Entertainment

A Couple Of Visitors Rock 'Brooklyn Nine-Nine'

by Laura Rosenfeld

If you had to choose a character from Brooklyn Nine-Nine to befriend, Rosa would probably be your last choice. Don't get me wrong. She's a totally badass, cool chick who would always have your back, but the aloof detective is definitely not someone you could open up to or ever really get to know. However, when Jake partnered up with Rosa to solve a case with some visiting Swedish inspectors during Sunday night's episode of Brooklyn Nine-Nine, he saw a different side of his frequent partner that would end up changing their relationship for the better.

But first thing's first. Why are there Swedish inspectors in Brooklyn anyway? Well, when Jake and Rosa arrested a criminal, they found an uber-expensive diamond necklace stolen from Sweden in his possession. Captain Holt called in two Swedish inspectors from Interpol played by guest stars Anders Holm and Riki Lindhome to come collect the jewels and the thief, but they ended up discovering that there were more smuggled stones in Brooklyn. So the Swedish inspectors extended their trip to stay and work with Jake and Rosa to track down the stolen goods.

As you might expect, Jake and Rosa weren't thrilled to share the case with these visitors because they always like to do their own thing and get all of the glory. It didn't help that they were making greater headway on the case than the New Yorkers. However, what bothered Jake and Rosa the most was the fact that the Swedish inspectors knew each other so well. And maybe "bothered" isn't even the right word for it. It actually really freaked them out.

On the one hand, Jake and Rosa were somewhat justified in their feelings. Not only did the Swedes know things about each other like their hobbies (cycling and slam poetry, in case you were wondering), but they seemed to be involved in every aspect of each other's personal lives. For instance, Holm's character offered up his sperm in some tupperware to Lindhome's character without her even asking when she had some marriage issues and wanted to have a baby. And if that doesn't adequately communicate their closeness, the fact that they walked everywhere holding hands should.

But deep down inside, Jake and Rosa didn't like the Swedish inspectors' intimacy because it pointed to a larger problem that Jake and Rosa had worked together for so many years and knew barely anything about each other. In just this episode alone, we saw how Rosa wanted nothing to do with helping Jake brainstorm ideas for a six-month anniversary present for Amy. He also only just found out that Rosa had broken up with Marcus, which is something that happened about a month ago.

Rosa said she and Jake don't need to open up to each other because their relationship is all about the work and solving crimes, and they're not really friends. Naturally, this upset Jake, but he didn't let it get in the way of their work, and they did successfully solve the crime in Sunday night's episode of Brooklyn Nine-Nine.

But before you go and think that means Rosa was right about keeping things strictly business with Jake, she didn't feel happy after cracking the case because she realized that she does really value Jake's friendship, which she told him over beers, which was a change of pace over their usual celebratory drinks in silence. She even gave Jake a brilliant suggestion for an anniversary present for Amy (an overnight stay at the New York Public Library) and revealed that she has started dating a man named Tom, albeit after taking several shots.

Still, all of this continued to show the massive amount of character development we've seen with Rosa, starting toward the end of last season when she started showing a more vulnerable side when she began to date Marcus and continuing into this season after her break-up. All in all, Rosa seems to be one of the characters that has grown the most since Brooklyn Nine-Nine began. In the world of comedies, it's easy to continuously exaggerate the same parts of a character's personality to get laughs season after season, so I'm glad to see that Rosa still surprises me.

Images: John P. Fleenor/Fox; Giphy (2)