Bull Season 3 Episode 14
After last week’s episode, I was apprehensive when it looked like it was going to be yet another personal case for Bull.
Don’t get me wrong. I loved the personal slant the TAC team took on with each case all season. But the disconnect of the two plots last week left an impression. I doubted this week’s episode was going to be any different.
This week, Bull reassured me they can still pull out the right stuff.
I decided to play hooky from work.
The opening started serene (echoes the false air of security at the start of a lot of horror movies) at a house by the lake. Nathan Raynor arrived at the lake house to surprise his wife. Ava was a bestselling author who came up there to finish her latest book.
However, no one was home. Nate left her a message—one of many—and then proceeded to go about his day of relaxing and making dinner.
So you haven’t heard from your wife in three days?
The reality of the empty house hits at a door knock a few hours later.
Chris, his wife’s driver, arrived on a previously arranged time to take her into the city. As Nathan reviewed out loud when was the last time he spoke with his wife, both the husband and audience started to realize the significance of Ava’s absence.
Ava once told me she was like a ship and I was the dock.
When Bull (Michael Weatherly) and Benny (Freddy Rodriguez) arrived at the lake house, the police were processing what was now a crime scene. We know Nathan’s a college friend of Bull.
If it’s all sound familiar, then yes: another acquaintance of Bull is a suspect of a crime. Bull was back in the spotlight, caught between the case and his friend.
Benny voiced out loud what Bull was thinking: the evidence didn’t look good. The husband didn’t report her missing until days later. In cases like these, it’s almost always the husband.
Nathan’s explanation about giving Ava space was flimsy. I was relieved Bull wasn’t quick to jump to Nate’s defense. Bull pointed out how suspicious it looked and sounded. Maybe Bull learned from the last time?
Chemicals don’t lie.
From the beginning, we are usually privy to the knowledge that the character was innocent. We don’t have the same steadfast belief from Bull in this episode. Bull repeated Nate was his friend, over and over throughout the episode. I suspected it wasn’t to remind us but to remind himself.
Because there was an alarming amount of blood found after luminol and a black light in the kitchen, Nate was charged with murder, even though there wasn’t a body.
Talk about wreckage.
Nate’s initial insistence that his wife was still alive was different. We usually have the husband as the suspect, loudly insisting he loved his wife and he couldn’t have done this.
Nate was saying the same things but also insisted the blood wasn’t Ava’s. His repeating that his wife was still out there added legitimacy to Nate’s innocence. He was a husband, in shock, in denial and that cloud of denial helped because the evidence started to stack up against him as the story continued.
Maybe you don’t want to lose someone, so you start making compromises with yourself.
Bull’s personal involvement with the case worked in this episode because his responses directly related to the case.
When Bull talked to Benny found out about Nate and Ava’s ‘understanding’ to see other people when they’re apart, Bull’s reaction worked for both his arc and in Nate’s case. And when Bull hid in his office after the case hit a low, his scene still moved the main story along.
The team also had more to do in this episode while still maintaining that close dynamic I enjoyed.
Marissa (Geneva Carr) balanced both job and friend; their banter in the office touched on Bull’s personal worries about his friend and the case’s progress wonderfully.
It was great to see Danny tracking down the clues and offering her theories.
Chunk offered great insight and ideas about using Chris on the stand; his role evolving from his original function to a law student has been a significant contribution to Bull.
Taylor made a great sounding board, asking the questions the audience needed answers for. She’s still relatively new, making her a plausible candidate to ask.
They will be angry and want someone to blame. And in their minds, you’re the reason they’re here, so that someone will be you.
The show also took what we often see in a crime drama—jury sequestration—and made it a tangible piece of conflict rather than just another thing that might happen in a typical procedural. Bull made a good point about the jury’s enforced isolation might work negatively on Nate; the jury would blame him.
Bull like putting twists into their episodes somewhere after the third act, often in a nice courtroom reveal with Benny (not that I’m complaining), but this time, we got two twists.
Benny was trying to sell the theory Ava was alive for the jury. To be honest, I expected Ava to walk in towards the end. Luckily, Bull didn’t opt for this twist.
They’re all red, and they’re all miserable.
Pictured L-R: Mackenzie Meehan as Taylor Rentzel, Chris Jackson as Chunk Palmer, Jaime Lee Kirchner as Danny James, and Geneva Carr as Marissa Morgan Photo: CBS
Halfway through the trial, Ava’s body was found. The problem was Bull and Benny had collected a jury full of people who made decisions based on visible proof, not on circumstantial evidence.
Ava’s body was a burden of proof that swayed their once advantageous jury against Nate. Whatever doubt Benny tried to plant about Nate’s guilt was gone.
Someone’s always forgetting a shovel.
The second twist came after the TAC worked on a new theory with Ava and her bodyguard Chris. The stabbing was still a crime of passion, but not by a lover as we were led to presume. And not who everyone thought.
I’ll admit, I thought I pegged who the real culprit was from the beginning. It’s been a long time since a show surprised me. Bull succeeded stringing us along with a red herring.
While the real culprit’s motive was less sensational to the original theory, it was a good twist. And one that didn’t feel thrown in for a quick resolution.
The episode ended differently as well. We don’t get to see what the jury decided, although it’s a given Nate would be acquitted after yet another brilliant reveal by Benny. Bull’s right; it never gets old to see Benny do his magic.
I wasn’t inside your marriage.
Instead, we have Bull and Nate by the lake house again, which was a nice bookend. It served as a reminder this case was a personal one for Bull.
From Bull’s brief exchanges with Benny, we get the sense there was still baggage about Bull’s failed marriage. He said Nate was “just a guy who loved his wife the best he could” and that “Nothing else really matters.”
In a way, Bull was also talking about himself.
Bull’s conversation with Nate about comparing his failed marriage with Nate and Ava felt like the final chapter in the Bull/Isabel storyline. And with that, the episode managed to tie up both the case and Bull’s arc.
All the elements that made Bull a unique and fun show melded this week. The case was not as simple as we saw in the past. The personal angle didn’t interfere with the situation. If I weren’t sure it would’ve made me look ridiculous (and scary), I would have screamed “Finally” at the screen.
Bull played a tricky juggling act of character-driven and plot-driven. And it worked. The show kept the pace quick yet managed to bring in so much about the case and Bull as well.
I only wished they could have squeezed in some more scenes with the team besides the nice takeout pow-wow scene. But I understand there’s only so much time. Bull tossed in cute throwaway lines in the past that built up what we knew about the cast. It would be nice if they continue that again.
There may have been a lack of team scenes, but there also weren’t any wasted scenes in this episode. Everything connected. The story flowed in a way I wished it had for a few past episodes.
This episode struck the winning balance of case versus character. There need to be more team moments to bring it back to the cast chemistry it enjoyed in the first season. But it’s starting to look possible.
This episode proved it could pull off that golden ratio to give us all the good things. We got a compelling case with riveting courtroom and engaging cast. “Leave it all Behind” showed us it is possible. Just look at this episode.
Seeing is believing. Both for the case and Bull.
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