Beauty and the Beast Recap

In this week’s episode of Beauty and the Beast, Cat’s obsession with her mother’s murder causes some serious problems. We meet Cat’s younger sister, who is staying with her but getting sick of seeing boards and boxes dedicated to the unsolved crime. In the end, the two agree to try to mend their strained relationship, but I predict we’ll definitely see lil’ sis get into some dangerous situations this season.

Every spare moment Cat has between investigating the case of a murdered ballerina, she’s running off to Vincent’s not-so-secret lair – much to the chagrin on his roommate. She thinks she has found research linking her mom’s work to Muirfield, but Vincent says it’s nothing (not sure I believe him, though).  Seriously, after almost being murdered by Muirfield operatives last week, you’d think a smart woman like Cat would comprehend the gravity of the situation a little better, but she just doesn’t seem to get it. Vincent is torn between wanting to see her – yes, he pops up at her crime scene, too – and wanting her to stay away.

As for the ballerina murder case, I like seeing Cat at work (she’s a lot more impressive there than when making googly eyes at Vincent), but so far her cases are a little lame. It seems like we always meet only two people in the victim’s life – one is the likely suspect and, in a “twist,” the other is the one who actually did it. In a world where crime dramas are a dime a dozen, these cases just don’t hold water. I hope future episodes aren’t so predictable.

Cat decides to “borrow” (a.k.a. steal) a pic of Vincent and three of his army buddies who all participated in the Muirfield experiment and, when Vincent won’t give her any details about them and begs her to leave it alone, she runs the picture through facial recognition software. Bad idea, Cat! Immediately we see her computer being accessed by someone and wiped clean and we later learn from an NYPD IT tech that her computer is completely fried. Vincent is furious when he finds out that Cat has seriously put them on the radar – again – and, for the 100^th time, tells her to stay away (making his point with some beastly wall punching). Next time she goes to the warehouse (because we all know she can’t listen), all of his things are gone and his roommate tells her he left since she put them all in grave danger.

Cat is later attacked by a Muirfield agent who has a gun and some ninja-like moves. Cat is a pretty badass fighter herself and I enjoyed the scene but, like last week, she eventually ends up in the losing position. Again, the show seems a little too formulaic. Fortunately, Vincent is lurking in the shadows and goes all beasty on the guy, throwing him about thirty feet in the air and through the windshield of a car. Cat ends up stuck with a corpse to explain to her friends on the police force. It’s ludicrous that anyone – even the ME who has the hots for her – would accept her explanation that she pushed the wood-be mugger and he fell and his head. I guess it’s good to have the police on your side!

If I were Cat and knew I had a bounty on my head from a vicious black-ops group that was repeatedly sending assassins after me, I think I’d be a little more concerned. But she seems more worried that Vincent is mad at her than about the fact that she’ll probably be dead in a week, so she writes a four-page letter apologizing for crossing boundaries and asks JT to give it to him. In the end, Vincent and Cat meet up and make peace (and more googly eyes…gag).

I found the show entertaining, but the same thing every week is going to get old pretty quick. In the previews, it looks like next week’s episode will mix it up with Vincent getting captured, so I hope to see some new twists come in to play!