Directed by David Breckman
Written by Joe Ventura
Roderick Brody (Noah Emmerich) worries that his wife is cheating on him. So he hires Monk to investigate. But Monk doesn't want to meet with Roderick. Back in the seventh grade, Roderick "tortured" Monk.
After all these years, Monk is so traumatized, and afraid that Roderick just wants to pick up where he left off, that he asks Dr. Bell for a doctor's note to allow him to not meet with Roderick. Dr. Bell refuses.
Monk and Natalie meet Roderick's wife, Marilyn (Julie Bowen), who says her wedding to Roderick was small: her aunt from Texas didn't make it. Marilyn was adopted, and she doesn't know her biological family. This fact turns out to be very important.
When a man turns up dead and all the clues point to Roderick, Monk is happy. In the interrogation room, Monk tells Roderick that it's payback, comeuppance, for the seventh grade. But Roderick dismisses it as ancient history, frustrating Monk almost to the point of distraction from the important issue at hand: that Marilyn was lying about where she was at the time of the murder.
However, staring at the one-way mirror, Monk gets an idea: what if Marilyn has an identical twin? Indeed that's the case. Along with Stottlemeyer and Disher, Monk and Natalie go to the Brody residence to wait patiently for a search warrant. But when they hear screams for help, Stottlemeyer smashes the glass on the front door and reaches for the knob.
Guns drawn, Stottlemeyer and Disher show up in the bathroom just before Patrice (also Julie Bowen) can drown Marilyn in salted water in the bathtub. The idea was that Marilyn would have shown up dead under a bridge.
Roderick is grateful to Monk for solving the case. But Monk is disappointed, characterizing what just happened as "the worst comeuppance ever."
This episode includes examples of the following tropes:
- Always Murder: Natalie says "we don't do matrimonial investigations", but the case winds up being a murder case anyway.
- Bittersweet Ending: Monk has managed to save Marilyn from her literal Evil Twin, and Roderick is grateful to him. But if his boasting to Marilyn about his past with Adrian is any indication, he's still not sorry for what he did to Adrian, who voiced how dissatisfied he is with his bully's Karma Houdini.
- Comically Small Bribe: Monk tries to bribe a bartender with two "General Washingtons". In this case, he means a dollar and a quarter.
- Disproportionate Retribution: Played with. In any other situation, it would count as Laser-Guided Karma for Monk's childhood bully to go to jail for a crime he didn't commit. The problem is, that crime in question is First Degree Murder. Even if giving Monk a swirly was very bad unto itself, it doesn't warrant sending Roderick to the electric chair, especially when it lets the actual murderer go free.
- Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: Played with. Depending on how you see it, "evil" may be too strong a word for Roderick. But he's nonetheless a grown bully who's incapable of comprehending that Monk was scarred because of his actions.
- Evil Twin: Patrice Gesner (Julie Bowen), who kills one of her accomplices, almost killed Marilyn and had also planned to kill Roderick.
- Face Palm: Natalie's reaction (and really, the only proper reaction) to Monk's very cheap attempt at bribery.
- Foil: Monk sees Roderick as this to Trudy. While each significantly changed Monk's life, Trudy was the one who changed it for the better, while Roderick was the one who ruined what little childhood Monk had left.
- He Who Fights Monsters: Monk is so happy that Roderick will be going to jail for murder and is willing to let him die for it too... Except, part of him knows the evidence doesn't add up, and also feels like a "ghoul" for wanting Roderick to die for something he didn't do.
- Karma Houdini: Roderick has so far done well for himself, feels no remorse whatsoever for bullying Monk and has probably learned nothing from this harrowing experience.
- Mistaken for Cheating: Roderick assumed his wife Marilyn was seeing somebody behind his back, but it was actually Patrice he saw with her accomplice.
- Never My Fault: When Adrian confronts him with how he's always resented his bully for giving him swirlies, Roderick justifies that Monk also "bullied" him by splashing water at him.
- No Warrant? No Problem!: Averted. The screams for help, which Monk and Natalie would no doubt testify under oath that they heard, mean that Stottlemeyer and Disher can stop waiting for the warrant and charge in to the rescue.
- Spot the Imposter: When our heroes bust in on the evil twin drowning her sister, Randy questions how they'll tell who's who. He even tries an accent test, since the twins were raised in different states. The Captain suggests that they just arrest the one who wasn't being killed...
- Ungrateful Bastard: Played with. Roderick could not be any more grateful to Monk for saving his wife from her evil twin. But that doesn't change that he's not sorry for giving Monk swirlies.
- Worst. Whatever. Ever!: At the end of the episode, with Roderick having become a Karma Houdini and remaining unapologetic, Monk declares the entire experience the "worst comeuppance ever".
