Life: "Evil...And His Brother Ziggy"

Life, Season 2
Air Date: 12.3.2008

Before beginning to investigate the murder of the week, Crews and Reese get a little personal time. Crews uses his to un-kidnap himself from Rayborn, who explains that the kidnapping was the accidental result of an overzealous bodyguard. Rayborn actually seems interested in speaking with Crews under less coercive circumstances, and invites Crews to a fundraiser Rayborn is hosting Saturday night.

Meanwhile, Reese is enjoying the time off by wandering around her apartment in her underwear, sucking on a lollipop. And if you're the sort of person inclined to enjoy that mental image, let me ruin it for you by explaining that Tidwell is lying naked in her bed as this is happening. I know. Reese does redeem herself somewhat for this lapse in judgement by ordering Tidwell to cut his hair. Amen, sister.

Later that day, Crews and Reese are off to the reservation to serve as a neutral investigatory party for the murder of a California state trooper, Hawes. A Captain Whitehat (on the nose much?) explains that the tribe has recently hired their own police force to replace the troopers, now that an almost complete casino promises to make them all rich. Crews and Reese discover that the troopers are viewed as white interlopers in the tribe, so Hawes appears to have had lots of enemies. One such enemy is a Tomas Shasta, a councilmember who complained that Hawes' presence on the rez violated tribal law. Shasta has an alibi, though, in the form of his fiancee Anna.

While poking around Hawes' trailer, Captain Whitehat plays a mysterious voicemail Hawes' left on Whitehat's phone, referencing "money, guns and evil."

Shasta and his buddies don't take kindly to the appearance of Crews and Reese, and are somehow involved in the disappearance of the detectives' car. This forces our partners-in-crime-fighting to spend the night at the casino, where they are forced to share a room. Sadly for Crews, this also results in him answering the phone while Reese is in the shower, and being treated to some very uncomfortable dirty talk from a unwitting Tidwell. Not surprisingly, this is more horrifying for him than spending 12 years in prison for a crime he didn't commit.

Crews leaves Reese alone to have all the phone sex she wants, while he sleeps in Hawes' trailer. There, he's visited by the ghost of Hawes, who expresses his love for the tribe and his secret desire to belong. Upon waking from this dream, Crews discovers a non-ghost Anna, who explains that Hawes taught her about her tribal roots and was like a second father to her. Crews asks Anna about the mysterious voicemail, which she explains is referencing Eval, the unfortunately named casino developer hired by the tribe.

The search for Eval takes the team back to L.A., where Eval and his "brother" are based. The brother turns out to be a super hot chick named Ziggy, who seems way more evil than Eval and frankly, gave me the creeps. Eval and Ziggy don't know much about Hawes, but they do complain that Captain Whitehat has been stalking them. Sure enough, there's Whitehat down the street.

Whitehat explains that she thinks Hawes' messages has to do with illegal guns on the reservation. Tidwell finds out that Eval has hired a gunsmith to work for him on the reservation, converting rifles to fully automatic weapons. Whitehat points out that Eval and Ziggy park their expensive cars in their driveway, instead of their massive suburban garage.

The team won't be able to get a warrant for Eval's garage until the next day, so Crews invites Whitehat to stay with him. This turns out to be a fantastic idea, as it puts Crews' dysfunctional adopted family on full display. First Crews is embarrassed by Ted, who has ordered Indian food in honor of their Native American guest. Then Rachel shows up acting teenagery, and she and Crews bicker about neither of them spending the previous night at the house (with their identical trust issues, they might as well related). Then Ted non-sequitors that he's in love Olivia, Crew's soon-to-be stepmom. Sadly Christina Hendricks does not appear in this episode. But Crews does deliver the line of the night to Whitehat after this shitstorm goes down: "White people." Indeed.

The search of Eval's garage reveals a bunch of guns. In custody, Eval explains that Hawes wanted the tribe to fire Eval because he wasn't a tribe member. Eval attempted to bribe Hawes, but Hawes refused. Wondering why Hawes wouldn't take the money, Crews and Reese investigate his finances. They turn up a recent payment to the Chillicothe County Courthouse.

Turns out that Hawes had found out that Anna's father, Loomis, was conning the tribe. Neither Anna nor Loomis were actually Native, but Loomis had moved them onto the rez back before the casino money made membership lucrative. When Loomis found out that Hawes knew, he shot him to prevent Hawes from telling Anna and Tomas. Once Anna married Tomas, she'd be entitled to tribe money and apparently so would Loomis by proxy. When Anna finds that her actual dad killed her spiritual father, she threatens to kill Loomis. Tomas talks her down. Loomis is arrested.

Crews attends Rayborn's fundraiser, where Rayborn reveals that he has six months to live. And apparently he'd like Crews to take his confession before he dies. Hopefully his confession will explain some things about the Bank of L.A. heist and Jack Reese, because I'm honestly getting a little tired of the conspiracy hold-over from last season.