Or, "Who am I going to have homoerotic subtext with now?" -- When Mick thinks Josef is dead. 
I just highlighted a few of my favorite Josef lines/references since this episode was so much Josef.
The Recapist
I just highlighted a few of my favorite Josef lines/references since this episode was so much Josef.
The Recapist
Quote:
It's been three long weeks since we last checked in with McBeth, and I'm sorry you had to wait a couple of extra days for this recap. I was busy publishing a novella and visiting New York City, but no sooner did I drop my suitcase in the hallway than I cued up the TiVo. Thanks for your patience!
We begin in unconscious Coraline's hospital room, where the doctor tells McBeth that Beth's stake missed Coraline's heart, but hit her lung. Of course, the doc doesn't know it was Beth's stake per se, since Mick's claiming it was some kind of accident. They're in wait and see mode, and Mick is very worried. He also really, really wants to know how Coraline de-vamped herself, and if she bites it, he never will. Meanwhile, in the Big Apple, a hitman presents a sickly old man on an oxygen machine with a glossy photo of Josef. The old man, who lives in a posh Manhattan apartment, is played by Ian Abercrombie, a.k.a. Mr. Pitt. Mr. Pitt orders the hitman to burn Josef to death, over the clueless hitman's understandable objections, since fire isn't exactly the stealthiest form of murder. But Mr. Pitt insists, and our killer for hire should just be happy that he's not being ordered to look for the perfect pair of tube socks.
Back in the City of Angels, Josef and his buddies are playing poker with vials of blood instead of chips (cute!), and Josef is helpfully expositing that relationships with mortal women never work out. Pay attention kids, there's going to be a test later! The hitman suddenly barges into Josef's pad, spraying the room with machine gun fire before throwing two canister grenades over to where Josef is hiding behind his desk. They go boom, and a huge fireball erupts from the window. Yeah, not exactly killing on the downlow.
Commercials. I have to say that here in Ontario we have the most horrifying and effective PSAs I have ever seen in my life.
In the burned-out wreck of Josef's office, a shocked Mick questions the head of security, who says they haven't found any bodies, just ash.
Beth is burning the midnight oil at BuzzWire, and her editor assigns her the Josef story. Beth unsuccessfully pleads conflict of interest due to Mick and Josef's close friendship, but considering she's covered a case her boyfriend was prosecuting, her argument's a tad weak. Speaking of Josh, is he ever going to return? I'd think they'll at least kill him off rather than have him fade away.
At Josef's office, McBeth have a tense meeting. Mick's grieving Josef's death, and he gets quite bitchy with Beth when he realizes she's on assignment. It's all very prickly and uncomfortable. Mick goes over the building security feed with the security guard, and they see that the hitman had military grenades. Mick gets called to the hospital, and he gets to talk to a groggy Coraline. He tells her of Josef's death, and Coraline remembers the misty, water-colored days of yore, when she set up introduced Josef and Mick, and they didn't like each other, but grew to be BFF.
Mick may be sad about Josef and all, but not so sad that he doesn't start grilling Coraline on how she became human. Coraline notes his desperation to be mortal again, and thinks it's due to his love for Beth. Mick denies it, and she tells him she became human for him. Of course, she still won't tell him how she accomplished this incredible feat before drifting back to sleep. Because even in the hospital in serious condition and pumped full of drugs, Coraline is a mind-fucker extraordinaire. Mick takes a sample of her blood (with a syringe, not his teeth) for further testing.
Mick finds Beth waiting at the Fortress of Style, and they both apologize to each other for their earlier fight before Mick starts crying over the unbearable loss of his best friend. Yes, that's right. HE CRIES. His eyes water and his little face crumples as his voice breaks. Oh, Mick. I just want to hug him, but lucky Beth is there, and as she reaches for him, Mick pulls her into a hug with a forceful conviction that makes my heart flutter. I might have also have squealed, "Ohhhhh!" in a really high pitch. Then I had to wipe my tears away, since Alex manages to both break my heart and turn me on at the same time. He and Sophia were really great there.
They enter the Fortress to find Josef sitting in a bathrobe at Mick's desk, a glass of blood nearby. As McBeth gape, Josef saucily asks (in a very Logan Echolls tone) if Mick's going to stand there all day or help find his would-be killer. When we come back from commercial, we learn that Josef's vamp friends died, and now that everyone thinks Josef's dead, he can't access his money. Josef doesn't explain how he survived without a scratch, but I guess he's just super that way. McBeth toddle off to BuzzWire to investigate the ex-military hitman after Mick orders Josef to stay. Heh.
BuzzWire. Mick is surprised Beth's hacker pal (another in this show's long line of apparently expendable tertiary characters) is a hot chick, but he's pleased when she's able to find the hitman's name and mercenary history. Later, Mick returns to the Fortress to find Josef having a party with some hot freshies. Mick, ever the killjoy, puts an end to the festivities. Josef tells the women, "Daddy's a little grumpy." Okay, for real, I expect a ton of fanfic about how Josef puts Mick in a better mood right after the girls leave. Mick lays a guilt trip on Josef for putting him at risk like he their dead vamp pals, and Josef is chastened. Then he gets Mick riled again by saying he needs to go back to his office to get some cash from his fireproof safe.
Mick: (exasperated) I'm going to bed.
Josef: And what am I supposed to do?
Honestly, it writes itself, people!
At the hospital, the doctor's mystified by the fact that Coraline's temperature is dropping. Coraline vamps out when a nurse and her juicy jugular vein get too close, but she gets back in control just in time and the nurse doesn't suspect a thing. Back at the Fortress, Josef comes downstairs (hmmm, wonder what he was doing up there?) and puts on a fetching black coat before leaving. He tries to sneak into his office, but is caught by his trusty security guard, who it turns out, isn't so trusty. He calls the hitman, who shoots him for his trouble. Meanwhile, Mick wakes to find his spidey vamp senses tingling.
Josef pulls out his safe, which is like a drawer hidden in a wall near the floor. Inside is a lot of cash, and also a heart-shaped necklace in a velvet pouch. Josef ponders the necklace with his best wounded puppy expression. Mick arrives in time to save Josef from the hitman, and after a lot of fighting, Mick gets the hitman to spill the beans on who hired him. When Josef hears Mr. Pitt's name (it's actually Whitley), he tells Mick he doesn't recognize it. Of course, he disappears as soon as Mick turns around.
Carl the Cop must be off with Kevin Weisman somewhere, since it's the Asian detective who carts the hitman off to jail. Beth arrives to drop the science on wealthy Mr. Pitt and his past, which includes a daughter who went missing in 1955. McBeth head off to the City That Never Sleeps to find Josef. Meanwhile, the hitman pulls a Hannibal Lecter (minus the face eating and whatnot) and escapes from the back of the police cruiser after killing the two patrol cops up front.
Beth is just zipping up her suitcase when Josh returns from the land of the missing to knock on her door with the dreaded "We need to talk." Josh is no fool, and sadly tells her things aren't working out due to the Mick situation. Mick shows up to add to the awkwardness, and although Beth is teary, she insists on going with him.
NYC. The hitman has somehow gotten to the east coast already, so I guess he caught the red eye. Hitman gives Mr. Pitt the gears until Pitt admits that Josef is a vampire. He then demands to know how to kill said vampires. Meanwhile, we get an outdoor stock shot of the New York City street that I was standing on this very morning to catch a cab. Like, seriously, it was this exact street. It's kind of surreal. Anyway, Josef goes to a brownstone and is ushered in by a woman who says they've been expecting him.
At Mr. Pitt's, the doorman won't let McBeth in, so Mick leaps up and pulls down the fire escape for Beth. How gallant! Inside, they question Mr. Pitt, and he tells them that Josef, who was "Charles Fitzgerald" in 1955, murdered Pitt's 21-year-old daughter, Sara. Turns out that Sara kept a diary, and Pitt gives it to McBeth. In the park, Beth reads aloud the last entry, about Sara wanting to be turned into a vampire to be with Josef. This is all news to Mick.
Thanks to Beth's hot hacker pal, they get the address Josef's car dropped him off at. They scurry off to the brownstone as the hitman tails them menacingly. Josef's housekeeper tries to brush them off, but Josef lets them in and shows them into a bedroom where Sara, still looking 21, is comatose on the bed. Josef gets emo as he tells them that he knew better than to get involved with a human (Beth and Mick each do an awkward shuffle), but he loved her and she didn't care he was a vampire.
His voice breaks as he tells them how he finally gave in to Sara's requests and tried to turn her. Oh, Jason. You always get me with your glistening eyes and your quavering voice! The turning went wrong, and now Sara's stuck somewhere in-between. Josef couldn't let her go, and keeps her alive in the coma because he hopes someday modern medicine will find a way to help her. Although I can't imagine there are many scientists hard at work on the problem. Although, Josef is richer than god, so maybe there are.
That pesky hitman interrupts Josef's soul baring by crashing through the window and staking him after pumping him full of lead. To the hitman's considerable consternation, Josef is only temporaralyzed. Mick and the hitman fight before Mick finally snaps his neck. He pulls the stake out of Josef's chest, and Josef wheezes his thanks. Later, Mick removes the bullets from a shirtless Josef's back as they bicker like an old married couple, and the slash keeps coming when Josef whines at the pain, saying giving it is different than receiving. Ahem.
Josef tells Mick that what happens to Sara is proof that vamp/mortal hook-ups aren't advisable, and that clearly the universe wanted him to be a happy-go-lucky manwhore instead of a loving man vamp. He tells Mick that if Mick pursues Beth, he hopes the universe is on their side. Well, I don't know about the universe, but I know there are a lot of people on the internet on McBeth's side.
Beth gives Josef Sara's diary as the emo rock soundtrack kicks in. McBeth leave, and Josef wistfully flashes back to the '50s and the day he gave Sara the heart necklace. Awwwwww. He looks so happy and in love, and I'm very glad we've finally gotten a bit more character development on Josef. Now they need to give him a non-comatose love interest.
Mick and Beth leave and discuss the sadness of Sara's situation, and also whether or not Coraline really has the cure for vampirism. Mick shakes off the blues and hails a cab, suddenly taken with a fit of whimsy. He sweetly and excitedly tells Beth they should take a later flight and do something fun and New York-y. But Beth bursts that bubble by saying she needs to get back to see Josh and talk things over. Beth, are you demented? I know you're a bit freaked by the whole Sara thing, but go have fun with Mick! He's so rarely jovial. Instead, they longingly bid adieu.
The episode ends as a very pale and sickly Coraline wakes suddenly, calling out Mick's name. A moment later the alarms go off in her room, but when the nurse and crash team run in, the bed is empty. Dun, dun, DUN!
Happy holidays, and see you in the new year for at least one more episode.
