Hey
sami, nice parallel between Cavaliere vs. kid and Nick vs. Walter! *hands
sami soft, chewy chocolate cookie*
I see where you're coming from, and I agree that Nick did more or less let his emotions get in the way of the case here. He didn't do anything to jeopardize the investigation, per se; it's all in the attitude. During the last half of the episode, I definitely got the feeling that he became tunnel-visioned on the homeless dude. He was a lot more willing to accept evidence against Walter, and like you pointed out, he was noticably more hostile towards Walter than he was towards the family. I don't believe it was even a conscious choice on his part; there's a difference between how one would normally apprach an adult and a child, and Nick was particularly sympathetic toward this child, who he thought was being bullied by Cavaliere. I mean, Nick's not a saint. He may not even know it, but his emotions were definitely affecting his attitude toward the two suspects.
That said, I do believe Nick was more justified in how he treated Walter than Cavaliere was in how he treated the kid, at least from the forensics perspective. All Cavaliere had on the kid was that he "looked" guilty, but Walter was caught wearing a sweater - which he claimed was his - spattered with the victim's blood. I'm sure if it were the other way around, Nick would've approached each suspect differently.
And while I thought Nicky was very professional at first (didn't anybody see my Lion-tamer vs tempermental pitbull analogy? ) but by the time Nick had glomed onto his Walter theory, he became as tunnel-visioned as Caveliere and as snide as Cavaliere was with Nick, Nick lowered himself to his level and matched him wit for wit -- it became competitive. Whether that was Nicky standing up for himself and not being steamed-rolled by others or not -- I saw it as being competitive when neither would back down.
I gotta disagree here. While Nick and Cavaliere were going their separate ways with the case, they had very different motivations. For Cavaliere, it was about winning and proving his method superior. (
Cavaliere: "Sort of kicks the crap out of your "evidence," now, doesn't it?" ) But for Nick, it was all about the boy. He never said or implied anything about getting ahead of Cavaliere; all his counter-arguments were centered around the wellbeing of Matt Hawkins. (
Nick: "Did you beat it out of him?" "Say, was an advocate or a parent present at the time of the confession?" etc.) For him it wasn't about trying to look better than Cavaliere; it was about making sure the kid wasn't being bullied, which he believed he probably was. Prejudiced? Yeah, sure. But I wouldn't say that Nick let himself get caught up in the petty competitiveness.
And this goes with how you interpret the ending. If you think Nick was being competitive throughout the episode, then his last remark does come off as childish and snide. But the way I saw it, by "that way" he was referring to Cavaliere's need to gloat, which goes with my interpretation of the rest of the episode that Nick was above such competitiveness. He was sorry that in the end Cavaliere still only cared about being right, an issue he thought was irrelevant compared to the family tragedy taking place in front of him. I guess you could say he was being dismissive, because he kinda was, but it wasn't out of defeat, which would've been immature. I think if there had been overwhelming evidence against the kid and Nick was the one believing him to be guilty from the beginning, he wouldn't have been any happier about the outcome. He was grieving instead over a larger issue - the needless loss of two young, innocent lives, and I don't find that immature at all.
On a side note: Judging by his behavior, Cavaliere was either heartless or cynical enough to have gotten used to the concept of kids killing kids. I tend to believe the latter. I wonder whether Nick will one day become hardened enough to be able to brush off something like this.
ETA:
Crap! I'm suppoed to be staying up studying for the finals, and look what I end up doing.
:lol: *sigh* What can I do? I love it here.
