Monday, January 11, 2010

Flashpoint in a Flash – Season 3 Episode 8: The Good Citizen

This episode deals with a very personal story of a family destroyed by drug dealers that made a perfectly happy neighborhood, corrupt. And, for all you Kevin "Wordy" Wordsworth fans, this one is very Wordy-centric! Read the summary of the penultimate episode of 2009 after the jump!



We begin at a bar, staff is clearing up as there is a single man having a drink alone in the corner. We flash back as he sips to his brother dying in front of paramedics. Two drug dealers come into the bar, and refuse to leave after the owner asks them to leave. They are there because the owner refused to let one of their friends into the bar. One holds the owner, and the other starts smashing everything in sight with a baseball bat. A waitress is in the back calling the police. The lone man steps in unexpectedly to salvage the owner’s precious crystal bowl , grabbing his baseball bat from him, and they leave. He chases after them, saying that he is not letting it go.

Wordy is riding with Ed, and he calls his wife asking if they want to go to Ed’s for a barbeque later tonight. Winnie patches through the hot call, and they head to the bar. The SRU searches around on foot, and Jules and Greg talk to the owner. The man who isn’t letting it go, has their handgun. Wordy and Ed drive around and remember times when there were more cops on the street to keep things like this from happening. Wordy grew up in this area and he can’t believe what it has turned into now as they drive past junkies on the street. They are looking for the man who they are calling a vigilante, or good citizen. Cut to the vigilante chasing the man through an alley with the gun. Greg tries to get more of a description out of the bar owner, Alphonse. The waitress is also of little help. Ed and Wordy catch up with the second of the two dealers and chase him through an alley. They catch him hiding inside a building, but he stonewalls and doesn’t give them a name on their first attempts. Sam and Leah drive towards the other dealer, only to find they are too late and he’s been shot in the leg. Where is the vigilante? ROLL CREDITS!

Wordy and Ed arrive at the scene as Winnie calls for EMTs. The dealer, Leon, is paranoid about the SRU’s motives, but finally gives them the name of the vigilante – a Robert Cooper. Wordy remembers him vaguely, he and his dad used to hang out at his father’s hardware store. Wordy thinks there is more to this story and tries to find out why Robert would want to shoot him, but Leon continues to be hostile. Spike learns that Cooper is an activist, and worked to get an apartment building that is notorious for being inhabited with drug dealers, torn down. Back at the bar, Alphonse gives the SRU the name of Robert’s wife. Ed and Wordy go to look for another dealer that Leon names (Torres) as he is whisked away in the ambulance, but Leah comments that it is going to take a while in this neighborhood. Wordy is a little irked by this, but Leah tells him that she had plenty of drug related calls in this neighborhood from her firefighting days. Greg and Jules talk to his wife who arrives at the bar, and learn that Cooper had a brother named Jimmy, who got into drugs and passed away. Flashback to a scene at a bar, where Jimmy is drinking and Cooper and his wife track him down after a missed job interview. Robert tries to talk to Jimmy and get him out of his habit, but he is unsuccessful. They lost the store, and Jimmy too.


This is a personal case. Spike relays a potential location to Ed and Greg of Cooper, and Leah considers apologizing to Wordy for what she said. Sam tells her not to, because it was based on professional experience. Inside the command truck, Greg confronts Spike asking why two high-ranking security agents wanted to take him out for coffee and talk about him. He says they will pick him up later. Ed, Wordy, Sam and Leah arrive at the address of Cooper. Wordy picks open the lock and the move in swiftly and quietly. They don’t find him in there! Alphonse finally starts opening up, and learns that these dealers burned down their hardware store. Cooper became obsessed with fixing things ever since. The flashbacks from the beginning that showed Robert with his dying brother and paramedics took place this morning. Meanwhile, Jules tells Spike in a conversation that Ed is proud of him. Greg speaks to the paramedics that tried to save him, and Cooper is pretty broken when there is nothing that can be done to save him. Spike finds out something about Torres, and he is the middleman of a group of coke dealers in the area. The SRU thinks that they are Cooper’s next target, and look around for them. Wordy is in conflict about protecting drug dealers, and Greg tries to say that they are just keeping the peace. Leah jumps in over the comm and says that when bullets start flying it is not only drug dealers that are being hit. Wordy ponders this, as Greg starts giving orders for where the team should position themselves.

The SRU have now surrounded a van playing loud music, and find Torres inside, shot in the stomach. Cooper beat them to the chase and he is now headed to the dealers – who are brothers! After some prodding, he finally gives them an address. At the bar, Cooper calls his wife. She begs for him to come home, but he won’t claiming that he has something important he has to do. In a seemingly normal-appearing house, the dealers are in a panic, packing up stacks of cash and figuring out a way to get out of this situation. One of them leaves the room, but when he returns, he is being held by gunpoint by Cooper. He tells them that they are responsible for killing his brother, but they don’t even know who he is. The SRU arrives at the house and sets up a camera. Sam is in the sniper position but he can’t see very well. Jules brings Cooper’s wife to the scene. Cooper demands that the brother he is holding at gunpoint consume a large mountain of coke. He is afraid to touch the very thing that he makes money off of. Greg tries to negotiate with Cooper through a bullhorn, but he doesn’t have much luck. Leah and Wordy work together to set up a window charge to bust inside. Wordy drops a phone line into the room, but Cooper hesitates to pick up. Ed calls for the SRU to break into the house, but cooper starts firing shots at random outside. After a status check, the SRU makes plans to go in. They are now face to face with Cooper.

Wordy puts down his gun, and remembers the hardware store in an attempt to negotiate with Cooper. They bring his wife on the line. Wordy tries to convince him that he still has a good future ahead of him with his wife. Wordy promises Cooper that they will make sure they get what is coming to him, and asks him to put the gun down, a few times, over and over. As Greg wanted earlier, no one died today. Everyone is taken away in handcuffs as the end of the episode montage begins. Wordy decides to take a raincheck on the barbeque saying he has some phone calls to make. At the command truck, Greg shares humorous stories he wish he could say to these agents, but he didn’t. Instead, he gave him a glowing reference. Spike said that he was headhunted and didn’t apply for the job, and Spike isn’t quite sure where he wants to be. Spike promises he will keep him posted after he says something in Italian. Wordy stands outside of the hardware store with some friends, and some crowbars, as they tear off the boarded windows and clean up the old hardware store.

It was nice to see a Wordy-centric episode - Flashpoint is doing a great job of intertwining the ins and outs of the SRU, the personal lives of the squadron, along with the case-of-the-day.


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