Max Hudson

Max Hudson is the main antagonist of the Monk episode"Mr. Monk is on the Air". He was a  radio comedian suspected by Mr. Monk and his sister-in law of murdering his wife, despite the fact that he was live on the air. He is arguably one of the most hated and cruel antagonists on the show due to his emotional abuse towards Mr. Monk.

He was played by Steve Weber

Personality
It is stated by his sister-in law that Max always had a bad temper, and had even been charged for assault at one point. It's also implied that he used his wife as the butt of his jokes most of the time on the radio. Max was extremely vulgar, heartless, selfish, and emotionally abusive, He  had a "welcome" mat that said "Go Away" versus the usual term. He even wrote a book titled Max Hudson: Sex, Lies, and Radio, which Monk described as merely nothing but "toilet water".

His Plan
It was for his heatless nature that his wife filed for divorce. Unfortunately, for Max, a divorce would have cost him about a million dollars, so he decided she had to go beforehand. Luckily, for him, his neighbor's dog needed watching while they where on vacation to Hawaii. He came up with the idea of using the dog (being a Jack Russel, who is a very smart breed) to sneak into his wife's room while she was asleep to turn on the gas fireplace, and leave with the door closed on a certain signal he would give on the radio: "Jiggle me timbers!" . He prescribed sleeping pills for his wife to make sure she would never wake up.

One day, after his plan was put in motion, him and his two radio sidekicks, Little Willi (a short person) and J.J (a joke machine) were on break at the radio station  when Max got a call on the other line from a police officer. Max took the call about his wife in the back room, but before doing so, he rehearsed what he was going to say before being informed about her death.

Upon Meeting Monk

 * While his wife's death was ruled as an accident, her sister was not at all convinced seeing as to how she never turned the fireplace on and knew Max had the motive and the kind of person he was. After she convicned Monk, he too had suspected Max of murdering his wife of investigating the scene of the crime himself. His assistant, Natalie, agreed seeing as to how she hated his show as well and would leave stores or restaraunts  any time he was on the air.


 * Monk and Natalie go to Max's  radio station to question him, Unfortunately, it's while he is on the air and they ae both made the butt of his and his sidekicks' jokes before they can get anything out of him.


 * Monk tries to confront Max twice: one other time at his book signing, in which Max tries to convince him her death was suicide, but Monk wasn't buying it. And a second time on his radio show live. Things were not going good seeing as to how the jokes Monk had burrowed for the show did not age well. Things get worst when the conversation leads to them discussing Monk's own marriage. Max uses his wife's, Trudy's, death to his advantage to mock him even further on the air, with one joke about her death pushing it too far (you should have called me in to help you with the case-I'm great with solving jigsaw puzzles!). Even Willie and JJ are shocked by this as if there was a line, and he crossed it. This urges Monk to to go berserk and lunge over the table at Max, only to be stopped by security guards who drag him out. Max, unmoved by this, simply thanks Monk for "dropping by".


 * After Monk had solved the case, Max arrived at his house, only to find Monk, Natalie, Captain Stottlemyer, Lieutenant Disher, and his sister-in law there ready for his arrest. Before doing so, Monk explained how he was able to murder his wife by basically using his dog as his accomplice. He figured it out when he noticed during the crime scene that a shoe was missing, and that the dog happened to be chewing on one while he was still trying to solve the case. They played a recording of his quote "Jiggle me Timbers!" for the dog to hear, only to dicover that that was the signal for him to sneak into his wife's room and turn on the fireplace while she was asleep. The case was closed, and Max was arrested. After he was put in cuffs, Monk dared him to find a joke in the situation, and Max couldn't.

