‘Blue Bloods’ season 6, episode 17 review: ‘Friends in Need’ and Frank’s … love interest?

For “Blue Bloods” on CBS Friday night, there were a wide array of different challenges. One of the biggest ones was simply presenting a story that we would care about given the context of when it was airing. There was no new episode of the show last week, and there is going to be no new episode of the show last week. This was on an island in the middle of nowhere; effectively, it is the Guam of episodes, but as we do still care about Guam, we care about it.

Unfortunately, we just cannot say that “Friends in Need” is one we’re going to remember, given how much time we spent on Jamie and Eddie’s attempts to help Marcus, a rookie cope who had almost no interest in helping himself. Unfortunately, it was terribly easy to project the trajectory of this storyline from start to finish. We knew that Jamie would get upset (and understandably so) when this guy wouldn’t control himself on the job, and eventually there’d be a brotherly heart-to-heart where the two realized that there is a compromise. Given that we may never see Marcus again, it’s really just hard to care.

As for Frank’s storyline, we suppose it is a good thing that his big dilemma at the end of the night was a nightcap at a hotel room. It’s certainly differently than watching him deal with more political problems or people calling for his resignation. Still, didn’t this feel as though it was natural to the story, and it came almost out of nowhere. If Frank is going to have a romance, we’d like it to be more of the epic variety rather than whatever this was.

Alas, we don’t think we will remember this particular hour much. This show is at its best when taking on political, hot-button topics. Tonight, the subject matter could have been charted a mile away. Grade: C+.

(Photo: CBS.)