Nikita: "Not in this place."
I can feel a Mick-related tirade coming on.
When Mick was revealed as Mr. Jones in the middle of season four, silly me, I thought it was cool. When it was revealed at the end of season four that Nikita worked for him, I was only partially on board because, come on, three years? What about all the times we saw them together in Nikita's apartment, and nothing covert was mentioned? Too far-fetched.
But having him turn out to be some idiotic actor? "They were so pleased with me that they gave me the plum role of Mr. Jones." WTF? He wasn't even Mick all this time? I mean, come on! Nobody can ad lib that well. The truth is, Mick Schtoppel was good comic relief, and he should have stayed comic relief. They should never have screwed with the character at all.
Moving right along... Quinn has an agenda. Is she bad, or just ambitious? I got a big charge out of Operations and Quinn having a tug of war with a disk, arguing about sex, and ending up in the Tower together. And now it looks like she's spying on him. Does she work for Center, too? Everybody else does.
Finally, it appears that the man behind the curtain is the real "Mr. Jones," Nikita's father. Who will he turn out to be? I guess it doesn't matter, as long as it's not Operations or Mick Schtoppel.
Bits and pieces:
— Michelle, with the name beginning with M, is Nikita's sister? Is she Roberta's daughter, too? How can that be?
— The office scene with the new Mr. Jones was fairly creepy. What happened to Mick? Is the poor schmuck dead?
— Nikita danced with another woman in the nightclub. I miss Michael.
— More Jasmine. She appears to be around mostly for other people to have dialogue with.
— In the teaser, Nikita took a high tech elevator to the surface. It reminded me of Robert A. Heinlein's descriptions of a "bounce tube."
— Section used to be near the Eiffel Tower. The new digs are near the water.
Quotes:
Quinn: "I'd like to feel you can count on me for whatever you need."
Operations: "What do you think? Go to bed with me, wake up with Madeline's job?"
Nikita: "I've been waiting seven years for an answer. I'm out of patience."
Me, too.
This episode dragged, even though it ended with a cliffhanger. Two out of four stars,
Billie
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Billie Doux loves good television and spends way too much time writing about it.
Same amateur scriptwriter as the previous episode, resulting in the same kind of derivative and poorly constructed script. The plot is again so thin that the pacing of the story becomes glacial: it takes the entire episode to capture one arms dealer who might have some information about the Collective? In previous episodes, a plan this simple would have been accomplished by the end of the teaser! And the subplot about finding Nikita’s father completely falls apart as nonsense is piled on top of nonsense in a lame attempt to explain Mick/Mr. Jones.
ReplyDeleteThe execution of the episode is stale, as well. The pathetic hand-to-hand sequences during the teaser chase scene and the capture of Valenti were completely uninspired and unconvincing (Dupuis’ absence is keenly felt in all the action sequences). Wilson’s action repertoire seems to have been reduced to a lot of running and the occasional use of a gun or “taser”. As for the rest of the cast, we only get a few sentences from Walter, Jasmine is still bland, and Quinn is still weak, plus her seduction of Operations is just cringe-worthy. Madeline is also sorely missed, as the audience is deprived of a White Room interrogation scene.
Worst of all are the clumsy actions we can now attribute to the real Mr. Jones, who is the head of this entire clandestine anti-terrorist organization, and as such, should be a strategic genius of the highest order. I would have expected a subtle, intricate, multi-layered series of puzzles to solve and tests to pass in order for Nikita to get to the truth. Instead, we got a disc in an exploding house, a necklace in a tomb, and now a break-in that seems to have accomplished nothing except leaving a pointless fingerprint. Why bother breaking into Nikita’s room at all if the only purpose of that action was to have Nikita follow the operative to the real Mr. Jones’ house, which by the way, apparently has no security? That’s about as subtle as hitting someone over the head with a baseball bat, and about as clever, too. And this doesn’t even include the complete idiocy of hiring an actor to play Mick/Mr. Jones.
Let us contrast what we have seen of Mr. Jones to what we have seen of Michael. The mission profiles that Michael designed and executed were far superior: every action had a purpose, often achieving several goals simultaneously; every method was chosen because it was the most efficient and effective. The audience has already repeatedly witnessed Michael’s highly original and supremely elegant strategies – Mr. Jones does not impress at all in comparison, and this is entirely the fault of the writer.
In fact, this entire boring episode feels like it was written from a template [insert pointless action sequence here]. Let’s hope the writer went back to school.
They didn’t care anymore and it shows. Boo to them for this. Robert Cochran wrote S5E1 and then they dumped us with the mess of the rest of the series since everyone went to do 24. It did feel hollow between the sparse production budget, cast and writing, but it’s better than the SATC cash grab reboot everyone justifiably abhors! I lost all of my DVDs over the years so I’m glad Tubi has been airing the show.
DeleteSome of the critique of this episode is valid, but I'm really enjoying this season on my third viewing of the series through. Feels likes it's gotten a real shot in the arm after the Michael/Operations/Paul stuff got a bit dull last season. I love Quinn, and I like O'Brien. Fresh stuff.
ReplyDeleteI m actually much more on board within this revelation about Martin.For a number of reasons:
ReplyDelete1) it fits the more gritty universe of original LFN that the outrageous character was fabricated
2) The layers within layers role-playing fits a spy universe not to mention the fact that that person also could never be somebody like Mr Jones
3) Important people who are the powers that be within certain organizations would employ a cover / decoy
4) gave us the opportunity for a great performance from Mr Rota and not to mention that the plot holes of previous seasons are covered in a more believable manner that way
Interesting comment on the pneumatic tubes from scifi Billie.
ReplyDeleteYou a reader of Sci-Fi then? :)
Of course I am.
ReplyDelete