Would you ever come back as a ghost? For Peter Bash, that is the question of the moment as he attempts to decide if life were worth living after death. This of course leads him to reveal the intense ending of The Sixth Sense, the 1996 movie by M. Night Shyamalan that everyone has seen by now - everyone that is except for Mr. Jared Franklin. Brekin Meyer and Mark Paul Gossler can work dialogue like I have never seen before, giving us a clever and witty introduction to episode two of their new TNT dramedy 'Franklin & Bash'.
This episode, cleverly titled "She Came Upstairs to Kill Me" sees our two lawyers diving into their own cases, a first for the new series. Bash, played to utter perfection by Gossler, inherits a murder case where he is set to defend Ms. Isabella Kaplowitz, a woman charged with killing her husband...with sex! It is later explained that although he was ordered to not have any sex, they were careful, using 'canteloupe' as their safe word. Now who could misinterpret that one? What ever happened to just saying 'stop'? Does that one not work anymore?
Anyways, the other half of the equation isn't nearly as exciting as Meyer's Franklin works to get out of his own case, creating a fictitious story about his wife going into labor with their first child - neither prove to be true.
It quickly becomes clear that this episode belongs to Bash as his trial gets under way and we get our first guest star of the season by way of Mr. Fred Willard. Playing one of Isabella's good friends and the lawyer/friend of her late husband Willard takes the stand as a character witness. It is here that we learn of his affection for the woman on trial, providing a cleverly placed side plot and a little breathing room for Bash's first client under Infeld Daniels.
But the episode takes a major turn when Franklin uncovers that you can actually bet on the outcome of the trial. After careful research the duo think they have found their culprit....Judge Hong. Franklin takes the opportunity to approach the judge and question her about her rising debt and gambling history. She quickly silences his suspensions by stating that the debt is due to her putting her buy-in for the World Series of Poker on her credit card. Damn it! Back to start, do not collection $200.
With character witnesses stacking up and Isabella's own housekeeper claiming she heard the couple fighting on the night of the murder, the future doesn't look so bright for our black widow billionaire. But then a huge break comes when a clever scheme that involves Franklin, Bash and their assistant Carmen lands them their betting insider - Juror Number 5.
A conversation outside of the court house reveals that Fred Willard's character hit on our mourning widow immediately following the funeral. (We knew he had to serve a purpose in the verdict...right?) This gets Bash thinking, and what do you know, he figures out that the last words the victim spoke, 'she came upstairs to kill me' was actually the punch line to a joke, not a reference to his wife Isabella.
Conclusion: The sophomore episode lacked a little in terms of originality, but I feel it is still getting its feet wet. The dialogue exchanges between our leading men make the show worth watching, and while this episode proved better than the pilot, I still don't think we've seen the best from our two unconventional lawyers. But only time will tell on that one.
Grade: B
