A someone pretending to be something pretending to be someone. Nothing is as it seems, and things unwind in all sorts of interesting twists.
9.5
"Superb"
Disarmed and Dangerous is an example of CSI heading in some new directions with the transition from Grisson to Dr. Raymond Langston (Laurence Fishburne's character). This episode provided many opportunities for the regular as well as guest cast to come across in some raw, gritty moments, and display some sudden plot shifts that left you guessing and psychologically messed-with.
Our episode begins when a well dressed man visits a slimy gas station restroom. We're not exactly sure what's going on at first, as he looks around at the filth, reads a somewhat lewd piece of graffiti on a stall wall, writes it down on a notepad. We then see that he is simply there to relieve himself. Suddenly and without warning, he is savagely attacked by a mostly unseen but clearly overpowering assialiant. We pick up on the degree of the brutality of the attack mostly from off camera screams and blood curling flesh ripping and bone cracking sounds as he is savagely being beaten to a pulp.
When the CSI crew comes on scene, we learn of the savagery of the attack when they find the victims arm lying across the room. "It's been disarticulated, not hacked off" Catherine comments. "That takes a lot of rage." We find out that he is one of three FBI agents who have been working undercover in the area. Was this a hit from the bad guys that they had been investigating? No one can say for sure. One of the FBI agents maintains a greater detachment from the murder of his colleague, while the female agent is on edge and short, clearly shaken by the turn of events. Answers must be found and the perp brought to justice, and it's clearly eating at her. In the course of this episode, we are taken on a journey that involves a trip to a steroid and testosterone soaked ultimate cage fighting event to apprehend a murder suspect, a very public, shocking accidental suicide, and more plot twists than knots in your grandmothers knitting circle.
The real wowzer comes when it is revealed that the FBI agents were not agents at all, but came from a very different background. They were posing as FBI agents and, in their eyes, doing the good work that the real FBI would have been doing. Tragically, they have their downfall one by one, starting with the man in the restroom at the opening of the episode. Next, the female "agent" turns up dead; it turns out that she was a hooker, posing as an FBI agent, killed on the street while posing as a hooker. The last "agent" turned out to be a psycatriac patient living in a halfway house. Brass finds him at the halfway house, where he secretively reveals that he is an FBI agent working "undercover" posing as a psycatriac patient in a halfway house. The surprise with which the show's writers pulled this off was commendable. Not to be outdone, just when we think that everything has been a setup and the "imaginary" FBI operation that the unlikely group of castaways put together was a figment of their imagination, we are treated to a DBSA (drive by shooting attempt) outside the group home, with the "FBI" guy as the intended target. The attempt failed, the FBI guy/psycatriac patient wasn't hit, thanks to Brass's street wise, lightning quick reflexes (thank you for the "GUN!" trope, used quite well here). The bad guys were real all this time, and ironically the motely crew of pretending FBI agents helped lead to the capture of the leader of a human trafficking ring. In conclusion, this episode did a number of things differently, but did so in a way that still drew upon the hallmarks of CSI, which are misdirection, follow the evidence, surprises and reveals, and a rare look at the grittier side that the cast, and especially in this episode, the guest stars, can bring out. High marks.