I very much like the TV series CSI, but I stopped watching after William Petersen left the series after 9 seasons. His Gil Grisson character, with hints of Aspbergers, was fascinating. It wasn’t the same show without him. But I got very excited about episode 300, which was billed as:
“On tonight’s “CSI” season 14 episode 5, “Frame by Frame,” Catherine Willows returns to help the CSIs solve a cold case that has haunted the team for 14 years.”
There were indications online that Marg Helgenberger, who played Catherine Williams until last year, was going to return and recruit the George Eads character Nick Stokes into joining her at the FBI. Plus, even if William Petersen wasn’t going to be there, it was still going to be an homage of some sort.
None of that happened. Catherine Willows didn’t return to the lab, she was there in flashbacks. (Newly shot, but still Catherine didn’t return.) And there was no Nick Stokes at all, George Eads wasn’t even in the episode (being on a leave of absence after a disagreement with a writer). Plus the 30 second montage at the end that was apparently supposed to be the Grissom homage, was too short and just disappointing. Grissom deserved more.
On top of all that, there was a continuity flaw. In one of the flashbacks, placed 14 years in the past, Catherine Willows is giving CSI Greg Sanders advice about working in the field. But 14 years ago, in the show’s first season, Sanders was in the lab as a DNA tech, and didn’t move to the field until season five.
As a normal CSI episode it was fine (except Ted Danson’s character is no Grissom), but it certainly didn’t live up to the hype.