Rizzoli & Isles 6×03 – Deadly Harvest – Recap

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Let’s talk about how every episode from this season so far has begun with Jane and Maura being domestic at Maura’s house. I’m not saying they’re married, but… they’re married. Also, does Jane even have an apartment anymore? Anyway, on with the Rizzoli & Isles 6×03 recap.

Action vs. emotional resonance

Angela’s been AWOL of late, and Jane and Maura miss their mother and mother-in-law, respectively, so they decide to make plans to go out that night. Jane suggests a Bruins game, Maura proposes Jello shots and arm-wrestling, Jane briefly lights up before she realizes Maura’s being sarcastic, then Maura suggests dinner and a movie. She’ll cook, provided Jane does the dishes. Iron Man 3? Not so much; Maura wants something with more “emotional resonance,” like Steel Magnolias or Terms of Endearment. Stop me when this deviates from a married couple’s conversation in any way whatsoever. Ultimately, however, the movie choice is immaterial because Angela has plans. She claims to be taking a French cooking class, but Jane’s skeptical. A cross-examination will have to wait, though: There’s a murder to solve, and the crime scene in Rizzoli & Isles 6×03 may just beat last week’s bass-fishing competition as the most eyebrow-raising of its kind in a while.

Jane and Maura head to Boston Cambridge University’s body farm where, amid all the research bodies, there’s a month-old corpse that doesn’t belong. Needless to say, Maura’s thrilled by their surroundings. “It’s like Disneyland for her,” Jane comments. “Plenty of dead bodies to play with and none of the long lines,” Korsak observes. Ba-dum-chhh. The one-liners keep coming when Jane has a barely civil encounter with the professor who oversees the happenings at the body farm, but apparently not very well. “From an academic perspective, Dr. Carlson is a highly respected forensic anthropologist,” Maura tells her. “From a people’s perspective, he’s a dick,” Jane counters. Everyone’s got jokes this week.

‘I don’t think that happened’

Back at the morgue, Maura determines that despite the factors surrounding the body’s discovery, murder probably wasn’t the cause of death. In fact, indicators suggest suicide by hanging – which, as Jane points out, makes about as sense as the fact that the woman was buried in an old house coat and slippers.

So she hung herself and then drove her body over to the body farm and then tucked herself in under some garbage? …I don’t think that happened.

Fun fact: According to showrunner Jan Nash, Angie Harmon ad-libbed that last sentence.

There may not be a lot you can count on in this world, but Angie Harmon bringing the lulz is a safe bet – as is Jane Rizzoli being unable to let things go. Over at the Dirty Robber, she quizzes her mother on what the “French cooking class” has covered so far. When you’re a terrible liar and your daughter’s a cop, you’re probably going to get busted sooner rather than later, and sure enough, Angela quickly fesses up. Much to Jane’s horror, she’s actually taking ice-skating lessons.

Angela: Why can’t you be supportive?!
Jane: Why can’t you take up bingo?!

Underneath all the criticism of her mother’s athletic ability or lack thereof, Jane is genuinely worried because female athletes are twice as likely to sustain concussions as men. Has she been reading Maura’s medical journals? Nope, just watching ESPN. With that, she gets called back to the crime scene, but before she leaves, she makes her mother promise to stop skating. Ugh, Jane’s no fun.

Curiouser and curiouser

At the body farm, yet another rogue corpse has been discovered, and this one’s been at the site for at least a year. Another suicide? Not this time – the cause of death was a gunshot wound to the head. Despite the different CODs, there’s a connection: A hair from Victim No. 1 is found on Victim No. 2. Curiouser and curiouser. “We know one thing for sure,” Korsak quips, “He didn’t kill her.” Nina and Frankie do their tech thing in the BRIC and find a missing person’s report filed for a married couple around the time the male victim died. Everything starts coming together when the results of the tox screen on the female victim, Bonnie, come back, revealing she was on a low dose of ketamine – enough to make her easily controllable, which could explain the hanging that presented as a suicide. Korsak and Jane talk to Bonnie’s sister, who says the police wouldn’t take her concerns seriously because Bonnie mailed a letter of resignation to her employer around the time she and her husband disappeared.

Remember that highly respected forensic anthropologist who was also a dick? His abrasive demeanor may have been hiding a guilty conscience. Turns out he was at the body farm the night the first victim was buried, but although he saw wheel marks and freshly disturbed dirt, he never reported the incident. As for the second body, he claims to have been out of town during the window of time it could have been dumped. The “who” may still be up in the air, but Maura’s honing in on the “what” – she suspects the house coat and slippers were part of some kind of fantasy, and Bonnie was killed after she failed to live up to expectations. In the five weeks since she was murdered, it’s quite possible her murderer has already found another woman to hold captive. Sure enough, two women who went missing the previous week match her physical description, and one – Sarah – submitted a letter of resignation identical to Bonnie’s.

Good old-fashioned detective work

Through some good old-fashioned detective work, Nina figures out a link: Jeffrey, the guy who delivers bottled water to the missing girl’s office, also used to make drop-offs at the body farm, and he may have kept a key. Jane, Frankie and Korsak head to his residence, and although he isn’t there, they do find some clues in the form of a first draft of the resignation letter crumpled in the trash, plus family photos featuring the man’s mom wearing a house coat. Surprise, surprise: His mother was hanged by his father back in the 1970s. As Korsak puts it, “The apple didn’t fall far from the freak tree.” They figure out that he’s holding Sarah at his parents’ old house and get to her just in time.

Remember how concerned Jane was about her mom taking ice-skating lessons? Turns out she was right to be worried – Angela sustains a sprained ankle, but doesn’t want to give up her classes. Jane apologizes for telling her what to do and admits she reacted the way she did because she always wanted to take skating lessons as a kid. It turns out that Angela doesn’t even like her new pastime, but she met a man who loves skating and hockey and wants to be part of his world. They share a tearful hug and all’s right in the Rizzoli family once more. Then, Jane shows up at Maura’s door holding a copy of Thelma and Louise, a movie that’s both action-packed and emotionally resonant. Maura notes that she and Jane, like Thelma and Louise, are two very different women who found a common connection, and they proceed to bicker over who’s yin and who’s yang. As Rizzoli & Isles 6×03 draws to a close, all’s right in the Rizzles world once more as well.