Moonlight: Arrested Development (Episode 105)

Hey, it's that vampire show

We begin this episode with Beth and Josh leaving a doctor's office, Josh having insisted on Beth being tested for tetanus due to the bite wounds cuts from a "chain link fence" she got at the desert motel. Nudge, nudge, wink, wink. Josh mentions that Mick hasn't been around lately, and Beth distractedly flashes back to the memory of Mick sucking her blood. Meanwhile, Mick shows up at the same office building, and the Emo Voice Over (EVO) notes that even if we try to avoid someone, sometimes the universe has different plans. Josh and Beth are having a one-year anniversary party, and Josh extends Mick an invite. However, Mick has other plans, namely continuing to avoid Beth. For her own good, of course -- not because he's proving that mortal or immortal, some men have serious intimacy issues.

Meanwhile, a shadowy man orders up a hooker -- sorry, escort -- named "Cherish" from the internet. When he arrives at her apartment, the woman takes one look at his face and rebuffs him. We still can't see what he looks like, but it sure sounds like a teenaged voice as he tells her she doesn't measure up to her online photo. Probably because that doesn't look like the same chick. He pushes his way inside the apartment, and it's curtains for our poor working girl.

At BuzzWire, Beth works hard on printing out a recipe for coq au vin. Her editor, who pronounces it "cock in a reduction sauce," gives Beth the dead hooker assignment, telling her that it could be a serial killer from San Francisco. As we say in Canada, Beth's on it like a fat kid on a Smartie.

In Mick's apartment, the Fortress of Style, he sits behind his desk in front of a huge window overlooking the city. I've never seen the Fortress looking so bright, and I don't think we've ever visited this office before. He speaks to Cherish's small-town parents, who tell Mick their daughter came to LA to be an actress and ended up a whore. Ah, a tale as old as time. Mick assures them he'll track her down.

Cut to the crime scene, where crafty Beth ducks under the tape and tries to get a look at the body. Her detective buddy Carl -- whose default mood seems to be exasperated and tense -- won't confirm that the murder is the work of a serial killer, but the FBI are tellingly on the scene.

Meanwhile, Mick visits Logan Josef at his tastefully appointed office, which is no longer in the palatial house from the pilot and now appears to be in a high-rise downtown. Multiple screens depicting stock market tickers remind us that Josef is in finance, or whatever. Josef asks about Beth: "Your reporter friend. Uh, what's her name?" Mick replies that Josef is well aware of Beth's name. Awwww, I think Josef's a little jealous. Josef can read Mick like a book and guesses that Mick's been avoiding her since "happy hour." He does a cute/sexy little mime of biting his wrist when he says that.

Mick brings the subject around to the missing girl, and Josef introduces Mick to Rider England, a nerdy guy who is basically Josef's Willow Rosenberg. Computer-wise, not in the lesbian witch sense. Rider quickly tracks down Cherish's address as Josef and Mick reminisce about the good old days of prostitution.

At Beth and Josh's apartment, their close friends toast their one-year anniversary. Beth gets a call from a morgue contact and leaves her own party, much to Josh's disappointment. Josh thinks it's Mick who called, and he tells Beth that he wasn't blind to the sexual tension between Beth and Mick earlier. Beth denies it, but Josh reminds her that he, you know, has eyes.

Mick goes to the dead hooker crime scene and gets a psychic noseful of death by vampire. At the morgue, Beth's creepy contact accepts payment and shows her the body just before Mick arrives with the small-town parents to ID the body. Shouldn't the police be doing this? Anyway, Beth hides and the parents happily sob that it's not their little girl. After they leave, Mick, who must have smelled or sensed Beth's presence, draws her out and they discuss the case. Mick tells her the killer is an extremely frustrated and dangerous vamp.

In the hallway of the morgue, Beth gives Mick the gears about avoiding her since the one-night stand biting incident, reminding him that she fed him as she holds up her wrist. Hee.

I have to note that Sophia Myles is really relaxing nicely into her role, and her chemistry with Alex is a delight. Mick doesn't know what Beth wants him to say, but finally he admits reluctantly that something did happen between them. He's also not sure what Beth wants from him, since last time he checked, he was undead and she had a boyfriend. Beth thinks there's a reason they keep ending up running into each other.

Meanwhile, our teen vamp killer calls Cherish, telling her that her old roommate Jazzmyn (yes, that's how she spelled it) says hi. Apparently the girls had a falling out after Jazzmyn stole Cherish's website, and now Cherish has gone private. She agrees to meet the killer for "500 roses," which is hooker code for money. As she talks to him, she's actually standing in a flower store, and I guess that's for the kiddies at home who will think that the pretty lady just really, really likes roses.

BuzzWire. Beth's friend Marissa comes by to find out the dealio with Beth and Josh. She wants to know why Beth and Josh are still living apart, adding that fate can only do so much -- Beth has to get on the ball with moving in with Josh. Marissa talks about the universe sending signs, and on cue, fate Mick rings Beth's cell phone.

Now for my favorite scene. At Josef's office, Rider gives them the facts on Jazzmyn, aka Natalie. She was voted most likely to succeed in high school, and Rider notes that's "unlikely" at this point. Heh. A valet shows in a slightly nervous Beth, and Josef zeroes in on her like a heat-seeking missile. God DAMN Jason Dohring is hot when he turns it on. *fans self*

Want. Take. Have.

Rider giggles over Beth's hotness, saying Mick said she had a "great voice." Mick is so busted, and he quickly turns the subject back to dead Jazzmyn. They have a list of the calls she made received before dying, and they want Beth to call the killer back, pretending to be the lady of the night. As they explain this, Josef is still giving Beth the stare, which I refer to as "The Panty-dropper." He turns his gaze to Mick, and I hope the threesome fics are coming along nicely, fandom. Don't disappoint me!

Beth gets on speakerphone and does her best sultry voice, but the first call turns out to be a bust. Josef pouts, apparently wanting to hear Beth's full fake hooker repertoire. The second call is a hit, and the killer thinks it's Cherish confirming their date at "Greenie's". Beth notes that the killer sounds like a teenager looking for a girlfriend.

McBeth head out to the address Rider gave them, and Beth wonders if Josef and Rider are vamps. Mick non-answers and laughs that she can't tell as they break into the apartment and are jumped by Carl and some cops. Meanwhile, teen vamp is meeting Cherish at a boardwalk bar. We finally get a good look at the kid, an acne-scarred geek. I was going to call him George Michael in light of this episode title, but he's more Screech from Saved by the Bell. Cherish, apparently not as picky as dead Jazzmyn, tells him to sit down as she orders a double from the bartender. Heh.

At the kid's apartment, a female cop yells at Mick as he tunes her out, noting all the clues in the apartment, particularly a sepia-toned framed photo of the occupants of an old-west whorehouse where Screech lived. Obviously, the cops have it all wrong, thinking the killer keeps his trophies in the large freezer and is a standard serial killer, etc. Of course, we know he sleeps in said freezer, and that he's right there in the old picture, a gangly 16-year-old with a broom. Before they leave, Mick distracts Carl while Beth grabs a daytimer from the table. They discover in the car that it's Jazzmyn's and get the location of Greenie's bar. Mick says that teenaged boys think about sex 20 times a minute, and that Screech must be pretty pent-up after 200+ years.

Greenie's. Cherish, thinking Screech is a virgin, tries to play nice. He wants to take her on the rides at the pier, and gets ornery and creepy when she tells him she doesn't have time. McBeth race to the pier in Mick's car, and after calling Cherish's cell with no response, Beth asks about how the whole sex thing works. "Your parents never told you?" Hee! Beth clarifies that she means vampires and humans. Hypothetically speaking, of course. Mick says it never ends well. Beth tries to hide her disappointment, and it's no accident both characters are wearing sunglasses in this scene. Oh, sweet, sweet sexual tension. There's nothing I enjoy more than two characters yearning to be together.

Beth tries Cherish again, and this time she picks up, dropping the phone when Screech gets violently handsy. Mick yells into it for Screech, saying he's a vampire too and he understands Screech's pain. As Screech drags Cherish out the back of the bar, he tells Mick that it wasn't his choice to be this way. He ditches the phone and is gone. McBeth run out to the bright pier, delicate flower Mick trying to shield himself from the sun as he uses his super-sonic hearing to find Cherish and Screech in an arcade. Screech takes off, hiding under the pier.

That night, Screech emerges on the deserted pier, where Mick is waiting to turn all the amusement park lights and rides on for effect, because he's a big ol' drama queen. Mick insists he understands what Screech is going through, but as they play cat and mouse, Screech bemoans that he'll never grow out of his awkward stage. Screech wonders if Mick has ever loved someone completely, and Mick says yes, flashing back to his wedding night with Coraline. Up high on the rollercoaster track, Mick and Screech vamp out and fight in artful slow-mo. Fate, in the form of the roller coaster, decapitates poor Screech. Let's hope he found his Kelly Kapowski in the next world.

Later, Cherish is reunited with her parents at the BuzzWire office as McBeth watch. Beth's editor thinks Beth should be filming the reunion, but Beth chooses to go after Mick to the parking lot. As Mick drops his keys under his car and searches for them, the EVO rambles on again about fate, the universe, and what we want not always mattering. Beth arrives just as Mick pops up with his keys, and she plants a kiss on him. I may or may not have clapped and squeed like a leetle girl. Mick stares at her, addled and possibly drooling a bit. She kisses him again before skipping back to the office, and a grin spreads over Mick's face.

Seriously, how cute are those two? SO CUTE. Now if we could have that McBeth/Josef threesome for Sweeps, that would be perfect, kthx.