S1 E8; Time of Death

My favorite episode of the season thus far! I know Nathan likes comedy but I love serious Nathan!!

Review - Spoilers
My worst fear realized - a cliffhanger! Arg!  Face Palm

I knew this was going to be tense so it was great to see a beginning that was light-hearted. Nolan and Bishop chase a guy through a building and wind up in a room that looks like a dungeon, complete with shackles, a double headed axe, skeletons, and other dungeony things. They get the guy in cuffs but the door is locked and there is no cell signal. Suddenly they realize they are in an escape room! Nolan is excited but Bishop is not happy and their prisoner sees no reason to help. It turns out Bishop's ciphering skills solve the 1st clue and even the prisoner chimes in with his Latin knowledge on another clue. They all bond with their success doing high fives but Bishop quickly pulls them back to reality.

Things soon get tense as Nolan and Bishop get called to a convenience store being robbed by 2 guys. They each go after a guy. Bishop quickly gets her guy in hand, but Nolan's runs out of the store and down the street and into a house where he threatens a dad with his 2 young kids watching. Nolan confronts him and the guy runs upstairs. Nolan corners him in a bedroom. The guy swings around raising his gun and Nolan shoots him in the chest. This begins Nolan's nightmare.

Bishop pronounced the suspect dead and told Nolan he was the homicide suspect. I was surprised by that choice of words and also surprised that they took his mug shot and did a blood draw. I knew he would have a mandatory suspension and the shooting would be investigated, but I was surprised at the intensity for such an obviously clean shooting. I assume they have LAPD advisors so I would think it was portrayed fairly honestly.

Nolan almost seemed to be in shock. Everything seemed to be happening faster than he could process it. He picked Sergeant Grey to be his Companion Officer to help him through the process. It seemed to be a good choice. Although Grey seemed to want Nolan to fail early on, I think he has come to respect him. Nolan had to talk with his lawyer, make a written statement, speak to his union rep, then he has to be interviewed by internal affairs accompanied by the lead homicide detective, DA, and police auditor questioning everything that happened in a split second. The internal affairs investigation is led by Commander West, Jackson West's dad. 

Nolan appeared to doubt himself as to whether he did the right thing. He had Captain Anderson show him the body cam footage. He was so subtlely expressive watching the footage, you could see him reliving the incident. Captain Anderson had also taken a life on the job and she assured Nolan that he did exactly what he was trained to do.

Bishop got tapped to be a detective so she'll have to take the detective's exam. Since Nolan is tied up in his investigation, they asked her to work on a big drug bust. Isabel struck a deal to be a CI to get out of jail time and Bishop will be working with her. Bishop has great instincts and suggests a way to get Isabel into a position to make a drug buy. She doesn't think Isabel is really up to the task but the detectives are insistant and Isabel is too because she can't do jail time. Bradford is livid that they intend to wire her up and send her to a drug buy. Captain Anderson tells him he can be on the rescue team in case anything goes wrong. I can't believe that would happen in real life. He is too involved to react rationally where his wife is concerned. Isabel's buy goes great but instead of leaving, she pushes for more drugs hoping the detectives can get everything they need in one bust so she won't have to do it again. After a few minutes the guy seems to recognize her (remember - former cop), finds her wire and disappears with her. Although the police break in  immediately she's gone and Bradford screams at the detectives that it is their fault. 1st Cliffhanger.

Lucy is really concerned about Nolan, he is taking it really hard. She sees how despondent he is and she makes him come with her. She drives to the house where the shooting took place. She tells him that family is alive because of him and of course they could see them through the window laughing and enjoying life. His whole purpose for becoming a cop was to help people. Pointing out the good he did was probably the best thing to help him. They go back to Nolan's house. Lucy doesn't intend to stay but she gives him a hug before she goes. You can see as they hug that there is a release and a desire that neither expected. You could almost feel the electricity shoot through their bodies with that touch. They share a passionate kiss and wind up in bed together. John obviously needed that but Lucy says it was a mistake and it won't happen again. While she's in the shower, the brother of the guy that John killed breaks into the house, beats John with a baseball bat, and threatens him with a gun. Lucy hears something and throws on a robe to see what is happening. Then there is a gunshot...  Cliffhanger #2. This scene reminded me of the end of Castle, when out of nowhere they are shot. 

On the plus side, The Rookie returns on Jan 8. I was afraid they would hold off until Feb since there are only 20 episodes.
On the negative, we have many unanswered questions.

1)  Did John or Lucy get shot? I'm pretty confident John survives.
2)  Whatever happened in #1, everyone will know about John and Lucy. Will that really end her career? What are the repercussions?
3)  What happened to Isabel?
4)  What about Bishop becoming a detective? She did at least 2 things wrong. She gave Bradford confidential information about Isabel's undercover op and he confronted Captain Anderson with it. She saw what bad shape Isabel was in and gave her a packet. Isabel assumed it was methadone, but it looked like the packet she took off Carson. I'm thinking the detective thing will fall through and she'll have to return to being John's TO.
5)  While Jackson was speaking to his dad, it was apparent there is friction with his mom. So what's going on there? Is she mad he followed in his dad's footsteps?
6)  West and Lopez nabbed a women that had a foot with her. When asked she said her boyfriend had gangrene and it fell off. Both cops seemed totally unconcerned about the body that owned the foot. Was his dead body back at her place or was he some how still alive? I don't think there will be any answers to this last question.