Episode Guide

Season 3

Episode 35-Sam and Dave


The Case

Elain Johnson hires Blue Moon to find out if her lover, Alan McClafferty, is falling back in love with his wife. She's the other woman and suspects he is about to break off the affair. David doesn't want to take the case, Maddie does. They take it and have to do surveillance that night. Maddie and Dave fight because Maddie won't break her date with Sam that night to work. David is very upset. That night Dave and Bert do the surveillance and Dave is very preoccupied. Bert let's it slip where Maddie is having dinner with Sam. Dave hears this and leaves immediately for the restuarant. The case is continued in the next episode.

What's Really Going on Chris?

Maddie arrives to work very late. Dave pretends not to notice but is extremely irritated. Maddie knows something is wrong with him, but he won't tell her. Finally he tells her that he was worried about her given what she said the night before and her late arrival to work. She tells him she went home and got a call that an old friend, Sam Crawford, arrived in town. They stayed up late catching up.
Later, Maddie has lunch with Sam. She arrives back at the office very late, with a new hairdo and a new dress "cut down to South America." It's becoming apparent to Dave that Sam is more than an old friend. Dave goes over the edge when Maddie refuses to break her date with Sam to work and accuses her of being irresponsible. Maddie becomes incensed that David would accuse her of that, as she is irresponsible "once in a decade" while he has raised it "to an art form." She insists that he take Bert if he doesn't want to go alone and David storms out of the office.
When David goes to the restaurant he finds Maddie and Sam and interrupts their dinner with an "emergency." Maddie introduces them and David starts to say they met already, but Sam cuts him off and acts like they've never seen each other. Sam leaves for a few minutes and it's obvious David is trying to muster up the courage to tell Maddie that he loves her. Sam comes back just as Dave is about to say it. Sam invites Dave to stay for some wine and David, who is surprised, accepts and then stays for dinner too. We find out that Sam is hardworking (worked his way through Yale) smart (he was issued a patent while at Yale for low density polymers)and has a highly respected and highly paying job as an astronaut. He's also polite, humble (claims it was luck he became an astronaut, they just needed a particle physics guy), funny, and an all around nice guy. He's really good looking and has a cool car. You can't help but like Sam, he's as close to Prince Charming as a girl can get and Dave knows it. We also find out, though Maddie tries to stop Sam from telling David, that Sam and Maddie were a couple a long time ago in the early 70's. Dave responds by getting really drunk and generally makes a fool of himself while showing repeatedly throughout the dinner how he is the opposite of Sam. Sam offers to drive David home. They stop for gas and Dave gets in a fight with another patron. Sam saves him. Sam puts David to bed and then returns to Maddie's. She and Sam make love. When Sam falls asleep Maddie is lying awake in bed, presumably thinking about David.

Chris's Obsessive Analysis

Dave is really threatened when he finds out Sam is an old "friend" and not a one night stand. David knows this is potentially more dangerous to him. The whole dinner scene compares Sam and David. Sam is shown to be the perfect guy for Maddie, all she has ever claimed to want in a guy. We hate that Sam is keeping Dave and Maddie apart, but we can't help liking him too, even Dave admits to liking him in the next episode. David's behavior at the dinner is Maddie's first clue that David might actually have feelings for her, as she knows he was trying to tell her something important, so important he couldn't get it out.
During dinner we find out that Maddie used to deathly afraid of flying and Sam had to drive her back to Chicago from Cambridge, MA (it's implied he did his graduate work at Harvard.) Dave tells Sam that she doesn't seem to be afraid now. This is important because it tells us that Maddie has changed over the years, possibly due to David. I believe it foreshadows her later choice.
The Johnson case interestingly parallels what is going on with Maddie and David. David doesn't want to take a case about infidelity right now, as he himself feels betrayed. David identifies with Elaine Johnson. They both want to find out if their love interest is falling back in love with their old partner. David begins to feel like the "other man" and doesn't like it.

Memorable Moments

Links

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