(S02E03) I loved the beginning of this episode. The editing and the dialogue made it look like we were starting off at another crime scene where a famous person died, but it turns out Brenda was out on a tour of stars' homes with her mama and her beau, Fritz. Great opening.

The show doesn't waste any time getting to the crime. Brenda's called away to a triple murder--an apparent gang shooting--leaving Fritz alone with her mother. The victims are teen-agers and one is the son of a friend of Det. Taylor. I found the monologue where Brenda was telling Det. Gabriel how to notify a family of a death to be riveting. That was very effective storytelling: cutting from Brenda's instructions to the interaction with Det. Gabriel and the parents of the murdered boy. Stirring line from Brenda: "You're about to become the main character in somebody's worst day ever." Remarkable.

First, the cops round up all the nearby gang members but nobody's bragging about it. It turns out that Wesley, one of the victims, was dating a white girl and keeping it secret from his parents. So, it could be a hate crime. Fritz is convinced Wesley is a weekend gang member but everybody who knows Wesley--even his girlfriend, who survived--say he stayed far away from gangs. The detectives find their confession in the form of graffiti on a wall in gang territory. The graffiti says two guys named 'Pookie' and 'Lil' Devil' got revenge against the 53 gang for shooting at their 81 brothers.

Pookie and Lil' Devil are dragged in for questioning. When the boys won't tell Brenda which one of them was the driver, she flips a coin to let the boys decide who gets questioned first. The point, of course, is to make the younger of the two (Lil' Devil) sweat it out: worrying about what Pookie is telling Brenda. It works, of course. Brenda acts like Pookie hung Lil' Devil out to dry and blamed him for the shooting. Lil' Devil freaks out and tells Brenda everything, including the fact that the Escalade these two bozos shot at is the one that "opened up on Pookie's cousin two weeks ago." How does he know? The USC sticker.

Let me stop right here. See, this is what I like about this show. While we've seen this technique on every crime show known to man, this show gives us a twist. The interrogator thinks she's getting a kid to confess to mistaken identity, but his confession takes her investigation in a totally different direction (one that she hesitated to go, since everybody insisted that Wesley wasn't involved in a gang).

Brenda mixes business with pleasure: taking her mama and Fritz to the restaurant where Wesley's parents were having dinner on the night that someone supposedly used the Escalade to shoot a gang member. Of course, Fritz knows what she's up to, while her mother thinks they're out for a nice dinner. They barely get in the door when an offhand comment by her mother makes Brenda suspect the valet took the USC-stickered Escalade out for a drive through gang territory. Her suspicions are confirmed when she eyes a valet who tries to run. She and Fritz tackle him in the parking lot.

She gets the valet to confess that he was being harassed by the 81s. He drove the Escalade and, even though he knows he's going to get killed for giving out the information, he gives up his gang member friend who shot some 81s. I really felt terrible for Marcus the valet who tried to stay out of gangs but had to remain friendly with them in order to survive. I wasn't so sure that he'd get the protection that he needed but maybe he'll resurface in another episode?

The show ends with Brenda's mama announcing that she knows Brenda and Fritz live together. She saw the signs. And now we know where Brenda gets her ability to notice little details.

This was a great episode, complete with a handful of plot twists and comedy. I'm much more impressed by the storytelling this season. Last season, I think I solved the crime before the way before the characters in about half of the shows. While I suspected that this episode was a case of mistaken identity, it wasn't that simple and it took a lot of investigating to come to that conclusion. Lots of red herrings in this episode to keep it interesting. My favorite scene was where Brenda put on her mother's glasses while discussing the case with a room full of detectives.