Bad Monkey Ep. 3 - "Nobody Said He Was Alvin Einstein"
A surprise guest star and a few surprise developments get us up to our elbows in an ever-twisting mystery.
“No matter how hard you wished for somebody to be OK, it rarely made a lick of difference.”
So says the narrator as we find Andrew Yancy (Vince Vaughn) urgently trying to get in touch with a contact who may be in danger from the mysterious resort developer Christopher Grunion, as Yancy and his new friend Rosa (Natalie Martinez) continue to try to find out who killed Nick Stripling and threw his arm in the Caribbean. (If you’re confused how you found yourself here, go back and check out my review for episodes 1 and 2 of “Bad Monkey.”)
But more and more people are definitely not OK who are in the orbit of Nick and Christopher, and as Yancy gets closer to the case, they keep ending up dead. In fact, one of the only people connected with the matter of the severed arm who’s not dead yet . . .
Well, OK, we’re getting ahead of ourselves. But if you go on, be warned, we’re getting spoiler-y now. If you haven’t watched the episode, pause here and come back when you have.
As we get started with Episode 3 of “Bad Monkey,” it seems like we may end up slowing down for a bit. The teased intersection of Yancy and Neville (Ronald Peet), as we left them both in the coffee shop owned by Neville’s sister last time, turns out to be only a brief encounter in the kitchen while Yancy completes his health inspection. So for now, we’ve missed our opportunity to connect the dots of people who are on the trail of Christopher.
But, far from slowing down, we’re only dragged farther and farther in, as Yancy races to track down anybody connected with Nick before Christopher can “tie off loose ends” by ending them.
On the Keys side of the story, Yancy and Rosa finally catch up with Madeline (Nina Grollman), girlfriend of the recently murdered Finny, first mate of the fishing boat that started the whole story - turns out Finny had been paid by someone to plant Nick’s arm in the water. And that someone might just have been Israel O’Peele, a sleazy,-pill-popping surgeon who was also Nick’s business partner in a fake medical device company that they used to scam Medicare.
Appearing as Israel “Izzy” O’Peele is - in a fun surprise - none other than Zach Braff. We probably owe this to the fact that “Bad Monkey’s” creator Bill Lawrence also happens to be the co-creator of “Scrubs.” Having Braff appear as the shady, dissolute doctor is not only a nice inside joke, but another one of the creative touches that keeps “Bad Monkey” on the lighter side of all the corruption and murder. While Dr. O’Peele is a far cry from Braff’s lovable J.D. Dorian, he nevertheless brings plenty of audience good will with him, even if he’s mixed up in some very bad business.
Too bad Izzy doesn’t live to cash in on that good will, as he’s quickly gunned down, seemingly by Christopher himself, after he agrees to talk to Yancy.
Meanwhile, Neville returns to his former home in the Bahamas, only to find himself, as well, at the business end of Christopher’s gun when he tries to return to his former property. Neville smartly chooses to run away, and lives to fight another day. And fight he will. He’s pissed enough now to double down on his efforts to take Chrstopher down, both by investigating the developer himself and by getting in deeper with the voodoo arts of the Dragon Queen (Jodie Turner-Smith). In both cases, he ends up in more trouble, as he runs afoul of Christopher’s intimidating enforcer Egg (David St. Louis), and has to give up Driggs the monkey to the Dragon Queen, as a literal show of good faith (along with more cash, of course) to make her magic work.
If this seems complicated, that’s because it is. It is to “Bad Monkey’s” credit that the show can keep a narrative running smoothly and clearly with quite a lot of moving parts. To try to explain it all in writing feels a little like the cliché of the half-crazed investigator with a wall full of photos, thumb tacks, and yarn, but it all flows pretty naturally on the screen. And this isn’t even all there is to the story, as we continue to learn more about characters’ backgrounds and relationships while getting deeper into the web surrounding Nick and Christopher.
Speaking of relationships, we’re beginning to see possible sparks between Yancy and Rosa, though Yancy is trying hard to pretend he’s not trying to get closer to her, and Rosa is trying hard to pretend she’s not interested. Yancy and his lover Bonnie (Michelle Monaghan) are on ice, which is understandable, since she has skipped town while being pursued by Oklahoma police for an inappropriate relationship with a student while she was a teacher there. (See last episode.) This will surely come back to bite Yancy in the butt, though it’s not clear how yet. In this episode, Yancy is too busy getting literally bitten in the butt by an angry guard dog.
It’s probably too early to tell, as well, how things will turn out with Yancy and Rosa. At this point I kinda hope they don’t get together, since that’s the more predictable turn of events for a story like this. But I’m also one of those who never wanted Mulder and Scully to hook up either.
But wait, there’s more! Yancy’s investigation continues to stir up a hornet’s nest and more revelations – including a game-changer this week. Nick’s daughter Caitlin (Charlotte Lawrence) is driven to confront her stepmom Eve Stripling to ask her point blank – no, really, I mean point blank, as she aims a pistol at her face – if Eve was the one who killed Nick. Eve insists that she didn’t, even as Christopher sneaks up behind Caitlin, turns her around, and . . .
“Dad!”
Cut to Christopher - or rather, Nick Stripling, embracing his daughter with one arm. His only arm.
Told you we were getting spoiler-y this time.
Besides the dual identity, we’ve still got a few other things brewing that have yet to play out, which we will surely discover in the coming weeks, including:
What will happen to Driggs the monkey in the Dragon Queen’s hands, and how he’ll end up affecting the story that is more or less named for him.
Why Yancy got kicked off the Miami police force and what it has to do with a cop named Mendez.
What’s going on with “Heather with the Weather,” the gorgeous, bitchy TV meteorologist who works with Rosa’s sister and has seemingly just disappeared.
Finally, another observation: I’m not quite sure how well the musical selections are serving “Bad Monkey.” The original score by Jamie Jackson is upbeat without being intrusive, but there are also frequent needle-drops of classic songs, mostly cover versions, which are sometimes a bit too on-the-nose for my taste. In a previous episode, for instance, a version of “Cheeseburger in Paradise” accompanies an establishing shot of a restaurant. This time, we get a brief burst of a Tom Petty cover, “Runnin’ Down a Dream,” while Yancy is actually running from the guard dog and “working on a mystery.” OK, OK, we get it. Sheesh.
Back for more monkey business next week.