Plot: After a mysterious criminal shreds important paper documents of students across X, Valejo decides to bring in Frank Bishop – his former partner and the best profiler in X. However, Folsom is against the idea. Frank had been disgraced after an incident he caused nearly got the school sued. Frank had to stand down for the lawsuit to be dropped. Valejo didn’t defend his partner because he was up for the role of Junior Commissioner, leaving Frank bitter toward his partner and ruining their friendship.
The animosity Frank has with the Safety Patrol makes him a suspect, but Valejo refuses to hang his friend out to dry again. Is Valejo right to defend his old partner or has Frank fully fallen from grace?
Breakdown: Another very (mostly) well-written episode that had me questioning my suspicions from start to finish.
Frank is obviously the main suspect here. He’s given the most focus, he has a concrete motive (to ruin Valejo’s chances of getting a second term as Junior Commissioner and get back at the Safety Patrol), he mostly stays holed up in his room so he doesn’t have much of an alibi, and even Fillmore and Ingrid suspect him.
They do a great job making you question whether it actually is Frank or if you’re falling for the bait. And if you are falling for the bait, who would be the perp? There are several very viable suspects here.
I won’t spoil who the perp was, but it made for an extremely clever reveal, especially for a kid’s show. Fillmore! never disrespects their audience’s intelligence while also making sure to not be too difficult. That is a fine line to walk, and they walk it well. Frank made some incredible observations, and the clues were all there for the viewer to pick up on and follow.
This episode’s even a tiny bit darker than the norm as Fillmore nearly gets his his head smashed in with a huge block of chocolate.
The reason I wrote “Mostly” up there is because of one very silly note. They find a pattern in the Shredder’s victims and believe that Frank’s sister is next.
What are they going to shred?
…Her massive ice sculptures…………What….the….frick?
How do you shred ice sculptures?! Especially with a little portable shredder.
What were they thinking when they wrote that in? Why wasn’t the special thing Francine had a paper product?
Don’t get me wrong, it makes for a great backdrop for the finale, but it makes no sense. This whole episode has been paper themed and now suddenly we’re worried about someone jamming an eight foot tall ice angel into a shredder the size of a laptop, I guess.
A funny detail about this episode is when Valejo is being named Junior Commissioner for his second term, they purposefully censor out his first name with feedback on the mic. I don’t remember when they actually reveal his first name, but I always find these moments where a character’s name is a secret so they have to cover it up sometimes pretty funny.
All in all, a really great episode. I liked exploring Valejo’s backstory. It was pretty cool and engaging.
They tease like Frank will be a recurring character, but as far as I remember he never comes back. Shame, he’s pretty cool and would be useful to the team, but I feel like they probably opted against it because they didn’t want someone to outshine Fillmore and Ingrid.
Next Episode….
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