Rizzoli & Isles 6×11 – Fake It ‘Til You Make It – Recap

After last week’s Kent/Maura kiss, Rizzoli & Isles writer Katie Wech declared via Twitter that the coupling of the two title characters is “actually the last ship.” Wech penned Rizzoli & Isles 6×11, which featured said title characters jetting off on a romantic getaway to Los Angeles… wherein “romantic getaway” is a synonym for “crime investigation.” Baby steps. Read on for our full recap.

A selfie with a murderer

Criminal Minds watchers among us, raise your hands. Wait, I can’t see you. OK, anyway, remember that episode with that teenage girl who was babysitting and taking selfies, and the guy who was about to kill her was behind her in one of the selfies? The same thing totally happens in the opening scene of Rizzoli & Isles 6×11, and it’s just as creepy the second time around.

Over at Frankie and Jane’s apartment, Jane’s been getting calls intended for an escort service. In a hilarious twist on the usual “Rizzoli!” “Isles!” phone-answering schtick, the time she chooses to give a caller a piece of her mind is the same moment the Boston Police Department is trying to contact her about a case. The bad news: She calls whoever is on the other end of the line a “basement-dwelling mouth-breather.” The good news: Maura’s able to stop her from dropping the F-bomb. See, there’s always a silver lining.

This week’s victim is Dan Walsh, a Los Angeles transplant with a mysterious past who worked for a nonprofit that helps troubled kids. Could his death be related to his job? It doesn’t take Jane long to find the photo of Dan with his soon-to-be killer in the background, wearing a ski mask.

Jane: He has a selfie with his murderer.
Korsak: Yeah, too bad he didn’t have one of those selfie sticks to use as a weapon.
Maura: And achieve a universally flattering angle.

Yo, this show is ridiculous.

Jane’s going to LA & Frankie’s life sucks

Back to the whole LA connection. Korsak gets a call with some mind-boggling news: A man named Dan Walsh recently showed up at the LA morgue, and he was killed the same way as the Boston victim. California Dan has been dead for about two years – the same amount of time since Boston Dan started putting down roots in Boston. Upon hearing about the discovery of California Dan’s body, did someone eager to keep the murder a secret kill Boston Dan to keep him quiet?

Korsak wants someone from the BPD to head out to the City of Angels to check things out, and although Frankie jumps at the chance, there’s only enough funding to send one detective. (Translation: Jane’s going to LA and Frankie’s life sucks.) Meanwhile, Maura’s been on the phone with the LA Coroner’s Office, and she’s heading out west to “facilitate the autopsy” and check for any similarities to the Boston murder. (Translation: Jane and Maura are actually jetting off on a romantic getaway to LA.) Seriously, is anyone else getting Crossing Jordan flashbacks? How many times did the notoriously on-again, off-again Boston Medical Examiner Jordan Cavanaugh and BPD Detective Woody Hoyt fly out to LA on a case? At least twice, guys. Jane and Maura are officially on a Cavanaugh/Hoyt trajectory, hopefully without the off-again part – or any characters named Tallulah.

Anyway, over in LA, Jane doesn’t want to drive the vehicle that the BPD rented, describing it as looking like “a toaster had sex with a clown car.” After Jane’s credit card is declined by the rental service, Maura jumps in and splurges on a super-fast, super-sexy Aston Martin that turns Jane’s frown upside-down.

See, LA is already working its magic. Let the joint investigation begin between the BPD, LAPD, Boston ME and… OK, is the LA Medical Examiner known as LAME? I hope so.

Going straight

It turns out that California Dan was a regular at a nearby homeless shelter when he was reported missing, and around the same time, an obituary featuring Boston Dan’s photo was printed in the local newspaper. The latter’s real name is Roger Parsons, and it’s beginning to look like the fast-living Parsons faked his own death after his girlfriend overdosed, with the goal of starting over across the country – which he did, and helped kids in need to boot. That night, Jane and Maura follow a lead, ending up at a club where two things of note happen: Jane has straight hair, and another of her credit cards gets declined. Honestly, I’m not sure which is weirder. Oh, also, Jane tracks down Parsons’ former boss, who employed Parsons off the books to obtain drugs for VIP guests, but nothing shakes out.

As for Jane’s canceled credit cards, Nina has news: A hacker got into her accounts and canceled them all without touching her money. Whaaat? According to executive producer Jan Nash, this is the beginning of the show’s end-of-season arc (just the summer portion of the season, don’t worry), so the mystery won’t be wrapped up in Rizzoli & Isles 6×11.

A regular Cagney & Lacey

The same can’t be said for Jane’s homicide case. It turns out someone using the identity of Dustin Shaw, another dead homeless man who lived at the shelter with Parsons, flew to Boston from LA and back again around the time Parsons was murdered. Jane gets a tip that a bar down the block from the shelter cashes Social Security checks for patrons and heads over to check things out. The bartender, Michael, looks an awful lot like the guy using Shaw’s identity, whose image was captured on airport footage while he was making the trip to kill Parsons.

With the perpetrator captured, the only thing left to do is connect the final dots. Using hair analysis, Maura reveals that Walsh, an alcoholic, got sober a few months before he died. Jane surmises that he must have caught on to the bartender’s scheme and threatened to expose him around the time that Parsons was looking to make a new start, which prompted Michael to kill Walsh and sell his identity to Parsons. Once Walsh turned up dead, Parsons had to die too, ergo Michael a.k.a. Shaw’s impromptu trip to Boston. Needless to say, Jane’s LAPD counterpart is impressed, commmenting, “You two are like a regular Cagney and Lacey.”

Hey, it only took six seasons for someone on the show to make that comparison.

With Walsh and Parsons’ murders all wrapped up, Rizzoli & Isles 6×11 draws to a close… but not before Nina drops a final bombshell on Jane. During her investigation of the hacker who compromised Jane’s account, Nina came across a disturbing video that indicates the fire at Jane’s old apartment building was no accident – and whoever set the blaze wants Jane to know it was done on purpose.

So, who’s the culprit? My guess is that creepy kid Daniel from episode 6×07 because of that throwaway line about his obsession with fire, but next week’s episode – which is also the summer finale – should shed more light. Tune in Tuesday at 9/8c on TNT!