As much as I enjoy Elsbeth’s reliable howdunit and howcatchem-of-the-week episodes, the show’s occasional forays into longer arcs and different formal approaches are often my favorites. It’s a mark of how assured the writers are that we get such an episode so early in the season.
In addition to being a rare episode where Elsbeth isn’t working closely with an NYPD patrol officer/minder or homicide detective, the suspicious death in “Doll Day Afternoon” is more of an accidental manslaughter rather than the first-degree murders we usually see. Although the murderers are often characters with redeeming qualities, Nolan Hurst (David Cross) is more sympathetic than most, and his killing of toy store manager/part-time extortionist Patrick Palmer (Drew Seltzer) is an unpremeditated act of desperation, not the settling of a score.
Palmer, the manager at the flagship Becker’s Toys store in lower Manhattan, has been running a sideline in black market sales of Spirited Girl dolls (not to be confused in any way with American Girl™ dolls), charging Nolan $6,000 for a specific doll for his somewhat estranged daughter Bella, and then pulling a little bait and switch, saying Nolan was outbid for the specific doll he wanted. Nolan is furious and distraught, and in the struggle to get his envelope of cash back, Palmer falls, striking his head on a step.
There’s an elegant transition from Palmer’s death in the alley to Elsbeth gazing out at the skyline from the adjacent pier, but she and Officer Summerville (Angus O’Brien), an eager third-generation cop, get to business quickly. He suspects the killer was a woman, thanks to a strand of dyed red hair found on Palmer’s body, but Elsbeth quickly spots that it’s not hair, but nylon. It could be a wig, but wrapping paper with Becker’s Toys branding in Palmer’s trunk points them to consider dolls instead.
The store is a wonderland to Elsbeth right away. The store is bright and airy, and she’s swept away by the inventory, a nicely curated selection including picture books, stuffed animals, Folkmanis hand puppets, a big astronaut suit, child-sized guitars, a floor piano like the one immortalized in Big, and, of course, a large selection of Spirited Girl dolls. You can describe Elsbeth as easily distracted, flighty, or whimsical, but this episode uses the narrative equivalent of neon highlighters to remind us that her playful curiosity is driven by her open-mindedness, and those qualities are what make her so successful as an investigator.
They lead her to quickly identify Nolan — who is trying to exchange the doll Palmer stuck him with for the one he really wanted at the in-store Doll Hospital — as Palmer’s killer. Impressive as that is, though, forestalling a hostage situation is not really in her wheelhouse, and Nolan grabs Summerville’s gun, kicking out Elsbeth and Summerville while trapping the store’s staff and one customer. What a day for that guy to be shopping for a birthday card!
By the time Wagner arrives at the scene, there are several helicopters flying overhead, a bunch of NYPD vehicles, and Elsbeth and Summerville are safely tucked away in the Emergency Service Unit’s command center trailer. Summerville is mortified that Nolan was able to grab his gun out of his insufficiently secure holster (he uses his dad’s old holster), and for Wagner, that’s punishment enough. The ESU leader is Captain Tully (Campbell Scott), an impatient, just-the-facts-ma’am kind of guy who hasn’t yet learned how to value Elsbeth’s contributions.
Not only does Tully develop a Swiss cheese theory of the case a little too quickly — following Hurst’s four-year stint for insider trading at the Midtown Detention Center (the venue for the second season’s musical finale), he must be a drug trafficker — he arrives there so firmly that considering other ideas about Hurst’s motivation and priorities is anathema. Thanks, I guess, to Tully for being so arrogant that we know very quickly who the real villain of the story is.
Nearly every move Tully makes over the course of “Doll Day Afternoon” is driven by his impatient mania to get his man. He’s so callous that using a sniper to take Nolan out is equivalent to arresting him. Either way, his work is done, and he can move on to the next case. Are there so many hostage situations erupting in New York that he needs to rush this one? Nolan is clearly not an expert criminal, and Tully’s team would do better to focus on de-escalating the situation. I think it’s more likely that Tully is a petty dictator of his own little fiefdom and loathes the way Elsbeth’s divergent thinking is slowing down a resolution to the case. Wagner confirms that Tully’s behavior today is of a piece with his character going all the way back to their days as patrol officers, when he always assumed his poker hands were the best, and didn’t take losing with much grace.
The story starts to unfold more briskly once Nolan gets Tully to agree to exchange Elsbeth for the increasingly and very loudly distraught store staffer in costume as Raggedy Ann. Elsbeth’s ability to think clearly about a bunch of things at once and to connect with others emotionally makes her especially well-suited to hostage negotiations. As annoyed as Nolan is by her speed-talking and distraction tactics, he’s fundamentally a decent person who can’t help but open up to her once she’s been a little vulnerable with him.
Okay, he was in prison for insider trading, but why? Whatever greed motivated him was driven by a desire to provide everything possible for his daughter, Bella. He’s aware of the bitter irony that his attempts to furnish a maximally comfortable life for her are exactly what has made it impossible for him to have a real relationship with her since his incarceration, and he poured all his hopes for reconciliation into the special edition Chrissy Spirited Girl doll that she’d asked for years ago.
This line of thinking is as wrong-headed as it is sweet, but it’s also something Elsbeth can work with. The store provides her with tons of options for building their bond, and she makes a perfect choice by using the Not An Easy Bake Oven™ to make sure everyone keeps their blood sugar up and reminisces about how her dad refused to let her have one for safety reasons. Nolan wouldn’t let Bella have one for the same reason! How about that!
As it becomes increasingly apparent to Elsbeth that Nolan is just a guy in over his head and Tully’s goal is not a peaceful arrest but a clear kill shot, she shifts into harm reduction mode. She gets the Doll Doctor out of the store by encouraging her to feign vomiting using fake vomit, and once the Doll Doctor is safely in the ESU’s command center, she’s able to walk them through activating one of the nanny cam teddy bears next to where all the hostages are sitting. I love the hostages’ little peanut gallery moments; their conversation about which hostage situation movies Nolan has watched way too frequently is even funnier given their circumstances, and they seem pretty spot-on: Dog Day Afternoon, Die Hard, and Inside Man. I am relying on eagle-eyed readers/film buffs to identify visual, plot, and dialogue allusions in this episode — shout them out in the comments so we all develop a richer understanding of its storytelling DNA!
Elsbeth gains more and more of Nolan’s trust by using the secret nanny cam to make sure that Tully and Wagner know Nolan would really like to speak with Bella, and later walking him through the defense she would mount for him if he turned himself in and his case went to trial. Eventually, those conversations lead to other officers perceiving Nolan as a person rather than a target, and to Nolan wanting to be taken into custody rather than attempting some cockamamie escape to Lichtenburg by police-arranged jet. It’s just as well, since that was only ever a fantasy at best.
By this point, Teddy, having seen Raggedy Ann’s terrified livestream from earlier in the episode, has raced downtown to the crime scene. Tully hates that Wagner is present, but it’s Wagner who is preventing this entire situation from going off the rails. He reassures Teddy that Elsbeth is fine and even jokes that both he and Teddy know how good his mom is at talking her way out of sticky situations.
Tully’s sharpshooter tries to take a shot at Nolan, but Elsbeth sees the little red laser dot on his forehead and pushes him out of the way. Her final stroke of brilliance — getting everyone in the shop to dress identically in Becker’s Toys jumpsuits, with wigs and hats obscuring their faces — allows them all to emerge from the store safely, while protecting Nolan from any further attempts on his life. Solidarity! (I recognize that little gambit from the trailer of Inside Man, and welcome any further relevant details folks want to share!)
Bless Officer Summerville for tackling the scrum of hostages and Nolan; when Tully’s sharpshooter fires, his bullet only hits the ill-fated Chrissy doll. The Doll Doctor respectfully drapes a little tarp over the $6,000 fallen soldier, and Summerville re-holsters his gun. Whew.
As Nolan is being bundled into a patrol car, Elsbeth assures him that although she can’t defend him formally, she knows exactly who’s right for the job and will put him in touch with her. The whole episode has been both fun and touching, and I think it’s reasonable for us to hope that it’s the start of a multi-episode arc featuring Nolan and his soon-to-be defense attorney, Diane Lockhart. Christine Baranski, we are ready for you! Is it too much to hope for some kind of crossover allusions with The Gilded Age, as well as The Good Wife and The Good Fight? If we are the luckiest TV viewers in the world, perhaps David Cross’s close friend and Mr. Show collaborator Bob Odenkirk will make an appearance, too. He’s done a bang-up job of portraying one of the most creative attorneys-at-law TV has ever produced, after all. Fingers crossed!
Tote Bags Extravaganza
• I could say there’s nothing in this week’s tote bags, because Elsbeth had to manage most of her time on screen without a single tote, but I’m not that clever.
• Another unusual aspect of this episode: Elsbeth only wears one costume! Is this the first time that’s happened? Her ensemble is charming and bright — cute striped sailor pants, a floral hat that would not have been out of place in an episode of Blossom, a cropped hot pink blazer with a lacy white blouse, and matching floral brooch and earrings. The items I most want to shout out, though, are her pink high tops and little pom-pom ankle socks. All children of the ‘80s feel seen and understood!
