"In Plain Fright" is the eleventh episode of Season Five. Shawn and Gus witness a murder at a theme park and are soon led to believe that the culprit is the ghost of a man who fell to his death in the same park 13 years ago.
Plot Summary[]
In 1990, Shawn and Gus are wait in line for the haunted house at Scare Fest, a Halloween-themed event at a local amusement park. Shawn wants to know why Gus is so scared if he's been on the ride a dozen times. Gus tells him that the ride doesn't seem structurally sound and it might break and throw them through the roof. Shawn points out that the ride is only 12 inches off the ground. Gus asks why Shawn doesn't want to go on the ride, and he explains that mechanical monsters can come alive in the unusual circumstances. Gus points out that the chances of that happening are highly unlikely. Shawn and Gus start arguing about who needs to go first. After a moment of bickering, their eyes are drawn to all the creepy statues that around them and they both scream grabbing onto one another. A second later they pull apart with Gus telling the people around them "That didn't happen."
In the present, Juliet surprises Shawn with tickets to Scare Fest, which the amusement park has brought back after a 15-year hiatus. When Shawn doesn't react the way Juliet thought he would, she realizes that he already had tickets to go with Gus. Not wanting to let either one down, Shawn decides to go with both on separate nights, but doesn't tell either one. Shawn already has enough tension built up with having to tell Gus about his and Juliet's relationship. He doesn't want either relationship to suffer because his attention is now divided.
On opening night, Shawn and Gus head into Scare Fest. They are instantly transported to back to their youth. But, things turn sour when on the Haunted House ride, Shawn witnesses a murder. Unfortunately, Gus is no help, as he was shielding his eyes the entire time. Shawn tells Carol, the ride operator, immediately after, but she doesn't believe him one bit. She's also been too busy texting someone named Todd, who irritates Shawn with his use of poor grammar.
Shawn and Gus discover their old assistant Ken Wong is now working at Scare Fest. They convince Ken to help them break into the Haunted House ride to get a better look at the possible murder victim. While inside the ride, Shawn takes Gus to the place he saw the man get murdered, but the man is nowhere to be found. After getting caught snooping around, the boys are brought into the park's administration offices. There, they meet Eve, one of the park officials. When Shawn sees the victim's photo on the wall, Eve identifies him as Mr. Wayland, the park president. Shawn's story is now starting to check out, as Mr. Wayland hasn't been seen in over an hour, missing an important meeting in the process.
Back in the haunted house, the police are there checking out the body, but Shawn sees something fishy about the crime scene. Shawn saw the man get killed on the complete opposite side of the ride, and he wasn't wearing a mask like this dead body is. Mr. Holloway, the park's Vice President, steps forward and claims that he thinks the murderer was Johnny Rickets - or, rather, the ghost of Johnny Ricketts. Holloway explains that Johnny Ricketts was a kid that fell off the Ferris Wheel at Scare Fest 15 years ago and died. That was the last year they did Scare Fest - until this year, when they decided to open it back up. Holloway goes on to explain that he has been seeing Johnny Ricketts everywhere, and that he thinks Ricketts is trying to tell him something from beyond the grave.
Back at the station, Juliet tells the guys about some research she did on Ricketts' death. She discovers that Holloway was running the ride that night when Ricketts fell to his death. Back at the fest, the guys go looking for Holloway, but it turns out Holloway has been murdered on the log flume ride. The guys check the ride's photo-cam and they are shocked to see Johnny Ricketts riding in one of the logs.
At this point, the park has been shut down, and SBPD is now on the hunt for the murderer at the fest. Shawn and Gus run into Ken and ask him about Johnny Ricketts and if he thinks Holloway's and Wayland's deaths are linked. Ken tells them that they should look in the archives, as the park keeps everything on record. While there, Shawn discovers that Eve was also there the night Ricketts died, and that Holloway and Wayland made Eve falsify statements about the death of Johnny Ricketts. Then, Shawn discovers that the park paid the Ricketts family off for his death. But, then they see that another person was paid off by the park - a Jamie Emerson. Suddenly, Eve shows up. Shawn tells Eve he knows about the payouts and the falsified statements. He questions her, but Eve gets scared and runs away.
Back at SBPD, they discover that there is no death certificate for Jamie Emerson. Jamie only has a California I.D. because she can't drive due to an injury. This is where Shawn discovers that Jamie was there with Ricketts on the Ferris Wheel the night he died, and that she is the one who is murdering everyone who lied about Ricketts' death. They immediately go looking for Eve because she is next to be killed. They find Eve and she admits that she has also seen the ghost of Johnny Ricketts. Then, suddenly, the ride operator Carol shows up. Shawn immediately knows that she's the murderer and that her real name is Jamie Emerson. Shawn then puts the rest together: Johnny was trying to save Jamie's life on the Ferris Wheel because her latch belt wasn't properly locked. But, it was Johnny who fell and Jamie who survived. The park never came clean about the accident publicly, and Jamie had to live with knowing Ricketts' death was a cover-up for the last 15 years. But, Jamie wasn't working alone - there was no way she could have ran the ride and killed Wayland at the same time. She had a helper. Shawn flashbacks to the moment he saw the ride operator, Carol (Jamie), texting with Todd, the fest's guess-your-weight-guy. This leads him to believe that Todd was in on it. Shawn figures it out that Jamie and Todd dressed as Johnny Ricketts when they murdered Holloway and Wayland. Shawn, Gus, and Eve hide from Todd, who is brandishing a gun. Just as they've been found, Lassiter and Juliet arrive to save the day. The arrest is especially satisfying for Juliet, as Todd had guessed her weight wrong on the heavy side.
In the end, Shawn finally tells Gus about him and Juliet dating. Much to Shawn's surprise, Gus isn't surprised at all to hear this news, though he starts to eat caramel as a coping mechanism.
Trivia[]
- The title is something of a portmanteau concept, blending "in plain sight" with notions of fear.
- One of the park's employees is called Piña, which is Spanish for "pineapple". There also appears to be a glass pineapple figurine on Gus's desk (which resembles the one seen in Pierre Despereaux's hotel room in the previous episode).
- Shawn tells Gus "don't be the only black lead on a major cable network." At the time of the episode, Dulé Hill was the only black lead on USA Network.
- Shawn wants Gus to say "Zoinks!" (eventually saying it himself) and "Jinkies!" (to which Gus obliges). These are the catchphrases of the Scooby-Doo characters Shaggy Rogers and Velma Dinkley respectively.
- Steve Franks revealed that there were plans to have the episode air in 3D during the Super-Sized Psychtacular Binge-A-Thon, with 3D glasses to be distributed through Entertainment Weekly and 7-11, but executives shot down the idea.
- The scenes at the theme park were shot at the Playland Amusement Park in Vancouver, BC.
Digital Releases[]
