'The Mentalist': Going up in flames

 Tonight on The Mentalist, we have a small-town murder. Does anybody remember Murder in Small Town X? I liked that show. Every night when they'd send two contestants off to a creepy locale and only one would return, I would always get pretty freaked out even though I knew nothing would actually happen to either of them. Yes, I'm a wuss. Anyway...

Curtain up tonight on Patrick playing a mind game with Lisbon. He's making her imagine shapes and "send" them to his mind. He guesses that it's a triangle inside a circle, which is exactly what I was imagining too! Weird! (Probably a common choice.) He jokes that he can actually read her mind now and she blushes. She is Saved by the Dead Body, as the team whisks off to Marquesa, California to investigate an arson.

They come upon a burnt scene with a car as the source. Patrick observes that Piller been crying and guesses the victim and Piller served in the national guard together. Hey, Chief Piller is Cult Leader Josh from Veronica Mars episode "Drinking the Kool-Aid." Cool! Rigsby realizes the arson was of a garage and Garcia, the victim, was locked inside. Patrick discovers the arsonist watched the fire from a nearby scarecrow.

At Garcia's farmhouse, Rigsby says it was very professionally done arson, with an electronic timer and a rocket fuel-like acclerant. Lisbon, Patrick and Piller interview the widow. Piller touches the widow's arm, which I saw coming a mile away. Please let it be something other than them having an affair. Surprise me, show! The widow thanks a man named Ben for doing some chores. He's a real estate agent who also served with Garcia and Piller. I'm pretty sure I recognize him from a Quantum Leap episode, the one where Sam's a priest. I have watched far too much TV.

After Ben leaves, Lisbon takes the widow and Patrick helps himself to some food (snerk) while examining the family photos. Patrick questions Maddie, the daughter, about the lack of military paraphenalia. She says her dad used to have it displayed, but took it down awhile ago. She also alludes to the fact that her mom doesn't really love her or her father.

Widow interview. Susan saw the fire and heard her husband screaming from inside. A boy named Tommy interrupts, having brought Susan some food. Susan tells the detectives that Tommy is a mentally-challenged boy who does odd jobs. Hey, it's Chip from Kate & Allie! I am immediately suspicious of the mentally-challenged boy. Maddie yells at her mother to call him "retarded" and how she never tells the truth and storms off. Patrick then lays it out that Maddie suspects her mom's lover of killing her father. The mother is sleeping with Chief Piller (awww, really? REALLY?) and Patrick and Lisbon suspect that she isn't sure of PIller's innocence in Garcia's death. She confesses to sleeping with Piller but says Piller would never hurt her husband.

Rigsby and Van Pelt interview Reese, a local mechanic, who was the last to see Garcia before he died. Reese lets the detectives know that Garcia is the second man in their town from the National Guard unit to die in an arson. David Martin was the first, three years ago. Van Pelt recieves a phone call. (I'm pretty sure Reese played a villain on a CSI episode once, and Wallace's mom's creepy tenant on Veronica Mars. The VMars alums are popping up ALL OVER tonight!)

Cut to Piller's house, smoke billowing from the windows and screaming from inside. Rigsby runs inside, throws a chair through the living room window and carries a burning Chief PIller out. Van Pelt strips off her jacket to put out the flames on Rigsby's arm. It's very heroic! Go Rigsby! That house isn't the only thing on fire; Van Pelt's panties just burst into flames!

Van Pelt changes Rigsby's dressing, telling him that Piller isn't out of the woods yet. Lisbon arrives and tells them that the doctors found tranquilizers in Piller's sytem. So the victims are doped up just enough to wake up so they can burn to death. Awesome. Cho is dispatched to talk to Susan Garcia about Dave Martin. She tells him David's death was an accident because he passed out with a cigarette in his hand. She also informs Cho that David, Ben, Trey and Garcia were in business together. They bought 5 acres and let David live there. Tommy the Challenged Boy lives there now and Ben is the only owner still alive.

Speak of the devil, Patrick and Lisbon arrive at Tommy's trailer on the property. Patrick spies a copy of Moby Dick tucked in with Tommy's children's books and toys and then takes off into the brush, where he finds a fenced-in open-air greenhouse type thing that Tommy has been growing. He found a natural aquifer, which he uses to grow his plants.

Rigsby and Van Pelt in recovery. Doped-up Rigsby tells Grace she has a lovely name and then he tells her he loves her. Her reaction is to put her fingers in her ears and hum, which is AWESOME. She shoots him down because they work together and there are rules. In the middle of her speech, he falls asleep. HAHA! Cho relieves her from RIgsby-watch and they skedaddle.

Ben's house. He starts shooting at them until he realizes they're cops. Cho finds 6 jugs of accelerant in his barn. They cuff him and haul him off. In interrogation, Ben claims he's being framed. He's worried he'll be next, since his fellow owners of the land are all dead. They think the aquifer is perfect motive for Ben to kill the others, which of course means he didn't do it.

Patrick intercedes, saying Dave Martin is the arsonist. Patrick says the other three tried to kill Dave and he faked his death and is now taking his revenge. Huh. That's a little too Scooby-Doo for my taste. Ben insists that Dave's death was merely a tragic accident, but Patrick says that someone is enacting revenge and he says, "I hope you burn like a candle, you miserable son-of-a-bitch." Oooh, Mean Patrick is HOT. H-O-T.

Outside, Patrick informs LIsbon that they have to let Ben go because he's their bait. Their tethered goat. Heh heh, Jurassic Park. "Is he gonna eat the goat?" Lisbon says Ben is not a goat, but Patrick says that Ben helped burn Dave Martin alive and deserves to suffer a little because it's about vengeance. Lisbon tells Cho to let Ben go, saying that Patrick needs to learn about consequences and that if Ben gets hurt it'll be on Patrick. Uhh, what? She can't just turn Ben loose so as to teach Patrick a lesson! Oh my god, Lisbon! Patrick then informs Lisbon that when he catches Red John, he's going to gut him like a fish and let him slowly bleed to death. Lisbon says if he does so, she'll have to try to stop him and she'll have to punish him if he succeeds. Innnteresting.

Cho and Rigsby stake-out Ben's house. The following exchange occurs and it must be included verbatim because I almost wet my pants from laughing and had to rewind my TIVO because I missed like the next 2 solid minutes of action. Rigsby says to Cho, "You thinkin' what I'm thinkin'?" and Cho says, "No." Rigsby asks how he could know that for sure and Cho deadpans, "I was thinking how I wish I could go back in time and have sex with my 8th grade History teach Ms. Hoofaker." Oh my god, awesome.

Anyway, Rigsby points out that Reese is new in town, yet pointed them in the direction of Dave Martin. He also has burn scars on his arms. They think he may be Dave Martin in a wig. They drive off to Reese's garage. Of course, while they question him, Ben is lured out to his barn. Ruh-roh!

Barn of Creaky Doors and Ominous Shadows. Ben is locked in (a board across the doors on the outside) and the barn is started on fire by a creepy-ass mysterious figure up in the hayloft. It's Dave Martin, being very Jason from Friday the 13th. How did he get from outside to the hayloft so fast? Does he have an accomplice?

In Dave's Villains-Must-Explain-Themselves-And-Thus-Give-The-Police-Time-To-Save-The-Day Speech, he reveals that he is actually Patrick Jane in a rubber mask. Wow, I did not see that coming. Seriously.I love it when I get surprised. Now that Patrick got Ben to confess, he goes for a machete and advances on Patrick. Patrick threatens to drop the lighter, but a voice rings out from outside the barn, calling for Ben. Someone throws a fire bomb at the barn with Ben and Patrick trapped inside. Cho and Rigsby show up just as Ben and Patrick run out from behind the barn. They arrest Ben for killing Dave Martin and Rigsby takes off chasing a figure running into the woods. It's Tommy.

Interrogation. Cho asks Tommy if he likes to burn things and he says no, fire hurts. He keeps asking for root beer. Lisbon tells Patrick there is no way Tommy is capable of this. They think someone is manipulating him. Patrick goes into interrogation and tells Tommy he knows he's not dumb. He spotted the Moby Dick at his house and tricks Tommy into revealing that he's read it. Tommy keeps trying to play dumb, but Patrick says he should've spotted it right away. He wore a death shirt to the Garcia house and Patrick says only a true idiot or a daring killer would have worn that shirt to a house in mourning. Tommy finally gives up the act and Patrick asks if there are 2 personalities or if Tommy is just an act. He says Tommy is a performance. He realized a few months ago what the other guys did to Dave and went out for revenge, calling it beautiful and redemptive. He wants Patrick to tell Maddie that he's sorry for causing her pain.

At the Garcia house, Maddie cries and screams about getting revenge on Tommy, and Patrick tells her not to get caught in the revenge cycle. He says revenge is for fools and madmen. He makes Maddie and her mother hug and they cry together. Outside, Patrick tells Lisbon that what he said about revenge is total nonsense. It's hard to tell if he means it.

Okay, so I sniffed the mentally challenged boy as the culprit, but I enjoyed that he wasn't actually mentally challenged. I didn't see that coming, I thought they'd go another way. Also, what's with the white people pairings? Van Pelt and Rigsby, Lisbon and Patrick. Poor Cho is just left out in the cold!

'NCIS': What Would Tyler Durden Do?

On a long enough time line, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero. It’s the job of NCIS to figure out why some of those people die unnaturally. Of course, I think Gibbs and the gang would find it more helpful if those involved would break the first two rules.

The Spoilers are now a part of Project Mayhem, having been moved out of the basement.

Camping is fun, except when someone not invited is lurking in the bushes. It’s only two kids not invited to a party, although the guy tries to invite himself anyway with a bottle of Jägermeister as a peace offering. Before the offer can be accepted, yet another guy stumbles from the woods, only he falls dead.

DiNozzo is taking pictures of his best “deep in thought�?face with his webcam. Seems a new website designed to help you one-up the world has been created, and the competitive side of DiNozzo has taken over. Ibeatyou.com�?yes, it’s for real. Of course, Ziva doesn’t really see the point of the website. DiNozzo says it’s for fun. Ziva tries to rally McGee on her side, but he’s already challenging for the best psycho face. Gibbs rounds up the gang. Over the river and through the woods, they find Petty Officer Greg Collins looking beat the hell up. Ducky notices blunt force trauma, but also notices that the officer’s minor injuries were tended to but the major ones were ignored. Once they find the car with bullet holes, DiNozzo notes someone else was directly involved.

During the autopsy, Ducky confirms Collins suffered injuries in both the crash and in the time before. He shows Gibbs proof the killer also helped to wrap the wounds.

Ziva is looking through crime scene photos when Gibbs wants them displayed on the big screen. Of course, one of the candid air guitar photos shows up during the process. McGee catches Greg’s phone in use, so the gang zips over to his house. Once there, McGee finds a wad of cash in a laundry basket, Ziva finds a bloody towel while DiNozzo finds teeth. The friendly neighborhood watch saunter over to offer all the information they can. Ever since Greg moved in, the quiet street isn’t so quiet anymore. With his finger on the pulse of late 90s pop culture, DiNozzo figures out the suburbs has a new fight club franchise.

Running the prints, Abby finds no fingerprint matches, but is reinvigorated once McGee switches in a new Big Gulp for her. From the DNA search reveals the profile of one Sam Bennett, a regular wayward loser, currently part of a salvage crew on the USS Rubicon. Once on the ship, the foreman tells DiNozzo and McGee that Sam is on the run. With jobs like that, the crews are normally less than reputable.

 Back at NCIS, DiNozzo can’t get a man on the other side of a phone conversation to cooperate, but lucky for him, Sam is carted into NCIS anyway. In the interrogation room, Gibbs learns that Greg was a real pal to Sam, even going as far as securing the welding job for him. When Gibbs presses for information on the fighting, Sam upholds the code he swore to. After quite the back-and-forth, Sam confesses to killing Greg, but the gang quickly figure out he’s taking credit for something he didn’t do. Gibbs wants names of the fighters, but all Sam gives is nicknames.

McGee and Abby study Greg’s car. Abby would pay to see Gibbs versus the Terminator while McGee wants to lay money on a Gibbs/Godzilla smack down. Once the fun is over, the lab rat shows our fearless leader a computer simulation of the car being accosted by another car. Of course, McGee traces part of the paint to a brand new 2009 Maserati Quattroporte, linking the specific car to one Tabitha Summers. She arrives at NCIS with Dale, her attorney/fourth husband in tow. She doesn’t recognize Greg from a photo, but knows her car when she sees it. Gibbs focuses on gathering names while Ziva wants information on the car. They’re being not quite as cooperative as NCIS would like.

Running new prints, Abby gets a partial from Dale, but when the gang tries to corner the guy, Tabitha reenters the building saying he has driven off in the car. McGee runs the plates proving in the process his alibi is less than stellar. Abby locates encrypted files on his laptop. Once unlocked, they find it’s nothing but naughty instant message chat files. From the chat logs, they get an address.

 At the apartment, Gibbs and DiNozzo are invited in by quite the sexy voice. The two find hidden cameras and a dummy in the shower which takes their picture. Gibbs picks the lock on the equipment, revealing multiple monitors recording their every move. McGee determines the apartment is nothing more than a blackmailing operation targeting rich men finding it difficult keeping it in their pants. The big reveal is that the whole enterprise is registered to the dead petty officer.

The gang finds the ritzy car in question at Greg’s house. They surround the house and prepare to move in, only to find Dale dead in the backyard. Blunt force trauma is once again the name of the game. The neighborhood watch reappears again, telling Gibbs they saw Sam earlier that day. Later, they determine Sam lured Dale to the house, calling from the shipyard.

Back at the USS Rubicon, no one is to be found. They split up and search the ship when the lights go out. DiNozzo finds where Sam’s been sleeping. McGee runs into Sam, who makes a run for it. After some tense moments waiting for McGee to respond to frequent hails, Gibbs finally finds him placing the cuffs on the wayward loser. At NCIS, Sam says it wasn’t him. Simultaneously, Abby checks out discrepancies in the emails Dale received. Meanwhile, the now vindicated Sam is offered a lineup by Gibbs to point out the real killer. Adam Parker, the head of the neighborhood watch, arrives at NCIS with the same deal. Parker peers into the interrogation room and immediately identifies Sam as the killer, but when the roles are reversed, Sam singles out Parker without hesitation.

In the end, DiNozzo heads off to a midnight screening of Goodfellas and invites Ziva, but she declines, only to stay behind and practice her air guitar.

The next all-new NCIS is in two weeks, so until then, have fun!

'Eleventh Hour': How the BCS is like the Emmy Awards

First things first, the news. CBS announced earlier this week that it has ordered five additional episodes of Eleventh Hour, bringing the show to a season total of 18. The show will continue in the same Thursdays-at-10 timeslot through early April. It's an overdue but nevertheless appreciated show of support from the network for a series that is still having some growing pains but which certainly seems to be getting stronger over time as it figures out who these characters really are. Eighteen episodes is not what has traditionally been called a full season, which is traditionally 22, but eighteen is good. Eighteen I can be very happy with. And I've gone very firmly on record in the past espousing a less-is-more attitude toward season lengths, so I'd much rather have 18 strong episodes than 18 strong episodes plus 4 mediocre filler episodes.

So how was this episode, strong or mediocre? I'd lean toward saying it was pretty good. The more we get to learn about who Jacob Hood and Rachel Young are, the better the show is going to get, and there were some very, very positive developments to that end here. The case-o'-the-week takes Hood and Young to Oklahoma, where several students at Tulsa State College have come down with the bends - a condition associated with scuba diving where the body reacts poorly to pressure changes. Oklahoma is not exactly a hotbed of scuba diving, so it's instantly a stumper.

The first two students, Tom and Tara, both died, necessitating Hood's arrival on the scene. We're soon introduced to the next victim. Lawrence and Isaac Richmond are two brothers attending school together. Isaac is the brains; Lawrence is the brawn. He's a stud on the football team, leading the Tulsa State Titans to a possible berth in the Cotton Bowl, which has everybody on campus excited. (Why is the Cotton Bowl not really something to be excited about? And what does that have to do with the Emmy Awards? That'll be at the end of the post.)

Isaac accompanies Lawrence on a run, and soon collapses. Isaac has the bends too, but thanks to Hood now being here, it might not be fatal. Hood gets Young to demand that a pressure chamber be flown in, and Isaac is inserted into the chamber, which will buy everyone some time before the condition can kill him.

Jacob and Rachel are assisted by Blake Miller, the head of campus security and a former FBI agent. The three of them start looking for possible leads. The first possible lead is that Tara's boyfriend had recently scored some designer drugs, so maybe the drugs caused the condition somehow. Nope; dead end. Testing reveals them to be sham drugs, just sugar. So it's on to the second possible lead. A look at health records reveals that all three victims had recently been administered flu shots at the student health clinic. Did the vaccine somehow go bad? Nope, that's not the answer either. But it'll lead to some different answers entirely.

Hood examines the vaccine and doesn't find anything wrong with it. But when he examines the blood of second victim Tara, he finds that she didn't have any of the vaccine in her blood anyway. She went to get a flu shot, but was apparently dosed with something else instead. So it's up to Young and Blake Miller to investigate the people who were administering the flu shots.

While they're running down these leads, Rachel and Blake exhibit some chemistry, and we're treated to some meaningful character development for Rachel as a result. Blake lays on a whole lot of flattery, but Rachel's response is bittersweet. She likes Blake, but she has resigned herself to the fact that her job isn't going to allow for any sort of relationship, so it's not worth it to get too close to Blake and just get herself heartbroken. "It's hard when I get back to my real life," she tells Blake. "How are we supposed to have relationships in this job?" For once, Rachel isn't talking like a hardened federal agent, but rather like the young woman that she is, somebody with feelings and insecurities and questions about whether she's really doing the right thing with her life. It's great to see this additional dimension of her, smiling and laughing. But that being said, it's also great that this side doesn't extend too far. She may be young, but she's not immature. She's not a floozy who's going to fall into bed with the first guy who comes on to her. That would have been a big mistake. One of the problems that some people have been having with the show is the feeling that Rachel may be too slight as a character; she's young and many fans believe she doesn't really seem to have the stature and gravitas that should be required of an FBI agent. Maybe it's ironic that Rachel shows strength here in her sex life as opposed to just at her job, but the fact that she's not willing to settle for a fling with this guy because she wants something more for herself is really a healthy character move.

While Rachel is working with Blake, Hood is working with a university geneticist named Dr. Ruscillo. They find that the victims had something curious going on with their muscle cells. They have been administered a form of gene therapy that is intended to build up the muscle cells. If such a thing were successful, it would be way better than steroids. It's something that could revolutionize sports, even if maybe in very negative and unhealthy ways.

Rachel and Blake find the link. One of the people administering the flu shots raises a red flag, because he is studying sports medicine. Rachel and Blake inspect his apartment, and find files not on the victims, but rather their siblings. Tom Cassidy's brother, Tara Bingham's sister, and Isaac Richmond's brother are all star athletes. Tom, Tara, and Isaac were guinea pigs - the two guys behind this plot, Dylan and Ellis, used them as test subjects on their experimental gene therapy program because they would have similar body chemistry as their athlete siblings. The tests, needless to say, didn't work out too great.

The investigation closes in on Dylan and Ellis, though not before Tara's sister Vivian becomes another casualty. Vivian Bingham was the only one of the athletes who knew something about what really happened to their siblings, and overcome by grief and guilt, she kills herself in a half-beautiful-half-morbid scene diving off into an empty swimming pool. But eventually Young, Miller and Hood are able to capture Dylan and then Ellis.

But they still need to save Isaac, who's still in the pressure chamber. They also need to save his brother Lawrence. Lawrence knew Dylan and Ellis, but didn't know what they were actually doing to him - they injected him too, but Lawrence thought he was just getting a standard cortizone shot. Lawrence is prevented from playing in the big football game, but he'll survive. Isaac will survive as well, as Hood and Dr. Ruscillo are able to concoct an antidote that in effect tricks his cells into no longer replicating the negative chemical reaction that caused the bends.

"Strictly Professional."
Elsewhere in the episode, there's some further character development for both Jacob and Rachel. The first time we see them, in fact, they're at Hood's nephew's birthday party. It's an odd little glimpse into Hood's daily life, to see that Rachel accompanies him here, when they're not really on the job. Hood's sister notices that as well, and inquires as to whether there's something more to that relationship. "Strictly professional," Jacob demurs.

Jacob is also pretty great with his nephew. He shows off some science tricks, which are just like the magic tricks your crazy uncle pulled on you as a kid, only these are way cooler. Hood's surprisingly great with kids - he's interacted with teenagers and young students a number of times so far in the series, and he seems to really enjoy it. I'm guessing there will be some elaboration at some point as to why Hood and his late wife were never able to have children of their own, and how that may affect Hood today.

Jacob and Rachel talk further about their families later on. Hood notes that his father was a high school football coach, so Jacob, not exactly an athlete, always felt like a disappointment. Rachel has always felt the same way. Her father wanted a son, and even though Rachel followed in his footsteps in joining the FBI, Rachel has never felt fully accepted.

How the BCS is like the Emmy Awards
It's ironic that people at Tulsa State College are excited about the possibility of going to the Cotton Bowl in this episode, because in real life, the nearby team that's actually in that position this year could not be more disappointed. That would be Texas Tech University. For Texas Tech, going to the Cotton Bowl will be a massive letdown. The Cotton Bowl is a second-tier game compared to the BCS. To just use the money as a yardstick, this year, it's estimated that BCS bowls will pay out $17.5 million, whereas the Cotton Bowl will pay out around $3 million.

So what does this have to do with TV? The reason that Texas Tech is locked into the Cotton Bowl is that the BCS only allows a maximum of two teams per conference, and Tech is the #3 team in their conference, despite clearly being one of the top ten teams in the country (there are 10 BCS slots in total). Inferior teams from other conferences will be in the BCS, while Texas Tech will not. A similar situation has long annoyed me with the Emmy Awards. There were 16 different awards for acting handed out at the Emmys this year. But there's no hope for ever recognizing the 16 best acting performances on television. The fact that the awards are separated into categories makes it impossible.

Here are the sixteen categories: lead actor and actress in a drama, lead actor and actress in a comedy, lead actor and actress in a miniseries or TV-movie, supporting actor and actress in a drama, supporting actor and actress in a comedy, supporting actor and actress in a miniseries or TV-movie, guest actor and actress in a drama, and guest actor and actress in a comedy. You see where the problem is? The title of "Emmy Award Winner" holds massive cache for all of us - but not all Emmy Award winners are created alike. It's not like you get a bigger trophy for a more important award. An Emmy Award winner is an Emmy Award winner and will forever get to call himself or herself that. So Hugh Laurie and Jon Hamm and Michael C. Hall and Bryan Cranston and Kyle Chandler and the list could go on for another dozen names have to compete in a loaded category of best actor, and only one can win. But is there any argument that any of them gave a less award-worthy performance than whoever in hell wins supporting actress in a TV-movie or miniseries? No. These awards don't recognize the 16 best performances. They should.

For another angle on how the system is flawed, think about this: Marley Shelton has a far, far better chance of winning an award for Eleventh Hour than Rufus Sewell does. I don't say this to knock down Shelton; I think she's probably been unfairly maligned as an actress because the character didn't have enough to work with for a while. But still, Sewell is the unquestioned dominant figure here. Nonetheless, Sewell has no shot in a lead actor category that is packed with the majority of the greatest performances on TV today. On the other hand, there are simply so few TV dramas with female leads that it is far, far easier to break through. There's simply less competition. Texas Tech's conference, the Big XII, is the Lead Drama Actor category - they're squeezed out by a numbers game despite the fact that their performance is clearly one of the best anybody has put up this year.

Next week: a Spring Break episode. In December. Naturally.

'NCIS': A Very Peter Coyote Christmas

If you’ve ever had to work on the holidays, then you can sympathize with the NCIS crew. Gibbs and the gang work overtime to find out who killed a well-off couple, all while bringing good cheer to all they meet. Abby’s festive attitude even got yours truly in a good mood�?a nearly impossible task these days!

Spoilers, like mistletoe, can really get you in the holiday spirit.

‘Tis the season for murder, as one flower delivery guy finds an older couple dead inside their million-dollar home. Even more surprising to the guy is finding a scraggly looking individual wandering by the front door.

I guess the holidays bring out the best in everyone, what with Vance and the biggest smile I’ve ever seen on the man. DiNozzo, on the other hand, seems upset about having to work with a detective Justin Kemp because he ultimately married and made a family with an old girlfriend of his. Before he can become too bitter, Kemp reveals prints from the scene are from one Ned Quinn, a Vietnam-era petty officer. No issue there, except Quinn is supposed to be dead from a 1991 fire.

Ducky and Abby are talking Christmas traditions when Gibbs makes a visit. Turns out it was the Duck that assisted on the identification of Ned Quinn when he originally “died.�?The man who would be Ned was a meth addict, which rendered a definitive dental ID impossible, so Ducky used circumstantial evidence to name the dead guy Ned.

 Ziva and McGee make a visit to Ned’s ex-wife and daughter. Like many vets of the day, he returned from Vietnam worse for the wear. His wife Connie was as supportive as she could be, but it became too much and they divorced. In the meantime, she kept daughter Melissa (Carla Gallo, who plays Daisy on Californication) from ever finding out anything on her previously deceased father.

Ned’s psychologist from the VA, Dr. Pryor in full Santa getup, meets with Ducky to reveal all he remembers on Ned. The doc can’t recall all that much, but Abby steals the scene with her childlike fascination with the good doctor’s turn as Kris Kringle. McGee later notes not only did Ned have a soldier friend die just before his tour of duty was complete, the death came on Christmas Eve. Ducky surmises Ned might visit the Vietnam Memorial Wall�?the perfect opportunity to pick him up for questioning.

McGee returns to NCIS with Melissa in tow. She tells those assembled that her mother doesn’t speak for her; she wants to reconnect with her father. Ziva and DiNozzo are staking out the Wall, looking for anyone fitting Ned’s description. In the meantime, Ziva tries to dig deeper into DiNozzo’s once unrequited love for the woman who is now Detective Kemp’s wife. To prevent revealing too much in the emotions department, he goes after what he presumes is Ned. Gibbs gets the call that man in question is indeed Ned Quinn.

In the interrogation room, Gibbs asks why Ned was at the house. As a drifter, he was picked up by the couple for holiday work. He claims his innocence, claiming he was in the garage when the attack happened, only going into the living room to save the woman. This is a claim Ducky will later verify from the autopsy results. While Gibbs interrogates, McGee and DiNozzo investigate Ned’s hotel room. It’s predictably sparse, save for sketches of his war buddies and other assorted things. Abby pleads her case to Ziva for a Christmas miracle: she begs for Melissa to finally meet her father, while Ziva wants nothing of the sort.

 Vance is ready to put NCIS on a holiday break, except Gibbs kills his cheery mood by asking for overtime to wrap up the case. Detective Kemp arrives; angry his holiday is being disrupted as well. To show his contempt, he shows off pictures of the wife to the gang, much to DiNozzo’s chagrin. He gets his revenge when Gibbs breaks the news to Kemp that Ned won’t be released to Metro’s custody.

With the Yule log on the big screen, Gibbs sends Ducky and Abby home, leaving the rest to babysit Ned. Doing background work, McGee discovers the dead man was suing a company run by Kemp’s father-in-law. Meanwhile, Ned asks Ziva for paper to sketch, seeing as how it helps him to relax.

Christmas Day at the crime scene, and DiNozzo wins a bet against Ziva for having cracked the alarm code before Gibbs picked the lock. Inside, they look for evidence to support Ned’s story. Somehow, the hidden wall safe inside the closet went overlooked by the police, but not by DiNozzo. At that moment, a security guard from the alarm company arrives, only because DiNozzo wasn’t aware he needed to enter the code twice. The rent-a-cop wants nothing more than to become a legitimate law enforcement official, although taking a good look at him reveals why that’ll never be the case.

Back from Christmas services, Abby once again insists (this time to McGee) for Melissa to see her father. After too much begging, McGee relents and tells Ned of his visitor, except he’s not as receptive to the idea as Abby is. Back at the murder house, security guard Harvey is only too eager to help the gang. While DiNozzo finds the hammer in question, Vance calls Gibbs, incredulous that Leroy went as far as to breach a sealed crime scene. Analysis of the hammer reveals the prints belong to the husband and Ned.

When Gibbs shows pictures of the hammer to Ned, he admits to having handled the ultimate weapon. At the same time, Kemp can’t believe he’s being kept waiting. As he waits, the good detective wants to know why Gibbs and the gang went to the scene, all while Gibbs want to know why Kemp didn’t recuse himself from the case. He says he never talks business with his father-in-law.

 In the lab, Abby takes care of her business, revealing hair recovered from the couch belongs to Mrs. Taylor while a button found at the scene can be traced to a police uniform. The only information in doubt is whose glove matches a fabric print found on the hammer. McGee discovers the alarm to the house was deactivated for nearly five minutes after Kemp sealed the house but before the gang arrived to investigate. Gibbs has Kemp meet up with the gang at the house to reveal the true killer: Harvey the rent-a-cop. He had the access and the motivation to steal and kill. Harvey pulls out a Taser, hoping the mere threat will let him get away. McGee points out he only has one shot, so Harvey decides to take his aggression out on our favorite techie, dropping McGee like a pile of bricks. Gibbs tackles Harvey before he can get away.

Back at NCIS, DiNozzo shares his Christmas tradition with everyone: caramel popcorn and It’s A Wonderful Life. Meanwhile, Gibbs takes Ned to see Melissa. As a thank you gift, Ned hands Gibbs a sketch of the entire NCIS team. Touched by the holiday spirit, Leroy calls his father from the car, with a very happy elder Gibbs on the other side.

'The Mentalist': Patrick's past love?

 We kickoff tonight's Mentalist at Leyland University in California, where Professor Alex Maxwell collapses during a lecture. Back at the office, Patrick gets a phone call from Sophie Miller and is visibly shaken. He tells Lisbon that he needs a favor and they head to investigate Alex Nelson's death.

They question Patrick's friend Sophie and it's nice to see Elisabeth Rohm again. I'm a big fan of hers from Angel. It turns out she was previously married to Alex and had plenty of access to hydrogen cyanide, the substance that killed Alex. Lisbon is concerned that Patrick's friend might actually be guilty and Patrick is secretive about his connection to Sophie, but insists she didn't do it.

The local cops show the CBI team a poster hung all over campus by an animal rights group that basically laudes Alex Nelson's death. The university chancellor comes to see the team, wanting assurances that prestigious Dr. Stutzer, who worked with Professor Nelson, has protection and won't be attacked by any animal rights group too.

Lisbon corners Patrick about the truth regarding his relationship with Sophie Miller. He confesses that she was his psychiatrist when he was in a mental hospital following his wife and daughter's murders. He is clearly ashamed of having had a breakdown and Lisbon thanks him for being honest.

Van Pelt and Rigsby are reviewing campus security tapes and researching the animal rights group. Cho says anybody could've poisoned Nelson, there was no security at the lecture hall. On campus, Lisbon and Patrick meet Nelson's teaching assistant, who clearly had a thing for her professor.

They speak with Dr. Stutzer (hey, it's Anspaugh from Cook County General!), who tells them that their department has identified the section of the brain that governs moral decision-making. He calls it the source of good and evil, which seems oversimplifying to me but... whatever. He says a person's soul is electricity and that morality is a binary switch system. They use animals to poke around within a mammal's brain. He shows them Susie the chimp. They recalibrated her brain to make her nicer. Yikes.

Patrick asks if they have ever been threatened by animal rights groups before and he says of course. Lisbon tells him he'll be guarded and he shows her his six-shooter pistol that he uses to protect himself. Huh. He then goes on a tirade about irradicating violence and creating a world of peace, as some bongo-drum-coconut-island music plays in the background. Weird.

Stutzer shows them his human testing for this experiement, which only shows a guy choosing to save a homeless man from a fire versus a briefcase full of money. Yes, that proves that violence is gone. Outside, Lisbon and Patrick run into Dr. Miller. Patrick is quite the smitten kitten around her, it's unnerving. She confides to him that she left clinical practice because she has her own issues. Patrick wants to know what was up with her and Professor Nelson and she says she's just drawn to controlling damaged and emotionally unavailable men. Yikes. This throws an interesting wrench in the works.

Patrick insists that he'd do anything to help her because of how she helped him but that she's innocent so why does she need his help. She says maybe she just wanted to see him again and walks off. He then flashes back to being in the mental hospital and meeting Dr. Miller. Patrick looks shaken again.

Van Pelt, Rigsby and Cho find 5 names that cross-reference Leyland University alums with Northwestern Oregon State alums. A logo of NWOS is on a van near the murder scene. There is only one name on both lists that lives in the area who is a known animal rights activist, so they head for a warehouse he owns. They find him with about six cats, sitting in a chair and apparently playing video games. Yeah. Dangerous.

At the office, the crackpot guy is Howie Daubert and he confesses to killing Nelson and says he'll kill Stutzer too, then tries to leave so he can feed his cats. He's one kitten short of a litter, I'd say. Lisbon tells them to call the mental health department and she and Patrick head to speak to the widow.

Mrs. Nelson (Emily) is in the midst of planning the funeral and refers the florist to the chancellor so she can speak with the team. Emily confides that she couldn't understand her husband's work but that she heard him shouting at a woman named Rosie on the phone a few weeks ago. Patrick and Lisbon hypothesize that Rosie may have been Carrie Sheehan, the teaching assistant, and head to her house.

At the house, they find Carrie slumped over with a bottle of poison nearby. Lisbon tells the EMT's "not to run the lights." So Carrie is dead and she has left a note that says, "Forgive me." Hmmm. Too easy. The coroner says she was poisoned with cyanide and Van Pelt finds pictures ripped up of Professor Nelson and Carrie.

We come back to the chancellor. It's totally him, he's so skeazy. He played the Bulgarian Ambassador who was sleeping with the Bulgarian Prime Minister's daughter on the West Wing and also got a tinge racist with Charlie. He's good at playing skeazy.

The intrepid team thinks it's a staged suicide but Patrick argues against it. Lisbon insists that Sophie is the last viable suspect and he demands they go ask Sophie about it. Cho, Rigsby and Van Pelt drink coffee and eat donuts. They don't do much this episode.

Sophie shows off her experiement that can manipulate her subject's morality choices with electrical impulses and Patrick wants to join in as both test subject and controller. Lisbon heads that conversation off at the pass and asks to speak to Sophie in private about Carrie and Professor Nelson. Lisbon can't believe Carrie talked to Sophie about her affair with a married man and Sophie gets defensive about Alex, insisting she wasn't still in love with him. Lisbon brings up "Rosie" from Nelson's conversation and every time the name is mentioned the monkey next door goes crazy. Lisbon asks to speak with Sophie alone.

Alone, he asks her to tell him the truth. She confesses that Rosie is the monkey next door, which she switched with Susie the Nice Monkey who wasn't really nice to prove her point and falsify her data. She insists they are close to a breakthrough and have been making up data so they can keep at it. Professor Nelson was going to confess their experiment problems at the symposium and Patrick thinks it was Sophie.

She says she doesn't know who killed Alex but Patrick is upset simply because she didn't give him all the facts. He tells her that if she had anything to do with the murders she better get on a plane to Brazil. Flashback to them in the mental hospital. Each flashback has been progessively more intimate, I wonder if they slept together. Back in the present, she insists she had nothing to do with the murders.

The office. Patrick fakes an affirmative response from Evil President Logan to his team and we cut to Sophie telling Dr. Stutzler that their morality engine works. She spews out some scientific stuff and whisks him off to a demonstration involving Patrick as the test subject. Patrick answers the first question morally but then she "makes him evil." Patrick then answers immorally and Dr. Stutzer is ecstatic and says they must tell the chancellor.

When the chancellor shows up, Patrick leaves the experiement still "calibrated for evil." He then locks the chancellor and Dr. Stutzer in an office and points Stutzer's six-shooter at them and demands to know who killed Professor Nelson and Carrie. Because the gun that is introduced in the first act MUST go off in the third act. When they won't tell him, he "shoots" Sophie. This gets the chancellor to confess to the murders. He killed them to protect the fraud they were perpetrating with their research.

Sophie is revealed to be still alive and the chancellor tries to insist nothing he said is admissible. Lisbon arrests him and Dr. Stutzer is aghast that the morality engine doesn't work. Outside, Patrick and Sophie chit chat about her future now. She's going back to psychiatry and they share a moment. Interesting.

Lisbon teases him about Sophie. It's all very junior high. They argue about who should drive and he is touched she'd relinquish control of the vehicle to make him feel better. Hopefully this relationship goes somewhere once they are back from winter hiatus.

Ghost Whisperer: Melinda thwarts a kidnapping psychopath

 Previously on Ghost Whisperer, Jim jumped into the body of an accident victim named Sam and doesn't remember who Melinda is. The newest kink in the works it that Sam bought an engagement ring for someone before he was in the accident.

We open with Jim leaving the house and not telling Melinda where he's going. At the Farmer's Market, Melinda freaks out to Delia about Jim's dodgy activity. Rena Sofer suddenly shows up, a ghost who doesn't seem to know she's dead. I've enjoyed Rena Sofer since Saved by the Bell: Hawaiian Style. Rena is Tammy Gardner and when Melinda goes to the Gardners' house, Tammy's ex-husband Roger is remarried and says he hasn't heard from Tammy for two years. He happens to be played by George Newbern, who I've crushed on since Adventures in Babysitting. I love guest stars like this!

That night, Roger comes to see Melinda and says that his wife disappearing was a pattern throughout their relationship. If she started feeling confined, she'd run away and then come back, looking disheveled. He's pretty sure she was bipolar. Melinda hasn't told him that Tammy is dead yet.

Melinda and Eli posit that her bipolar disorder is keeping her from realizing that she's dead. Meanwhile, Tammy gets ignored at the dry cleaner's and starts spinning the machines out of control. Melinda tells her to stop taking care of her husband and Tammy insists that Roger needs her. Melinda finally has to tell her that she died and Tammy starts to remember the park where she disappeared. Eli investigates the park and finds Tammy's car there, with a hose running from the exhaust pipe into the car. Tammy's skeleton is still inside. Gruesome.

Eli and Melinda posit that maybe she was drawn to that park because of an affair she was having. Melinda calls Roger to see if they can meet up. Tammy is at Melinda's, worrying about how wrong Roger's new wife is. She was just trying to make Roger happy and worried about her kids. Melinda tells her maybe she just needs to say goodbye to her children. Tammy then insists she must get home and disappears. Out the window, Melinda spies Jim packing a bag in his apartment.

Melinda geeks out on him about leaving for a trip, but he says he's just doing laundry. She tells him to use her washer and dryer. The next day, she heads to Roger's house, while telling Delia on the phone that she was a total lunatic the night before.

Melinda asks some neighborhood girls about the Gardners' kids and the kids say there have never been any kids at that house. Melinda calls Eli and they wonder if Tammy had another family. Eli is at the police station and is all nervous about being questioned regarding the car with the skeleton in it. Jamie Kennedy does nervous very cutely.

The detective isn't arresting him, just wants to talk. They think it's suicide and the dental records confirm it's Tammy Gardner. There are no records of kids, but Sarah Evers had two children and the dental records matched her too. The first husband reported Sarah missing six years ago. Eli gets the Evers' address.

Melinda speaks with Mr. Evers and he confesses he thought she was having an affair. He hasn't had the heart to tell his kids that their mother abandoned them. Tammy appears and has a flashback to leaving her family with Roger Gardner.

Delia comes to see Jim, who is busy working in his building. He finds it so weird that he found the engagement ring and that he doesn't want to find her because it would be so awful for her that he doesn't remember. He also figures that if this woman was the love of his life, why didn't she find him after the accident?

Melinda finds Roger cleaning out the garage and tells him about Tammy's ghost. Roger tells Melinda that Thomas Evers was pretty awful, according to Tammy, but that he doesn't know anymore because Tammy subsequently left him too. Tammy appears and Melinda notices ligature marks on her wrists. Tammy can't remember what they are from. Melinda wonders if Elizabeth, the new wife, would have any information.

Melinda approaches Elizabeth at the market and fills Elizabeth in on Tammy's death. Elizabeth reacts suspiciously and it's hard to tell if Elizabeth is being abused by Roger like Tammy was or if Elizabeth killed Tammy because she wanted Roger for herself. Maybe I watch too many cop procedurals because it's probably the "abused wife" thing and not the "murderous mistress" thing. Hahaha. Elizabeth runs off for home.

Tammy starts to remember being kept in a trunk with her wrists bound and there's a creepy-ass shot of Roger opening the trunk to check on her. Tammy says that's where Roger kept her after he kidnapped her. She barely knew Roger, he was the electrician on their house. He tried to make the neighbors suspect something so that his tracks would be covered when he took her. She lost track of the days when she was in the trunk, until one day he finally let her out and was kind and caring. Very Stockholm Syndrome of him, which Melinda calls it about 30 seconds after I typed that.

Melinda offers that her only escape was to kill herself, but she says no. She came home late from the market and Roger tells her not to lie to him. He fixes dinner and then she falls asleep. Roger obviously drugged her food. He puts her in the car and drives to the park. Tammy tells Melinda that Roger always said, "I decide when you leave." Ohh, creepy.

Melinda calls Eli and he says it's exactly Stockholm Syndrome. Mel tells Eli to get the detective to investigate missing women matching Elizabeth's description and Melinda heads for the Gardners' house. Melinda and Tammy find Elizabeth locked in the same trunk and Melinda busts her out. Roger sneaks up on Melinda with the fireplace poker and smacks her with it.

A chase ensues and Elizabeth bug bombs Roger and then whacks him a few times with a fireplace poker. She wants to kill him and Melinda convinces her not to because the police are on their way. That night, Elizabeth is reunited with her husband and baby girl. Tammy doesn't want to say goodbye to her original family because she knows they think she abandoned them, but Melinda shows her that she still kept her son's soccer clippings in her wallet, even after she was kidnapped. That's the reason she was late the day she was killed because she stared at the newspaper picture for hours at the market.

Melinda tells Thomas Evers how much Sarah wanted to do with him and mentions the houseboat on the lake they were going to name "Two Old Coots" and he finally starts to believe that Melinda can see Sarah. Sarah wants Thomas to move on and be free like she is now.  She just wants Thomas to tell her kids what Roger did to her so they don't think she abandoned them. Sarah goes into the light.

The next day, Melinda and Jim hang out in the front yard. He gazes at the ring and says he can't keep carrying it around. She wonders what happens if he finds his woudl-be fiance and he responds, "I don't know."

Such tension. They really found an interesting way to revamp the Melinda/Jim relationship.