Three years after losing his job with the San Francisco Police Department because of his obsessive/compulsive disorder, Monk is working as a private consultant investigating the murder of a young woman named Nicole Vasquez. Shortly after determining that the murderer was at least 6'3", smoked menthol cigarettes, and wore slippers, Monk receives a call from his former boss, Captain Stottlemeyer, who reluctantly requests his aid in discovering the would-be assassin of mayoral candidate Warren St. Claire. While at least three people (including Mrs. St. Claire) seem to have sufficient motive to kill the candidate, the Vasquez murder seems to be unmotivated. Despite the captain's skepticism, Monk is certain that the cases are related. The police get a lead on the would-be assassin, but he manages to escape, in part because of Monk's fear of heights. Sharona convinces the deputy mayor to let Monk continue his investigation despite Captain Stottlemeyer's objections. After Monk has gathered the suspects together to recreate the crime scene, the hitman takes a shot at his accomplice and Sharona, playing Lois Lane, follows him into a sewer. Overcoming his revulsion, Monk goes in after them, placing Kleenex on the rungs of the ladder to protect his hands and feet on the way down. But Kleenex won't protect his shoes or the cuffs of his pants from the filthy, six-inch deep water. This novel act of courage moves Monk one step closer to recovering his emotional stability--and getting his old job back.

Three years after losing his job with the San Francisco Police Department because of his obsessive/compulsive disorder, Monk is working as a private consultant investigating the murder of a young woman named Nicole Vasquez. Shortly after determining that the murderer was at least 6'3", smoked menthol cigarettes, and wore slippers, Monk receives a call from his former boss, Captain Stottlemeyer, who reluctantly requests his aid in discovering the would-be assassin of mayoral candidate Warren St. Claire. While at least three people (including Mrs. St. Claire) seem to have sufficient motive to kill the candidate, the Vasquez murder seems to be unmotivated. Despite the captain's skepticism, Monk is certain that the cases are related. The police get a lead on the would-be assassin, but he manages to escape, in part because of Monk's fear of heights. Sharona convinces the deputy mayor to let Monk continue his investigation despite Captain Stottlemeyer's objections. After Monk has gathered the suspects together to recreate the crime scene, the hitman takes a shot at his accomplice and Sharona, playing Lois Lane, follows him into a sewer. Overcoming his revulsion, Monk goes in after them, placing Kleenex on the rungs of the ladder to protect his hands and feet on the way down. But Kleenex won't protect his shoes or the cuffs of his pants from the filthy, six-inch deep water. This novel act of courage moves Monk one step closer to recovering his emotional stability--and getting his old job back.

A panicky woman driver goes off the road thanks to a skid block placed by her husband, former police commissioner Harry Ashcombe. The next morning Dolly Flint, a psychic on first name terms with Captain Stottlemeyer (who has arrested her three times on bunko charges) wakes up in her car next to the site of the staged accident. Dolly insists that she was led to the site by the dead woman's ""aura,"" but Monk is suspicious. At the memorial service held in the dead woman's expensive home, Monk figures out what the audience already knows--that Ashcombe is the murderer. With the aid of Ashcombe's mistress, Monk, the captain, and Dolly stage a psychic ""reading"" to catch the killer. Eight out of ten.

A 911 call from a judge identifies the man who is about to murder her as rich and obscenely fat financier Dale Biederbeck. But ""Dale the Whale"" weighs over 800 pounds and can't get up from his bed, making it impossible for him to have commited the murder, despite the 911 call and the testimony of a ten-year-old witness who saw an extremely fat man through the window of the judge's house. The fact that Biederbeck sued Monk's wife for libel after she criticized his ethics in a newspaper article gives Monk added incentive to find him guilty. While Monk and Captain Stottlemeyer try to figure out how Dale could have committed the murder, Sharona gets her chance to play Lois Lane, or rather Florence Nightingale, by briefly serving as Biederbeck's nurse instead of Monk's. She also finds herself attracted to Dale's private physician, Christian (kristy AN) Vezza.

Officer Adam Kirk, an old friend of Stottlemeyer's, steps off a ferris wheel to find the young man he was riding with dead from a knife in his chest. Stottlemeyer has no choice but to arrest his friend and advise him to remain silent. He enlists Monk to investigate the case unofficially, even though Monk believes the hair-triggered cop is guilty. Matters are complicated when a criminal Kirk is charged with beating is released for lack of evidence, and more so when Monk discovers that the bruises on the victim's body were self-inflicted. Meanwhile, Stottlemeyer is forced by his conscience to state that Monk is not ready to rejoin the force and to endure the resentment of both Monk and Sharona as a result of this decision. When Monk, still furious with Stottlemeyer, figures out what really happened, he and Sharona return to the carnival and Sharona climbs aboard the ferris wheel to spot the escaping criminal because Monk is too afraid of heights to do it himself. But the criminal is hidi

After attempting to prepare his dead wife's favorite dinner in her old house to celebrate the anniversary of the day they met, Monk is arrested for unlawful entry and is taken to Medford Psychiatric Institute for forty-eight hours of psychiatric observation. His roommate, overly empathic John Wurster (""I'm a detective, too!""), informs him of an unsolved murder four years earlier, while another inmate, Manny, involves him in a quest to discover Santa Claus on the asylum roof. In addition to Dr. Lancaster's orders not to play detective during his stay at Medford, Monk finds his quest to solve the two ""cases"" thwarted by apparent slips of memory--a picture he doesn't remember drawing and another patient's necklace that has found its way into his pocket. After the necklace incident, Monk finds himself strait-jacketed in the ""choir room"" as the doctor's sinister aide goes upstairs for four cc's of Thorazine. Meanwhile, Sharona, who hears about the murder on a visit to Monk, examines the mur

When billionaire software magnate Sidney Teal is shot dead by ex-cop Archie Modine after allegedly turning mugger and another policeman mysteriously flees the scene, Stottlemeyer calls in Monk to investigate. Not only is the idea of a billionaire turning mugger hard to swallow, the circumstances of the mugging are suspicious. Why, for example, would a mugger wear knee and elbow pads? Meanwhile, Sharona threatens to quit (this time for sure) when her paycheck bounces, and Stottlemeyer is hounded by reporters demanding information on ""Fraidy Cop."" Unable to continue the investigation without Sharona's help, Monk returns to the seemingly unsolvable mystery of his wife's murder only to find that his ""new"" clue isn't new; he's already talked to writer Kelly Street three times. Sharona finds that selling lamps isn't nearly as much fun as working for Monk (with or without money) and comes to the rescue with a new clue involving Teal and Modine.

When a lawyer and his assistant are murdered, suspicion falls on a disgruntled client whose burnt file is found in the wastebasket. When the suspect, Grayson, is also murdered, Stottlemeyer is certain that Grayson's neighbor, a pretty blonde named Monica Waters who has been feuding with Grayson for two years about her garage, is guilty of all three murders. But Monk is attracted to Monica, who bears a slight resemblance to Trudy. Because Monica's absent husband had OCD, she understands Monk in a way that Sharona can't, which of course adds to the attraction. Even her garage is perfect, exactly the way Monk would want his garage to be organized if he ever had one. A touching bond forms between them until a call from Stottlemeyer leads him to suspect that Monica may really be the murderer.

A woman is murdered during the San Francisco marathon and Monk suspects her married lover, Trevor McDowell, even though he was running in the race. Although McDowell disappears from the video tape of the race less than halfway through and reappears only at the end, the data from a computer chip indicates that he was present at all checkpoints during the race. After interrogating the murdered woman's ex-husband as a possible suspect only to find that his alibi is probably credible, a frustrated Stottlemeyer provides Monk with a brilliant suggestion--that the computer chip was passed off to someone else during the race. Monk meanwhile has the chance to visit his hero, an aging runner from Nigeria whom Sharona briefly suspects may be the murderer's accomplice--a theory Monk refuses even to consider. When Monk figures out what really happened, he must catch the murderer himself to prove his theory.

Monk's beach resort vacation with Sharona and Benjy turns into work when Benjy witnesses a murder. But with no body to be found and ""the cleanest crime scene in the history of crime,"" Benjy can't convince anyone except Monk and the hotel's kooky security chief that he's telling the truth. Believing that Benjy's imagination is working overtime and determined to enjoy her vacation, Sharona takes unneeded tennis lessons from yet another Mr. Wrong while Monk and his new assistant follow what turns out to be a false lead. Benjy spots the body only to have it disappear again, and the security chief reveals Monk's own room to be contaminated with some of the ""fourteen bodily fluids"" detected by her sonar machine. When Monk figures out who stole four bags of lime from the grounds supervisor's shed, he solves the case. Unfortunately, his time at the hotel is almost up and the body still has not been found.

A wealthy businessman is apparently killed in an earthquake, but Monk is sure that he was murdered by his wife. The trauma of the earthquake temporarily worsens Monk's condition by causing him to talk gibberish, but he recovers soon enough to communicate his suspicions to the beleaguered captain, who has his hands full with fires, false alarms, and looters. Meanwhile Sharona is forbidden to enter her apartment because of earthquake damage, so she and Benjy are forced to spend the next few days with Sharona's snippy and competitive sister, Gail. They are quickly joined by Monk and Sharona's latest Mr. Wrong, whom the viewer knows is really the lover of the dead man's wife. Complications arise when the conspirators decide that Sharona knows too much and Monk, who has mentally reconstructed the crime, again loses the power to speak English after going through an aftershock. The captain, who has just begun to investigate a second murder in Sharona's neighborhood, receives an untelligible c

Country singer Willie Nelson, who portrays himself, becomes the prime suspect when his manager is murdered, but the only witness is a blind woman who claims to have overheard a scuffle and can identify Willie as the murderer by his voice. At first Stottlemeyer (who is on the case despite a broken arm) is reluctant to arrest the famous singer on such shaky evidence, but a video tape convinces him that Willie must indeed be guilty. But for Monk, the fact that a note used to lure the victim to his death refers to him as ""J. Cross"" while Willie refers to him as ""Sonny"" casts doubt on the blind woman's story. Determined for the sake of his dead wife, Trudy, a devoted fan, to prove the singer innocent, Monk interviews the blind woman and investigates the manager's less than reputable background, searching for the clue he needs to clear the singer's name.

Thinking that he's just accompanying Sharona to the airport to pick up her aunt, Monk discovers to his dismay that she's the one making the flight. The choice between being on his own without Sharona or flying cross-country to New Jersey is a tough one, but he overcomes his fears and boards the plane. After annoying the passengers and crew with his first-time-flyer questions, he becomes even more unsettled after small anomalies convince him that the Frenchman sitting across the aisle has murdered his wife and the woman accompanying him is an imposter. He calls Captain Stottlemeyer only to find that it's the captain's day off but manages to persuade Lt. Disher to search the airport for a body. With on-and-off help from Sharona (who would rather be ""helping"" Tim Daly decide whether to accept a role in an upcoming film) and from the extension cord salesman in the seat next to him, Monk tries to provide the evidence Disher needs to order the arrest. Meanwhile another murder is committed wh

When English teacher Beth Landow falls from the clock tower at Trudy's former high school, the assistant principal doubts the police department's conclusion that the death was a suicide and invites Monk to investigate. Monk quickly concludes that the suicide note is a forgery: a highly respected English teacher wouldn't confuse ""its"" with ""it's."" A few words with the teachers in the lounge lead him to suspect that the murderer is a science teacher, Derek Philby. Unfortunately for Monk, Philby was proctoring an SAT exam when Ms. Landow's body landed on Philby's car, setting off his car alarm and alerting the entire school to her death. Armed with a strong suspicion but no evidence, Monk becomes a substitute teacher in hopes of finding the information that will incriminate Philby, who arrogantly informs him that he's ""failing the class""--he has no evidence to support his hypothesis. Faced with students who throw erasers at him, an irate father who is also the school's gym teacher threat

When a friend's college-age son dies mysteriously in Mexico, the mayor sends Monk to investigate. Doubting the coroner's report that the young man ""drowned"" in mid-air, Monk nevertheless has difficulty concentrating on the case. His eighteen suitcases carrying not only his clothes and ""back-up pillowcases"" but a year's supply of food and his favorite brand of bottled water are stolen, leaving him with nothing he considers safe to eat or drink. Even worse, someone is trying to kill him, first by running him down with a pick-up truck and then by planting an explosive device behind a picture that he compulsively straightens every time he enters his room. Neither the witnesses nor the police, a south-of-the-border caricature of Stottlemeyer and Disher, offer any helpful leads--except for the mention of another unsolved murder, this one a mauling by a ""wild lion,"" the previous year. The fact that both victims were from San Francisco offers Monk the clue that he needs to solve the case and e

When tyrannical CEO Lawrence Hammond and his pretty young wife are murdered at night in a deserted parking lot, Stottlemeyer suspects the CEO's many enemies, but Monk notes that the wife was shot four times and the husband only once, meaning that she was the primary target and the husband ""an afterthought."" The only clues are the CEO's last words, obsessively repeated: ""Girls can't eat fifteen pizzas""--and a computerized navigation system that apparently malfunctioned. A talk with the housekeeper and an examination of the wife's separate bedroom lead Monk to an art studio, where he reluctantly interviews a nude male art instructor and discovers that the wife was having an affair with Major League superstar Scott Gregorio, who was attending the same classes. Gregorio, whose on-field performance has deteriorated since an earlier attack by an assailant with a baseball bat, is clearly devastated by Mrs. Hammond's death and is more a victim himself than a suspect. Seeing his own loss of Tr

When a sarcastic and unpopular ringmaster is murdered by an acrobat wearing a face mask and a Ninja-like costume, Stottlemeyer suspects an animal trainer who not only has a motive (he's the former lover of the ringmaster's dinner date) but also owns the murder weapon. Monk, however, suspects the ringmaster's ex-wife, a trapeze artist billed as ""the Queen of the Sky"" who is also a sharpshooter. Unfortunately for Monk's theory, the trapeze artist, Natasia Lovara, has a broken foot, confirmed by X-rays. The mystery, as in ""Billionaire Mugger"" and ""Dale the Whale,"" is not who did it but how it was done. Meanwhile, the everythingaphobic Monk alienates Sharona by telling her that her fear of elephants is irrational and advising her to ""suck it up."" Only when the elephant actually crushes its trainer's head in front of both Monk and Sharona does he begin to empathize with her and attempt to offer her the sort of comfort and understanding that she routinely offers him. Having been informed b

In an attempt to stabilize his shaky marriage, Captain Stottlemeyer redecorates his office with the New Age artifacts that his ""hippie wife,"" Karen, has given him, but he can't bring himself to watch the documentary that she spent forty-five thousand dollars to film. When Karen thinks that her documentary subject--the world's oldest man--was murdered, the captain rejects the suggestion as absurd but calls in Monk to pacify her. Unfortunately for the captain, Monk agrees with Karen, and Stottlemeyer finds himself on Monk's front porch with two packed suitcases. Monk, glad for a chance to repay the captain for helping him through his three-and-a-half year ""slump,"" invites him to stay as long as he needs to. Predictably, they both end up with frazzled nerves and very little sleep. Depressed over his own ""slump"" and his inability to solve a five-year-old case involving the death of a seventeen-year-old boy, the captain becomes even more despondent when Monk finds a clue that he missed in

Sharona's actress sister, Gail, is suspected of murdering Hal Duncan, a fellow actor who dies onstage after Gail stabs him with what she insists is a retractable knife. When Sharona's mother (who thinks that Sharona is Monk's partner, not his assistant) arrives for a visit and Sharona tells her the bad news, Monk and Sharona promise to ""do whatever it takes"" to discover what really happened. ""Whatever it takes"" turns out to be a bit more than Monk bargained for, however. After talking with the props manager, he begins to suspect that Jenna Ryan, Gail's understudy, somehow killed Duncan and framed Gail, even though she was at a party on the other side of town when Duncan died. In order to talk with and observe Jenna, he endures a painful half hour at a speed dating service and even agrees to take the dead man's part in the play for two days until a new actor arrives. While Monk is on stage battling stage fright and fully aware that one of the knives on the stage is real, Sharona searche

In a new twist on the ""how could he (or she) possibly have done it"" theme that we saw first in ""Dale the Whale,"" Monk suspects that the man responsible for the mail bombing murder of rich and beautiful Amanda Babbage is the victim's brother, Brian--who has been in a coma for four months after attempting to lure Stottlemeyer and Disher into a car chase and crashing into two cars. Since the package was postmarked three days before the bombing, Stottlemeyer is naturally skeptical, but he prefers siding with Monk to tagging along behind Agent Grooms of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms, who suspects the victim's other brother, Ricky. Monk, meanwhile, has other problems. Dr. Kroger is leaving for a three-week vacation, Sharona's ex-husband wants her to come back to him and leave her job, and he temporarily loses most of his hearing after being caught in the explosion of another bomb. Depressed and lonely, Monk confides his woes to the comatose suspect--and makes a near-fatal blun

Suspecting that her boss, Elliott D'Souza, has been murdered by playboy/publisher Dexter Larsen after withdrawing his financial backing for Larsen's Sapphire magazine, D'Souza's secretary hires Monk to investigate. After enlisting the help of the initially reluctant Stottlemeyer and Disher and convincing them that D'Souza's death was no accident despite his being alone in a room locked from the inside, Monk suddenly tries to withdraw from the case. The reason? Larsen has obtained and is threatening to publish nude photographs of Sharona, relics of her past as a struggling single mother in Atlantic City. When Sharona discovers the reason for Monk's strange behavior, her first reaction is shame and fear, but Benjy's response to her partial confession arms her with fierce determination to retrieve the photos and ""nail"" the murderer. Through the common bond of motherhood, she persuades the Sapphire Girl who had provided Dexter's alibi to confess the truth. Meanwhile, Monk puts together De

Faced with a string of nine brutal murders, all with different MOs and no apparent similarities among the victims, Captain Stottlemeyer calls in Monk to help him investigate. Suspicion falls at first on Henry Smalls, an insurance agent whose calendars appear in three of the victims' photographs. But as Monk, accompanied by Sharona and her new boyfriend, Deputy Mayor Kenny Shale, waits in the dark for Smalls to return home, he helplessly witnesses a fatal stabbing in which the suspect becomes the victim. Rushing after the murderer, who is wearing a ski mask, Monk tries futilely to subdue him, but all he's able to discover is that the murderer bites his fingernails. As the number of victims rises to eleven, the diversity of the victims, combined with the fact that they all live in Marin County, suddenly causes both Monk and Stottlemeyer to realize that they're all members of a jury. The ensuing investigation leads them to a six-year-old personal injury case, won by the plaintiff, who is

When his paperboy, Nestor Alverez, is murdered on his front doorstep by a newspaper thief, Monk searches the newspaper for clues, all the while assuming that the murderer is really after him. Meanwhile, he has to put up with policemen examining every inch of his apartment, which is now a crime scene, and wiping their feet on his clean doormat. Worse, his nerdy upstairs neighbor, Kevin, can't stop talking about his affair with a pretty woman who suddenly finds him irresistible. The search through the newspaper leads Monk to solve two unrelated crimes, including one in France, but takes him no nearer to solving Nestor's murder until a second murder is committed near his home. This time it's a convenience store clerk killed with a broken soft drink bottle near an ATM. A sharp-eyed Sharona spots a smudge of lipstick on the bottle, leading them to suspect that this time the killer is a woman. As Monk, returning to the paper one last time, tosses it in the trash in frustration, he sees the

When Monk's older brother Ambrose calls him about a ""life-or-death matter,"" Monk accepts the call grudgingly and agrees to meet the brother from whom he's been estranged since Ambrose refused to attend Trudy's funeral seven years before. In fact, Ambrose, an agoraphobic packrat whose house is full of bundled up newspapers, has not left the home he and Adrian grew up in for thirty-two years. Believing Ambrose's claim that his next-door neighbor, Pat Van Ranken, has murdered his wife after a loud argument, Monk and Sharona visit Van Ranken and decide to follow him. Van Ranken, meanwhile, is behaving very strangely, entering a potato sack race and a bingo tournament in which the prizes include a cherry pie. It's not hard for the Monk brothers to tie Van Ranken to another murder involving a cherry pie--the challenge is finding a motive for Van Ranken and proving that he did it. The episode provides a glimpse of Monk's family background and the reasons for his estrangement from his brother,

After visiting the set of the hit TV series Crime Lab S.F. during a celebration of its one hundredth episode, Monk suspects the show's star, Brad Terry, of murdering his ex-wife so he won't have to share his huge new paychecks with her. But the actor's alibi seems solid--he was with photographers when the victim's screams were heard. To complicate matters, a fan confesses to the crime and Terry passes a lie detector test. After Terry invites the captain, Disher, and Sharona--but not Monk--to a party, Monk realizes that Terry reminds him of a popular boy who treated him the same way in sixth grade and begins to doubt his own instincts. But when Stottlemeyer invites Monk to hear Marci's confession, Monk's doubts shift to Marci's story. When she tells him that Terry's ex-wife was once an actress who made a single B movie, Monk has the clue he needs to solve the crime.

Unable to pay for Monk's services as a private detective, middle-aged law student Julie Parlo offers him a trade--she'll help Monk become reinstated as a policeman with the SFPD if he'll help her find her missing grandmother. The only clue to the identity of the kidnappers is a roughly drawn lightning bolt on a note left at the grandmother's house, leading Stottlemeyer and Disher to suspect the former leader of an anti-Vietnam War group from the Seventies. But when the captain, anticipating Monk's reinstatement, invites Monk to help him with interrogation, Monk accidentally discovers that the suspect's tattoo doesn't match the symbol on the note--it has three humps instead of two. Meanwhile, the kidnappers order Julie to provide turkey dinners to the homeless in exchange for the return of the grandmother. Julie complies and her grandmother is returned safely, leading Stottlemeyer to put the case ""on the back burner."" True to her promise, Julie informs Monk of a loophole that will all

On her way to film a documentary (apparently about a union dispute), Captain Stottlemeyer's wife, Karen, is badly injured when her car is struck by a tow truck whose nonunion driver has been killed by a sniper. Distraught and furious, the captain blames a sleazy union official and his thug, a theory that seems to be confirmed when a second tow truck driver is murdered. But Lieutenant Disher, in charge of the crime scene investigation, discovers an odd detail that doesn't fit well with this scenario--both the assailant and the murdered truck driver were barefoot. Empathizing with the captain's anguish, Monk offers to do whatever he can to help and of course ends up investigating the case. A small dog that follows Sharona from the crime scene leads her to the home of a handsome man who seems attracted to her, but Monk is more interested in the next-door neighbor's off-kilter sundial. Meanwhile, the captain, fearing that his wife will die, becomes increasingly violent, taking out his ange

After a phone call from Lt. Disher, Monk and Sharona find him in Captain Stottlemeyer's office, drinking Scotch to console himself because his 58-year-old mother has married a 37-year-old antique dealer he's sure is up to no good. The con man, Dalton Padron, has taken his aging bride to a marriage counseling clinic for their honeymoon, and Sharona persuades Monk that the best way to catch him is to pose as husband and wife and join him at the clinic. In a group therapy session, Sharona accuses Padron of winking at her and, in the scuffle that follows, snatches an old letter from his jacket pocket. The letter confirms their suspicions: Padron is after the gold that was stashed away 150 years earlier by the crazy old prospector who once owned the house. Padron later grabs the letter and burns it, but not before Monk and Sharona discover that the secret is somewhere in the hundreds of journals that the old man wrote before he died. Early the next morning, Sharona follows Padron into an ol

Who would murder a death-row inmate forty-five minutes before his execution--and why? That's the question Captain Stottlemeyer asks Monk--but Monk's response is to ask why it matters. As Monk is hurrying to leave the prison, however, he gets a phone call from his old nemesis, Dale ""the Whale"" Biederbeck, that changes his plans. The police consider Dale a suspect in the inmate's murder (the young man owed him twelve hundred dollars) and refuse to give him a window in his cell until his name is cleared, so Dale strikes a bargain with Monk--solve the case and he'll provide information about Trudy's murder. After interviewing the cook who prepared the dead inmate's last meal, Monk notices that another cook never clocked out the evening before. The missing cook is found dead in a freezer with a wad of bills in his apron pocket--clearly the person who bribed him to poison the inmate was afraid he would talk and killed him, too. On his way out of the prison, he receives another phone call, th

Monk and his friends go to New York City to discover the connection between Trudy's murder and Warrick Tennyson, whose name was given to Monk by Dale the Whale in last season's cliffhanger, ""Mr. Monk Goes to Jail."" As they're checking into their hotel, mayhem breaks out in the lobby and three people are killed, including the Latvian ambassador to the United Nations. Monk quickly discovers that the ambassador's coat is wet--an odd detail because minutes earlier he was standing near Monk in a dry coat. Monk provides a police sketch artist with minute details about the perpetrator's left ear--the only part of his face that wasn't covered--and Stottlemeyer pressures the New York police captain to allow them access to Tennyson in exchange for their help in the new case. However, the DA, for reasons of her own, is blocking their access to Tennyson, and only after Stottlemeyer ""borrows"" the keys to the captain's office and pulls out the file that he saw Captain Cage hurriedly stuff into the b

In yet another case of murder in a room locked from the inside, a music producer is found dead with bullets in his back, head. and chest, clearly neither an accident nor a suicide. But this time there's a further twist: the dead man's pet chimpanzee, Darwin, is caught with the murder weapon in his hand. Not wanting to make a monkey of himself by falsely accusing a chimpanzee of murder, Stottlemeyer takes the chimp into the interrogation room, tempting the animal to fire what he thinks is an empty gun. Meanwhile, Disher realizes that he's inadvertently given the captain a loaded gun and panic ensues. When the gun goes off, endangering not only Stottlemeyer but Disher, Monk, and Sharona as well, Stottlemeyer is persuaded that the chimp is guilty and is ready to allow animal control to put him to sleep. Sharona, however, is convinced that Darwin is innocent. In desperation, Sharona resorts to breaking and entering to rescue Darwin, persuading the most unlikely person imaginable to take hi

Three deaths during a city-wide blackout result in a joint investigation by Stottlemeyer, Monk, Sharona, and Disher, with the unprecedented cooperation of the FBI and the help of power company spokeswoman Michelle Rivas, an attractive brunette who is inexplicably attracted to Monk. While Sharona and Dr. Kroger pressure Monk to call Michelle, Disher follows up on Monk's suggestion that the power outage is connected to a '90s radical named Winston Brenner. Everything fits--the handwriting in the note, the phrasing, even a pair of photographs. Everything except one small detail at the end of the report--Brenner died in 1995. When the FBI acknowledges the possibility that Brenner may have faked his own death to avoid a trial, Captain Stottlemeyer presents a tree-hugging former friend of Brenner's with the evidence that Brenner is still alive and reminds him that this particular power outage is also a homicide. When the tree-hugger is murdered, it becomes clear that the killer is indeed Bre

Karen Stottlemeyer has decided to film a ""cinema verite"" documentary about her husband's work, but her timing couldn't be worse. The police commissioner shouts at the captain (on camera) for focusing on a routine arson fire in a wig factory and relying on Monk to solve a more newsworthy case involving a female victim whose body was cut up with a chainsaw. Monk is in even worse trouble. After presenting some useful leads involving the chainsaw victim's age and nationality, he accidentally erases several years' worth of crucial computer files, and the enraged commissioner revokes Monk's private practice license despite Stottlemeyer's protests that doing so will destroy him. With Sharona forced to return to her old job as a nurse, the devastated Monk sits in the hospital hallway all day waiting for her until, at her exasperrated insistence, he finds a job with a magazine as a fact checker. Meanwhile, having identified the victim based on Monk's information, the captain and Disher zero i

When five members of the West Coast Mafia are shot down in a barbershop, Monk is pressured by mob godfather Salvatore Lucarelli and his nephew ""Fat Tony"" to solve the case. But the FBI in the person of Agent Colmes is pressuring him, too. Despite Captain Stottlemeyer's insistence that Colmes is not to be trusted, Monk accepts his offer of reinstatement on the police force if he can bring down the whole gang. The only clues are a partially completed crossword puzzle and a gumball machine that was apparently used to break a back window so the killer could escape. With a Mafia bodyguard named Vince as their ""babysitter,"" Monk and Sharona interview the sole witness, Phil Bedard, a young U.S. mint employee who tells them that he saw three men running from the scene, one of them wearing a jacket with a strange-looking number 15 on the back. Bedard also explains the heightened security at the mint: someone has stolen five double-headed pennies. Associating the numbers on the jackets with a Ch

It's Sharona's turn to be terrified. After several frightening and mysterious encounters with a blood-soaked man that no one else can see, she begins to doubt her own sanity, and Stottlemeyer advises Monk to give her time off to restore her nerves. Monk is left with an irritating substitute nurse whose philosophy is the opposite of Sharona's: everything from Monk's requests for wipes to the obsessively systematic organization of his refrigerator has to go. Wanting Sharona back again, Monk goes to the garage where Sharona first saw the blood-soaked man and finds a clue--the silver tip from the toe of a cowboy boot. Meanwhile Sharona, who is attending a night class in creative writing, apparently forgets to turn in an assignment and seems to be misplacing objects. But when her writing instructor's husband dies of a heart attack after eating tomato soup, Sharona recognizes the plot of her missing story and realizes that she's not crazy. All she and Monk have to do now is tie together the

When Edna Coruthers, a model employee at a giant chain store called Mega-Mart, is killed by a falling television set, Monk is called in to investigate by the store's security chief--who turns out to be his disgraced ex-partner, Joe Christie. Neither Monk nor Stottlemeyer wants to work with Christie, whom they hold responsible for some missing cocaine and the death of two police officers, and both of them disregard the evidence that Edna might have been murdered--a broken shoe heel (suggesting that the victim ran from someone or something), her dust allergy (which normally kept her from entering the loading dock where the death occurred), and the three letters (in different handwriting but with similar stamps) complaining about the victim. Twenty-seven days later, realizing that the stamps were all from the same roll and therefore from the same person, Monk reluctantly agrees to help Christie discover a suspect and a motive by working undercover as a store clerk. But he still doesn't tr

With Sharona in New Jersey to visit her ailing mother, Monk is left in the very incompetent hands of his annoying upstairs neighbor, Kevin Dorfman, but the prospect of a week with Kevin is eased somewhat by a visit from Trudy's father, Dwight Ellison. Dwight invites Monk (and Kevin) to spend the week with him and his wife, Marcia--and at the same time investigate gameshow host Roddy Lankman, who appears to be involved in a conspiracy to allow one of his contestants, Val Birch, to win every game. Despite the memories of Trudy aroused by spending time with her parents in her former home and the questionable help of Kevin, Monk discovers evidence that Lankman visited Birch's house--and that Birch visited the site of the accident that killed Lankman's assistant, Lizzie Talvo. To discover exactly how Lankman and his crooked contestant are communicating--and possibly prove that they're involved in something much worse than cheating--Monk becomes a contestant on the game show. His knowledge o

After Captain Stottlemeyer is shot in the shoulder by an unknown assailant, a somewhat rattled and very angry Disher is left in charge of the investigation. Although Monk is almost as distressed as Disher, he provides very little help with the investigation, even allowing a suspect to get away. Feeling depressed and helpless, Monk decides to try a new medication that controls his OCD and eliminates his phobias but also makes him insufferably egotistical, unempathetic, and oblivious to the details that are so vivid to the ""normal"" Monk. Meanwhile, the suspect Disher has been pursuing is proven innocent, and the bullet taken from the captain's shoulder is traced to a gun belonging to a dead woman. Stottlemeyer impatiently checks himself out of the hospital with his arm in a sling and arranges to interview the new suspect with the help of Monk, Sharona, and Disher. Monk arrives late, dressed in a loud Hawaiian shirt and talking like a ""cool cat"" from the 1950s. ""The Monk,"" as he calls him

With Sharona in New Jersey remarried to her ex-husband, Monk has been without an assistant for three months and it's time to find a new one--if only he could find a suitable applicant. When Natalie Teeger, a thirty-something widow with an eleven-year-old daughter, arrives at his house, he thinks she's applying for the job, but she's really been sent by Captain Stottlemeyer to get Monk's help--two men have broken into her apartment in the last few days and she had to kill the second one with scissors in self-defense. Examining Natalie's apartment, Monk finds a single clue, an unused fish net caught between the sofa cushions, suggesting that the intruders were trying to steal Mr. Henry, Julie's pet fish. But why would anyone want to steal a ninety-nine-cent red herring, er, crimson marblefish? A second clue surfaces when Lieutenant Disher finds a note in the dead perp's pocket reading ""2:30 Sea of Tranquility"" and Natalie identifies the Sea of Tranquility as an exhibit at the science mus

When John Ricca, author of a controversial and unfavorable biography of martial artist Sonny (""the Cobra"") Chow, is found dead in his home, all the evidence points to Chow as the murderer. Unfortunately for Captain Stottlemeyer, his chief suspect has been dead for six years. While Monk and Natalie (who's more interested in being reimbursed for her business expenses than in solving the case) visit Chow's former teacher, Master Zee, who claims that Chow died in his arms, Stottlemeyer resorts to having the corpse dug up to prove that, despite rumors to the contrary, Chow is indeed dead. A dental X-ray proving that the corpse is Chow leaves Monk to figure out who tried to frame the dead man for murder. On an inadvertent tip from Disher, an avid Cobra fan, Monk and Natalie visit the Sonny Chow museum, where Monk finds two important clues--a hairbrush that has been stolen from its case and replaced with a lookalike and the stamp that the museum proprietor placed on Natalie's hand so that she

After witnessing a Chinese gangland murder, Monk has to stay in an FBI safe house--a cabin in the woods--in the protective custody of Agent Grooms, with Stottlemeyer and Natalie as company. Awakened by a man's scream, Monk convinces Stottlemeyer and Natalie that a woman in a nearby cabin has murdered her husband. Agent Grooms, however, remains skeptical. After Grooms disconnects their telephone, Stottlemeyer locks him in the bathroom and the three ""borrow"" Grooms's car and set out in a rainstorm to investigate, only to get stuck in the mud on the way. Meanwhile, Disher and his new girlfriend Hayley are encountering a strange circumstance--the fortunes in their fortune cookies keep coming true. When a fortune informs Disher that an old friend is in trouble and only he can save him, Disher immediately sets out to save Monk, unaware that he's leading a pair of hitmen to the FBI cabin. After a rainy night in the car, Stottlemeyer leads Natalie and Monk through the woods toward the neighbor

When Monk, Natalie, and Julie get stuck in a traffic jam after a multi-car collision blocks the freeway, Monk gets out of the car to investigate. He soon deduces from the absence of skid marks and other clues that the young man in the overturned Volkswagen that caused the pile-up was murdered and his body placed in the car to make his death look like an accident. But the highway patrolman in charge of the ""accident"" scene wants nothing to do with Monk (or the not-very-successful lawyer who has latched onto him), and the mountains blocking the signal prevent Monk from calling Captain Stottlemeyer for an authorization to investigate. Monk briefly returns to Natalie's car, where he finds Julie in need of a bathroom and Natalie nursing an injured wrist. Unfortunately for them, Monk's mind is on the fatality, and he returns to the Volkswagen. The angry officer gives him the victim's name and occupation (environmental activist), but he still refuses to listen to Monk's evidence. Meanwhile, t

In the middle of the night, Monk receives a phone call from a drunken Stottlemeyer, who has gone to Las Vegas with Disher for a fellow officer's bachelor party. Stottlemeyer believes that a wealthy casino owner has murdered his wife, but he needs Monk's help to prove that the death wasn't an accident. Unfortunately, when Monk arrives in Vegas with Natalie the next morning, Stottlemeyer can't remember anything that happened the previous night--including how his pants happened to be thrown out the window. As Monk and Natalie explore the elevator where the woman died, interrogate witnesses, and reenact the death scene (with Monk in the role of victim), Stottlemeyer tries to retrace his steps and deal with Disher, who has become addicted to blackjack and fallen hopelessly deep into debt. When Monk, at Stottlemeyer's insistence, takes Disher's place at the blackjack table to win back his money, he figures out how the murder occurred as he simultaneously places winning bets, but the casino o

With her daughter's school about to be closed as a cost-cutting measure, Natalie becomes a candidate in the upcoming school board election despite Monk's fears that she'll desert him if she wins. Natalie's frustrations with a jammed photocopier and other defective equipment bought at a police auction are dwarfed by fear for her life when a sniper fires into her campaign headquarters, further damaging the equipment and killing a security guard. The only clues to the identity of the sniper are an oddly folded note demanding that ""Natalie Teege"" withdraw from the election and a bullet from a semiautomatic rifle made in Russia. Suspicion falls on Natalie's opponent in the election, Harold Krenshaw, whom Monk knows as a fellow patient of Dr. Kroger's. Although Monk thinks that Krenshaw is lying about his friendship with Dr. Kroger and Krenshaw admits to being an excellent shot, Monk is sure that Krenshaw is innocent because he wouldn't misspell Natalie's name. When Krenshaw passes a polygra

After twenty-two-month-old Tommy Graser finds a severed finger and gives it to a policeman, Monk walks through the park with Tommy trying to retrace the child's steps. He finds no body or other incriminating evidence, but he does discover a surprising affection for the placid and intelligent toddler, who constantly repeats Monk's name and quietly submits to having his hands wiped when he touches ""nature."" A lab technician identifies the finger as that of a twenty-five-year-old man, and Monk deduces from a callus that the young man played the violin. After visiting the home of Daniel Carlyle, a musician who fits this description, Monk concludes that Daniel's mother and her other son, Jason, killed Daniel and that Jason is masquerading as his brother. Meanwhile, little Tommy is temporarily removed from the custody of his foster parents, and Monk surprises everyone, including himself, by volunteering to care for him for two weeks until his new adoptive parents can take him. With Tommy in

While Monk is immobilized by the presence of dog poo at a crime scene, slovenly private eye Marty Eels steps in, using the dog poo (and the dog) as clues in the murder of a security guard, the robbery of a jewelry store, and the disappearance of the store owner, Harold Gumbal. With Monk tailing helplessly behind, muttering ""He's cheating"" and ""That's impossible,"" Eels locates the stolen jewels, Gumbal's car, and Gumbal's body. Using Gumbal's watch as a clue, he determines the identity of one of the killers, who is then arrested and interrogated. Just as Eels is becoming a local celebrity, with Monk as ""yesterday's news,"" Monk figures out Eels' secret and confronts him. Eels challenges him to prove it, but moments later, he runs after Monk begging for his help: the killer who's still at large wants the jewels back and is holding Eels' mother hostage. The shoe is on the other foot, and Monk must figure out where Mrs. Eels is and why she must be rescued before 8:20.

Monk is reunited with his agoraphobic brother, Ambrose, after the murder of an armored car driver.

Monk feels too sick to work until a case gets him out of bed.

Monk goes undercover as an office worker to solve a case.

Monk goes to a wine-tasting and finds it a bit more than he bargained for.

Is Monk hallucinating or is he really seeing Trudy?

Needing a date for her brother's rehearsal dinner, Natalie resorts to asking Lt. Disher.

Monk flashes back to his early teenage years.

When an officer dies after drinking poisoned wine sent to Captain Stottlemeyer as a Christmas gift, the captain suspects Frank Prager, who tried to shoot him outside a bar several months earlier. Searching the crime scene for clues, Monk notes that the bullet holes seem to form a pattern, but neither he nor Stottlemeyer can figure out the message they're intended to convey. After trying unsuccessfully to talk with Prager's young daughter, Monk goes under cover as Santa Claus. This time he learns that Prager is hiding in a church with ""three ladies"" in front of it. But when Prager is caught and interrogated, it's clear that he had nothing to do with the poisoned wine. With the other suspects on Disher's list also eliminated, Monk and the captain are back to square one. But when Monk opens the card accompanying his gift from the Christmas party, he finds the clue that solves the case.

Monk is facing a crisis: he's down to five shirts. But Inspector No. 8, the only shirt inspector who can meet Monk's criteria for perfection, is not up to her usual standards. Sensing that something is wrong, Monk visits No. 8 on the job. The inspector, Maria Ortiz, informs him that her son, Pablo, has been imprisoned for murdering a fashion model, but she's certain that he's innnocent. Monk is chiefly concerned about his shirts, but Natalie persuades him to talk to Pablo because ""it's the right thing to do."" The conversation uncovers just one clue: Pablo can't read English. When Monk realizes that the killer must have been able to read an emergency exit sign, he's convinced that Pablo is innocent despite the DNA evidence used to convict him. With Stottlemeyer and Disher in tow, Monk and Natalie attempt to talk to the model's former roommate and the fashion designer she worked for, Julian Hodge. But now there's a new problem: Hodge wants thirteen-year-old Julie to model for him. Watching the rehearsal for a fashion show in which Julie will make her debut, Monk discovers a clue that points him to the real killer. When another supermodel is found dead, it's imperative that Monk find new evidence to prove his suspect guilty of both murders and set Pablo free--and for Natalie to get Julie away from the person committing the murders.

Suffering from amnesia, Monk wakes up believing he is the husband of an eccentric resident of a small town.

During the investigation of a murder in a junkyard, Captain Stottlemeyer punches a cop named Ryan Sharkey, who claims to be having an affair with the captain's wife, Karen. The only witness to the murder, a homeless man named Gerald or Jerry, has disappeared, but Stottlemeyer suspects businessman Michael Karpov, who is facing charges for money laundering and had a motive for killing the victim, who was scheduled to testify against him. Removed from the case and ordered to take anger management classes, Stottlemeyer asks Monk and Natalie to follow his wife, whom he suspects of lying about her whereabouts. They discover Karen having lunch with a man but are only able to photograph him from the back before being interrupted. Meanwhile, the homeless witness has been stunned and thrown from the third floor of a building but survives the fall, thanks to a corrugated refrigerator carton. Disher places Karpov in a line-up otherwise composed of police officers, including Sharkey, but Stottlemeyer, still enraged at Sharkey, disrupts the line-up before the procedure has been completed. An apple provides the clue that Monk needs to solve the murder case, and Karen reveals the identity of the mystery man she had lunch with. Unfortunately for the captain, it isn't Sharkey.

Low on cash because they haven't had a homicide to investigate in three weeks, Monk and Natalie search for the stolen Alexander Diamond, hoping to win the million-dollar reward. Unfortunately, they have competition in the form of a retired Scotland Yard investigator, a bounty hunter, and a gadget-loving private detective, all of whom want the reward money for themselves. Monk quickly figures out that the heist was an inside job and that one of the robbers was under five feet tall, short enough to hide inside a roll-top desk. He also discovers a clue linking a perpetrator to a transcendental meditation retreat. With their competitors close behind them, Monk and Natalie head for the retreat, where they find the thief, who is unfortunately dead. Meanwhile, Disher is having to interrogate a strange young woman who keeps turning herself in for such ""crimes"" as stealing pens or murdering a hamster. Monk tells Natalie that he's solved the case and they race to the police station with the other detectives following. The only thing left is to find the diamond before their competitors do.

When Captain Stottlemeyer suspects that a suicide is really a murder, Monk confirms his suspicions by discovering that the victim, Joanne Raphelson, was too short to have used the stool she supposedly stood on to hang herself. But the next clue, the remains of an olive, a cherry, and a cocktail onion on a stirring stick, leads Monk to suspect that the murder was committed by an astronaut, Steve Wagner. A little research reveals a motive--Joanne was about to publish a book revealing that Wagner had abused her five years earlier. Now all Monk has to do is to prove that Wagner could commit the murder when he was in outer space.

During the investigation of an armored car heist involving the deaths of two drivers and the theft of valuable government bonds, Lt. Disher tries to convince Captain Stottlemeyer that he witnessed a murder while under anesthesia in the dentist's office. When one of the highjackers, Denny Jardeen, is found murdered, Disher insists that Jardeen is the man he saw Dr. Bloom and his assistant kill while he was sedated. Stottlemeyer still thinks that Disher was hallucinating, and Disher angrily leaves the force, deciding to revive his high school rock band, the Randy Disher Project, as an alternate means of earning his living. Meanwhile, the only clue to Jardeen's murder is two pairs of bruises each ten inches apart on the dead man's chest.

Monk is summoned to jury duty against his wishes and must solve two crimes: he has to convince the jury the defendent is not guilty, and solve the mystery of a corpse outside the jury room's window.

While working on a double murder, Monk finds that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery when he finds that an obsessive method actor has been cast to play...Adrian Monk in a new movie.

Monk finds himself adrift in an ocean of filth when a garbage strike brings San Francisco to a halt...and Adrian to near-paralysis.

Julie and her friends hire Monk to look into the suspicious death of their basketball coach.

Monk tries to solve a murder after losing his eyesight.

When Natalie convinces Monk to go into business as a private eye, his first case is a seemingly innocuous fender bender that leads to a far more dangerous investigation.

Monk attends his college reunion and uncovers a complex murder plot against one of his former classmates.

When Dr. Kroger retires after his cleaning lady is killed, it's up to Monk to solve the case and get Dr. Kroger back to work.

Monk goes to a rock concert to look for Captain Stottlemeyer's son and finds himself in the middle of a murder investigation.

When Monk's truck driving father rolls into town at Christmastime, Monk joins him on the road, where they stumble across a very peculiar mystery.

A missing millionaire suffering from leprosy comes out of hiding to hire Monk, who soon finds himself in the midst of a shadowy murder plot worthy of a classic Hollywood film noir. Episode originally aired in black and white.

A fun-loving everyman named Hal bumps into Monk, and the two become fast friends. For the first time in his life, Monk appears to have a buddy. But is Hal up to something?

When Natalie suspects foul play in the deaths of her parents' wealthy neighbors, Monk goes undercover as a butler to investigate.

Monk goes toe to toe with a popular radio shock jock who is suspected of killing his wife.

When Lt. Disher inherits a farm from an uncle who committed suicide, he decides to quit the police force and start a new life in the country. But Disher soon suspects that his uncle was murdered, so Monk joins him on the farm to investigate.

When the mysterious “Six Way Killer” strikes in San Francisco, Monk matches his detective skills against the flashy forensic technology of a federal agent as they both pursue the murderer.

Monk goes to the emergency room for a bloody nose, but when a doctor in the hospital turns up dead, Monk joins the murder investigation, and soon his own life is in grave danger.

A missing millionaire suffering from leprosy comes out of hiding to hire Monk, who soon finds himself in the midst of a shadowy murder plot worthy of a classic Hollywood film noir. Episode originally aired in black and white. This is the colorized version from the DVD.

When Marci Maven is accused of a bizarre crime, she turns to the object of her obsession for help - Adrian Monk.

Monk is hired to clear the name of a famous rap star who is accused of murder.

Monk must confront his prejudice against nudists when he's called to investigate a murder on a nude beach.

Monk's friendship with Captain Stottlemeyer is put to the test when Monk suspects the captain's girlfriend of murder.

Monk tries to prove a sports agent is guilty of murder while helping Natalie’s teenage daughter with her love life.

Monk digs up trouble after following a treasure map brought to him by Dr. Kroger's son Troy.

Monk has trouble coping with new information that he finds out about his arch-rival, Harold Krenshaw.

When a man he sent to prison years ago is cleared based on new evidence, a guilty Monk tries to help him adjust to life on the outside.

Mr. Monk takes a walk when he can't sleep, but ends up running into a murder.

Monk becomes a social pariah when he shoots a man dressed as Santa Claus. Then he must clear his name and foil a larger criminal plot, all in time for Christmas.

Monk joins a cult to solve a murder case, but becomes entranced by the cult's charismatic leader.

One of Monk's treasured possessions is stolen from a safety deposit box, and he'll go to any length to solve the case.

Monk searches for a killer who is apparently targeting women with the name Julie, a name which Natalie's daughter shares.

Monk decides to take up painting as a hobby, and discovers an ardent admirer willing to buy anything he produces.

Monk is arrested for murder, and finds that he has to go on the lam to clear himself.

Stottlemeyer must keep up the pretense that Monk is dead, while Adrian tries to determine who framed him for murder.

Monk finds himself forced to move into what he hopes will be his dream house... which is anything but.

Monk must match wits against a grandmaster chess player that he suspects of murder.

Monk has to help out Natalie when she becomes involved in a lotto scandal.

Monk finds a new lease on life after giving up his hope of reinstatement to the SFPD.

A friend of Natalie's ex-husband seemingly commits suicide aboard a locked cabin on a submarine. Monk agrees to investigate, despite his phobia about being on--and beneath--the water.

When Monk develops a crush on a model who is accused of murder, he is determined to prove her innocence, even though she confessed.

As Monk and his friends watch a TV news magazine piece on the solution of his hundredth case, he realizes that one of the victims was murdered by a different killer.

Monk agrees to undergo hypnotic therapy as treatment for his OCD and reverts to a different persona.

When three homeless men seek Monk's services at the holidays, Natalie convinces him to investigate their friend's death; Stottlemeyer's faith is reawakened after a visit to a monastery fountain rids him of crippling pain.

When Monk's delinquent half-brother, Jack Jr., escapes from prison and breaks into Monk's apartment, he manipulates Monk into helping him find the person he claims framed him for murder.

When Natalie unwittingly helps a thief steal the bicycle of a biotech CEO, she ropes Monk into solving a crime straight out of "Encyclopedia Brown" until Monk learns the hard way how dangerous this thief really is.

While investigating a murder at a museum of oddities, Monk befriends a warm older woman, but he has trouble believing the friendship comes without a catch.

Monk has scored tickets to the biggest football game of the year, but he and Captain Stottlemeyer can't go inside until they figure out who tried to blow up a fan in the parking lot.

When a childhood bully who terrorized Monk hires the detective to trail his wife, whom he suspects of infidelity, Monk relishes the opportunity to prove him right — and things get even sweeter when the bully is accused of murder.

When a friend of Monk's is killed, Monk believes that a magician is responsible and a battle of wits and sleight-of-hand ensue.

Monk becomes involved in the disappearance of a city official that could have ramifications concerning Trudy's murder.

After the attempted murder of a former child star from Monk's favorite show, Monk accept the job as her bodyguard.

Monk meets a visiting African widower who's determined to find the hit-and-run-driver who killed his wife near Monk's apartment. Monk begins to identify with the man and confuses his wife with Trudy.

Monk and Natalie are stranded in a small desert town and the detective spots a UFO. He soon discovers himself the center of attention, and is called in to investigate a dead woman discovered in the desert.

Monk assumes a dead hitman's identity in order to foil an assassination plot.

Monk and the police have a killer right where they want him... until the case goes to court and a hotshot lawyer demolishes the prosecution as he uses Monk's phobias against them

Natalie suspects a theater critic is responsible for a murder, despite the fact that he was present to review her daughter Julie's play at the same time the victim died.

Area residents receive unmarked dolls that seem to predict a series of strange deaths, leading many to suspect a voodoo curse is in play. The mystery hits close to home when Natalie becomes involved.

After Monk's insurance company refuses to pay for more private therapy sessions, he joins Dr. Bell's therapy group, where it appears that someone is murdering fellow patients.

Natalie tries to throw a surprise party for her surprise-hating boss, who is busy trying to solve the murder of a maintenance man.

When Sharona returns to San Francisco to handle legal issues related to an uncle's death, Monk suspects foul play and is torn between the differing styles of Sharona and Natalie.

Monk reluctantly adopts a dog while looking into the suspicious disappearance of its owner.

To get reinstated, Monk must go camping with the son of a committee member... and try to solve a crime.

Monk must determine who is trying to ruin a friend's wedding.

Upon being reinstated, Monk is put in charge of tracking down a serial killer.

Monk is called to a murder at the location where he first heard of his wife's murder, and while Monk figures out who the assassin is, he doesn't know that the one who ordered the hit is also responsible for the death of Trudy. Knowing that Monk will eventually put all the pieces together, he orders Monk's death, and when all hope seems lost, Monk discovers something which could finally end his 12-year nightmare.

After listening to Trudy's last message, Monk finally discovers who killed his wife. Racing against time before he dies of poison, he must make a fateful decision.