Some thoughts on "Dead Man Talking," the Nov. 11 episode of NYPD Blue, 
but first, a (very) quick summary:

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Sipowicz, Simone and Kirkendall receive some surprise assistance from the 
retired Vince Gotelli in investigating a home invasion murder, a visit 
from an old friend puts Fancy on the trail of a 15-year-old murder, and 
the rest of the detectives investigate the beating of a music executive 
whom everybody wanted to beat.
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1)Vince is back! Vince is back! Vince is back! Excuse me for a moment 
  while I dance a little jig. :)  Vince Gotelli has long been one of my 
  favorite recurring characters -- amusing without being a caricature 
  (usually), and always well-played by the underrated Carmine Caridi -- but 
  it looked like last season's "Is Paris Burning?" was his swan song. Not 
  only did the writers dream up a plausible way to occasionally bring Vince 
  back, but they've managed to make him seem much more competent since he 
  got his ticker fixed, so I needn't worry about him becoming too clownish.

2)Familiarity can breed contempt, but it can also breed hilarity. The bit 
  at the strip club where we catch glimpses of Andy with the dancers 
  through the glass had me rolling on my couch, entirely because my 
  imagination and my extreme familiarity with Sipowicz allowed me to fill 
  in the unheard dialogue. I'm still chuckling.

3)James McDaniel doesn't get to show it nearly as much as he should, but 
  he really is a wonderful actor, and tonight's episode provided him with 
  another good showcase. (Can anyone think of a Fancy-centered subplot 
  where he *hasn't* been terrific?) The final scene, which is apparently 
  setting up Fancy's mid-life crisis, was wonderful; I only wish Fancy had 
  been given someone to bounce feelings off of before the show's fifth 
  season. Guest star Dick Anthony Williams (Harvey) was also very good, 
  making the long-dormant murder case work even though it wasn't the most 
  original or suspenseful idea on the block. I only wish we could've heard 
  some of Harvey's music at the end. 

4)When I saw the clock read 10:50 with no resolution yet to the music 
  murder case, I smiled and thought to myself, "Wow, they're actually *not* 
  going to tie up all the loose ends, for once. Cool." And then Dana the 
  Wacky Custodian came in for an interview. I'm not sure what I think about 
  that scene. On the one hand, I've been complaining a lot about the recent 
  need to overexplain everything (the dreaded "Brooklyn South Syndrome"), 
  and I'm glad we were allowed to realize Dana was hinkey without being 
  tipped off by an unnecessary scene where Diane tells Greg and James that 
  she just ran a background check on the janitor, and guess what? I also 
  liked Diane's interview style here, particularly the hand-holding gesture 
  (Andy hits perps, Bobby scares them, Jill empathizes with them, so why 
  shouldn't Diane try mothering them into confessing?). However, I still 
  felt this came out of the blue. Since it had already been established 
  that the victim had a list of enemies a mile long, the idea that the cops 
  would've had the time or inclination to check out the janitor *on the 
  first day of the investigation* was kind of a credibility stretcher. 
  (It's one of the reasons I wish the show wouldn't always lock itself into 
  the one-to-two days per episode format.)

5)Lord, please let this episode be the baseline that the writers use for 
  Naomi. She's been given a personality as efficient and protective of her 
  territory (the catching area), and is used in scenes where the PAA would 
  logically be involved, and that's about where she should stay -- in other 
  words, Upstairs John territory. I'm kind of growing to like her (the "I'm 
  just thinking of (the smelly rocker on the catching bench) as a hologram" 
  line was priceless), but I really wouldn't care to see her role expanded, 
  be it romance with one of the cops, an assault, or what have you.

6)Jill didn't do much tonight, but she was rather quick with a comeback, 
  first shrugging off Vince's "Hello, gentlemen," with "No offense," then 
  snapping at the strip club owner for asking if she had any experience in 
  the business. (Sexist porker time: how many men in the audience 
  immediately conjured a mental image at that moment? :))

7)Line of the Week: 

	"Hygiene, dude!" 
		-Diane's Valley-Speak quip upon the rocker's exit

See ya in the funny papers...

Alan Sepinwall * e-mail: sepinwal@force.stwing.upenn.edu
NYPD Blue page: http://www.stwing.upenn.edu/~sepinwal/nypd.html 

RANDOM QUOTE:

"The last time I was inside a woman was five years ago, and that was the 
 Statue of Liberty."
	-Woody Allen, "Crimes and Misdemeanors"