Field Mice

This episode centres around lab techs Hodges and Wendy, who invite a group of high school CSI cadets back to the lab to go over an old unsolved case. The crime scene, a burned-out apartment building, has been recently reopened and declared safe, so the baby CSIs and the techs can go into the field and finish investigating the case, including finding the identity of a woman who was found in the wreckage miraculously unburned. Also, lab tech Henry asks out Wendy on an elaborate first date, but his efforts to be ready on time are thwarted by a prankster. And Nick is caught up in investigating a case of food poisoning at PD.

The episode is one of those refreshingly humorous ones that CSI are so good at executing; the actors who play the lab techs make a good team in this respect and episodes are guaranteed to be good if centred around them (I recall "A Space Oddity" from season 9). There is good interaction between them and the cadets and of course Hodges is delightfully flawed as always. The episode was co-written by the actors who play Hodges and Wendy; my opinion was that if you didn't know that, you couldn't tell, though that is just my opinion and I'm no expert.

Nick's case is equally injected with humour, although I missed CSI's trademark evidence collection/processing montages with music. The two cases are well-matched so the tone is even throughout. A very enjoyable episode, showing that there's definite appeal in the post-Grissom line-up yet.