' everything he's accusing her of. Similarly, Ricardo Ramos, a reporter who accused them of focusing on media-attracting/"important" people's deaths--which was, y'know, kind of true. Were both men dicks? Yeah. They also happen to be ''right.''
157	** In "The Big Picture," Brenda accuses Taylor's men of doing a shoddy job investigating a murder, because they considered the victim "just some Russian hooker." Taylor points out that he didn't hear her clamoring to have the case named a "priority homicide" until it turned out the victim had well-connected politicians for clients, and asks if that was because ''she'' thought the victim was just some Russian hooker. Brenda doesn't dispute it.
158	** Captain Raydor may be (by her own admission, no less!) a total bitch, but the work she does is necessary.
159	---> '''Johnson:''' When officers are shot and killed in the line of duty, they're investigated by me. When they shoot back, they're investigated by you. That means that they'll think twice before defending themselves. That hesitation means that more good cops will die. I have to ask -- have you ever considered what your principles cost?
160	---> '''Raydor:''' Seventy million dollars -- that was the settlement in the Rampart case. One hundred -- that's how many convictions were overturned due to renegade policing and lack of oversight in one division alone, not to mention the loss of trust the LAPD needs to remain effective.
161	---> '''Johnson:''' There has to be a better way.
162	---> '''Raydor:''' Well, until then, you've got me.
163	* JurisdictionFriction: Happens at least OnceASeason between Brenda/the LAPD and Fritz/the FBI. After they get married, Brenda and Fritz make a concerted effort to avoid this. It doesn't (and can't) last.
164	** Season 1 opens with this between Brenda and Capt. Taylor.
165	** And in Season 5's "Strike Three", Brenda and Captain Raydor butt heads over an investigation: the two officers killed in the line of duty are Brenda's investigation, but Captain Raydor's investigating the dead civilian killed at the crime scene, who may or may not have been a suspect or a victim.
166	* KarmaHoudini: Bill Croelick is a particularly odious example. He's a {{Sociopath}} with a DarkAndTroubledPast who's sexually aroused by [[ManOnFire burning women to death]], but gets off for a variety of reasons: first the only witness against him [=ODs=], then in both the cases where he's a suspect, the real murderer turns out to be [[FrameUp someone]] [[NotMeThisTime else]]. He's also a ManipulativeBastard who loves to harass Brenda and company while staying ''just'' within legal bounds. At least Brenda gets him to leave her jurisdiction and never return.
167	* KilledOffForReal: [[spoiler: Brenda's mom]], the first of the series.
168	* KnightInSourArmor: Sharon Raydor, pre-''Series/MajorCrimes''. Provenza too.
169	* KnightTemplar: Brenda, in spades, whenever suspects are shown to be beyond the reach of the law.
170	** "The Big Picture" has [[spoiler: a serial rapist and murderer who is protected as an FBI informant against his father. Since she can't arrest him, Brenda just mentions his informant status in front of the family lawyer. The suspect is dead in the next scene.]]
171	** "Tijuana Brass" features [[spoiler: a foreign police officer who ordered a jail hit on an innocent man. Brenda has the foreign cop sent to prison using the innocent man's name. The cop is murdered in jail.]]
172	** She does this frequently over the years, though less frequently than in some other shows. Unusually, it gets ''{{deconstructed}}'' in a major way: ''Every single case'' that she did something wildly illegal or resembling street justice over the course of the entire series comes back to bite her in the form of a massive federal class action lawsuit. Her job is threatened, the city may be out millions, she's running out of money, and her work is hampered by constant oversight.
173	* KnowYourVines: In "Lover's Leap", Brenda ignores Buzz's urgent attempts to tell her something while she is examining a crime scene. What he was trying to tell her was that she was standing in poison oak. This later becomes an important clue in revealing the killer.
174	* LanguageFluencyDenial: In "Junk in the Trunk", a person of interest claimed that she didn't speak English, so Brenda had Buzz question her in Spanish. It turned out that she spoke perfect English but barely spoke Spanish!
175	* LastNameBasis / YouCalledMeXItMustBeSerious / FirstNameBasis: The evolution of the relationship between Brenda and her squad. Note that refers to what ''she'' calls ''them''--she's always going to be [[LastNameBasis Chief Johnson]] to them.
176	* LawmanGoneBad: An Immigration, Customs & Enforcement agent in "Help Wanted", who made a habit of raping illegal immigrants and then deporting them so they couldn't press charges.
177	* LeftTheBackgroundMusicOn: The source of the music playing over the opening of "Standards and Practices" is revealed to be a CD player at the crime scene.
178	** In "Unknown Trouble", a rap song plays while the team investigates a crime scene. After Provenza complains, Tao finds the remote and turns off the TV that's playing the music. It happens again in the murder room later in the episode, with the video for the same song.
179	* LethalChef: Claire's all-vegan selection, judging by Fritz and Brenda's reactions.
180	* LyingToThePerp: TheSeries
181	** Summed up in this little chat:
182	---> '''Lawyer''': (To Pope about Brenda) Is she lying?
183	---> '''Pope''': You're her lawyer, of course she's lying.
184	* ManipulativeBitch: Brenda, Brenda, Brenda... we know you want to close the case, but sometimes you go just far enough to be almost too far.
185	** Surprisingly, Fritz shows he can be this, manipulating Brenda into closing an investigation in a way the FBI wanted, while simultaneously taking her mind off the recently-deceased Kitty.
186	*** He tries the same tactic again using Brenda's father's cancer diagnosis. This time, Brenda sees right through it.
187	* MayDecemberRomance: The much-married Provenza heads in that direction during Season 5. [[spoiler: It doesn't end too well. But on the plus side, as Flynn puts it, at least the relationship ended before Provenza got married again. He finally broke the cycle.]]
188	* MeaningfulName: An ultra-ironic one: [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawley_Harvey_Crippen Dr. Crippen]].
189	* MilitaryBrat: Johnson, the daughter of a Navy man. Causes an ItsPersonal moment when a group of soldiers are murdered.
190	* MistakenForPregnant: One time when Brenda's parents are visiting, her (more than usual) random emotions lead Willie Ray to think Brenda's pregnant. Brenda quickly corrects her, informing her mother that she's actually going through early-onset menopause.
191	* TheMole: The leak in the department [[spoiler: was Gabriel's girlfriend Ann. Goldman hired her to cozy up to Gabriel for inside information about the LAPD and Brenda's cases especially. Gabriel is legally cleared of wrongdoing, since everything he shared with Ann was said in confidence. He's still heavily scorned by members of the team for his accidental role in the leak.]]
192	* MoodWhiplash: One episode starts with Flynn and Provenza talking on the phone, apparently setting up a comedic BreatherEpisode. [[spoiler: Then Flynn witnesses a hit-and-run and ''talks to a young motorcyclist as she dies''.]]
193	** There's a rare moment of utter familial peace and comfort between Fritz, Brenda, and her father at the breakfast table, with Clay finally feeling back to his old self after his cancer treatment. Brenda then goes to have a heart-to-heart with her mother and include her, [[spoiler: only to discover that her mother died that night and start screaming for Fritz. Holy crap, holy crap, ''holy crap...'']]
194	** "Time Bomb" opens with a crime scene sweep that turns into a bomb search that's PlayedForLaughs. It ends with a shootout on the roof of a mall [[spoiler: and Sanchez being seriously wounded.]]
195	* NeverGotToSayGoodbye: Brenda puts off a heart-to-heart with her [[spoiler: mother. Who then manages to die in the roughly ten hour span that Brenda put it off. Oops.]]
196	* NeverSuicide: Subverted once, in a fairly painful manner.
197	* NietzscheWannabe: The "[=EE=]" kids in "Time Bomb". Natural Selection does not work that way!
198	* NoCelebritiesWereHarmed: "Tapped Out" features the murder of a parody of VH-1's Mystery, from ''The Pickup Artist''. However, instead of being a guy in odd clothes who's good at chatting up women, "Intrigue" is actively a dick, taping his sex with the women he picks up, showing his "students" how to make a clean getaway, and showing the videotape to the woman later. He is an exaggeration of every negative image of a Pickup Artist, ever. The idea, presumably, is to make him so over the top even actual Pickup Artists hate him.
199	-->'''Brenda:''' Oh my Lord, this man is ''horrible''.
200	** The preteen singer and her fame-hungry father in "Star Turn" are likely based on Miley "Hannah Montana" Cyrus and Billy Ray Cyrus.
201	*** Seemed more like a female Justin Bieber (with the singing career starting on Website/YouTube) crossed with the "Balloon Boy" hoax.
202	* NobodyPoops: Averted in the side story of an episode where Brenda constantly fought with Fritz over their clogged toilet. She wanted him to fix it, he wanted to call the landlord. The only problem was they had a cat (forbidden in their lease) and Brenda thought it was much easier for him to fix than to hide the cat for a day. The funniest part of the whole situation came when Brenda asked why he wasn't as fed up as she was about waiting until they left the house to go. When Fritz replied "I took a shower this morning," Brenda's horror was priceless.
203	* ObfuscatingStupidity: Brenda Leigh Johnson is a sweet, scatterbrained Southern eccentric -- until her suspect slips up and gives her a piece of information she wants. At which point said suspect learns that Brenda Leigh Johnson is ''also'' a '''CIA-trained interrogator.'''
204	* ObstructiveBureaucrat: Pope starts being this when Brenda competes with him for the Chief position. He eventually relents when she gets to the next step of the process... and he doesn't.
205	** Raydor, as InternalAffairs, falls directly into this. (Her debut episode is even ''called'' "Red Tape".)
206	** Almost every FBI agent who isn't Fritz seems to be some combination of this and PoliceAreUseless.
207	* OnceASeason: Starting with Season 2, there will always be one comedic episode that starts with Flynn and Provenza getting in trouble and the team investigating whatever situation the two find themselves in.
208	* OohMeAccentsSlipping: ''Very'' rarely, but this has happened to Creator/KyraSedgwick on occasion.
209	* OppressiveImmigrationEnforcement: [[Recap/TheCloserS6E2HelpWanted "Help Wanted"]] features [[PoliticallyIncorrectVillain Joe Myers]] a vicious, bigoted ICE agent who uses his [[AbusiveParents much-abused son]] to find him nannies and babysitters who are undocumented immigrants. Myers then proceeds to torture and [[SerialRapist rape]] the poor women, silencing them with the threat of deportation. Panicking when he discovers his latest victim is in fact a legal immigrant, Myers beats her to death and then starts rounding up all his victims to kill or deport, to ensure the police don't link her death to him.
210	* OrganTheft: The victims in "Heart Attack" are killed for their organs.
211	* OutrankingYourJob: The Major Crimes Division consists of three Lieutenants (Flynn, Provenza & Tao), two Detectives (Sanchez and Daniels, who later transfers out) and one Sergeant (Gabriel, who later adds "Detective" to his rank), with a Deputy Chief (Johnson) in charge. Ordinarily a police unit will be headed by a Lieutenant or Captain, with the rest of the squad being no higher ranked than Sergeant. [[JustifiedTrope Justified]], as the point of the unit is to assemble a team of top investigators.
212	** A conversation between Taylor and Gabriel acknowledges this, as Taylor explains that in any other squad, "Sergeant" would be a supervisory position.
213	** Lampshaded in the series premiere of ''Series/MajorCrimes'', when Provenza has been given command of the squad... for all of a week until Captain Raydor transfers in.
214	* OverlyLongScream: A 6-year-old girl did this in the police station to demonstrate what her parents told her to do if the recently murdered child molester living next door ever approached her.
215	** In Season 5's "Tapped Out", a grown woman does one of these when confronted with a dead body... and continues to do so throughout the investigation, to the point of it being a one-episode RunningGag.
216	* ParentheticalSwearing: Brenda can make "Thank you so much" and "bless your heart" sound like insults.
217	** She's a woman from the Southern United States. "Bless your/his/her/their heart" ''is'' an insult. At best, it's an expression of pity for the terminally stupid.
218	** In one episode, a female suspect who happens to also be from the South explains that "Thank you (ever so much)" is basically used as a PrecisionFStrike depending on who's saying it and who's on the receiving end. She and Brenda volley this at one another as she's being carted off to booking.
219	** Father Jack and Flynn both make "Bless you" sound like an insult, especially when saying it to each other.
220	* PassThePopcorn: The squad considers Johnson's interrogations a spectator sport.
221	* PoliceBrutality: Sgt. Gabriel gets an admission out of a child molester by giving him a black eye. To cover it up, Taylor arranges for the suspect to be sent to central booking, and lets slip he's a child molester. The resulting beatdown is significantly worse than a black eye.
222	* PoliceProcedural
223	* PrecisionFStrike: In the Season 6 summer finale, Brenda and her team corner an aspiring suicide bomber in the LAPD parking garage. He's carrying an oxygen tank filled with Sarin nerve gas, and when he gets shot, it rolls down a ramp and towards a concrete pillar... until Tao steps in and stops it with his foot. Cue realization of how close he is to death and "Holy CRAAAAAAAP!"
224	* PrisonRape : Is mentioned as a sort of [[LaserGuidedKarma karmic justice]] for a rapist, who was the son of an L.A. County Sheriff Commander.
225	* ProneToTears: Despite being a tough ActionGirl, our heroine is always one blink away from tearing up.
226	* ProppingUpTheirPatsy: Phillip Stroh uses his position as a defence attorney for accused sexual predators--including his own accomplices--to cover up his own crimes as a sexual predator himself.
227	* PutOnABus: Detective Garth disappears from the squad without explanation during Season 1.
228	** Actually disappeared after the pilot episode. The actor playing him probably found other work between filming this pilot and TNT's purchase of the show.
229	** Detective Daniels, who [[spoiler: gets promoted out of the squad]] after season four.
230	* RagingStiffie: In "Layover" Provenza had taken some Viagra before having 'fun' with a flight attendant before finding a dead body in the bathtub. He had to stay seated to hide his erection from Brenda and Tao.
231	* RealLifeWritesThePlot: [[spoiler: Kitty's death. First, one of the two cats playing Kitty died; then, the second one also became terminally ill, prompting the storyline.]]
232	** Priority Homicide's transfer to the Counter Terrorism Bureau in Season 3, although played as a bureaucratic paper shuffle by Sgt. Gabriel, mirrors the real life transfer of Major Crimes to be under the Counter Terrorism and Special Operations Bureau.
233	** Also, Major Crimes' move to the new LAPD HQ, which happened in the same year the LAPD moved out of Parker Center.
234	** Season 3, which aired in the summer and fall of 2007, ends with Brenda and Fritz moving out of Brenda's bungalow. Season 4 begins with them in a rental... because of the 2008 housing market crash.
235	* ReactionShot: In the season 7 summer finale, "Fresh Pursuit", [[spoiler:Brenda wins her case about the man she left to die. Then the lawyer shows up with several more of her case files, and tells her he's going to Federal Court, and plans to end her. After he leaves, there's a shot of Brenda trembling with rage, or fear, or both.]]
236	* RightBehindMe: "Standards and Practices" opens with Provenza at a crime scene imitating Brenda giving instructions to the team. Then Brenda arrives and adds that those are all great ideas and everybody should get on them.
237	** Happens to Provenza again in "To Serve With Love". He's called the squad to the crime scene and is adamant that "the Chief does '''not''' need to know about this." Fritz arrives and finds him '''seconds''' later.
238	* RunningGag: In "Fate Line", people scaring Brenda with near-collisions (Pope) and sudden loud shouts (Claire and Tao).
239	** And in Season 6, Commander Taylor's office. Or lack thereof.
240	** It seems like every time Sgt. Gabriel is present at an autopsy, the coroner will offhandedly give him a body part to hold while he goes through his findings with Brenda. He gives a disgusted reaction each time.
241	** "I can live with that/this" in "To Serve with Love."
242	** Throughout the whole series, Brenda keeps referring to Kitty as "he", despite Kitty being conclusively proven to be female by giving birth, and Fritz keeps exasperatedly correcting her. (The only time he doesn't correct her is when Brenda is greatly upset over the fact that Kitty is slowly dying.)
243	* RunForTheBorder: In "Good Housekeeping", the murderer of an illegal immigrant's daughter flees to Mexico to escape prosecution. [[spoiler:Brenda waives extradition in exchange for his confession. Turns out Brenda's investigation revealed that the victim had been born on the Mexican side of the border, so the ''Mexican'' police have grounds to nail the culprit for murdering one of their citizens. And Mexican jails are ''much'' worse than American, especially for a pretty-boy white American. Prisoners in general don't like people who hurt kids, and rapists are only slightly better off than pedophiles. Brenda doesn't tell him the girl was Mexican until he's finished, and there are two Mexican cops in the room. He desperately tries to get her to take him back, but it's too late.]]
244	* SavvyGuyEnergeticGirl: Fritz Howard is the low-key point of stability for the very flighty and energetic Brenda.
245	* TheSchlubPubSeductionDeduction: Provenza and Flynn really should have figured this out a lot sooner in "Layover".
246	* ScreamingWoman: Marie Morgan, the love interest of the victim in "Tapped Out", kept on screaming so loudly that Flynn and Provenza had to wear ear plugs part of the time.
247	* SeasonFluidity: Surprisingly low for a crime drama, especially with regard to Johnson's personal life (usually the B plot of each episode). Each season also has its own theme that even carries over into the cases: a woman in a man's world, partnerships, family, power, change, attraction, and love and loss.
248	* SexyStewardess: Provenza and Flynn get taken for a ride by a pair of sexy flight attendants in "Layover".
249	* SharpDressedMan: Gabriel, to the point where Buzz's visiting sister knows who he is ''because'' of this.
250	** Flynn has excellent taste in suits, if the $500 jacket he's wearing in "To Serve with Love" is any indication.
251	** Provenza, in Season 5 (for romantic purposes). Flynn is horrified.
252	* SiblingYinYang:
253	** "War Zone": Twin brothers. One is a dedicated soldier with a spotless record, the other a banger who killed a kind old man and a little boy over a six-pack of beer. Guess who's the victim of the week. Not that Brenda's unwilling to set it up so that LaserGuidedKarma will take care of him.
254	** There's also the calm, grounded, FBI Agent Fritz and his younger sister Claire, who is a vegan spiritualist who has been a soap maker, a glass blower, a yoga instructor, and then a psychic.
255	** Buzz is an inquisitive, WideEyedIdealist, while his TV weather girl sister Casey is a world-weary cynic.
256	* SleuthDatesCop: Brenda's boyfriend-turned-husband Fritz is an FBI agent. Brenda belongs to the LAPD, but she has often found it useful to have an inside source in the FBI who can get information or do things that the LAPD cannot. He will sometimes offer to help, but there have been times when the FBI and the LAPD both had mutually exclusive interests in the same suspect (for example, a suspected murderer may be a mid-level member of a crime syndicate, and the FBI may consider his usefulness as a snitch above the interests of the LAPD). In these cases, Brenda will do something underhanded, in essence tricking the FBI, and, more personally, Fritz. Fritz will often take this very hard, and will call Brenda out, often gaining the sympathies of the audience (Brenda will often take an "ends justify the means" defense with Fritz when he reacts this way).
257	* SmugSnake: So many perps. Tend to be people with power (or who are adjacent to power), younger people who think their age will protect them from serious consequences, or people who simply don't think Brenda and her crew have the goods to put them away.
258	* SomebodyElsesProblem: Pope is incredulous that Provenza and Flynn are invoking this in "Tapped Out", as they're having breakfast while police cars are rolling up to a crime scene across the street. Flynn points out that they're in Central Bureau's Area of Responsibility, and that if they're needed, Central will call Major Crimes and they'll go over.
259	* SouthernFriedGenius: Johnson is, well, [[TitleDrop a closer]], phenomenally skilled at obtaining confessions.
260	* SpousalPrivilege: Appears on several occasions; see the trope page for details.
261	* StereotypeReactionGag: In "Culture Shock," Provenza asks Tao to talk to some onlookers who apparently know only Chinese. Tao proceeds to address them in English, then dryly points out to Provenza that he's fourth-generation American and doesn't ''know'' any Chinese.
262	** He ''does'' know Japanese, but only because his wife is Japanese.
263	** Performed again later, when Sanchez expects Tao to know about ninjas.
264	*** Of course, being a nerd, he ''does'' know all about ninjas! Plus, as mentioned above, his wife is Japanese and share that knowledge/interest.
265	* SweetTooth: Johnson's habit of stashing junk food and candy anywhere she can hide it, including her purse and desk drawers.
266	** TNT has caught on to this, and featured ProductPlacement for Reese's Peanut Butter Cups on the show.
267	* SympatheticMurderer: Carmen, a girl who shot a 12-year old wannabe gang banger, who was guarding her for the gang members who'd gang-raped her for several days. Nobody in Major Crimes is very keen on charging her for murder.
268	* TakingTheBullet: Sanchez does this for Provenza in "Time Bomb."
269	* TeethClenchedTeamwork: Brenda and Captain Raydor. Though they work together much more peaceably by the middle of Season 7.
270	* ThoseTwoGuys: Flynn and Provenza. If you think procedural cop dramas are immune to the PoliceAreUseless trope, just watch any episode where they get ADayInTheLimelight.
271	* ThrowEmToTheWolves: In "Good Housekeeping", spoiled rich youth Austin Philips flees south of the border to avoid prosecution for killing the daughter of a Mexican immigrant. Brenda knows she can't get him extradited, goes to Mexico to get the full story from him, and he refuses to come back to the US no matter what she tries. Brenda meets him in a Mexican police station and asks him for the story so she can close the case, and offers to drop the accessory charges against his parents. The killer tearfully confesses that he did it by "accident". Then Brenda hands the Mexican cops evidence the victim was actually born in Mexico, not America, which made her a ''Mexican'' citizen. As she leaves, Brenda points out that the Mexican justice is not going to go easy on a rich, arrogant gringo who killed (and possibly raped) a poor Mexican girl. The Mexican cops take Austin into custody despite his sudden pleas to go back to the US with Brenda.
272	* TimeSkip: Four months pass between "Overkill" and "Serving the King."
273	* TitleDrop: One episode was about a dead hooker inside a dead cop's casket. The funeral director gets interrogated and claims ''he'' is "The Closer", meaning the last guy to shut the casket before it's sent to the wake.
274	* TitleOnlyOpening
275	* TookALevelInBadass: Raydor in the Season 7 episode "Death Warrant," where she shocked Brenda's whole team by [[spoiler: shooting a bad guy right between the eyes with a bean bag round.]]
276	* TranquilFury: Brenda was a master of this, usually dramatic (questioning a horrible killer) but also for laughs (see anytime Provenza and Flynn pull a screw-up).
277	* TrickedIntoAnotherJurisdiction: An inverted version occurs in "Good Housekeeping", where a perp flees Brenda's jurisdiction but she tricks him into confessing to a crime he can be arrested for in the new jurisdiction. Spoiled rich youth Austin Philips flees south of the border to avoid prosecution for killing the daughter of a Mexican immigrant. Knowing she can't get him extradited, Brenda goes to Mexico to get the full story from him, and he refuses to come back to the US no matter what she tries. Brenda meets him in a Mexican police station and asks him for the story so she can close the case, and offers to drop the accessory charges against his parents. The killer tearfully confesses that he did it by "accident". Then Brenda hands the Mexican cops evidence the victim was actually born in Mexico, not America, which made her a ''Mexican'' citizen. The Mexican cops take Austin into custody despite his sudden pleas to go back to the US with Brenda.
278	* TrueCompanions: Priority Homicide. At first they're united in that they despise Brenda; by the end of season 1, they're united in that they'd put their jobs and lives on the line for her.
279	* UndyingLoyalty: In the most unexpected of places. Raydor's loyalty, over the course of three seasons, has come to rest wholly with a woman she once despised. Johnson is ''stunned'' when she realises it.
280	* UnsettlingGenderReveal: Done in the '''pilot.''' [[spoiler: The victim, a fugitive, had gotten plastic surgery and was living as a man. When the woman they were having a non-physical affair with found out, she snapped and killed them.]]
281	** Poor, poor Sanchez.
282	** Provenza has this happen as well, when his former partner [[strike: George]] Georgette shows up.
283	* VerbalTic: When she's flustered or upset, Brenda will often repeat the operative word of her sentence three, three, three times. Willie Rae does it too.
284	* VigilanteExecution: "Heroic Measures."
285	* VillainyFreeVillain: It seems that we are supposed to cheer for Brenda when she gets one over on [[InternalAffairs Captain Raydor]], but the Captain is a professional, zealous, by-the-book investigator who is doing exactly what her job description says she is supposed to do, which is to investigate misconduct within the LAPD. Given Brenda's [[ManipulativeBitch underhanded]] tactics, Raydor had good enough reason to track her every move.
286	** Later, she openly backs Brenda as a candidate for Chief of Police.
287	** And in Season 7, she is doing her best to ''stop'' investigating Brenda and her team, to the point of opening up the investigation by emphatically telling Brenda that she was being forced to investigate and, at numerous points in the investigation, trying to give strong hints to Brenda that she was being ''forced'' to continue the investigation against her will. Brenda is so insulted by the idea that she's being investigated at all that she just brushes Raydor off without thinking about the meaning of her words. [[spoiler:By the mid-season finale this appears to have changed somewhat, as Raydor is the first person Brenda looks to after she is cleared. Raydor's face is wreathed in smiles, and Brenda nods her thanks to Raydor before the scene ends.]]
288	* WeirdnessMagnet: The fuel that powers every "Provenza and Flynn get into hijinks" episode:
289	** Season 2's "To Protect & Serve": Flynn's car dies on his way to pick up Provenza for a Dodgers game, and they find a dead woman in the latter's garage.
290	** Season 3's "Saving Face": Provenza and Flynn are pallbearers at a former colleague's funeral. The coffin breaks and his body falls out... along with a naked woman.
291	** Season 4's "Dial M For Provenza": Provenza's car, which contains all of the evidence in a murder-for-hire case, is stolen from a diner parking lot.
292	** Season 5's "Tapped Out": Pope, Provenza and Flynn take over a murder case in Central division, only to be fooled by a police impersonator.
293	** Season 6's "Layover": Returning to L.A. after escorting a prisoner from Dallas, Provenza and Flynn pick up two flight attendants and go home with them, and Provenza finds a dead man in their bathtub.
294	** Season 7's "To Serve With Love": Provenza and Flynn rope Buzz into driving them to a hotel on a side job to serve a summons, then the man they serve is shot dead and thrown out of his hotel room, landing on Buzz's car. [[spoiler:And it wasn't even the guy they thought they were serving.]]
295	** Season 7's "Fool's Gold": Provenza, Flynn, and Provenza's first wife stumble into a robbery at a pawn shop while trying to get a wedding ring back. Before they even notice what's going on, the crooks get away with the gold and they find a dead man in the back of the store. (If you're counting, that's '''five''' occasions where Provenza and Flynn met outside of work, stumbled across a dead body, and failed to react properly.)
296	* WhatADrag: In "Elysian Fields", a suspected rapist and murderer is dragged behind a car by someone torturing to get him to reveal the location of the body of his victim.
297	* WhatTheHellHero: Johnson gets this treatment when she blackmails her niece Charlie into [[spoiler: signing a sworn statement about Jake's ex-girlfriend getting pregnant with his child and her father's subsequent threat]] by threatening to send Charlie's parents a tape of Charlie [[spoiler: describing in detail all the sexual high-jinks she got into with her ex-boyfriend]].
298	** Sanchez gets this in Season 6 when the team finds out that his search for a child's missing, deported mother [[spoiler:was actually him searching for babysitters and schools, and that he hadn't called anywhere in Mexico to even start looking for the mother]].
299	** Johnson has a tendency to put closing the case before all else, sometimes including other people's investigations, even Fritz's. Notably, in "Live Wire", she scares the murderer out of taking a deal with the FBI so that he'll go to jail rather than get off on a lighter charge, despite this screwing up Fritz's case against a major drug cartel. This was after messing with Fritz's investigation through out the episode. He calls her out on it.
300	** Brenda also gets this... well, all the time when someone finds out that she was circumventing procedures and throwing pre-existing investigations off track, but especially throughout Season 7 when she is facing the repercussions of blatantly setting up an untouchable murderer to be executed by his own gang in Season 6.
301	*** She herself kept giving one to Fritz about the FBI (and the LAPD, as he keeps insisting that she remember) doing something similar when they set a dangerous drug dealer on a rap star in order to get him to do something incriminating. And then she did the exact same thing, only it turns out that the FBI/LAPD's actions didn't cause the crime, but hers did result in three people being badly beaten in an incident that involved shots being fired. Though in all fairness, one of those was the criminal and she did get to arrest a bunch of criminals, including one that the FBI considered "untouchable."
302	** Another one occurs in the second season episode "Borderline". Brenda leaves the scene of a minor car accident (which occurred while she was on her cell phone) to get to a crime scene. She's then, to her annoyance, told to fill out an accident report and may lose her driving privileges. When the captain in charge of the Traffic division personally reminds her of the reports, she scornfully dismisses his "silly investigation". He quietly responds that car accidents cause as many deaths in L.A. as murders do, and the victims' survivors mourn them, and even build roadside shrines to them. There is ''nothing'' silly about his job. Not only is Brenda put in her place, but this provides her with a clue to her current case.
303	* WithFriendsLikeThese: Flynn and Provenza, although it's usually Provenza instigating whatever goes wrong ''this'' time.
304	* WorthyOpponent: Brenda may detest Captain Sharon Raydor, but even she thoroughly, if grudgingly, respects Raydor's investigative skills. See also EnemyMine.
305	* YouAreBetterThanYouThinkYouAre: On her wedding day, Brenda was scared because while she loves Fritz with her whole heart, she feels that her heart is tiny. Fritz reassured her that she has a big enough heart for him, the job, and then some.
306	* YouNeedToGetLaid: Another character advances this opinion, about Brenda, to Fritz (unaware of the latter's relationship to the former). Fritz's utterly deadpan response is to opine that he doesn't really think that's the problem.
307	* YourTomcatIsPregnant: Played absolutely straight. Brenda adopts a stray she calls 'Kitty' whom she assumes is male. Up until 'he' gives birth.
308	** She persists in using male pronouns to refer to Kitty [[RunningGag for the rest of the series]], much to Fritz's annoyance.
309

Context Series / TheCloser