‘iZombie’ 1.06 Episode Recap and Review: Virtual Reality Bites

Contrary to what the cold open’s sneaky fake-out would have you believe, Major did survive his encounter with the Candyman from last week’s episode. He didn’t want the questions at the hospital, so he’s come by the morgue to have Ravi patch him up. Of course, Ravi is better with stitches in skin that can no longer scar, so the needle gets handed off to Liv as soon as she gets there.

Of course, since this is a murder-of-the-week kind of show, Major isn’t the only one on the slab. Liv and Ravi are called to the basement of one Simon Cutler, and the dude has been dead for at least a week. Also in the basement are one major computer setup and a sad-looking birthday card. Heck of a time to go. Though it seems like Simon’s neighbors aren’t particularly sad about his passing. Simon was purportedly a Class A jerk, and no one’s exactly sorry to see him go. Not only was he a jerk, but he was an infamous internet troll, so half the internet is thrilled at his untimely demise, giving Clive more suspects than he can shake a stick at. The team even comes across audio of him screaming at a customer service rep.

Personally, I would have let the cops handle this one on their own, but Liv is a team player and whips herself up a decomposed-brain smoothie (nope, there’s just no way to write those words that doesn’t make me shudder). The first thing she flashes on is Simon having an allergic reaction to a donut from Best All Around Donuts and staving off eminent death with the EpiPen he keeps upstairs. Definitely points to a cause of death, but there are no allergens in Simon’s stomach.

Remember how the birthday card was pointedly mentioned earlier? Turns out Simon’s birthday wasn’t for four more months. Liv takes a second look at the card. It’s the kind of card that shoots confetti when you open it (that’s a thing? Google says yes.), but the killer added peanut powder to the mix. Cutler wasn’t able to make it up the stairs to his EpiPen before he succumbed.

Live and the crew discover that Cutler was a pretty hardcore gamer, as well, and that he’d made more than a few in-game enemies. Liv has inherited his computer skills, but the not-actually-World-of-Warcrack lead turns out to be a red herring, since their prime suspect is a 14-year-old who lives on the other side of the country.

Computer skills aren’t the only thing that Liv got from Cutler’s brain, though. She’s on her way out for a date with Lowell when she realizes that she can’t leave her apartment. Turns out that Simon was agoraphobic, which explains why his donuts were delivery. Lowell is totally understanding and brings over some anti-anxiety meds, saying that he’d eaten a PTSD brain just last week. They have a lovely evening in and almost kiss, but Liv isn’t quite in the right place yet and the date ends awkwardly.

Clive finds out that Best All Around Donuts had to shut down not too long ago after Cutler spammed their Yelp page with awful reviews (yeah, I know. Go with it for the sake of the show). The owners hated him, but aren’t exactly the murdering kind. But now we know that Cutler had to have found another donut delivering place within a three mile radius, and that’s one more lead they didn’t have before. Liv hacks into the employee database of the one shop that fits the criteria. They have a way overqualified delivery boy named Shawn Posey, which matches a flash Liv has of the birthday card playing “Ring Around the Rosie.”

Check out the rest of Jenn’s review on iZombie TV Series!