Season 3, Episode 6
There Might Be Blood
"...Is it just me, or does she seem peeved?"
Directed by John Badham
Written by Kell Cahoon
Safety inspector Butch Hicks falls to his death off an offshore oil rig, and Shawn thinks it was a murder. Chief Vick wants the case solved. Just one problem: the case technically falls under the jurisdiction of the coast guard, and the local commander, Barbara Dunlap, is Chief Vick’s sister – and they do NOT get along. Worse, the SBPD got an anonymous tip recently about something unsafe happening on the rig, and now a geologist named Professor Renaud, hired by the rig’s owners – Billy Joe Bamford and his daughter Ashley – has gone missing. Commander Dunlap takes Shawn and Gus away from the SBPD, but has no interest in using them – she just wanted to screw over Vick. Between the petty bickering intensified by legal jurisdiction, and someone very interested in covering their tracks, Shawn and Gus will have a doozy of a case on their hands… assuming they’re allowed to solve it at all.Tropes:
- Amazon Chaser: Lassiter seems quite enamored by Commander Dunlap’s forceful personality.
- Body in a Breadbox: Body in a closet. A closet in the house of the case's initial victim to boot.
- Dug Too Deep: In the show’s Cold Open, young Shawn and Gus are digging for oil in Henry’s backyard… and they hit a water pipe, turning part of the yard into a huge mudpit. We later learn that this was a serious problem with the oil rig as well – it was drilling directly into a fault line.
- Everyone Is a Suspect: Everyone on the oil rig hated Hicks, since he was constantly writing people up for the smallest infractions. Shawn and Gus can’t find anyone who isn’t thrilled that he’s dead.
- It Makes Sense in Context: Commander Dunlap catches Shawn and Gus inspecting Hicks’ office, against her direct orders. When she asks what they’re doing, an annoyed Shawn replies that they’re not eating candy. (Shawn was hungry, and looking for a snack stash somewhere.)
- Jurisdiction Friction: There’s quite a bit of it between the SBPD and the local Coast Guard. The oil rig is in the Coast Guard’s jurisdiction, but the body was found in Vick’s. The Sibling Rivalry between their leaders just makes things worse. A judge eventually decides the Coast Guard has jurisdictional precedence.
- Kneel, Push, Trip: Shawn tries using this at one point against someone with a gun during a standoff. Gus has no interest in being the “tripper”, and it never actually happens.
- Look Behind You: Shawn does a quick "Ooh look" to get Gus to turn around so he can leave the closet they were told to stay in.
- Mysterious Informant: Someone called police headquarters shortly before Hicks was killed, with an anonymous tip that something extremely dangerous was going on out on the rig. It turns out it was Christopher Renaud, a geologist hired by the Bamfords.
- No OSHA Compliance: Generally averted; Hicks was hit by a block-and-tackle and fell overboard because he was briefly in a “no-man’s-land” area of the rig where nobody is ever supposed to go.
- "Not So Different" Remark: Shawn manages to convince Ashley Bamford to surrender by pointing out that he too knows what its like to try to impress a dismissive parent, and that he understands with how her plot got out of her control.
- Pass the Popcorn: In the ending, Shawn and Gus gift Chief Vick a cookie basket as she prepares to reconcile with her sister... which naturally turns into her and her sister fighting again, at which point Shawn and Gus ease back and munch on the cookies as they watch.
- Peek-a-Boo Corpse: Dr. Christopher Renaut’s body falls out of a closet in Hicks’ house, right on top of Gus.
- Pull the Thread: Shawn and Gus pretend to want to go fishing in the ocean on Henry’s boat, in order to get on the rig, and Shawn goes on to say he heard the fish were biting well. Henry asks them what fish in particular were biting, and suggests they might be pike. Shawn agrees that it WAS pike – and Henry breaks it to him that pike are strictly freshwater fish, then asks Shawn what he really wants.
- Rules Lawyer: Hicks was an intense stickler for safety regulations, which made him extremely unpopular on the rig. It also makes it surprising that he was in a “no man’s land” where nobody is ever supposed to go.
- Sibling Rivalry: Between Chief Vick and Commander Dunlap. It exacerbates the Jurisdiction Friction mentioned above, but never quite lapses into The Glorious War of Sisterly Rivalry, since they’re actually extremely similar in personality, and Dunlap just looks like a taller version of Vick.
- Stay in the Kitchen: Bamford shows this attitude towards Ashley, which Shawn calls him out for.
- "Well Done, Son" Guy: A female version. Ashley Bamford turns out to be this, as well as a Bitch in Sheep's Clothing. She killed Hicks, because he found out they had been drilling into a fault line, and he threatened to go to the police. She was desperately trying to keep her father’s crumbling business afloat, and Shawn tries Talking the Monster to Death by calling her out on it at the end. He even talks her into giving up her gun… and then Lassiter ruins the moment by tackling her to the floor.
