The following is a quick episode spoiler review of FOX’s Lethal Weapon. Available in Denmark on Viaplay.
In the fourth episode of FOX’s Lethal Weapon, our buddy cops end up with a very personal case, as Murtaugh (played by Damon Wayans) has to try to stop an armed robbery in his own neighborhood. It gets even worse when an armed robbery goes really, really wrong, and a friend of RJ’s is involved.
Four weeks into the series, There Goes the Neighborhood is easily the best episode of the show, so far. It’s been pretty clear that Lethal Weapon works best when the focus is on the relationships and not on the action, and that is what we got this week.
The case itself wasn’t bad either, it was perfectly personal. It was a robbery in Sherman Oaks, and the people who were involved were from the old neighborhood that Roger came up from. It worked even better for me when Riggs was talking to the woman on the phone, while she was being robbed. That was absolutely heartbreaking, and one of the better scenes this season.
I also really liked that, even though Trish wasn’t in the episode a lot, Roger’s family was front and center. RJ calling Riggs may not seem like a big problem, but from Murtaugh’s perspective, this situation is really bad. Sure, RJ handled being pulled over really well, but that could’ve gone wrong. Murtaugh being kept in the dark about that is terrible for a father, I imagine.
That’s why the incident at the station works so well. Murtaugh may be acting irrationally, and maybe Riggs didn’t deserve to be yelled at or punched like that. But you understand the situation, and these characters are fun to watch together, so to see them at odds is something else.
Sure, maybe they got over it really quickly, but that’s what they need to do as partners, and it’s going to be even more extreme when Murtaugh thinks Riggs screws up again. And that’s going to happen at some point this season, you just know it.
I also really enjoyed that they didn’t beat us over the head with Riggs’s tragedy. I mentioned last week that I needed them to stop doing that every week. I’m glad that they know when to focus on other elements of the show. Even during the partners’ therapy, they didn’t really mention it. By the way, I’m glad Roger didn’t finish his line about his right arm being a lethal weapon.
I did have a problem with the station subplot between Detectives Cruz and Bailey, though. I don’t care about these characters yet, and what little we got this episode didn’t help. But the last thing I want to mention is that my favorite part of the episode was seeing Riggs and Murtaugh joke around in the barbershop during the end of the episode. That was a nice moment.
B+
– Jeffrey Rex
I'm Jeffrey Rex 