"Halloween, Part III" is the fifth episode of Brooklyn Nine-Nine's third season.
It's Halloween, once again, at the Nine-Nine and Jake and Holt have decided to hold a competition to find out, once and for all, which one of them is the superior detective. This year's bet: to see who can steal a crown locked in a briefcase handcuffed to the interrogation room table by midnight.
To facilitate the bet, Jake and Holt hold a draft and pick teams to assist them throughout the night. Jake picks Rosa and Charles while Holt picks Terry and Gina. Hilarity ensues.
Meanwhile, Amy feels left out because both Jake and Holt reject her from their teams, Jake because she sucks up to Holt and Holt because she's Jake's girlfriend. Scully and Hitchcock invite her to participate in their own bet involving Scully's foot fungus cream. She declines.
This episode provides examples of:
- Added Alliterative Appeal: Why do both Jake and Holt think that Amy would hide a camera in her bra?Holt: Because the cleavage cloaks the camera with its curves!!
- Air-Vent Passageway: Jake's first plan involves sneaking through the precinct's air vents and dropping into the observation room, pretending that he meant to drop into the interrogation room and Boyle labeled the vents wrong, all as a distraction so that Rosa can actually steal the crown.
- All of the Other Reindeer: Amy is left out of the bet because neither side thinks they can trust her.
- Ask a Stupid Question...: Holt's conversation with Terry.Holt: Sergeant, are you familiar with the Hungarian fencing term, Hossz Gorcs?Terry: You must realize my answer is no.
- Awesome Moment of Crowning: In the end, the Nine-Nine holds a coronation ceremony for Amy at their Local Hang Out, placing the prize on her head and Jake and Holt conceding that she's the better detective.
- Beat Them at Their Own Game: After being rejected by Holt and Jake as a potential Mole and left out of the bet, Amy launches her own scheme to steal the crown and humiliate them both by using their own plans against them.
- Call-Back:
- Jake tries to encourage Holt to say "HalloWEEEEEEN!" as the former discovered the latter did in the last Halloween episode.
- Amy wears the same janitor's costume that Jake wore in the first Halloween episode. Complete with moustache.
- Chekhov's Gun: The motion-activated witch plays a role in the ultimate outcome of the heist.
- Coordinated Clothes:
- Detectives Scully and Hitchcock are both dressed up as mustard for Halloween and as a prank on Charles. Hilariously, they manage to screw up even this simple thing: traditionally, one dresses as mustard and the other one as ketchup.
- Terry's wife Sharon is dressed up as a burglar and their adorable twin girls are two police officers.
- Drafting Mechanic: After the shenanigans of the previous two "heists", Holt and Jake decide to divvy up the other detectives (and Gina) to their sides by holding a draft.
- Either "World Domination", or Something About Bananas: When Amy is reading the Captain's lips, she deciphers, "Sharon and your kids will distract Jake. They'll be here at 9:30 sharp. My waffle xylophone on the cheese man."Captain Holt: What?Amy: My lip-reading is not flawless.
- Enhance Button: Averted. Jake squints really hard instead when analyzing the break room security tape.
- Gambit Pileup: In the end, three separate heists come crashing together with Amy's coming out on top.
- Gender-Blender Name: The guy Boyle tries to set Gina up with is named "Nadia."
- Graceful Loser: Jake and Holt admit their defeat to Amy quite well, agreeing that their attitude was wrong and cheer with the rest of the Nine-Nine after agreeing she's an amazing detective/genius.
- Hammerspace: Rosa pulls out a foot-long bowie knife from the back of her extremely tight jeans. Terry's shocked and horrified at the sight.
- It's a Costume Party, I Swear!: Played with. Charles refuses to wear a costume because everyone in the precinct laughs at his costumes. He discovers that everyone else is in costume, so he runs to his car to get his emergency costume. He returns to find everyone back in uniform, making fun of his Elvis Presley costume.
- Mistaken for Prostitute: Boyle tries to set Gina up with a guy named "Nadia." When Gina meets him in the flesh she cannot believe how incredibly handsome or complementary he is for her and believes Boyle is using a gigolo to try to distract her from her post.
- Not So Above It All: Holt spends the entire episode showing that he can be just as petty and childish as Jake. He even comes up with cool codenames for his team while Jake simply uses everyone's proper names.Holt: Alpha Team, this is the Golden Sparrow! Rendezvous at Drop Zone Yankee!
Jake: When did you come up with all those codenames?!?! - Obfuscating Stupidity: Hitchcock and Scully once again show that they have their uses in the precinct, although Amy mentions that she had to explain everything multiple times for them to even start to understand what they were doing.
- Oh, Crap!: Gina's reaction on discovering that Nadia, the guy Charles has been trying to set her up with and who is seemingly perfect for her, is in fact the twin brother of Charles's girlfriend Genevieve.
- Perilous Marriage Proposal: Parodied with small stakes when Jake gives an Anguished Declaration of Love to Amy...to try and get her to tell him where the briefcase is.
- Picked Last: Holt won't pick Amy to be on his team because she's dating Jake, while Jake won't pick her because she sucks up to Holt. She decides to take revenge on both of them.
- Reading Lips: Amy keeps tabs on Holt by reading his lips through a crack in his office blinds. She gets most of his plan, followed by "My waffle xylophone on the cheese man."
- Recognition Failure: Done purposely by the entire precinct, as they pretend to not recognize Charles' Elvis Presley costume. Holt even guesses that he's clearly Elvis... Stojko.
- Running Gag: In addition to the bet, the episode continues the running tradition of everyone in the precinct deliberately trolling Charles regarding his absurd Halloween costumes.
- Secret Handshake: Jake shares one with Rosa. Terry shares an even more elaborate one with Holt!
- Strange Minds Think Alike: Both Jake and Holt are convinced that Amy's wearing some kind of recording device concealed within Victoria's Secret Compartment and end up yelling abuse to the other directly at her décolletage.Amy: Why does everyone think that's where a camera would be?
Holt: Because the cleavage cloaks the camera with its curves! - Took a Level in Jerkass: Both Jake and Holt are surprisingly dismissive and mean to Amy in this episode. Justified in that their competitive streak regarding the Heist brings out their pettiness and childishness and both have equally petty and childish, but not unjustifiable reasons to believe that Amy can't be trusted into their respective teams (Jake's is due to Amy usually being the Teacher's Pet to Holt, and Holt's is due to her being Jake's girlfriend).
- Vomit Discretion Shot: After running up 31 floors, Jake has to buckle out of frame to puke a couple of times (after doing it twice on the stairs).
- What the Hell, Hero?: Amy delivers two such speeches to Holt and Jake; once while reacting indignantly to their insincere apologies while trying to get "Al's" home address from her, and during her summation of her scheme at the end in which she makes a point of informing them how little she appreciated their poor treatment of her. Lampshaded:Amy: Well, it all started when I went to tell Jake how badly he hurt my feelings and he yelled at my breasts.
Jake: Uh, boy. I am not gonna come off well in this story.
Amy. Nope.
