A police officer and friend of Stottlemeyer is framed for a crime he didn't commit involving a ferris wheel. Meanwhile Monk tries to convince Stottlemeyer to get him reinstated.

Monk is committed to an asylum, where he becomes convinced the chief psychiatrist committed a murder several years prior.

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 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 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. Meanwhile, the Monk alienates Sharona by telling her that her fear of elephants is irrational and advising her to suck it up.

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.

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

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

Captain Stottlemeyer and Lieutenant Disher are making a routine arrest when a mysterious man in a car drives up and shoots at them, wounding Stottlemeyer. When Monk and Disher try to apprehend their prime suspect, Monk’s obsessive-compulsive disorder allows the suspect to escape. Consumed with guilt, Monk goes to Dr. Kroger who gives him a drug to alleviate his obsessive-compulsiveness but impairs his sleuthing ability.

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

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

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

Is Monk hallucinating or is he really seeing Trudy?

Monk encounters an old crush from junior high when she hires him to discover why her housekeeper was killed and her favorite painting vandalized.

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.

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.

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

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

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

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 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.

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

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

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.

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

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.