TV Recap: “Will Trent” Lives Through a Wild Night of Mariachi Bands, Murder, and Mayhem
Last week’s cliffhanger of Will Trent continues in episode 7, which wraps up the two-part event. To set the scene, a hurricane was approaching Atlanta. John Shelly is in a cell at the APD as Angie waits for a witness to come identify him as her friend’s stalker. The only problem is that the witness was just attacked. Let’s resume.
Season 3, Episode 7 - “Mariachi Shelly’s Frankenstein" - Written by Adam Toltzis
As thunder shakes the building, Angie Polaski (Erika Christensen) visits John (Dan Gill) in his cell. She reviewed the notebooks his mother kept, which were turned in by his sister, and she noticed some odd things she wants to talk to him about. But for now, she just needs a picture of him to show Mia Elkin, who saw Peggy’s mailbox stalker.
Angie heads to the GBI conference room, finding Will Trent (Ramón Rodríguez) in conversation with Marion Alba (Gina Rodriguez) and Freddy Markovic (Federico Rodriguez). Angie tells them about John’s mother’s notebook mentioning another person present at the time John allegedly raped and murdered his girlfriend. Freddy says the information came in too late on the original case to be used as evidence. Angie notices that Freddy’s eyes twitch sometimes. Marion also points out that this detail wouldn’t absolve John of being a suspect in their current case. Angie sees Will and Marion making flirtatious eyes at each other as he notices that Marion is wearing an American flag pin.
Amid the storm's chaos, Amanda Wagner (Sonja Sohn) is planning a surprise party for her secretary, Caroline. She tasked Sunny (Kyrie McAlpin) with making a card, and Sunny’s father Rafael Wexford (Antwayn Hopper) helped, too.
John’s sister Joyce Peters (Cynthia Evans) and her husband Kenan Peters (Chris Burns) return to the GBI at Angie’s request. In the hallway, Kenan recognizes Freddy as someone he went to high school with. Angie is worried about Mia, pushing the elevator button to go to the lobby to see if she’s there yet.
Down at the APD, Faith Mitchell (Iantha Richardson), Michael Ormewood (Jake McLaughlin), and Franklin (Kevin Daniels) have tried to decorate for Caroline’s surprise party, but Amanda is sad to see how unfestive it looks. Not even Ormewood’s mannequin, complete with night vision goggles, makes the place look good. Thankfully, Captain Heller (Todd Allen Durkin) helps a mariachi band find the party spot. Just then, a lightning strike causes the power to go out. The mariachi band clap, revealing that their hats light up. The men head off to find the emergency generator.
Angie and Will are stuck in the elevator, and neither of their phones have service. It gives Angie time to ask Will about his feelings for Marion, and he gets defensive, reminding Angie that she released him. Something wet drops on Angie’s face, and they soon realize it’s blood. Will helps lift Angie so she can raise the elevator’s ceiling tiles. They find the body of Mia Elkan (Teisha Speight), the witness they were waiting for. Mia’s body is still warm, and Will suspects that she was killed elsewhere and dumped down the elevator shaft. Mia’s digital watch beeps with a reminder to get her steps in. Angie knows that the only key to the elevator shaft is at the reception desk.
With no power in the building, everyone convenes in the GBI conference room. Marion is surprised to see Rafael Wrexford there. Faith hears noises coming from the elevator shaft and goes to investigate, releasing Will and Angie. They begin to take action about Mia’s body. Marion sees Will alone and confronts him about Rafael being a conflict of interest. Will tells Marion about the body and gives her a walkie-talkie, asking her to keep everyone calm in the conference room. They kiss before parting.
Amanda uses a flashlight to move through the dark hallways. Her party-planning task is interrupted when she hears someone crying. Turning a corner, she finds the birthday girl, Caroline (Christina Wren), on the floor in a pool of her own blood. Amanda yells for Pete Chin (Kurt Yue), who rushes out of the examination room to help. Just then, Kenan runs out of an office holding a bag. Amanda tackles him as Angie and Will arrive. Angie calls for an ambulance, but it’s going to be at least an hour before they can get there in the storm.
Caroline is put on Pete’s exam table. The coroner is anxious about having to operate on a live body. He tells Amanda he will need blood, suction, power, and light to save Caroline.
The mariachi band keeps everyone entertained in the conference room, but Marion has to break up the party for a moment after speaking with Will on the radio. She asks if anyone has blood type O-. The leader of the band, Gustavo (Rolando Fernandez), does.
Will and Angie interrogate Keenan, who claims he is innocent and was lost when he happened upon Caroline. Angie searches the bag he was carrying and finds the elevator key in it, which Keenan says he’s never seen before. He shares that he’s secretly a drug addict and he stepped away from his wife to take some oxy. Will confiscates the pills, realizing Pete could use them to help Caroline.
Ormewood, Franklin, and Heller have been working to get the old, heavy generator up to the APD’s floor. As they struggle with it, they joke about what the mariachi band’s name could be. Franklin is the one to suggest “Mariachi Shelley’s Frankenstein." But their comedic mood is soured when Faith finds them, announcing that the generator is now needed in the morgue.
In the morgue, Will helps crush up some oxy for Caroline, who is unconscious and in the midst of a blood transfusion. Will asks Pete for details about the attack. Pete tells him that the stab wounds were made head-on and favor the left side of the body.
Will returns to the interrogation room, asking Angie to remove Keenan’s handcuffs. Will gives him paper and a pen, asking him to draw a smiley face, which he does with his right hand. In the hallway, Will tells Angie that Caroline’s attacker is left-handed. They decide to keep Keenan in the interrogation room while they further investigate. They split up, with Will focusing on where Mia was attacked while Angie tries to figure out who did it.
Will brings Rafael to help him, which gives them time to talk. In the elevator shaft, Rafael helps Will use Mia’s watch to ping her phone. Will calls on the radio, asking if anyone hears a phone ding.
Faith, who was helping move the generator, hears it coming from the bottom of the stairwell. She radios Will to tell him where it is, warning that she hears water and there may be flooding.
As Pete operates on Caroline, Amanda asks the coroner about his career. He was a surgeon, but a botched appendectomy ended his career on living patients. The generator arrives just as Pete realizes he has damaged Caroline’s spleen, which will need to be removed. They will need more blood, and thankfully, Heller is also O-. But as they get everything hooked up, Caroline’s pulse stops.
Angie returns to John’s cell, telling him that the killer is in the building and it’s not Keenan. She asks him to think hard about the night his girlfriend was killed. He tells her he and his girlfriend were at a party and they went into a bathroom with Keenan to do drugs. Another guy was there, someone Keenan knew from school. “I think his name was Rick," John tells Angie. He adds that Rick had a weird tick. Angie asks if it was a blinking thing. John asks how she knew that. Angie, concerned, dashes away.
Will finds Mia’s phone at the bottom of the stairs, along with her wallet. As he inspects, he and Rafael talk. The watch Rafael wears, the same kind Elias had in the previous episode, was a gift during a business deal. Rafael also tells Will that he is taking over the Grove Park Boys. But the next item Will finds stops their conversation - an American flag pin, just like the one Marion was wearing.
Marion has taken an officer with her on a snack run for everyone in the conference room. Will calls on the radio, asking if Freddy has the same kind of pin. Before Marion can respond, the other officer is knocked out by Freddy! His eyes twitch as Marion realizes Freddy was the killer, not only of the current case, but the one John was framed for in high school. He tells her about how powerful it made him feel. And then he promises to let Marion keep her tongue if she stays quiet. He hits her on the side of the head with his gun.
Looking for Freddy, Angie comes across the unconscious officer in the APD, and follows a blood trail to an office where she finds Marion cowering in fear. Angie tries to help Marion calm down, and gives her her gun to protect herself if Freddy comes back. Back in the hallway, Marion sees a gun in a holster on the back of another officer’s desk chair. She moves towards it, but shots fire, breaking windows, and she has to duck under a partition. Will arrives just in time to give her some cover. He helps her get to the spare gun.
Freddy emerges, wearing the night vision goggles from Ormewood’s mannequin. He can see Will and Angie clearly, while they can hardly make him out in the dark. Angie sneaks up behind him, only to find that her gun is empty. Freddy takes Angie hostage, ready to shoot. Thinking quick, Will uses his flashlight to blind Freddy’s goggles, shooting him down. Angie stands there shaking, and Will seems like he’s about to step forward to comfort her. But when he hears Marion in the other room, he skips Angie and rushes to his new flame. The power comes back on.
CPR seems to be failing on Caroline, but EMTs (Shannon Vick, Caleb Wilkinson) arrive just in time. Moving Caroline to a gurney, they use defibrillators to restore her heartbeat, wheeling her to the ambulance.
Angie brings John to identify Freddy’s body as the weird guy from high school. Knowing that John’s girlfriend was drugged, she speculates that Freddy followed her home and framed John for her rape and murder. Angie offers to help John find a place to stay, but he shares that his sister has offered to help him. John thanks Angie for giving him his life back.
Amanda reveals that Caroline is expected to pull through. She grabs Caroline’s gift to take it to the hospital, congratulating Angie on a job well done.
With the chaos over, Faith asks if anybody ever got the mariachi band’s real name. Nobody did.
Next Episode: “Abigail B." - Airing Tuesday, February 25th, at 8/7c on ABC
Will teams up with Marion to investigate a chilling child trafficking case, uncovering dark secrets along the way. Meanwhile, Ormewood assists Ariana Madix with personal security, until a seemingly routine intervention escalates into violence.
Songs Featured in This Episode: