Mr. Monk's 100th Case - Recap

James Novak, the host of In Focus, introduces the newsmagazine show’s newest feature: the hundredth case of private consultant Adrian Monk. The episode feature Monk working with the police to solve his hundred case: a serial killer who targets attractive young women.

The show is premiering on TV where Monk and his friends have been invited to Novak’s home to watch the episode. Monk is hiding in a corner while Stottlemeye flips over to the basketball game during commercials. Disher is there with his newest girlfriend Jillian, an actress who does crime scene reenactments for reality TV shows. Novak is disagreeing with his wife Melissa and is less than interested in meeting Jillian despite the fact she demonstrates her ability to die on cue.

On the show, Monk is brought in to solve the first murder of waitress and occasional actress Cassandra Rank. Monk notices that Cassandra apparently knew her killer and that her lipstick is missing. Between scenes, the show includes Novak’s interviews with people who know Monk, such as his babysitter, former teacher, and brother Ambrose Monk. There are also interviews with obsessed Monk fan Marci Maven, rival patient Harold Krenshaw, and former stewardess Leigh Harrison who is now part of a support group for people who have known Monk.

At Novak’s house in the present, Stottlemeyer flips back over to the game and Disher isn’t happy that the program has him shown with the wrong rank. Monk has finally emerged from hiding and is watching the show, but realizes there is something wrong with the case.

Barbara McFarland, another part-time actress, was killed two days after Cassandra and s also missing her lipstick. Novak follows Monk and Natalie as they visit a vampire theme-restaurant that both victims worked at. Monk and Natalie talk to the manager, in character as a vampire, but he can only confirm that the two victims weren’t there at the same time and seem to have no connection. Meanwhile, Novak interviews Natalie and goes over the details of Trudy’s death, and Monk admits on camera that he can’t die until he knows what happened to his wife.

Miranda Terhune turns up dead with her lipstick missing, and has no apparent connection to the first two victims. However, Monk goes over the photographs of the three victims and realizes that they all had their publicity photos taken by the same man, Douglas Thurman. However, Stottlemeyer has nothing to hold Thurman with and the photographer doesn’t confess. They let him go. Interspersed with Novak and his crew following Monk on the investigation are interviews with some of the people that Monk has put away: Father Roberts, Arelene Boras, Hal Tucker, Joey Krenshaw, and Jimmy Belmont.

On the show, it’s revealed Stottlemeyer obtained a search warrant for Thurman’s studio. Going in, they discover that Thurman has disappeared but he had a shrine to the three victims and lipstick. There’s a film canister with photos of a fourth woman, Kate Kindel. They go to Kindel’s apartment but it’s too late: she’s dead.

Watching the show in the present, Monk realizes there’s something wrong. He watches as they go into Kindel’s apartment and Novak turns on the light for them. He also watches as the camera crew captures Stottlemeyer getting a call about Thurman’s whereabouts at a hotel, and the police breaking in only to discover that Thurman has killed himself.

As the show comes to a close, Monk announces that there was a second killer: Kate Kindel was strangled from the rear while the other victims were killed from the front. He has Natalie rerun the recording of the show and points out that while all the other film cylinders were lying down, the one with Kate’s photographs on it was standing up. Realizing someone planted the film, he has Natalie run the scene in Kindel’s apartment. Monk realizes that Novak knew exactly where the light switch was… despite the fact the room was dark and the TV host had supposedly never been there. Here’s what happened: Novak was having an affair with Kindel and when she threatened to go to his wife, killed her. To cover his crime, he made her death look like the fourth victim in Thurman’s serial killings, and planted the photos in Thurman’s lab when the police busted in with the camera crew tagging along.

Novak denies the entire thing but Melissa admits she knew something was going on and searched his pockets when he came home the night of the murder. Novak has Kindel’s lipstick, and the DNA will connect him to the murder. Novak draws a gun and tries to escape, but Disher and Stottlemeyer manage to distract and disarm him.

Later at his apartment, Monk is ready to retire: he’s solved his hundredth case, and a hundred is a nice round number. Natalie thinks that’s a stupid idea, and then points out that when he brought Novak to justice, he solved his 101st case. Now Monk has 99 more cases to go to hit a round number again. Monk agrees with her and they start looking through the newspaper for mysteries to solve.

Share this article with your friends