Rizzoli & Isles 6×17 – Bomb Voyage – Recap

First off, I’d like to mention that before I even watched Rizzoli & Isles 6×17, it was my favorite episode of season 6B based solely on the pun-tastic title: “Bomb Voyage.” Now that statement of bias is out there, on with the recap.

Sharp-ass thorns

Rizzoli & Isles 6×17 opens with a guy doing t’ai chi in a remote, wooded area. The scene is all very calm and restful… until said guy goes boom. If the explosion was too realistic for your liking, take heart – this photo tweeted by executive producer Jan Nash shows T’ai Chi Guy up and smiling and no worse for wear.

Speaking of smiling, we cut to Maura wearing stripes, which makes me smile. (Yup, that’s really my transition sentence.) She walks into Frankie’s apartment calling “Morning!” as Jane emerges from the teeny-tiny closet bedroom she’s been staying in since her apartment burned down. How precious is it that Maura apparently has her own key? Anyway, Jane’s packing for her upcoming move to Maura’s professor friend’s vacant town house, but she won’t leave without a decidedly “dead-ish” cactus that survived the fire at Jane’s old place. “He might be a little charred, but, you know, he’s still got some sharp-ass thorns,” Jane observes. “Spines, I think they’re called,” Maura corrects her, then follows with, “I like the metaphor. We’ll put it on the best ledge in the house.” Before everyone’s hearts have time to grow three sizes and burst out of their chests, Frankie galumphs into the room and instantly ruins the moment by declaring that Jane living with him is cramping his love life and he’s happy she’s leaving. Little brothers, am I right? However, Jane has some ammo: Frankie sleeps in baseball pajamas that their mom bought him, so it’s safe to say his cohabitation with his sister is probably not his biggest turnoff.

Kid-tested, mother-approved

Oh, hey, so remember T’ai Chi Guy? Maura and Jane arrive at the crime scene (“I would like [nature] a lot more if there were fewer dead people in it,” huffs Jane), where Korsak tells them there’s been an explosion. When T’ai Chi Guy’s finger fell out of a tree in front of a passing jogger, the quick-thinking jogger put it in a sandwich bag for preservation.

Korsak: “The jogger didn’t want a critter to carry off with a partial digit.”
Maura: “Very considerate, though my evidence now has granola on it.”
Jane: “Kid-tested, mother-approved.”

Ba-dum-chhh. Angie Harmon really is great with one-liners.

As Jane, Maura, and Korsak roam the crime scene, Jane notes that the bomb squad is going to want to find all the pieces of the explosive device to ensure it’s fully detonated. Should anyone even be there before the bomb squad does that? Probably not, but TV shows like to take liberties with police procedure from time to time, and Rizzoli & Isles 6×17 is no exception. Korsak finally notices that they’re standing in the middle of a minefield, and he, Jane, and Maura duly freeze in place while the bomb squad works on clearing a pathway to safety. As they wait, Jane and Maura bicker adorably – and in front of an increasingly incredulous bomb specialist, no less.

Maura’s the first to get the all-clear, and she immediately heads back to the lab. At first I’m like “Worst girlfriend ever!” but then Maura tells Kent that the best way to help Jane (and Korsak) is to focus on solving the crime before the perpetrator hurts anybody else. The first step is identifying the victim. Turns out T’ai Chi Guy has a name (John Franklin) and a fairly ironic occupation – he’s the co-founder of an NGO that specializes in de-mining former war zones.

Just then, Frankie bursts in (for those keeping count, that’s the second time he’s done as much in Rizzoli & Isles 6×17) and proceeds to tackle-glomp Maura.

Frankie: “Maura! I’m so glad you’re OK!”
Maura: “Thank you for your concern, but I feel like I need to remind you that the one kiss we shared meant nothing – and BT-dubs, I’m dating your sister now.”

(OK, Maura technically only thanked him for his concern, but we all know she meant the second part of that sentence as well.)

In which Jane has issues with authority

Back at the minefield, Jane’s cleared to leave the site. She wants to stay, but Korsak hurries her away on a mission to find him some pizza. As soon as she’s out of earshot, he shares a sobering piece of information with the bomb techs: He’s standing on the edge of a land mine. Once Jane finds out, she’s determined to head back to the site and keep Korsak company, no matter how much the bomb squad protests.

“Let me explain something to you: That is one of the finest detectives I have ever known, and he is standing out there alone waiting to see if he’s gonna blow up. …I’m going.”

Cut to Jane wearing a very fetching helmet but little other protective gear, presumably because anything too robust would encumber her delicious swagger, and, well, we can’t have that. She walks further toward Korsak than she’s supposed to and then takes off the helmet, at which point the lead bomb guy is basically just like “Fine, whatever” because he’s totally been Rizzoli’d and there’s nothing he can really do. Jane and Korsak proceed to have a heart-to-heart about their lives being blown up (metaphorically and perilously close to literally), and Korsak gets a little choked up about Kiki, which leads to him asking Jane to be his best man. Honestly, Jane and Maura are totally going to have a female best man at their wedding, so this is good training for Jane, who says she’d be “honored” to accept the role.

In the meantime, Maura cashes in on “a lifetime’s worth of favors” to get a top-of-the-line bomb detonation cover from the Advanced Material Research Center. I love the personality aspects that this bomb situation is bringing out in Jane and Maura – Jane wants to physically be there for Korsak, while Maura is all about using her intellect and influence. Together, they’re the complete package, and thus, they should get married. First, there’s the small matter of saving Korsak, though.

Bomb Squad Dude, a.k.a. Bryce: “Time to head back to the command center.”
Jane: “OK, go ahead.”
Bryce: “No, you.”
Jane: “No!”
Korsak: “This is Bryce’s operation, Detective.”
Jane: “And I’m not going anywhere, Sergeant.”

You know that part in My Big Fat Greek Wedding when the wife says that the man is the head of the family but the woman is the neck, and she can turn the head any way she wants? That’s totally the dynamic at BPD Homicide, just saying. Jane eventually agrees to retreat to the command center, where she and Maura hold hands. There’s a deafening explosion, then Jane and Maura run back to the site and hug a relieved (and intact) Korsak tightly.

Meanwhile, Frankie mansplains mines to Nina, who’s sorting through the NGO’s emails in an effort to pinpoint their perpetrator. She zeroes in on Jenny, an ex-employee of the NGO who’s also John’s ex-girlfriend. Jenny points them toward a married hotel heiress who had been spending a lot of time with John, but the heiress claims their relationship was strictly professional and in turn points to John’s business partner – Walter Park, the NGO’s other co-founder. Honestly, whenever a victim is a co-founder or co-owner, it’s a safe bet that the other co-whatever was responsible for his or her death, and that turns out to be the case in Rizzoli & Isles 6×17. Following a tense standoff, Park is put behind bars where he belongs.

One more cactus

Remember the ongoing mystery of who’s after Jane and why? Nina’s been diligently following leads for the past few episodes, and it seems she’s finally hit pay dirt in the form of a woman named Rhonda, who was incarcerated at the same jail where Jane’s arsonist was being held and where Maura’s kidnapper worked. What’s more, Rhonda is the cousin of the hacker who broke into Jane’s bank accounts. When Rhonda’s brought in for questioning, Jane loses her cool in the interrogation room – and, honestly, who can blame her, after what she’s been through? “I’ll give you a reason to sue me!” she snarls at Rhonda, and it’s – it’s kind of hot? Korsak drags her outside, where she breaks down in tears. The conversation isn’t a total loss, though; Rhonda denies telling anyone at the prison about her cousin the hacker, which, of course, means she totally told someone at the prison about her cousin the hacker.

By the time dinnertime rolls around, Jane’s too busy trying to connect people at the prison to both Rhonda and psycho psychiatrist Joe Harris to accept Maura’s invitation to check out a pub in Charlestown, so Maura sits down beside her and starts going through files. “Just think of me as one more cactus on your ledge,” she tells Jane, and the two of them proceed to share microwaved noodles like a crime-solving Lady and the Tramp.

Over at the Dirty Robber, Kiki reassures Korsak that although the landmine and the realities of his job hit her hard, she still wants to marry him. What’s more, Angela gets inspired by Korsak’s new outlook (“Life is unpredictable and precious – we should always live for the moment, landmine or no landmine”) and decides to accept boyfriend Ron’s invitation to accompany him to Paris for a medical conference. She shares the news with Jane, Maura, and Frankie while wearing what her daughter describes as “a jaunty beret,” and Frankie promptly asks, “Paris, France?” As my own sister would say, he’s “not the sharpest bulb in the shed.” Read that again. Yup.

So, all’s well that ends well in Rizzoli & Isles 6×17? Um… almost. While at the Robber, Jane gets a call from Nina, who thinks she’s identified the woman who’s out to get Jane. It’s Alice Sands, a classmate of Jane’s at the police academy. Oh, and one more thing? Sands was released from prison three days earlier. Sounds like next week’s season 6 finale is going to be dramatic…