Season 2, Episode 15
Black and Tan: A Crime of Fashion
Directed by Mel Damski
Written by James Roday Rodriguez and Steve Franks
After Shawn takes Gus to an exclusive club’s fashion show for his birthday, the host of the show – a designer named Gregor Uwe Steeb – is electrocuted by faulty wiring in his microphone. The fashion models and designers are less-than-cooperative with the police, taking the opportunity to mock their own fashions. Shawn and Gus got into the club by pretending to be retired models, Mr. Black and Mr. Tan (Shawn is Mr. Black, Gus is Mr. Tan, and how dare you assume otherwise), and the duo decide to see if anyone wanted Gregor dead by using their Black and Tan personas to live among the models for a little while… and see if they can keep anyone else from being killed.Tropes:
- Aesop Amnesia: Juliet learns that she can dress nicely and look like a beautiful woman without compromising her competence as a detective. After this episode, she immediately goes back to wearing the same pantsuits she's been wearing all series.
- Asshole Victim: Gregor cheated on his wife with one of his models and both he and Ciaobella were stealing Emily's designs for their own work.
- Awful Wedded Life: Gregor and his wife, Ciaobella. They ended up killing each other.
- Becoming the Mask: As Gus is increasingly welcomed into the models’ social circle, he starts getting more callous and obnoxious toward Shawn (and everyone else). He claims he’s staying in character, but some of his decisions in said character are… questionable.
- Beleaguered Assistant: Emily Bloom, Gregor and Ciaobella’s assistant. She designed most of Gregor’s most recent clothing line, only for him to take all the credit. She’s generally treated like absolute garbage by both of them. Made worse by the fact that she’s a legitimate Nice Girl, one of the very few we see in the industry.
- Booby Trap: In order to ensure Gregor would touch the microphone, the killer had it lowered shorter than Gregor actually was. He grabbed it to adjust it, and poof; one dead fashion designer.
- Brainless Beauty: Every single model working for Gregor is shown as this. One woman, Belinda, apparently can't spell her own name. Even the most sympathetic ones are generally airheaded, egotistical, and vapid, and the majority are also snobbish and obnoxious, running the gamut from The Ditz to The Prima Donna.Lassiter: “There’s no one in here with an IQ over 40.”
- Brutal Honesty: The models are generally this, when they’re not acting smug and pretentious. They see Gus’s features as perfect, but are not impressed by Shawn’s. Shawn has to pretend to be a foot-and-hand model.
- Coolest Club Ever: It’s called “Ciao”, and it’s owned by a fashion designer named Gregor Uwe Steeb.
- The Dead Guy Did It: Gregor killed his wife Ciaobella...posthumously. See Mutual Kill.
- Disproportionate Retribution: When a model insults his jacket, Lassiter stands up and whips out his baton.
- Double Standard Rape: Female on Male: Susan pushes a reluctant Henry into the bathroom and it's played for comedy.
- Dude, Where's My Respect?: Emily Bloom, see Beleaguered Assistant above.
- Explain, Explain... Oh, Crap!: Gus takes some time to gush over the clothes in his new apartment closet apparently provided by Gregor’s company, marveling that they’re all the same as his. He then notices a picture of his mother parasailing, and realizes that Shawn moved his things into Gregor’s building.
- Fauxreigner: Gregor appears to be European, but was really just an American putting on an accent.
- Fashion Show: A few are seen in the episode; the first one is where the murder takes place.
- Forced into Their Sunday Best: In the show’s Cold Open, Young Shawn tries to sneak past Henry in a Knight Rider T-Shirt, rather than the sweater-vest provided by his mother. Henry catches him and points him upstairs to change – turns out it’s Picture Day at school.
- High-Voltage Death: Gregor when he touches the mic stand Ciaobella tampered with.
- Letting the Air out of the Band: As Shawn, Gus, and the models do a Team Power Walk towards their limousine, snazzy music starts playing... until Henry turns up looking for Shawn, at which point, this trope hits in full force.
- The Matchmaker: Chief Vick tries setting Henry up with her friend Susan in the episode’s B-plot.
- Mistaken for Cheating: Shawn is shocked to see Chief Vick at Henry's place, has absolutely no clue what to say until Vick pulls her friend Susan into frame and says she's trying to hook her up with Henry.
- Mutual Kill: Gregor and his wife Ciaobella killed each other. Ciaobella tampered with the electrical systems in the microphone stand, and Gregor tried poisoning Ciaobella, but her bulimia slowed the effects of the poison to the point where she got to kill him before they took hold.
- Noodle Incident: Exactly how did Shawn get himself and Gus into the fashion launch party? Apparently, the club’s phone number is in the phone book, and Shawn can pull a convincing Filipino accent.
- Not on the List: The episode starts on Gus’ birthday, and for his present, Shawn pulls a few strings to get himself and Gus into the launch party for a new fashion line-up. A bouncer at the door tries pulling this on them… then it gets inverted when he realizes they ARE on the list, much to his shock, and lets them in.
- Not So Above It All: Juliet initially acts the part of the hardass, no-nonsense cop while questioning Emily, but she’s visibly gleeful at a pair of shoes Emily asks her to try on.
- Only Sane Man: Shawn lampshades his sudden status as this in one scene: not only is Gus living a lie to try and score with an idiotic model, but Chief Vick has just questioned Shawn about Henry's status with Susan (which he has no interest in discussing) and had the nerve to accuse him of wasting her time right afterward, even though Shawn is the only one (aside from Juliet and Lassiter) to stay focused on the case from start to finish.
- Overly Narrow Superlative: Gus refers to one of the models as being "one of the most popular models in the entire Santa Barbara downtown area."
- Pen Name: Gregor Uwe-Steeb's name was this. His real name was Gregory Lipstanski.
- The Prima Donna: Several models, especially Sigrid, but the worst is Ciaobella, Gregor's wife and business partner. She's obnoxious, rude, and treats everyone around her like dirt. Gus starts acting this way as he gets more and more into character as a model.
- Punched Across the Room: Gus clobbers a model clean across the room at one point – with a pillow.
- Red Herring: Emily Bloom. She's the next in line for company president if Gregor and Ciaobella die. Gregor has been stealing her designs and passing them off as his own. Ciaobella is quite verbally abusive towards her. After she takes the helm, Juliet comes to investigate her and Bloom gives her a makeover (read: bribe). However, she's not only not the killer, she's almost the next victim by accident.
- Rhetorical Question Blunder: When Lassie interrupts Shawn's Summation Gathering.Shawn: Do I come down to your office and bother you while you're working?
Lassiter: All the time.
Shawn: (Beat) Okay, that's fair. - Serious Business: Gus refuses to work on his birthday. When the clock hits midnight, he finally agrees to work on the case.
- Shout-Out: To Zoolander. "What, you don't think we're capable of leering into a camera? Of blue-steeling it up?"
- Split-Screen Phone Call: There's one between Vick and Shawn. It eventually splits into a four-way one when Henry and Vick's friend Susan also try talking to them.
- Tampering with Food and Drink: Gregor attempted to get rid of Ciaobella by poisoning her smoothies. Her bulimia meant the poison wasn't absorbed until after Gregor's own death, but it did work its magic eventually. Emily almost dies from drinking them, but luckily recovers.
- Team Power Walk: When the models head out to the bar to do some O2. Subverted when Henry interrupts it.
- Undercover Model: A rare male case occurs when Shawn and Gus claim to be male models. Both played straight with Gus and subverted when nobody believes Shawn is a model, forcing him to claim to be a foot (and ankle!) model.
- Weight Woe: Hinted at with Ciaobella, who was rail-thin and bulimic when she died – to the point where two of her fingers were slightly discolored from constantly putting them down her throat. Said bulimia is what prevented Gregor's poison from killing her until after she killed him first.
