The Irrational

• Title: The Irrational – Suddenly Alec
• IMDb: link

“Suddenly Alec” is a fun episode of The Irrational that allows the show to play on the musical theatre backgrounds of both Jesse L. Martin and Karen David when Alec and Rose go undercover working for a community theatre company looking for a killer. We’d seen the show make use of David’s musical chops in a previous episode, but “Suddenly Alec” pushes the professor under the spotlight stepping in for the murder victim to provide the voice of Aubrey II in a production of Little Shop of Horrors. While the professor gets a bit too good to fast for someone with no experience (why not give him a bit of background like the show has done for Rose) it is quite fun to see Alec play the murderous plant while also using the play to solve a murder and a separate case for a client which Rose was hired for.

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• Title: The Irrational – Conversation Games
• IMDb: link

Suspecting her billionaire employer (Warren Christie) may be a serial killer Angelique (Sandra Shapiro) reaches out to Kylie (Travina Springer) and take advantage of her brother’s skills. “Conversation Games” offers an unusual setup with our initial suspect, who certainly meets the basic requirements to be a sociopath, agreeing that a member of his immediate team (who also all fit the right psychological makeup) is the killer and agrees to do whatever he can to help. The plot takes a few twists and turns before Alec (Jesse L. Martin) uncovers the truth with a little more help from Simon (Max Lloyd-Jones) than he was expecting.

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• Title: The Irrational – The Milgram Experiment
• IMDb: link

After a few episodes which struggled to make the experiment part of the larger story, “The Milgram Experiment” does just that (although more as an exercise to prove a point than solve a crime). The episode pairs  Alec (Jesse L. Martin) and Rose (Karen David) to investigate a deep fake video threatening to take down a local assistant district attorney (Ally McBeal‘s Gil Bellows) with political ambitions. The story has some nice twists involving Alec’s reaction to seeing Rose be differential to her boss (Adam Rayner) and in the discovery of the person (Jess McLeod) actually behind the video.

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• Title: The Irrational – Straight from the Heart
• IMDb: link

“Straight from the Heart” gets into fringe science as Alec (Jesse L. Martin) is approached by an old friend with dreams of a murder that happened to victim who died and provided the heart she is now using. The show doesn’t go as far to confirm events witnessed by the previous heart’s owner got transferred to the new one, although it certainly doesn’t shy away from the possibility with minimal effort spent to an alternate explanation for events. While once again the experiments don’t really tie-into the main case, a disturbing trend and growing concern, the show does open with Alec teaching his students a lesson. The episode is also notable for Marisa (Maahra Hill) meeting the child (Fritzy-Klevans Destine) she gave up for adoption several years ago. 

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• Title: The Irrational – Ghost Ship
• IMDb: link

Aside from exploring family dynamics of Alec (Jesse L. Martin) with his father (Ron Canada), “Ghost Ship” feels like a story that could have been written for any number of procedurals that was adapted for The Irrational. The idea of unraveling a ship with a missing crew is an interesting setup, but the mystery turns out to be rather straightforward (even if it was fun to see Monk‘s Jason Gray-Stanford, albeit in a mostly thankless role). In terms of psychology, Alec is able to get a key witness to relax enough to provide answers, but the show is largely geared to Alec’s damaged relationship with his father and a necessary first-step to remedy that.

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