A Dog and Pony Show
Directed By: Alan Taylor
Written By: James Yoshimura
Howard and Felton suspect Pony Johnson (Geoffrey Ewing), a drug dealer, is behind a series of murders. Pembleton and Bayliss investigate the death of a police dog. Blythe persuades Bolander into letting her son tag along while he's on duty.
Tropes applying to this episode:
- Based on a True Story: Pony Johnson is based on Vincent Frazier, a drug dealer also investigated for a similar series of murders.
- Despair Event Horizon: Chris Thormann reaches this when Crosetti visits him, as Thormann is embarrassed about anyone witnessing the fact he has to pee in a bedpan, crying that he wished he had died when he was shot.
- Female Misogynist: Howard doesn't think much of women officers in general or the women officer at the crime scene she's investigating in particular, and calls them "secretaries with badges."
- Nightmare Fetishist: Dr. Blythe's son Danny, having a medical examiner as a mother, thinks homicides are very cool.
- Pet the Dog: Pembleton comforts a depressed Bayliss while they watch Jake's owner scatter his ashes at the lake.
- Serious Business: Bayliss is astonished that the death of a police dog has to be investigated as a full-blown homicide.
- Sympathetic Murderer: It turns out Jake had been killed by an overworked woman who singlehandedly ran an animal shelter and put the dog down after mistaking it for a stray due to how tired she was.
