‘The Rookie’ Recap: Season 5, Episode 16 “Exposed”
Happy Belated Valentine’s Day! This week The Rookie had a delayed Valentine’s episode that focused on most of the couples fighting on the day of love.
Mommy Dearest
Nyla is upset when James gives his mom the link to the live feed from their baby cameras. It starts to upset her more when his mom starts doing things like buying James a new robe because it looks like he needs it. She brings it up to Angela on shift and asks if she’s right to be creeped out by this and Angela tells her that it’s understandable that she’s upset.
Aaron, who was also present for the conversation, disagrees with Nyla and spends the shift trying to explain it to her. He feels that if she included her mother-in-law in their life more, then she wouldn’t want to be this overly involved.
At the end of the day, James shows up with apology flowers and tells her that she took away his mom’s access to the cameras. Nyla asks him if they can start doing Sunday brunches with her so she feels more included though.
Threats
With the threat of Elijah (and Abril) over them, Wesley starts getting nervous and decides to hire some private security. The person he hires is named Charlie, leading to him assuming they’re was a man when really they’re a woman. A very attractive woman at that.
Angela goes to Nyla about it, over the shop radio, and asks if she should be worried. Nyla asks for the name of the woman, leading everyone that’s listening in to look her up and give their two cents. The consensus is that she should get Charlie out of her house.
Later, while face timing Wesley, Angela sees Charlie in the background, holding Jack, and gets upset. When Angela is home, she and Wesley talk about why she’s actually upset, which is that her life is so complicated and she doesn’t get to catch a break. A few minutes later, Charlie shows up at the door with a box sent by Elijah. The content of the box is dead roses and bugs.
First Fight
At the start of the episode, Bailey is fighting with customer service over a package of hers not being delivered. She’s been going back and forth when Nolan grabs the phone from her and tells the person on the other line that they need to figure it out. Bailey gets upset that he did that leading to a fight.
She’s still upset with him when they run into each other on a call, but when Nolan comes home from work, she’s a lot less upset. Bailey tells him that she realized that this was their first fight.
Chenford’s First Valentine’s Day
Tim and Lucy’s first Valentine’s day has an eventful start with the pair being woken up by Lucy getting a call for help from someone she trained with at UC school. She and Tim rush to help with Tim hiding in the backseat while Lucy drives up and pretends to be her friend’s significant other. They manage to get the guys he’s dealing with to back off and offer to help him further. While talking, her friend realizes that Tim is Lucy’s boyfriend and makes a comment about him being “that Bradford.”
Tim leaves early the following morning and after some digging, he learns about what Lucy did to get him into Metro. Grey ends up having him ride with Lucy though because they would need a Metro to assist and Metro hasn’t been available in a timely fashion recently. He’s short with her throughout the day until she gets him to talk about what’s going on. She assumes that he’s jealous of her friend until Tim tells her he knows what she did.
She doesn’t understand why he’s upset until he lays out how this looks for him. After their shift, she goes and talks to him. She starts to apologize but ends up doubling down on what she did because she knows it’s what was best for them. He accepts her “non-apology” and they move on. Tim gives her the necklace that he bought her for Valentine’s day before they leave for dinner.
Mobile Lab
The undercover cop that Lucy is friends with briefs the others on the operation that he’s been working. He believes that his cover has been made and there’s a mobile meth lab driving around the city. The plan is to keep an eye out for the lab while patrolling.
While driving around, they get forwarded a 9-1-1 call from the cop’s source on the inside. He got assaulted by the crew he was with and they left him there. When they get to him, they find him dead from a chemical reaction. They realize that it couldn’t have been meth and Tim recognizes that it’s sarin gas.
This makes the hunt for the lab even more crucial. They figure out that the victim’s sister is probably in on it and call her to the scene. They manage to scare her enough that she calls the leader of the operation while her phone, unknown to her, is tapped. This reveals the end destination for the lab which allows them to intercept it before anyone gets hurt.
Ebola Outbreak
The CDC enlists help from the LAPD when some people who went on a trip to Nigeria recently might have been exposed to Ebola. They work together to find all the people and limit the spread.
Among the ones infected is a man who ends up exposing his mistress, a soon-to-be father that was on his way to his child’s birth when he was intercepted for quarantining, and a man who unfortunately uses public transportation and they barely catch him after he gets on the bus.
The Truth
After not being able to access them herself, Celina asks Nolan if he can pull the case files from her sister’s murder for her. He’s hesitant to do so but when Celina explains that she just wants closure for her and her mom, he agrees until the condition that he gets to read the file first.
When he gets the file, they’re on shift so he can’t read it immediately but does glance at the photos. He tells Celina that they’re gruesome and she won’t want to see them, but she insists because she feels she doesn’t get the luxury when that’s what her sister suffered. Nolan agrees to still give her the file but only when she’s absolutely ready.
The Rookie returns on Tuesday, February 28 at 8 p.m. EST. Until then, check out our other coverage of the show!