Off-Season Week 4

4/13

Time for week four of my off-season roundup. We have five episodes today, including a Night Shift two-parter, so grab a cuppa and come join me for some insights on telly's most recent offerings.

DEADBEAT - 3x04 "The Cindy 500"

"Pac and Clyde take a job helping a ghost whose daughter is about to get married. She wants them to track down her daughter's biological father so he can walk her down the aisle; the only hitch is that the mother used to be a pornstar, and the father is one of 500 men with whom she filmed a cult classic porn video in the 1990s."

I keep waiting for Deadbeat's newfound hilarity to wane but four episodes in and I'm seeing none of that. This was another hilarious twenty minutes to sit through and included plenty of gay sex jokes, some questionable profiling and a very flawed theory on how to make money. It all ended with the probable introduction of an upcoming arc, where Pac, in the final scene, sees a man at a poker tournament on TV who is winning via the help of a ghost looking at his opponent's cards.

VERDICT: Funny, on the edge and entertaining throughout, this season is shaping up to be the best of the three. 8.5/10

HELL ON WHEELS - 5x11 "Gambit"

"In the aftermath of the kidnapping gone wrong, a debate rises over whether it was real or staged. Campbell, Cheyenne's ex-Mayor, returns as Governor intent on retrieving Durant; meanwhile, Mickey realises he cannot control his cousin and makes a decision - but the consequences for some are deadly."

Today's episode was all about Durant's kidnapping. Mickey's unstable cousin Johnny Shea, continues to act intemperately. This was always going to be the case, so why on earth Mickey decided to hire him to orchestrate the fake kidnapping I don't know - but it was pleasing to see Mickey struggling to deal with the lawmen in Campbell and balance it with hiding his part in Durant's kidnapping.

   In the end, Durant's lover and Cheyenne hotel mogul Maggie Palmer was killed trying to rescue Durant, believing the kidnap real in the face of all the evidence. In retaliation, Mickey killed Johnny and took the $50,000 ransom money - which transpired to be the proceeds of Maggie desperately selling her hotel. A tragic end for her and a long-time-coming end for Johnny, but it was the scenes with Mickey and Durant lying to Campbell about what happened that really gave this decent episode a boost. I love how shady Mickey's character is, and Durant's just a clever schemer. Two men perfect for each other in business.

   And that closes down that storyline quite well. I do wonder what will happen with them from now on (although we see Durant's death in 20 years' time in a flashforward at the beginning of the episode), so maybe all that's left is to out Durant for his crimes and whatever will happen to Mickey.

VERDICT: An episode that didn't feel like a wind-down, even though it arguably closed more than the previous episodes. Good writing and acting, and it was clever to bring Campbell back. I hated that guy. 7.5/10

THE NIGHT SHIFT

3x05 "Get Busy Livin'"

"In the first instalment of The Night Shift's self-styled two-part event, a pharmaceutical rep comes to San Antonio Memorial Hospital to try and clinch a deal for exclusivity in medical distribution and divides feeling. Jordan fights for a patient with cancer who teaches her life lessons in return, while TC tries to save the life of a girl who attempted suicide and Shannon's past drug abuse haunts her."

As The Night Shift enters its early middle phase, its episodes are starting to improve. The race riots episode previously was going to be hard to match, but they didn't try and that was a wise choice. Instead, the show returned to its main characters and in some way they were all affected today, be it big or small.

   Jordan's cancer patient taught her to be a bigger go-getter with personal relationships, which was a nice sentiment and heartbreaking when the patient died. Shannon made her distrust of TC's reformed drug addict sister quite plain in relation to her own addiction with prescription drugs, which is fair since even I'm just waiting for the inevitable relapse to occur. Only this time it's probably gonna take Scott down too. Drew continues to make amends for Syd having to remain in Afghanistan by videoing her daughter's first martial arts fight, but then accidentally injures her himself. Oh dear, Drew. He just can't get a break.

   The pharmaceutical rep, Jessica, split opinions (TC shouted at her for pushing dangerous drugs, Topher wanted the deal just to get conference trips to Hawaii, Jordan enjoyed the administrative side), but ended up with the deal likely and a potential relationship with TC in the works. While Jordan sits in the corner with Fireman Sam I'm OK with this, but we need TC and Jordan back together by the end.

VERDICT: As The Night Shift advances it becomes better and more watchable. The storylines resonated across the board here, but some serve to foreshadow the probable conflicts later on in the season. 8/10

3x06 "Hot in the City"

"In the second of The Night Shift's two-parter, Drew is forced to perform risky spinal surgery on a patient, Jordan and TC's new relationships head in different directions and Shannon reverts back to her ceaseless teasing of Paul. Scott reveals to TC about his relationship with TC's sister Annie, and Jordan treats a wrestling fan who stopped her from being injured in a ringside brawl."

Although a "two-episode event" was drastically misrepresented (these were just two episodes aired back-to-back rather than a two-parter), the one thing producers are following up with is their promise to show more of our characters outside the hospital setting in season 3, and they're delivering. We've seen cafés and casinos, and now we see a wrestling match. The cousin of one of the wrestlers hits on Jordan but ends up in her care after pushing her out of the way of a jumping kick, and his playful interest continues throughout, eventually helping Jordan to make the decision she's not ready for a full-time relationship with anyone - even Fireman Sam. Meanwhile, TC begins a (rather risqué for network TV) sexual relationship with the pharmaceutical rep, Jessica. I think we're going to see them both bumble along now, Jordan on random dates - maybe something will go wrong and they'll do a dangers-of-internet-dating episode - until the end where hopefully they reunite and we can all be happy.

   I continue to love Drew, who is just amazing whether he's being a great doctor or caring for Syd's daughter. Annie and Scott reveal to TC about their dating, and he understandably holds some reservations. As I keep saying, this is bound to blow up when Annie reverts back to drug use. I can't wait for these sparks to fly. Elsewhere, Kenny has been sidelined a little with almost no plot of his own in these two episodes, but at least Paul and Shannon's cute teasing banter returned again today. Those two need to do it already.

VERDICT: The patients themselves presented more interesting cases than usual (Kawasaki's disease and a parasitic cyst), and, alongside the good character development, the uncommon medical issues elevated this episode just beyond the level of the first. 8.5/10

ORANGE IS THE NEW BLACK - 3x03 "(Don't) Say Anything"

* "Tastee gets switched from janitorial duties to being Caputo’s assistant. Red is both angry and jealous that Judy gets special treatment and that she is always in her garden. Piper loses employees in her illegal panty business as they think that it is becoming too dangerous. Maria tries to help her fellow Dominican by asking Piper if they could join her business but Piper declines, stating that she doesn’t want thugs so instead, the Dominicans decide to start their own panty business. Caputo goes on a date with Linda and in the restaurant he sees one of the CO’s that walked out working as a busboy. When he confronts Caputo and tells him how hard it is for him and the other CO’s who walked out, he states that it is all their fault for walking out on an important day in the prison. Brook and Poussey grow closer together. Poussey is a big fan of Judy but gets nervous every time she sees Judy and is unable to speak to her. Brook tries to talk to Judy and explain why Poussey acts weird in front of her but lies about Poussey’s past in order to get Judy’s acceptance, falsely claiming that Poussey is poor and her mother is a crack addict and acts strange because Judy is rich and white. Judy invites Poussey to have lunch with her but when Poussey hears Brook lied to Judy, she abruptly leaves lunch, insulted that Brook knows nothing about her. It is shown that in Brook’s past, she exaggerates the truth to be accepted. Brook apologises to Poussey and promises to make an effort to know her. Lolly begins to crack and attempts to dig up Aydin’s body in the garden but Alex stops her. Frieda sees Lolly’s instability and states that they are going to have to kill Lolly."

That's one long-ass Wiki description, but I'm not sure I could have condensed it all that much more. So all I'll do is just wrap it up quick: Poussey and Brook's relationship is super cute, so it was nice to see Brook's casual racism tear them apart and then bring them back together later on. I like these two characters and I'm interested to see how they grow later on.

   Caputo is just a boss in every episode he's in, and even here he's brilliant in dealing with the CO's that walked out. I miss them though, these new guards aren't as good.

   Piper is finally starting to properly understand the danger of her position as top dog, and doesn't have a particularly strong bodyguard either. The Dominicans are also starting to muscle in on her panty business, but I can't wait for that bit in the trailer where they jump her in the kitchen. She'll deserve it.

   Alex and Lolly start to go mad over the hitman they killed, and with Lolly's mental instability I wonder if Alex and Frieda actually will genuinely try and kill her. That would seem silly, but needs must I suppose.

VERDICT: The first genuinely watchable and enjoyable episode of the series, but that was mostly because of Brook and Poussey, where everything didn't offer too much more than before. 7.5/10

Final thoughts

I've yet to have a week in this off-season where every episode was top notch, but at least this week the quality was more consistent than it has been of late. I've enjoyed watching TV this week and enjoyed writing all about it, and I'll enjoy seeing you all in the next roundup! Thanks for reading!

Sam