Airdate: Sundays at 10/9c on A&E

Rating: ★★★★★

Last week I replied to a comment that I am going to let this season play out and see where the writers take Matt Passmore’s irreverent, irrepressible homicide detective, Jim Longworth, before I decide if I would hang out in The Glades another season. This week’s episode brought me a little closer to remembering why I willingly follow this cop into the Florida swamps to solve murders.

Jim wonders why a doctor would need a gun....

However, I’m not sure where the writers are going with the attraction they’ve rekindled between Samantha “Sam” Harper (Natalia Cigliuti) and Jim. Sam gets the job in Florida only to have her boss in Chicago panic and offer her a promotion—which, as any self-respecting career girl will tell you, she can’t pass up on the off-chance she and Jim might get things going again. Jim’s reaction to this news is mixed—I can see he is genuinely happy for his former partner, but completely unclear about what to do with the pit in his stomach he feels at the realization that she’s actually leaving this time.

They don’t exactly close the book on that relationship, though. It seems the writers want Jim off-balance. Which is baffling to me because the character was so intriguing when he was simply a messed-up cop who had his own way of doing things—a way that garnered results. Even his uncanny ability to read people—suspects, in particular—has tapered a bit with his personal drama clouding his perceptions.

Callie schools Jim on "pill mills."

While Jim’s interest in and attraction to Sam has resurfaced, his appreciation for Callie (Kiele Sanchez) is also renewed as they investigate the death of a Haitian doctor in “Addicted to Love.” There’s no room in the episode to advance the storyline of Callie’s divorce from her ex-con, Witness Protection-residing husband, but there is room to remind Jim (and us) that this chick knows her stuff. The murder investigation leads the FDLE homicide team to uncover a “pill mill” and a corrupt doctor, William Grant (The Sentinel’s Richard Burgi).

According to Callie, addicts will not only pay lots of money for pain meds, they will attach themselves to the supplier like a lifeline, seeing that individual as their only connection to reality. It’s an unhealthy, often dangerous bond—one as additive as the drugs themselves. As she’s explaining this to Jim, a look crosses his face and it’s as if he’s seen a ghost, but instead it’s more of a correlation between the case they’re solving and the tangle of his emotions. It’s a tenuous connection, but if I squint and tilt my head, I can see it, too.

I’m totally spit-balling here, but since the writers are leaving it a bit open-ended as to why a character with such moxie would be so easily distracted, I’m going to go with this theory. When he left Chicago, Jim had a broken heart (that we just learned this season was caused by Sam). Enter Callie and her snarl of domestic issues and you have the perfect recipe for a guy gun-shy of commitment. He can look, but not touch. And boy, does he like to look. In fact, he’s a bit addicted to looking because it simultaneously settles him and unnerves him.

Bringing Sam into the mix—and making her accessible, in a way Callie is not—has thrown his addiction to “looking” off-kilter and making his whole approach to the situation…awkward.

Sam’s exit may open Jim’s eyes to what it is he really needs to focus on. Watching Jim and Callie question Dr. Grant is as entertaining as watching Jim work with the M.E., Carlos Gomez (Carlos Sanchez). There’s a sense of team, a unified approach to the timing of the questions and a confidence that the other will have their back if the situation goes south. Callie isn’t afraid to do what it takes to get to the truth—she just does it with a softness that is directly opposite of Jim’s way of pushing the suspect off-balance until they come clean or convinces Jim of their innocence.

Investigations lead Jim, Carlos, and Callie into some interesting locales.

Jim even shares his appreciation for Callie’s skill while he’s in the interrogation room, convincing the murder suspect to turn on Dr. Grant and help him nail the pill-pushing bastard (he may not have actually said that, but I’m sure that’s what he meant). Knowing Callie can hear him through the observation glass, his words tell her he recognizes that by avoiding confrontation with her due to his mixed-up feelings, he’s been missing out on her true skills as a forensic nurse and how much of an asset she is to his whole team.

The episode ends with several key question marks surrounding our lead character. Seven episodes in, it’s still a bit murky as to how this season is going to find balance between crime and passion.

Tune in to The Glades, Sundays at 10/9c on A&E. For more information on the show, visit http://www.aetv.com/the-glades/.

All photos © 2011 A&E. All rights reserved.

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