I started watching Monk not long ago, through cable TV. At first I was just amazed watching the main character do strange things. Then I couldn't stop watching the movies because it is the only TV show that really, really, really makes me laugh. At every show I get anxious to see what "comes next" when it comes to Monk's behavior. I think one of the most hilarious act was to see Monk ironing his shoelaces in the episode where he plays his assistant's assistant at a basketball game ! that was really funny ! I would like to compliment Mr. Jack Bernstein. I admire his ideas of acts one has never heard of ! Also, a special compliment goes to Mr. Shalhoub. He is the right guy to play that role, no doubt about it.
13 Reviews
FEEL GOOD EPISODE🌞
Alex_GJTweet8 June 2023
Warning: Spoilers
That's one of my favourite "feel good" episodes of Monk. It's so relaxing watching it. It's different but in a very good way. It's the time you see Monk's enthusiasm without the script shouts that you will see that.
I love the fact that he helps the girls. I love that he finally doesn't get any money from them. I love the whistle! He reminds you of why you wanted to have a whistle when you were a kid and how much pleasure you could get by just whistling! Monk is playful here and his OCD is there but not starring. The star is Monk's enthusiasm to be a coach and win a trophy.
The finale of the episode is one of the sweetest endings. Finally no worries, no misery. Just pure joy and compassion.
Jennifer Lawrence appearance as the mascot was another "treat of joy". Very unexpected. I loved it.
My favourite scene: When the referee takes the whistle from Monk's mouth and Monk's reaction!
Also when Monk repeats what Natalie says to the girls while she is coaching them.
Watch this episode if you want to relax and have fun.
I love the fact that he helps the girls. I love that he finally doesn't get any money from them. I love the whistle! He reminds you of why you wanted to have a whistle when you were a kid and how much pleasure you could get by just whistling! Monk is playful here and his OCD is there but not starring. The star is Monk's enthusiasm to be a coach and win a trophy.
The finale of the episode is one of the sweetest endings. Finally no worries, no misery. Just pure joy and compassion.
Jennifer Lawrence appearance as the mascot was another "treat of joy". Very unexpected. I loved it.
My favourite scene: When the referee takes the whistle from Monk's mouth and Monk's reaction!
Also when Monk repeats what Natalie says to the girls while she is coaching them.
Watch this episode if you want to relax and have fun.
Mr. Monk and the Big Game
nikidurand22 July 2006
Warning: Spoilers
Last season the writers began turning the conventions of the show on its ear. The first three episodes continues this and Monk fans won't be disappointed. I really like that the writers and cast take chances with the content and their characters- it's refreshing when many shows seem content with the formula they've created. I also love the show because they use Monk's OCD as a comedic device yet always balance it with compassion. In this third episode Adrian Monk gets to confront his number one phobia- germs- many times as the Julie and her friends hire him to solve a case. He also becomes Natalie's assistant for the first time. She relishes this turn of events. The writers also have fun with Monk's traditional summation of the case- it's pretty funny!
Monk the basketball coach
TheLittleSongbird18 August 2017
'Monk' has always been one of my most watched shows when needing comfort, to relax after a hard day, a good laugh or a way to spend a lazy weekend.
While not quite as good as the previous two Season 5 episodes "Mr Monk and the Actor" and "Mr Monk and the Garbage Strike", "Mr Monk and the Big Game" is a hugely entertaining watch. The mystery aspects are fairly obvious from the outset (especially with the basketball coach), apart from the motive, but while not quite as memorable as the character moments and the coaching scenes the story is engaging and paced well. It was also interesting to see how the three crimes were tied together and solved.
Particularly great in "Mr Monk and the Big Game" is the character moments. Loved the priceless basketball coaching scenes with Monk being a basketball coach and failing spectacularly and hysterically so, basketball has rarely been more hilariously depicted on television, and the parts with the whistle and the one minute silence are hilarious and classic 'Monk'. The trophy part is very sweet and one feels happy for Monk.
As said many times, one of the best things about 'Monk' has always been the acting of Tony Shalhoub in the title role. It was essential for him to work and be the glue of the show, and Shalhoub not only is that but also at his very best he IS the show. Have always loved the balance of the humour, which is often hilarious, and pathos, which is sincere and touching.
Natalie is down to earth, sympathetic and sassy, also being sensitive to Monk's needs and quirks which Traylor Howard does well bringing out. Felt sorry for her a little too. Ted Levine and Jason Gray-Stanford have fun as Stottlemeyer and Disher as ever. The supporting cast are solid, and it was great to see more of Julie.
It's not just the cast or story though. Another star is the writing, which is also essential to whether the show would be successful or not and succeed it does here. The mix of wry humour, lovable quirkiness and tender easy-to-relate-to drama is delicately done, particularly the last one. The quirks are sympathetically done and never exploited or overdone.
Visually, the episode is shot in a slick and stylish way, and the music is both understated and quirky. While there is a preference for the theme music for Season 1, Randy Newman's "It's a Jungle Out There" has grown on me overtime, found it annoying at first but appreciate its meaning and what it's trying to say much more now. Oh and a good job is done with the different opening credits sequence to accommodate the changes made.
In conclusion, great. 9/10 Bethany Cox
While not quite as good as the previous two Season 5 episodes "Mr Monk and the Actor" and "Mr Monk and the Garbage Strike", "Mr Monk and the Big Game" is a hugely entertaining watch. The mystery aspects are fairly obvious from the outset (especially with the basketball coach), apart from the motive, but while not quite as memorable as the character moments and the coaching scenes the story is engaging and paced well. It was also interesting to see how the three crimes were tied together and solved.
Particularly great in "Mr Monk and the Big Game" is the character moments. Loved the priceless basketball coaching scenes with Monk being a basketball coach and failing spectacularly and hysterically so, basketball has rarely been more hilariously depicted on television, and the parts with the whistle and the one minute silence are hilarious and classic 'Monk'. The trophy part is very sweet and one feels happy for Monk.
As said many times, one of the best things about 'Monk' has always been the acting of Tony Shalhoub in the title role. It was essential for him to work and be the glue of the show, and Shalhoub not only is that but also at his very best he IS the show. Have always loved the balance of the humour, which is often hilarious, and pathos, which is sincere and touching.
Natalie is down to earth, sympathetic and sassy, also being sensitive to Monk's needs and quirks which Traylor Howard does well bringing out. Felt sorry for her a little too. Ted Levine and Jason Gray-Stanford have fun as Stottlemeyer and Disher as ever. The supporting cast are solid, and it was great to see more of Julie.
It's not just the cast or story though. Another star is the writing, which is also essential to whether the show would be successful or not and succeed it does here. The mix of wry humour, lovable quirkiness and tender easy-to-relate-to drama is delicately done, particularly the last one. The quirks are sympathetically done and never exploited or overdone.
Visually, the episode is shot in a slick and stylish way, and the music is both understated and quirky. While there is a preference for the theme music for Season 1, Randy Newman's "It's a Jungle Out There" has grown on me overtime, found it annoying at first but appreciate its meaning and what it's trying to say much more now. Oh and a good job is done with the different opening credits sequence to accommodate the changes made.
In conclusion, great. 9/10 Bethany Cox
Sports?!
Hitchcoc2 April 2020
When Julie's basketball coach is murdered, Monk is put on the case. Natalie takes over for the final game, the championship. She enlists Adrian to be her assistant (why, I don't have a clue). When the final game is played, it is chaotic and Monk is a disaster (of course). Along the way some interesting discoveries are made about the coach. The basketball scenes are pretty poor with girls just kind standing in a group. Still, we didn't watch to see a realistic game.
What's With Monk and The Whistle?
TheFearmakers26 November 2020
Monk has OCD and many problems, but is he mentally-challenged? In this episode, as he blows a whistle over and over for no reason, it sure seems like it... These are moments in the mid/later episodes where they go too far with Monk's illness... Making him look like his character from Quick Change...
Not a bad episode, but many concerning Natalie and her daughter seem like Hallmark Channel Mysteries, and this is no different. Nothing to get you really into the mystery of the coach's death since the death itself was so forgettable. A semi-good filler.
Not a bad episode, but many concerning Natalie and her daughter seem like Hallmark Channel Mysteries, and this is no different. Nothing to get you really into the mystery of the coach's death since the death itself was so forgettable. A semi-good filler.
Good episode!
heshamwza29 April 2019
Starring Jennifer Lawrence
safenoe11 April 2020
Warning: Spoilers
That's right, Mr. Monk and the Big Game features Jennifer Lawrence as the Mascot, well before she became famous in Mother! The plot motive is slightly convoluted, but still entertaining. There's a touch of Hoosiers here, but I really wanted Monk to lead the basketball team to victory. Also a shade of the infamous USA-Soviet Union basketball final in the 1972 Olympics.
Letting Monk have a whistle is a dangerous thing
FlushingCaps10 July 2020
Warning: Spoilers
This has to rank as one of the funniest in this series as Monk actually winds up with the job of coaching a high school basketball team. We begin with Julie on the court with others in a practice where he coach Lynn Hayden is obviously bothered by something so much that she cannot focus on her coaching at all.
After practice and after the players all left, in an unusual move, Coach Hayden takes a shower in the players' locker room. She would be much more likely to just go home to shower OR there would be a coach's shower in her office area. While she is showering, an unknown person sneaks into the room and sets up a hair dryer, a towel over a drain, and a leaky pipe under a sink to arrange for the electrocution of the coach when she steps out of the shower.
The police view it as an accident, but Julie and two teammates "hire" Mr. Monk to investigate. He finds plenty of evidence that it was done on purpose, but nothing conclusive and no leads toward anyone who might have wanted her dead. He interviews Hayden's brother, who is living with her after two bad divorces and he is full of praise for his wonderful sister.
We then learn that Hayden went camping in a forest some 2½ hours drive from San Francisco two weeks ago when a terrible fire was set by accident when the wind shifted that destroyed several homes but injured nobody. What wasn't explained is why a fire this far from the bay area would be investigated by Captain Stottlemeyer, as stated.
Intermingled with the investigating, when Natalie and Monk go see the principal of the school, the principal mentions the team will have to forfeit their upcoming championship game because they don't have a coach. Natalie volunteers and the principal agrees, but says "You'll have to have an assistant." Natalie immediately looks to Monk and he is the assistant. I immediately wondered why this one game coach "needed" an assistant when the season-long regular coach didn't need one. He was eager to get a whistle even though Natalie tells him he won't need one. Later, in the forest talking to the ranger about the fire from two weeks ago, Monk drives the pair crazy by blowing his new whistle so often. How Natalie handled it was remembered by me but Monk's reaction to that surprised me, even on the third viewing, but it was a real hoot.
It was funny watching Monk trying to be useful in practice, but all he did really was repeat almost everything Natalie told the players to do. We learn that he always wished he could have won a trophy and he was excited to learn he would get one if the team won the big game.
In the big game, Natalie makes a very mild objection to a referee's call and is amazingly ejected from the game. This sets up Monk to coach solo the game's last few minutes. Meanwhile, Natalie is in the locker room and she finds the telltale clue that reveals the murderer. She gets the school mascot to lend her the cougar suit and rushes back onto the court holding the key evidence because even though the tight game has just two minutes to go, she has to tell Monk, and then the spectator captain and lieutenant, all about the evidence.
Problem is, the killer-as Natalie knew-was in the stands and he sees the evidence and he takes off running-which of course proves his guilt. After a brief chase, he is caught and now we can finish the game. This too has a surprise ending which need not be revealed here. I thought it was amazing to see that this rabbit-eared official who ejected the coach for the mildest criticism delivered rather quietly, walks past her twice while she is in the cougar suit without the cougar head, and ignores her. A coach who is ejected in high school who is then found courtside long after the ejection but before the game is over, would create a forfeit. Otherwise, an ejection would mean nothing. Can't believe the ref would have ignored her.
So pretty much everything connected with basketball here, from the girls wearing their first names on the backs of their uniforms, to the home team wearing the dark uniforms, to this varsity (apparently) team winning their league title and not having any sort of state tournament coming up (One game left, we were told), is not realistic at all. The gym had fewer seats than the one in Hoosiers, which was set in a tiny town, not San Francisco.
Monk did do some clever detecting in the locker room and of course, we viewers knew there would be a connection with the murder and the second case Monk investigated. There were few suspects so we couldn't play "Whodunit"-which is fine, because only some Monks are whodunits. There were also two nice touching scenes involving Monk and trophies.
I didn't think the inaccuracies involving basketball took away from the many comedic scenes and the drama portions were satisfactory for me. This episode was loads of fun to enjoy again, which is why I have no problem giving it a 10.
After practice and after the players all left, in an unusual move, Coach Hayden takes a shower in the players' locker room. She would be much more likely to just go home to shower OR there would be a coach's shower in her office area. While she is showering, an unknown person sneaks into the room and sets up a hair dryer, a towel over a drain, and a leaky pipe under a sink to arrange for the electrocution of the coach when she steps out of the shower.
The police view it as an accident, but Julie and two teammates "hire" Mr. Monk to investigate. He finds plenty of evidence that it was done on purpose, but nothing conclusive and no leads toward anyone who might have wanted her dead. He interviews Hayden's brother, who is living with her after two bad divorces and he is full of praise for his wonderful sister.
We then learn that Hayden went camping in a forest some 2½ hours drive from San Francisco two weeks ago when a terrible fire was set by accident when the wind shifted that destroyed several homes but injured nobody. What wasn't explained is why a fire this far from the bay area would be investigated by Captain Stottlemeyer, as stated.
Intermingled with the investigating, when Natalie and Monk go see the principal of the school, the principal mentions the team will have to forfeit their upcoming championship game because they don't have a coach. Natalie volunteers and the principal agrees, but says "You'll have to have an assistant." Natalie immediately looks to Monk and he is the assistant. I immediately wondered why this one game coach "needed" an assistant when the season-long regular coach didn't need one. He was eager to get a whistle even though Natalie tells him he won't need one. Later, in the forest talking to the ranger about the fire from two weeks ago, Monk drives the pair crazy by blowing his new whistle so often. How Natalie handled it was remembered by me but Monk's reaction to that surprised me, even on the third viewing, but it was a real hoot.
It was funny watching Monk trying to be useful in practice, but all he did really was repeat almost everything Natalie told the players to do. We learn that he always wished he could have won a trophy and he was excited to learn he would get one if the team won the big game.
In the big game, Natalie makes a very mild objection to a referee's call and is amazingly ejected from the game. This sets up Monk to coach solo the game's last few minutes. Meanwhile, Natalie is in the locker room and she finds the telltale clue that reveals the murderer. She gets the school mascot to lend her the cougar suit and rushes back onto the court holding the key evidence because even though the tight game has just two minutes to go, she has to tell Monk, and then the spectator captain and lieutenant, all about the evidence.
Problem is, the killer-as Natalie knew-was in the stands and he sees the evidence and he takes off running-which of course proves his guilt. After a brief chase, he is caught and now we can finish the game. This too has a surprise ending which need not be revealed here. I thought it was amazing to see that this rabbit-eared official who ejected the coach for the mildest criticism delivered rather quietly, walks past her twice while she is in the cougar suit without the cougar head, and ignores her. A coach who is ejected in high school who is then found courtside long after the ejection but before the game is over, would create a forfeit. Otherwise, an ejection would mean nothing. Can't believe the ref would have ignored her.
So pretty much everything connected with basketball here, from the girls wearing their first names on the backs of their uniforms, to the home team wearing the dark uniforms, to this varsity (apparently) team winning their league title and not having any sort of state tournament coming up (One game left, we were told), is not realistic at all. The gym had fewer seats than the one in Hoosiers, which was set in a tiny town, not San Francisco.
Monk did do some clever detecting in the locker room and of course, we viewers knew there would be a connection with the murder and the second case Monk investigated. There were few suspects so we couldn't play "Whodunit"-which is fine, because only some Monks are whodunits. There were also two nice touching scenes involving Monk and trophies.
I didn't think the inaccuracies involving basketball took away from the many comedic scenes and the drama portions were satisfactory for me. This episode was loads of fun to enjoy again, which is why I have no problem giving it a 10.
Starting to Think don't be related to someone who knows Monk
radarfirs723 March 2021
Warning: Spoilers
Sorry, in this episode, I have started to wonder how many episodes that the one Murdered ends up had known someone who knows Monk? Why doesn't Natalie know that Monk would have a Backup for a Whistle? Why does Natalie get kicked out of the game on purpose? Yes, on Purpose rewatch the scene. Loved the "Trick" story Natalie does to the Captain - BUSTED. Why didn't Natalie just have Monk read 1/2 of the Captains pile of cases at least 1/3 would have been solved?
Best written episode
jeannebpaul25 May 2023
One of the best written and most entertaining and funny episodes I've seen. The episode depicts a murder of course, and monk takes over the role of coaching girls basketball. But it is the subtle things that happen in between that make this episode hilariously funny. As usual, we see the very childish nature of monk as he responds to both Natalie and to his surroundings... but this episode in particular has some hilarious twists and turns. He has a particular fondness for a whistle that he's given as the assistant coach of a girl's basketball team. This episode had me laughing at several different intervals.
More Silliness
ccthemovieman-17 August 2007
Julie's basketball coach is murdered in the girls' locker room via electrocution and it's ruled an accident. However, the girls think something is fishy and several of them go to Monk to ask him to investigate.
It looks like this might be what I was hoping for after two silly episodes to begin the fifth season: an episode where the crime case is given decent air time. However, it quickly evolves into a story of Natalie and Monk taking over the coaching reins for the final game of the season. It still had some humorous material here - Monk ironing his shoelaces, for example - and there but not with the basketball scenes, which were ludicrous.
We learned Monk was a stoolie for the principal when he was in high school. No wonder he wasn't popular. It's also revealed he never won a trophy in his entire life, and he'd love to have one. If the girls win the game, he'll get one so he's motivated, even though he's clueless about basketball, of course.
They really stretch things as Natalie gets thrown out of the game and Monk has to coach in the final dramatic moments. Man, I'm wondering if they are ever going to go back and concentrate more on the crime cases at hand. "Silly" has replaced "clever" for most of these shows in the past year or so. This was one of the dumbest episodes ever.
It looks like this might be what I was hoping for after two silly episodes to begin the fifth season: an episode where the crime case is given decent air time. However, it quickly evolves into a story of Natalie and Monk taking over the coaching reins for the final game of the season. It still had some humorous material here - Monk ironing his shoelaces, for example - and there but not with the basketball scenes, which were ludicrous.
We learned Monk was a stoolie for the principal when he was in high school. No wonder he wasn't popular. It's also revealed he never won a trophy in his entire life, and he'd love to have one. If the girls win the game, he'll get one so he's motivated, even though he's clueless about basketball, of course.
They really stretch things as Natalie gets thrown out of the game and Monk has to coach in the final dramatic moments. Man, I'm wondering if they are ever going to go back and concentrate more on the crime cases at hand. "Silly" has replaced "clever" for most of these shows in the past year or so. This was one of the dumbest episodes ever.
Don't Watch if You Have a Cat or Value your Sanity
leboutaine24 September 2019
Warning: Spoilers
For some reason the writers decided to make Monk weirdly stupid and far more neurotic in season 5. This episode is no exception.
He becomes obsessed with having a whistle. It's infuriatingly annoying. He blows it all the time. The cat went mental as he was near me when I was watching it. Incredibly annoying
And the police KEEP ON questioning Monk. It's far from believable. The guy is a prophet and gets everything right in the end. Randy doubting Monk is laughable - how does he have the authority to do that?
Unbelievable in all.
He becomes obsessed with having a whistle. It's infuriatingly annoying. He blows it all the time. The cat went mental as he was near me when I was watching it. Incredibly annoying
And the police KEEP ON questioning Monk. It's far from believable. The guy is a prophet and gets everything right in the end. Randy doubting Monk is laughable - how does he have the authority to do that?
Unbelievable in all.
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