CDN Television: Rookie Blue, Episode 1.11 "To Serve or Protect"

Rookie Blue
Season One, Episode Eleven, To Serve or Protect
Original Air Date:  September 2, 2010

Epstein and Diaz see someone in their squad car as they are leaving a call.  They chase the person but he gets away.  The call they make reporting the incident becomes a tool to make a point at the next briefing (as well as a good joke).  McNally and Swarek do a favor to his nurse friend Monica by taking a statement from a patient.  The statement leads to the discovery of the murder of a man that was a suspect in one of McNally's fathers old cases.  Some of the evidence in the murder points towards Tommy McNally.  Shaw finds the person who was in Diaz and Epstein's car, The Guardian, was accessing information in the car. 

Epstein and Diaz go to the apartment of the drug dealer The Guardian accessed information about and find Guardian at the building when they arrive.  They manage to capture him this time.  When they get him back to the Barn, the seasoned officers are right there with their cameras to take pictures and further tease Epstein and Diaz.  The more Diaz and Epstein talk with Terry Porter (Guardian), the more they learn he isn't what they originally thought.  He's a guy who made a mistake as a kid and is trying to do something good.  Using photographs Porter was able to take, the police can work to make a case against a local drug dealer.

Gail Peck is upset because her mother is getting a lifetime achievement award and she has to introduce her mother at the banquet and she's got stage fright.  Nash tries to help her with the speech she needs to give so she will feel more comfortable.  Gail is afraid to fail.  This is the first time this season that Peck has actually seemed like a normal human being and not some self-absorbed, spoiled girl that thinks she's better than everyone else.  It was nice to see that she has vulnerabilities and is afraid of them even though she still ends up chickening out and not giving the speech.

McNally and Swarek go to her father's apartment to ask him about the man that was found murdered and find blood on the wall outside and her father bloodied with no memory of what happened.  Tommy McNally feels he has to follow the suspect because no one else will.  He was following him when he was murdered but claims he blacked out.  Swarek locks Tommy's gun, which had been fired recently, away and tells him to not talk to anyone or answer the phone.  They need to put together what happened before everything comes back to Tommy implicating him in the murder.  Not only is Swarek trying to protect Tommy McNally but he's trying to protect Andy.  He doesn't want any negativity from this case to stick to her.

Swarek is familiar with the old case and lets Andy in on the details.  Tommy was drinking heavily then and his mistakes caused the case to be pled down to weapons charges and a walk on rape and murder.  Both Andy and Swarek are shocked to see Tommy McNally walk into the office with his case notes saying he's there to help.  Callaghan is angry when he learns that Swarek and Andy kept information about Tommy from him as he sees him as a suspect.  Everything changes with the victims widow confesses to Swarek that she was the one who committed the murder.  Swarek also finds a traffic camera that recorded Tommy McNally in an area nowhere near the murder scene. 

Andy refuses to cover for Tommy anymore and doesn't want to be part of his life because of all the mess his drinking causes.  Not wanting to live without his daughter, Tommy McNally attends his first midnight meeting for his addiction to alcohol. 

The moment between Andy and Callaghan in the interview room near the beginning of the show was almost sickeningly sweet.  Yeah, I get it they are the happy lovers united once again after a nasty bout but the moment was still a bit too cutesy.  Callaghan was with Andy when she took Tommy to his midnight meeting but Swarek is always there to be Andy's saviour when she needs one most.  At some point, I can't help but think that Andy will be able to see that when she needs someone to actually be there for her, be understanding and not judgmental, only one of the two men in her life actually fits the bill.

For more information:
Official Site:  http://abc.go.com/shows/rookie-blue
Hulu:  http://www.hulu.com/rookie-blue
The Internet Movie Database:  http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1442065/
TV Rage:  http://www.tvrage.com/Rookie_Blue