Training Day - Trigger Time - Review: “Let’s Hear It for the Ladies”

Well, looks like it’s one step forward and two steps back for Training Day.

After last week’s promising and improved episode, this week’s “Trigger Time” reverted to form with heavy-handed story-telling and filled with clichéd/stereotypical characters. These were some of my biggest problems with the pilot, and I couldn’t help but notice this week’s episode was written by the same person, series creator Will Beall, which is disappointing - I loved his work on Castle; I'm not sure what the problem is here.

I will give Beall and the writing staff credit however, because the one thing Training Day has gotten right is creating interesting and intriguing female characters.

You want to know more about Holly Butler (Julie Benz),the Hollywood Madame, and how she ever got involved in what appears to be a complicated relationship with Frank Rourke (Bill Paxton)? It appears as though theirs is a bittersweet relationship that is certainly worth exploring. Paxton and Benz have great chemistry, so any scenes with the two are definite assets to the series.

The Amazonian Guard Lina (Tehmina Sunny) in last week’s “Tehrangeles” was one of the highlights of a solid episode. Her escape opens the door for her to reappear.


Then you have the ladies of this week’s “Trigger Time”- four female characters so compelling that I would honestly rather watch a show about them than any of the male leads.

The cross-bow wielding assassin with an apparent code-of-ethics, Artemis, who in just a handful of scenes tried to assassinate Frank, got the best of Kyle (Justin Cornwell) in hand-to-hand, and ultimately saved Frank and Kyle’s life with a well-placed arrow. She tells Frank she saved them and didn’t kill the mercenaries responsible for the attacks on gang couriers that was at the center of the episode because her target was “El Cucuy (the Boogeyman)” originally suspected of the attacks. She disappears as mysteriously as she appeared, but I hope she’ll be back. The actress playing the part was perfect however remains as much of a mystery to me as the character Artemis is not even credited or listed in the cast in CBS promotional material or on IMDB.

There’s robbery/homicide Detective Valeria Chavez (Christina Vidal), who it would appear only serves the function of turning the case of the week over to Frank and his team and then virtually disappearing for most of the rest of the episode. Why is she so eager to let Frank and his team do all the work? Is she another plant from one of the other intriguing women of this episode, Deputy Chief Joy Lockhart (Marianne Jean-Baptiste)?

Deputy Chief Lockhart is an enigma that I enjoy watching and trying to unravel. Just when you think she truly did send Kyle undercover to help clean up the department and get rid of rogue cop Frank Rourke, she’ll toss out a random question to him like, “Did Frank mention anything about your father’s murder?” Then, you begin to wonder about her motives, are they in the best interests of the department or is she protecting her and is involved in Kyle’s father’s murder as Frank suggests?

Finally, we have the woman of this hour, Detective Rebecca Lee (Katrina Law). From the very beginning, in the pilot and subsequent episodes she has been by far, the most intriguing character on the show. This episode was insight into Rebecca and gave Law a chance to shine.

What do we really know about Rebecca? We know she’s a crack shot with a sniper rifle, she doesn’t trust Kyle and she will go to great lengths to protect those she’s loyal to, mainly Frank Rourke.

She proves this in one of the standout scenes of this episode. Rebecca has followed Kyle to police HQ and innocently shares an elevator ride with him as he has just come from reporting to Lockhart. She tells him she doesn’t know who he is or how he got assigned to their unit, but if she finds out he’s from Internal Affairs out to get Frank that the next time it pops off out in the field, in the chaos and the confusion she just might make a tragic mistake. Yes, she just threatened a fellow officer, and you truly believe she’ll do exactly what she says. Law played this scene beautifully, with just the slightest hint of menace in her voice. No apologies necessary, Rebecca, you did make yourself very clear.

To be truthful, I had very little interest in the main plot of this episode. Someone killing gang couriers making it look like “El Cucuy” (a boogeyman who’d killed a large group gang members years ago) had returned. When the reality was, the couriers were actually working for a Russian mobster trafficking in young girls. A group of what looked like polo shirt wearing bored white-bread mercenaries were robbing the couriers to get to the Russian for a big score.

Turns out Rebecca and Tommy (Drew Van Acker) were already working on a plan to bring the Russian and his human trafficking ring down. From the beginning their efforts to help a young Russian girl (Bonnie Dennison) escape from the Russian mob have a strong effect on Rebecca. It’s triggering nightmares about monsters with little girls in cages, and later even causes her to offer to let the girl stay with her when a previous sting goes bad and their victim becomes a witness.

Rebecca vows to the girl that she’ll never have to go back and that they’ll do everything they can to help the girls she left behind when she escaped. It’s as though she knows exactly what the girl had been through.

Later, after the Russians kidnap the girl from Rebecca’s apartment, the team gets a break in the form of a rather convenient and stupid mistake by the mercenaries who had killed one of their members who had gotten cold feet and wanted to back out. That mistake gave Frank, Rebecca and the team a lawful way into the club where the girls were being held.

Again, Law was a highlight of the escape scenes. She is unstoppable in her mission to rescue the girl, taking down Russian thugs almost twice her size with a single throat punch all the while wearing a killer dress and deadly heels.

She makes her way to the main Russian mobster’s office where she is fearless facing him and does not hesitate to snap his neck to stop him from hurting anyone else. Rebecca is bad-ass to the bone.

I just wish they had given Rebecca one scene with the cross-bow wielding assassin, Artemis, as a sort of inside shout out to Arrow’s Nyssa Al Ghul, another assassin who used arrows as a weapon, played by Katrina Law.

Although, I’d like to think we just might see a confrontation between Rebecca and Artemis yet.

Remember, Artemis’ target is the elusive “El Cucuy”. It turns out the “El Cucuy” is none other than Frank Rourke, who killed those gang members all those years ago to break up a human trafficking ring, and at the time rescued a seven-year-old Rebecca from their clutches. He got her into a foster home, gave her a birthday day, and since has been only father she’s known. So yes, Rebecca has a soft spot for Frank and we all know what lengths she’ll go to, to protect him. I look forward to seeing a Rebecca/Artemis confrontation over Frank.

Hit the comments with your thoughts. Are the ladies of Training Day more interesting than the men? Will we see Artemis and Rebecca battle over Frank? What are Dep. Chief Lockhart’s true motives?