Sam and Andi continued to pretend to be “just friends” in Reaper episode 7. They’re probably gonna make him wait all season before he gets the girl.
Gladys comes to The Work Bench. Sock’s got questions and is “almost certainly going to do something stupid.” She’s less happy to see him than he is to see her. In the back of her car is what appears to be a body bag. She goes to run him over, he jumps out of the way… and gets hit by someone else not even trying to hit him.
Sam gets the dog of the month award from Ted, meaning he’s shown an utter lack of everything. Sock’s offended because he wanted to be dog of the month again. But Sam is the Devil’s employee of the month. He gets a watch as a reward. What’s the catch? He also gives him the case file for the next escaped soul, Curtis Dean Mays, a multiple murderer. Now Sam’s wondering what the catch is, too. He does stick him with getting the bill, but there’s gotta be more evil afoot than that.
Sock and Ben spy on Gladys’ shopping history and find out she’s been buying some rat poisoning. Sam says that’ll have to wait until they figure out where the killer is. It doesn’t make any sense yet, but Sam’s got a bird tattoo that he didn’t have before. They decide to go to the courthouse, where Sam sees another tattoo, a 6. He also shows the boys the gift he got for Andi, a necklace with a diamond in it, but they tell him that it’s a wife present, not a friend present. They convince him to get her something else, then they head upstairs to look for clues. If only they’d turn around, they would see that Curtis has walked in behind them.
They pretend they’re writing a book about true crimes and go to ask someone who works at the courthouse and says Curtis never used the same weapon twice and blamed everybody but himself, including his own now dead defense attorney. While they’re chatting, Judge Collins is killed by Curtis with barbed wire. They suspect the prosecutor is the next target. They finally get a vessel that doesn’t suck, a taser. Sock and Ben are still more interested in stalking Gladys than helping with Curtis, though.
Andi’s boyfriend Greg asks Sam for his help surprising Andi with a huge party at a club. Sam warns him she doesn’t want that, but he agrees to help. Then he gets another tattoo, a 1.
A bunch of kids go up to Gladys’ house and toss eggs at it. She runs out with a broom and chases them off her lawn. So apparently she’s this neighborhood’s mean old lady who all the kids are afraid of. She threatens to cook their brains, which I’m assuming is just a figure of speech.
Sam uses his taser. Too bad he used it on a cop, detective Dan Stafford, who looks nothing like Curtis. As he’s getting arrested, Dan sees his watch, so he takes the watch and leaves. He’s got the vessel as well.
Everybody meets up at the bar, where Andi reminds Sam she doesn’t want a surprise party. He’s afraid to deny it, smoothly running away saying Sock’s on fire. Andi takes this as a yes, and she gets upset at Greg, who she says hardly qualifies as her boyfriend. Josie says the person she’s describing for her boyfriend is somebody like Sam, and Andi again plays the friend card.
Sock and Ben return to Gladys’ place, this time when she’s at work. They find out she’s into angel figurines and flowers. Then she shows up and finds out someone’s been in her home, so she comes in swinging with a shovel. The way she goes crazy just makes the neighborhood, all of whom are watching the scene, even more convinced she’s mean.
Dan probably recognized the watch, which belonged to Curtis’ defense attorney. Sam’s afraid this will link him to the murder. Then the Devil’s kind enough to point out that Sam was also on the scene of the judge’s murder. To make him feel better, the Devil offers Sam the opportunity to “go all Barry Bonds on my ass” and gives him a baseball bat to hit him with. Sam’s more than happy to hit him again and again. When he gets back to work, Sam’s informed by Ted that the police showed up and searched his locker.
Sock, who claims he was 6 feet tall at age 7, starts to get sympathetic for Gladys, who he believes was once an angel and now is frustrated with little kids picking on her all day.
Greg’s got a new plan. He doesn’t want to throw Andi a surprise party on her birthday. Instead, he wants to blow it off, then throw the stupid party the next day. Sam tells Greg his idea is stupid, and Greg gets suspicious that Sam’s trying to sabotage their relationship, when in reality he’s doing a great job of sabotaging it on his own. Then they get into a chick fight.
Sock and Sam go to see the detective, where Sock pretends to be an attorney. Unsuccessfully. Dan threatens to beat his face with a phone book, getting him to leave the room. After all but accusing him of the murders, the detective spots some blood on Sam’s hand. Sam responds “That’s not my blood.” It’s just Greg’s blood from when he slapped him in the face, but still, not a good response. Then Sam starts asking the Devil for help and admits he’s talking to him. Dan spots Sam’s tattoo, which is now complete to spell out 613 Cardinal Drive, Dan’s address. Rather than locking him up, the detective seems to believe Sam’s story, so they go to check out his house. Sam asks for his taser back and tells him Mays is back.
Sock goes to see Gladys and apologizes for not considering her feelings. He goes into her house for coffee and cookies. She eventually tells him she wants to kiss him, and he’s fine with this. They start to kiss and get undressed. Then he wakes up from his nightmare.
Sam finally convinces Dan to get his taser. They go out to the car to get it, when a fireball comes flying at it. Like the barbed wire, Mays has a fire tattoo, as he’s drawing all his weapons off his body. Sam knows bullets won’t do anything, but he shoots Curtis with a shotgun. It’s enough of a distraction to prevent him from killing Dan and buys him the time he needs to get the taser from the burning car. Sam takes Dan into the house and calls 911 to get him some assistance. Before he can get through, though, Dan pulls a gun on him. Catching an escaped soul won’t work. He’ll need to catch an actual person to get credit for this, meaning Sam.
He tries to shoot Sam but can’t. Instead, the gun is turned around, and he shoots himself. Thanks to the Devil. With the combination of the defense lawyer’s watch and written confession upstairs, it should be pretty slam dunk that Dan gets blamed for being a copycat killer. It seems Dan, too, made a deal with the Devil. Catching himself was the fifth and final case in exchange for his soul.
Sam apologizes to Andi for hitting Greg, when she stops him and tells him they broke up… then she asks him “You punched Greg in the nose?” She jokes that she should have waited for her present first before breaking up, so Sam gives her the present he originally planned to give her. She cries and says she can’t accept the gift because it’s not a friend gift. He suggests not wearing it as a friend, but he’s too important to her for her to want to risk it.
When they go to the DMV to turn in the vessel, Gladys asks Sock whether he’s had any good dreams lately. This time, Gladys also has something to give Sam, a gift from the Devil. He doesn’t want to open it but Sock insists. It’s a get out of Hell free card. Whether it’s real or not, Sam’s keeping it.
Stay tuned to dingoRUE for another recap of Reaper episode 9 Charged, which airs Tuesday at 9/8c on The CW.