We open with Dan visiting some friend-basically a 5-minute stop to say "Hello"-no real purpose was shown. The friend's son, with a toy gun, tells Dan to "Stick 'em up!" and Dan plays along, going into the barn where he gives the kid pointers on how to shoot accurately-without any real guns being used, just a homemade one that the kid painted with some "whitewash" that he got from the barn. Now right away, Dan remarks that the whitewash isn't dry and has to wipe it off his hands.
Moments later, Dan starts feeling sick. We also see that the boy, Tommy, also has a most-upset stomach. His problem is his father has gone to the proverbial "back 40" and after feeling worse and worse, the boy tries to go to him for help, but collapses on the way.
Before all that happens, we see Dan is sicker and sicker. He enlists help from his police doctor, who suspects food poisoning. They go see a diner operator who served the food at "the ball game" last night, where lots of people could have gotten sick-but there's no reports of that happening. While they are checking all the food and finding nothing, the doctor finally gets word from the lab person that it is now believed to be lead poisoning.
The whole time, we viewers, knowing about Tommy as well as Dan, know full well where the poison came from. Dan eventually suspects and drives back to that friend's farm. Nobody is around. He has his man blare the "screamer" (siren) for a few seconds, and this does get Tommy's father running toward his home-actually dashing right past his son lying in the field in plain view, now quite sick.
The man talks to Dan and after insisting nothing he is using has any lead, he remembers from 6 months ago that he had something but the can was damaged, so he stashed it in his barn. When he goes to find it, it is gone. Finally they decide to look for Tommy and, guess who-Dan, finds him in the field and all is well.
Without weighing the merits of whether Dan and Co. Should have suspected something more recent than a meal from 12-14 hours earlier sooner than they did, I find fault with this episode this way: For the viewer, there was no mystery about what it was, no criminal, no crime whatsoever, just a lot of obviously wasted time with Dan trying to track down who provided the food for the game last night, going to his diner, talking to the man, who insisted there was nothing wrong with his food (we know), then Dan and the doctor trying to figure it out by eliminating what did not happen.
We were also relatively certain Tommy would be alright-and Dan too. This leaves little to find interesting, which is why I cannot give this show any score higher than a 4.
Moments later, Dan starts feeling sick. We also see that the boy, Tommy, also has a most-upset stomach. His problem is his father has gone to the proverbial "back 40" and after feeling worse and worse, the boy tries to go to him for help, but collapses on the way.
Before all that happens, we see Dan is sicker and sicker. He enlists help from his police doctor, who suspects food poisoning. They go see a diner operator who served the food at "the ball game" last night, where lots of people could have gotten sick-but there's no reports of that happening. While they are checking all the food and finding nothing, the doctor finally gets word from the lab person that it is now believed to be lead poisoning.
The whole time, we viewers, knowing about Tommy as well as Dan, know full well where the poison came from. Dan eventually suspects and drives back to that friend's farm. Nobody is around. He has his man blare the "screamer" (siren) for a few seconds, and this does get Tommy's father running toward his home-actually dashing right past his son lying in the field in plain view, now quite sick.
The man talks to Dan and after insisting nothing he is using has any lead, he remembers from 6 months ago that he had something but the can was damaged, so he stashed it in his barn. When he goes to find it, it is gone. Finally they decide to look for Tommy and, guess who-Dan, finds him in the field and all is well.
Without weighing the merits of whether Dan and Co. Should have suspected something more recent than a meal from 12-14 hours earlier sooner than they did, I find fault with this episode this way: For the viewer, there was no mystery about what it was, no criminal, no crime whatsoever, just a lot of obviously wasted time with Dan trying to track down who provided the food for the game last night, going to his diner, talking to the man, who insisted there was nothing wrong with his food (we know), then Dan and the doctor trying to figure it out by eliminating what did not happen.
We were also relatively certain Tommy would be alright-and Dan too. This leaves little to find interesting, which is why I cannot give this show any score higher than a 4.