Recap / Psych S 04 E 13 Death Is In The Air

Season 4, Episode 13

Death is in the Air

"Spencer One to Ground Control. I am ready to commence orbit. GGGKKXXXT."

Directed by Stephen Surjik

Written by Bill Callahan and Anupam Nigam

A horrified courier named Donny Lieberman hires Shawn and Gus to find the whereabouts of a small cooler he was tasked with delivering to a biotech company named GenuTech. It seems that while he was delivering it, he got drunk, and a prostitute took advantage of him and stole it (along with his watch). However, the prostitute has already been found dead, after staggering into a convenience store and collapsing, bleeding from the eyes. Turns out Lieberman’s cooler was carrying samples of an extremely deadly virus from Africa – the Thornburg Virus – and the prostitute was exposed when she stole it. While the CDC and the SBPD have the situation in hand fairly quickly, the samples of Thornburg are still out there... and it soon becomes obvious that someone wants to spread this disease. But where will they deploy it... and why are they doing it?

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Tropes:

• Almost Dead Guy: Mallon dies of the virus within a few minutes of the gang cornering him at the hospital.
• Angry Guard Dog: Dr. Mallon has a very aggressive Rottweiler guarding his mountain cabin.
• Bland-Name Product: GenuTech, a biotech company, is named after the real-life company Genentech.
• Butt-Monkey: Donny Lieberman. He gets liquored up and robbed by a prostitute, losing an extremely valuable and dangerous cooler in the process, then gets fired for it. The ending shows he kind of deserves it for being a truly Horrible Judge of Character.
• Call-Back: Lassiter still has all the softball equipment from "Shawn Gets the Yips" in the trunk of his car.
• Cannot Spit It Out: Even after Juliet is (apparently) infected with Thornburg and Shawn vows to tell her the truth, Shawn has an extremely hard time confessing his feelings to her, stalling with metaphors and such until Lassiter comes in and inadvertently ruins the moment.
• Contamination Situation: A deadly virus is stolen and released on a public place.
• Crowd Hockey: The plague vial gets kicked around the bus station as Shawn tries to retrieve it.
• Everything Is Racist: Gus seems to think the Thornburg Virus is quite racist, as it's generally limited to Africa.
• Hoist by His Own Petard: Dr. Mallon, a Thornburg Virus researcher who released it into crowded areas in an attempt to drum up funding to research it, winds up collapsing and dying from it after he’s infected and can’t get enough antivirus.
• Horrible Judge of Character: Donny gets played by a hooker, which launches the plot. At the end of the episode he gets played by a Russian, Olga.
• Improvised Armor: Shawn uses some softball catcher’s equipment to armor himself against Mallon’s Rottweiler, running like hell while Lassiter makes a break for Mallon’s cabin.
• Insane Troll Logic: Mallon unleashed the virus in hopes of showing the need to further develop a cure for it. Shawn points out the insanity behind this thinking.
• Meaningful Name: Dr. Mallon, the doctor spreading the Thornburg Virus, gets his surname from Mary Mallon, who is better known as Typhoid Mary.
• Metaphorgotten: While trying to steel himself up to confess his feelings to Juliet, Shawn claims there’s two kinds of kids going after the prize in the bottom of a cereal box: the ones who turn the cereal box upside-down and get their toy early, and the ones who open the box, eat the cereal, and let it happen naturally. He then mentions a kid named Mikey, who’ll eat anything, including the prize, but he’s not really important right now.
• Motive Misidentification: Upon learning that Dr. Mallon was the one responsible for the Thornburg being released, Shawn and the others believe he did it to save his lab from being shut down. It's not until they confront him that he reveals he did it because he wanted to show how dangerous the virus could be and why it was necessary to have an antivirus.
• Nightmare Fuel Station Attendant: Most of the doctors in this episode are this to some extent, ranging from one who seems almost gleeful at seeing Thornburg released to the public if it’ll help their research and funding, to one who asks Shawn for a sample of his DNA and wants to measure Gus’s cranium.
• No Celebrities Were Harmed: A rare literally viral example. The Thornburg Virus is native to Africa. It spreads through contact with bodily fluids, is extremely dangerous, and causes the victim to bleed from the eyes and other orifices. This seems to be a cross between Ebola and the Marburg Virus.
• The Plague: The threat of one drives the plot. The Thornburg Virus has some nasty effects – headache, weakness, bleeding from the eyes, heavy sweating, and finally, death. It spreads through contact with body fluids. An antivirus was developed by GenuTech, but it turns out to be only partly effective – most people need a great deal of the stuff to fight it off.
• Running Gag: Shawn develops a taste for vile-smelling food in this episode, driving Gus nuts as his snacks turn up everywhere.
• The Schlub Pub Seduction Deduction: The culprit hired a prostitute to get some vials of a deadly virus from a hapless deliveryman while he was incredibly drunk. Although his judgment in women while sober isn't much better...
• This Is Gonna Suck: In the show’s Cold Open, Henry cleans Shawn off on the lawn because he was sent home from school for having lice. Shawn then reveals he used Henry’s comb that morning. Henry’s reaction is very much this trope.
• Villain Has a Point: When Dr. Mallon points out how easily the Thornburg could be weaponized, hence his motivation, Gus comments that it's not "garden variety crazy person logic".
• Well-Intentioned Extremist: Dr. Mallon feared the potential of Thornburg re-engineered into a viral superweapon. When his funding was canceled just after he managed to develop a weak – but working – antivirus, he tried to release Thornburg into populated areas to drum up financial support for further research.
• What Did I Do Last Night?: Donny Lieberman shows up to see if Shawn and Gus can figure it out. Apparently, he got boozed up and robbed by a prostitute.