I admire Boston Blue for refraining from turning Episode 3 into a wacky Halloween special, but after last week's lament that it seemed too eager to concoct happy endings for everyone, it feels like a double-edged sword. The title "History" is a telling sign, as it presents a dichotomy.
On one hand, the main case of the week revolves around a dead woman found on a wharf, tied to a drug case being handled by Lena's ex-partner, Detective Brian Rogers. Due to a bit of jurisdictional confusion, Danny and Lena refuse to let the case go, prompting Sarah to order them all to work together on it. There's an ulterior motive here; there was always a romantic spark between Lena and Brian, but she refused to cross that line while they were working together directly. Sarah is forcing them to work together again in the hope that something might manifest now that they're no longer officially partners. And, predictably, it does.
Meanwhile, Brian clashes with Danny in a way that feels a little forced. Brian thinks that Danny's reputation in New York is almost entirely due to his family connections, while Lena's circumstances are very similar, though she points out this for reasons that don't make much sense. The inevitable happens: begrudging respect between the two men, and Lena finally willing to explore a date with Brian.
While this does allow for some sage advice from Danny that helps to flesh out their partnership and color their respective backgrounds, careerists being bad at relationships isn't exactly revelatory – Lena once put her career on hold for an ex-boyfriend who ended up meeting someone else. But Danny's own experiences of being afraid to take the next romantic step after his wife's death are a nice reminder of his relationship with Maria Baez, who makes a brief cameo at the end of Boston Blue Episode 3. Aww.
With Danny and Lena's love life neatly tucked away, other threads of the narrative weave their way into the story. Take Sarah, for instance, who is grappling with her relationship with her boyfriend's teenage daughter, Phoebe. It's a predicament that comes as no surprise, given Sarah's tendency to show up at a small gathering and threaten to arrest her friends for daytime drinking—a move that would undoubtedly irk any teenager. Sarah's inability to switch off her cop persona is a challenge when she's supposed to be playing the role of stepmother, but she's making a genuine effort. She invites Phoebe to family dinner—the ultimate fix-all, right?—and strives to be understanding and reasonable. While this subplot doesn't end in a tidy resolution, progress is made, and it counts for the story's depth.
Similarly, Sean and Jonah in "History" overstep their bounds by making promises to a woman they meet on patrol that they shouldn't be making in an official capacity. Despite everyone advising them against it, they play the role of detectives throughout the episode, ignoring their job as uniformed cops to do so. Annoyingly, it all turns out okay in the end. What lesson is being taught here? At the end, Danny tells Sean that while he's happy they saved a life, he wishes Sean would listen to him more, but Sean counters that Danny would have done the same thing. Danny confirms that he would have. So what was the point? That it's okay to make the wrong decision as long as you stumble upon the right outcome? I'm not sure that's necessarily the right advice, but it's symptomatic of Boston Blue's approach to storytelling in general: taking risks and seeing where they lead.
