PLOT: Vanessa Farrow's ex husband Tony Galper turns up at her house. They have a row and Tony ends up smashing his head on a coffee table. He is dead and Vanessa phones her boyfriend Justin Price. He comes round and sees the body. Tony has invested a large amount of money in Price's newly refurbished nightclub, so Price decides gets rid of the body and makes it look like Tony disappeared two days after he did, which is the same day Tony's cheque to him clears. However, then it emerges that someone had been watching Vanessa's house and has incriminating photos. Justin meets with the man, who is a friend of his, Linwood Coben, who is a tabloid reporter. Justin agrees to pay the amount Coben demands to give Justin the photos. Justin goes round to Coben's house. Instead of paying Coben the money, Justin strangles him. Then Justin's pager beeps and it says there is a problem at the door of the club. Justin makes his way back to the club and a young lad who is the worse for wear is being taken to hospital. The ambulanceman asks what took Justin so long and he makes up an excuse that his pager was broken and he eventually got the message by word of mouth. It is customary for Justin to be around the club all the time and deal with any trouble. The following morning Columbo arrives on the scene and notices a smell of mouthwash on the victim. He goes up to his apartment and finds the mouthwash and evidence that the victim had cut his toe nails. He then has the computer keyboard dusted for prints. Coben's prints are on a number of keys on the keyboard. The suicide note was typed on the computer and, though the letters i and e were typed numerous times in the suicide note, there are no prints on those keys. Columbo then suspects foul play, as the person who typed the note must have worn gloves and rubbed off Coben's original fingerprints (he doesn't surmise that Coben typed the note himself wearing gloves, which is a reasonable assumption). He turns up at Justin's new nightclub where the final preparations are taking place for the opening night of his newly refurbished club, which has had fish tanks inserted in the floor. He knows that Justin and Coben were friends and asks him if Coben was the type to take his own life. Columbo reassures Justin he's just tying up a few loose ends, which as all Columbo watchers know means that he suspects it's murder. Justin tells Columbo that Coben had tried to take his own life the previous Christmas. As the case progresses Columbo finds more clues. He speaks to the ambulanceman who tells him about Justin taking a long time to show up at the door. A chance phone call left on Coben's answerphone when Columbo is at his apartment leads Columbo to Sean Jarvis' house. It turns out Coben had offered to pay Jarvis money to sit in a tree in his garden. Columbo sits in the tree and notices it overlooks someone's back yard. He pays the owner a visit, and the owner is Justin's girlfriend Vanessa. Columbo had already looked over Coben's files and knows that he was following Vanessa. Coben had got some dirt on Vanessa's ex husband Tony Galper, who was the son of a mafia boss. However, Columbo noticed that the photos that he had taken in Mr. Jarvis' tree were missing. Vanessa is very jumpy and Columbo already suspects her of involvement in the cases. Galper's body hasn't turned up so it is still a missing person case. Although there is nothing linking Justin and Vanessa, Columbo suspects Justin of killing Coben and Vanessa of killing Galper. Finally he gets proof when he shows up at Justin's club on the opening night and finds him and Vanessa together. Then, using a heat seaking device he finds the body of Galper hidden under the fishtanks, which are in the floor of Justin's club.
VERDICT: This is another below par effort, though slightly better than the previous episode. As usual there are many irritating coincidences, such as the phone call from Jarvis just when Columbo happens to be in Coben's apartment. This establishes a crucial link of how Coben had access to Vanessa's yard. Also the way Columbo finds Galper's body is lucky. Rhys gives a reasonable performance, with the odd bit of banter between him and Columbo. However, this is typical of the later Columbos in that there are too many plotlines and not enough Columbo and villain cat and mouse. It seems that this episode was intended to showcase Columbo with a group of young people in an attempt to either make him look like a 'cool old geezer', or to secretly laugh at him for not being one. All it achieves is to emphasise the fact that Columbo looks too old to work for the LAPD. It seems like the prime reason for making the more recent episodes was to show everyone that the great legend Columbo was still around. This is not a very good reason for continuing to make episodes. Personally I would rather remember him at his peak.
Written by Mark Wilson
(C) Copyright Wilson/Young Enterprises 2006.
CAST:
Justin Price..........Matthew Rhys
Vanessa Farrow........Jennifer Sky
Sergeant Harkins......Julius Carry
Linwood Coben......Douglas Roberts
Tony Galper.....Carmine Giovinazzo
Freddy..........Steven R Schirripa
Sean Jarvis..........John Finnegan
Officer Rogers........Patrick Cupo
Julius................Jorge Garcia
