Discovery

(S02E12) I don’t know about you, but since Psych returned with new episodes I’ve noticed a bit of tweaking with the format. Nothing major, mind you, just some minor things to shake it up a bit. And, because of those tiny tweaks, the show has a somewhat different feel to it. I guess that’s what happens as a show, even a crime-comedy like Psych, matures.

Gallery: Psych: The Old and the Restless

Things were different right from the get-go. Rather than having a ‘Young Shawn and Henry’ moment like we normally do, we were introduced to Shawn’s grandfather, played by Brian Doyle-Murray. We all know where Shawn got his keen observation skills from; now we know where he obtained his sense of imagination and adventure. It’s too bad that Murray is only in the flashbacks because it would be interesting to see how Grandpa Spencer reacts to Shawn’s current profession.

The other thing that was different this week was how the viewer got involved with this week’s mystery. Normally, we get to see what’s happening with the investigation from beginning to end. This time around, though, we were brought in during the midst of Shawn and Gus’ sleuthing. I’m guessing that this was utilized in order to bring Henry Spencer into the investigation pretty quickly and establish him as the plant.

By the way, I am extremely grateful that Corbin Bernsen had a bigger role this week than just his cold open appearances and the grumbling he usually does when his son is around. I have always wanted to see an episode where father and son got together to investigate a mystery and I got my wish this week. And, even though Henry seemed very reluctant to be part of this whole set-up, you could see that he was really enjoying it as the investigation progressed. It seems you just can’t take the cop out of a retired cop.

Henry’s appearance with Shawn and Gus actually made this week’s mystery more enjoyable for me — probably because I wanted to see the senior Spencer at work. I also like the fact that no one really died this week; it’s good to shake up the type of investigations that Shawn and Gus take on. The only thing I didn’t like about this week’s mystery was the reveal — it seemed very short and sloppy for some reason and I wondered if the nutritionist was really the culprit since the facilities manager has a look on her face of getting away with something. Despite the weakness of the reveal, though, I did enjoy the fact that Henry got a fist bump at the end (or at least tried to get a fist bump).

Moving on to Lassiter and O’Hara…for the second week in a row the two detectives had a separate storyline from Shawn and Gus. The difference between this week and last was that the two plots didn’t converge at the end. I wasn’t really fond of this week’s plot, although there were some good moments. For instance, when the hardened criminal comes clean and tells Lassiter’s juvenile delinquent that prison isn’t really all that bad. Another nice moment was at the end of the episode when Juliet got the young man to smarten up with only a few angry sentences. What she said will remain a mystery to all of those except lip-readers.

I’ll be honest, I didn’t keep track of this week’s pop retro-references. I remember mention of Val Kilmer and the movie Real Genius (great movie, by the way), but that’s about it. I guess you could say the biggest retro pop reference of the week was the appearance of Curtis Armstrong — Booger from Revenge of the Nerds — as Shawn and Gus’ informant at the senior facility.

Next week — Yo soy Shawn, el guapo