Monk season 7

1-Mr. Monk buys a house

Suddenly there is no more Dr Kroger, they tell us he had a heart attack 

:(  Monk is going crazy, he says he hears too much noise coming from the neighbouring house, owned by a piano teacher. 

He’s so bored and overwhelmed that he insists on getting a case and with the Captain and Randy they check the house where an old man fell down the stairs. Well, they think so but we know otherwise, we saw his nurse pushing him down the stairs.. while surveying the house, Monk makes up his mind that he wants to buy it, and he does.

Monk has discarded a lot of therapist, until Natalie takes him to see Dr Neven (a palindrome) Bell (Hector Elizondo), who opens the door at the exact second, has Kroger’s painting on his wall, and is very good. 

The piano playing that upsets him so much started a year ago, but he’s been bothered by it only these last five weeks, since Kroger died. Monk won’t accept that explanation, he’s very stubborn. He moves into the new house and already calls a handyman - Jake - for something a little off centered, but the man breaks everything down, destroying the house. 

Monk figures out that the old man was killed, and surprise surprise (not really) Jake is an accomplice and kills her now that she’s being suspected. 

Monk already regrets buying the new house because of all the work, and tells the Captain that they should have warned him and stopped him “what’s good having a gun if you don’t shoot your friend in the leg when he’s about to buy an old house?” *rollingeyes*

Many years ago four million dollars were stolen and hidden in that house. When Monk understands that, Jake chains him and Natalie, finds the money, kills his other partner and stupidly gets knocked out by them in the silliest of ways, and Natalie makes smoke signals and the Captain arrives right on time to save them. 

Monk goes back to Dr Bell :) and also to his old house, not bothered by the music anymore, and has a picture of Kroger in the house.

2-Mr. Monk and the genius

Monk doesn’t give Natalie all the money he owes her, the cheap :/

A woman comes in saying that her husband wants to kill her, that he’s a chess master, very intelligent, so much that nobody can stop him, she’s sure she’ll die, and pays Monk to catch him after her death. She was right, she dies very soon, that same day. Monk figures out how he poisoned her, but he anticipated that and had her cremated before they could test for it. Monk is so obsessed with this case that he tries to plant evidence in his house, and again he was waiting for him. The man’s first wife died too, and she also had a huge insurance policy. Monk has her body exhumed but there’s no poison in the body, because the man switched the bodies in the graves, so Monk solves it. 

End: Monk doesn’t want to cash the woman’s check, but Natalie tricks him into it so he can pay her 

:-p

3-Mr. Monk gets lotto fever

The lottery girl is killed, and Natalie is asked to pick the numbers on TV in her place and Monk has a hard time ‘permitting it’ but he does eventually. The first time she’s nervous and when it’s time to say goodbye to the audience she says to keep playing the lottery “you’ll thank me later”. The TV people ask her to keep doing it, and now her face is everywhere and of course she gets pretty quickly all full of herself (not so much as to not feel bad when a guy is fired because of her, but still). Monk is very upset and talks about it to Dr Bell. People ask Natalie for her autograph and take pictures with her, and Monk makes her choose between her two jobs so she quits working for him and runs away. 

The Captain thinks he won the lottery, 200 million dollars and more, and even if it turns out that there were two winners it’d still be a lot! Of course he’ll not get paid because he’s worked with Natalie and there’s suspicions that they cheated. They find proof that the game was rigged and she asks Monk’s help. The guy that was fired had rigged the show and also killed two people. 

There’s a new lottery girl now, and she’s back working for Monk.

4-Mr. Monk takes a punch

Monk has to pass a fitness test if he wants to keep working as a consultant for the police. He thinks he’ll never pass, and wants to quit his job, just like that, instead of trying more and exercise because it hurts. 

A poor man is killed at a gym but the intended victim was a boxer, Ray. Monk finds out that the boxer five years ago sold his fight to help his trainer’s daughter with the money she needed, her only hope of getting better and live. She died anyway, and Monk understands and doesn’t report him.  Ray is so grateful he’s determined to help him pass his test and starts training him. 

The night of Ray’s fight he asks Monk to be his ‘corner man’, not imagining what he was getting :-p Monk tries to stop the hitman by himself, but luckily the Captain arrives too :) Monk solves the case and also passes his fitness test, and is all excited :p

5-Mr. Monk is underwater

Steven, an old friend of Natalie’s Mitch, asks Monk’s help. It is believed that his friend Jason committed suicide but he doesn’t believe it. What he called ‘the boat’ turns out to be a submarine… Monk is not happy to go in there, and even less when there is an emergency drill and he can’t get out, three men have to stop him… To get thru this, Monk talks to the hallucination of Dr Bell. He talks to him the whole time, while working the case. He finds out that the commander killed Jason, and he also tries to kill him and Natalie - Monk says that he can’t swim but he’s been in the ocean before: does he forget of it’s just stubbornness due to panic?

When he solves the case he says “I’ll let Dr Bell explain” and both Natalie and Steven shout No! :-p The commander attached a firecracker to a lighted cigarette, a bullet-proof plan… 

6-Mr. Monk falls in love

A man is murdered and Monk likes the suspect Leyla :-) so he keeps saying that she didn’t do it :p and yet when somebody mentions that he has a crush he gets angry because he says that he’s a married man.. and also says “I’m just not used to being around attractive girls” :-p He actually dances with her, really dances, in a pretty scene :-) and he’s at her place when they come with a search warrant, and she confesses! But Monk finds out the truth, that she confessed when she saw all the evidence and realized that her mother had killed the war criminal that killed her family. Now that he put her mother in jail, I doubt she’ll see Monk again. She tells him to go back to his wife… or life, or both…

7-Mr. Monk’s 100th case

James Novak (Eric McCormack) is the host of the InFocus show, and is doing a show on Monk’s 100 case. They are all at his place to watch it. Randy is there with his girlfriend Gillian. 

The crew has been following the investigation and interviewing people from his life: the Captain, Natalie, Randy, but also Ambrose and Marci (apparently she’s a fan again) and Harold, and an ex-teacher who spoke about how it all changed for Adrian after his father left, and his old babysitter who says how remarkable he was, changing his own diapers and then crawling to throw it away… and also the flight attendant who is now afraid of flying after hours with Monk on a plane.. and even some of the people that he sent to prison; obviously Trudy’s death of 11 years ago is mentioned too.  Some part-time actresses are strangled; the photographer who took all their pictures is the first suspect but when they ‘catch’ him he’s already killed himself. Case over, and so the show, but Monk’s not happy, something’s wrong, he thinks the photographer killed the first three girls but not the last one. James killed her, because she was his mistress. 

Monk wanted to quit at 100 but Natalie points out that with James he went to 101, so now he can’t quit anymore :-p Maybe at 200 :p

8-Mr. Monk gets hypnotized

Actress Sally Larkin disappears. She turns up alive saying that her husband had kept her prisoner until she managed to kill him and escape.

Harold seems all cured, he looks happy, because now he has a new doctor, a hypnotist. Monk wants to get better too and thinks about calling him, so Natalie has him promise not to do it before talking to Dr Bell, and yet he calls him nonetheless. The guy hypnotizes him, bringing him back, ‘way back’, to a happy place, and the next day Monk acts like a six-year-old child. He acts like that for a while, until he figures out how Sally planned 

it all, and staged it and killed her husband for his money. Finally he comes back to himself, to realize that he had been chewing a gum made by Randy, spit by the Captain and then taken from the bottom of Sally’s shoe

for five hours…

9-Mr. Monk and the miracle

Three homeless guys come to Monk’s house to hire him because a friend of them died. He freaks out, won’t let them touch anything and won’t even get out of the car at the ‘crime scene’. The Captain is unwell so Randy is in charge. The Captain was in a lot of pain until he drank from a sacred fountain and joined a monastery. Monk and Natalie find out the truth (well, after a woman told them everything…): a pharmacist had planned it all because he had buried his partner under the fountain and making it a sacred place he made sure that it would never be dig up. 

It was rather weird to see Randy with mustaches and specially the Captain without it.. he was looking good though!

10-Mr. Monk’s other brother

A man escaped from prison: Joe. He goes to Monk’s house and tells him that he’s Jack Junior, his half-brother who is a con-man and busted out of prison, yes, but he did not kill the woman they say he killed. Monk doesn’t want him around but Joe is a conman and a good talker, and is able to convince him. A guard killed the girl, and there’s a shooting at his place when he understand that he just got found out. Now, come on, a guard with an automatic rifle of the roof of his house aiming at three people walking slowly, not yet suspecting a thing, and he misses!! It’s even full daylight and everything! :-/

Anyway, Adrian finds the real killer and Jack doesn’t run away but turns himself in, and makes peace with his brother (still, he’s probably thinking of escaping again, but at least he kept his promise to Monk!)

11-Mr. Monk on wheels

A guy stole a doctor’s bicycle. Natalie and Monk visits his lab and he’s all excited about a square tomato that the doctor’s staff gave him since he was so enthusiastic about it. Natalie feels guilty for unknowingly helping the thief, and insists that Monk helps her find it: “it can count as my birthday gift” - “I didn’t plan on buying you a birthday gift” but still she convinces him. Monk feels embarrassed to be working on something as little as that (yeah right, only killings matter, while normal people with normal lives who are deeply affected by little things like their stuff being stolen… that’s not important). Natalie and Monk go to the guy that stole it and Monk gets shot in the leg and Natalie feels so guilty “good” he says :-/

Now the Captain cares about the case too, and questions the guy’s cousin (played by Sung Kang :-D ) but he doesn’t know where he is, then the thief is found murdered. 

Monk behaves like a jerk, much worse than ever I mean :-/  He blames Natalie for everything. She’s stayed with him three whole days, not sleeping, not seeing July, pushing his wheelchair around, doing everything for him, and finally the Captain tells him that he can’t take it all out on her or he’ll lose her, saying he knows this “because you’re acting like me”: aww

Monk keeps slaving her of course, simply saying that the captain doesn’t understand their relationship. Natalie even paid for the wheelchair herself!

She has a breakdown and he falls down, so they take a motorized wheelchair, and he’s still blaming everything on her, every mess he makes. Only when the doctor notices how unwell she is he realizes how bad he has been, and finally pays attention and solves the case: the doctor’s assistant paid a guy (and then killed him) to steal the bike with the lock with the same combination as his safe, so she could break into it and steal his research. Natalie then accidentally shoots Monk in the other leg… I’m not sure if I should say poor Monk or poor Natalie here…

12-Mr. Monk and the lady next door

An old woman helps Monk cross the street, and he promises her to help her with her neighbour making loud noises all day long, two weeks now already. No surprise, the neighbour is the same guy we saw murdering a man. 

Monk eats at her place.. he forgot to wash his hands and eats mixed vegetables.. and much more! He likes her a lot, she’s like a mom to him, and she loves him… that’s when he starts wondering what is she after: “how could anybody love me unconditionally?” and “there’s always a catch”. He starts accusing her, he hurts her with bad words. She’s actually totally innocent here, the murderer used her to provide him an alibi. 

End: Marge leaves to go stay with her sister, but makes peace with Monk and gives him a scarf, and hugs him. :-)

13-Mr. Monk makes the playoffs

Monk has free tickets for a press box at the stadium because he knows Bob Costas, and Natalie tells him to take the Captain with him because he really likes football. While there, he sees that a guy’s hand is badly burned by accident, and he starts investigating, so they miss the beginning of the game… when they also find a player dead, Monk wants to keep investigating, while the Captain wants to see the match :-p he tries to remind Monk of the time he was funny, when the two of them and Trudy had fun together. Monk’s only replies is “Trudy died”. Captain points out that he’s still alive and he only says “alive is a funny word”. I honestly think Trudy would be so sad :-( I mean, it’s very romantic and touching how much he loved her (loves her, really), but he should remember how she lived more than how she died. 

He solves the case, of course, it was all about selling the team playbook. 

The captain went inside without Monk but then he felt bad about it and went out looking for him, in time to help him and catch the guys.

14-Mr. Monk and the bully

A guy wants to hire Monk, saying that they’re old school friends, but this Roderick used to put Monk’s head into the toilet :-/ these things always happen in American movies, always full of bullies :-/ 

Monk is afraid of him, and the jerk talks about it as the ‘good times’ :-/

Monk tells him how he hurt him reading a note, but to Roderick that’s just stuff kids do :-/ 

The guy’s afraid that his wife might be cheating on him and Monk accepts the case, all happy that he’ll have to tell him, hurt him and even get paid for it. They find Marilyn with another man, but Roderick won’t believe Monk, he tells him to quit and pays him, but Monk wants to keep following her, and then the alleged lover is found killed.

Monk is even happier now, believing Roderick killed him and will go to prison…. unfortunately for him Roderick is innocent, and Monk helps him. Marilyn didn’t do it either, but her secret twin sister did, grown apart because adopted. The sister tries to kill Marilyn but the captain and Randy stop her, and poor Monk doesn’t have his revenge.

15-Mr. Monk and the magician

Kevin gets a job as a magician: he’s terrible at it, really, he only got the job because he found out a secret about the real magician Torrini.

After the show Kevin is killed :’( and this is so sad, I liked Kevin, he was funny and a good guy :(  At his funeral, his relatives and friends all talk too  much as he did. 

Monk is sure that Torrini killed him, but he seems to have a very solid alibi. The captain tells Monk “you want me to dig, I’ll grab a shovel, I’ll dig for you, but you gotta tell me what to look for”. 

Torrini’s secret: he was using the secret compartments in his magician equipment to bring heroine in the States. During a show he makes Monk disappear and plans on killing him, but his assistant has a change of heart and tries to give him the handcuff’s key with a kiss but she doesn’t know who she’s dealing with. When she finally manages that, he spits it out!! Luckily the captain finds them and rescues him (and her too, I’d say at this point). At the end, Monk and Natalie watch Kevin’s video-will, which of course is very long because he kept on digressing as he always did.. Natalie asks him if he wants her to fast-forward the video, but he says no, they’ll watch all of it, remembering and missing Kevin… 

16-Mr. Monk fights City Hall

The parking lot where Trudy was killed is about to be torn down, so Monk chains himself there to stop them. A councilwoman comes, listens to him and agrees with him, for now. Natalie can’t believe it “you did it, you just stopped a children playground from being built and saved a parking garage”… four days later two German tourists are killed. 

The council should vote again on the parking lot subject, and the councilwoman Eileen Hill disappears. Monk wants to find her before there’s another vote because without her support he’ll lose. Dr Bell asks him if he really believes that there’s evidence there to be found, and he admits that there isn’t. He just can’t live without the place. Dr Bell tries to tell him to let it go…

Monk tries to flirt with Hill’s married and pregnant receptionist Maria, to get her to vote in his favour. Miss Hill is found dead.

Monk only cares about the parking lot, but after he wins the vote he solves the murder case, and while he explains why and how the married journalist killed Eileen and also the two tourists because they could have seen him, he keeps insulting Maria, calling her idiot, moron, not caring at all about her feelings. Maria is so insulted that she changes her vote. Good.

Still, they’ll build the “Trudy Monk memorial playground”, for some reasons..