2.13: "The Meat Puzzle"

by DC

opening scene: Ducky takes Jimmy Palmer to task about attaching a toe to a hand, but Jimmy points out why he did it correctly--the man was in an accident. This triggers Ducky's memory--he knows who it is.

Tony teases Kate about her date, pretending he takes a first date to all the same places Kate went on a first date on Saturday. Kate is sure he has been following her. Tony announces to Gibbs and to Kate that he knows Kate's boyfriend (but Kate doesn't consider him as such): Steve Adler was Tony's fraternity brother. The ever-private Kate is horrified. Just then Ducky comes in; he has identified one of the bodies: Baltimore DA Michael Grant. Ducky testified at several of his prosecuting cases. Through Tony, we learn it has been six months since Ari kidnapped Kate ("Reveille"), when the body first appeared. The other bodies' skin has been removed, so no photo ID or fingerprints are possible. Kate then finds a Judge Roland is missing. They are both tied to a Vincent Hanlan, a med school dropout who had wanted to be a ME. He'd try to rape a Navy lieutenant, couldn't do it (physically) and then murdered her. Ducky's testimony help put him away. The third body, Ducky guesses, is the jury foreman. Since Hanlan's dead, somebody is taking revenge for him. Gibbs, however, does not think so and throughout the episode keeps after Abby and Jimmy to investigate the body which is supposed to be Hanlan's.

Gibbs has Kate profile Hanlan, and when Ducky remembers Hanlan was particularly agitated when Ducky was on the stand, Kate knows why: Ducky was the ME he would never be. Gibbs assigns Ducky a protective detail - and begins by sending Tony to the Mallard home to watch over his mother, age 96 and with dementia. (When a boiler blew in Tony's apartment and he was trying to find somewhere to stay, Ducky did not want to tell Tony where his house was ("Left for Dead"). They question Hanlon's family--the mother is a scary woman. She never denies that her son is a rapist and a murderer but repeats how he was a good boy and prison destroyed his life--never mind about the girl Hanlon tried to rape and then beat to death. He drank heavily after he was released and died in a car accident. She threatens to have the agents arrested.

Tony arrives at the Mallard home, and Mrs. Mallard is a brassy woman who is convinced Tony is a furniture-moving Italian gigolo who wants to look down her blouse (and then she will put right into his back the knife she carries in her brassiere). There are also a herd of small, adorable little dogs called Corgis. Back at the office, the team has discovered that the detective who had the case has disappeared. In the next scene, a barrel is delievered--to the Mallard home. When they arrive and Ducky pops open the barrel, it is a body looking just like the ones he has in his autopsy body fridge. Ducky is worried but puts on a brave face for Jimmy, and Kate is assigned to guard Ducky--in Gibbs words. (When Kate asks Gibbs what Ducky looked like when he was younger, the amusing response is "Illya Kuryakin.") Tony comes out, ready to leave and so happy because Mrs. Mallard is asleep and then he finds out Gibbs is leaving him at the house to watch over Ducky's mother and goes nuts.

Kate comes with Ducky to his home at the end of the day. Mrs. Mallard is suspicious of Kate's motives at being there. Tony agrees with her (perhaps just to poke fun at Kate), but Kate is shocked and thrown off balance, although she tries to be polite. (Ducky scolds his mother for what she says to Kate.) That night, using a dog as a lure, the killers lure Mrs. Mallard into the yard--and thus Kate, who has to protect her. When she discovers the trap, it is too late--Ducky has been taken. The next morning, she is distraught over losing Ducky, but Gibbs feels just as guilty--he gave Kate two protectees when he should have assigned an agent each to each protectee. (Strange that Kate didn't think of it, as Secret Service.) When they test the body, Abby and Jimmy discover that the nerve tissue in the gums don't match Hanlan's--and the teeth have Super Glue on them. They pulled out the teeth from a body and put it in Hanlan's.

The unfavored son, the taxidermist brother, soon talks when faced with the angry agents. After the car crash, in which they both got out, their mother decided to put Hanlan's teeth one by one into the body so dental records would show he was dead, when he wasn't, thus giving him a new life. He tells the team his brother and his mother have terrible secrets and Ducky is probably at their place. They make him call his mother to tell her that everything is okay, banking on the mother taking Ducky out of the place they hid him. It works, and they are going to desanguinate Ducky when the team arrives. They save him, but the brother can't bear the thought of going to prison again and kills himself and the mother goes crazy. At the very end, Kate is off on another date with Tony's fraternity brother, who has promised to tell her things about Tony to make up for his telling Tony about their date.
 

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Crazy Credits

• David McCallum, of course, was the famous blond Russian (yeah, I KNOW he's a Scot) spy for U.N.C.L.E., Illya Kuryakin, in the hit show "The Man from U.N.C.L.E." from the '60s (with Robert Vaughn as Napoleon Solo).

• from an article in TV Guide at the end of January 2005: the Corgis used in the episode are not trained dogs; those in charge of the dogs used monofilament wire leashes to keep the dogs from wandering.

• Jesse D. Goins (Jeff Wilson) is credited with Harmon in "The Presidio"; Holmes Osbourne (Fred Hanlan), in "From the Earth to to the Moon".

• from LACoroner:
  • Let us not forget the uncredited role, yet pivotal, that of the casketed corpse of the litigating next of kin that was dutifully frisked and his permanent abode diligently searched.

    The dearly departed was played by actor Fred Tate, who is also the regular stand in for "Ducky" during filming.

  • One fan asked if the body parts used in the episode did not come from LACoroner's office. Absolutely not. Human specimens would be out of the question. They have some very talented SPEFX folks and prop masters that work for them. There was a couple of occasions where they used a cows liver (we had to cut to down to human size)and a hunk of meat, but that is rare (no pun intended).

    With respect to the appearance of things, I shared some photos and copies of reports from our case to assist them in setting the scene for a case such as this. What you see on TV is the combined efforts of folks that wanna get it right.