Pros 3.08 Slush Fund
Aug. 6th, 2012 09:30 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
llywelaOkay, I'm on my hols from work for a glorious fortnight (or possibly not so glorious, depending on the weather), and since I have all this time on my hands, I decided it was time for another Pros review.
Overview
I watched this episode in the company of Sue, Carol and Marnie over a show-oriented weekend together in the mountains. None of us were organised enough to take notes, but the consensus of opinion was that this is a bit of a schizophrenic story. On the one hand, the plot is full of so many gaping holes and implausible contrivances that it appears to have been cobbled together out of the fragments of ideas rejected from other stories, but on the other hand, it is stuffed full of wonderful little scenes and moments that no fan can help but love.
This is the one where Doyle goes undercover as a South African assassin while Bodie interrogates the actual assassin, and the intended victim turns out to be an unassuming journalist about to write an exposé of some highly flawed aircraft or other, whose investors want him silenced before he loses them a lot of money. That's about as much plot as anyone needs to understand about this story – just focus on the good bits and ignore the rest!
Like I said: schizophrenic. It is, therefore, something of an opinion-divider. Some fans hate it for its nonsensical plot, while others – myself included – love it for the character moments. Which side of the fence do you fall on?
Observations
Random thoughts while watching:
I quite like the way the plot is set up, establishing that Hope is an utterly normal man who leads a totally humdrum life, utterly oblivious to the murky waters he has strayed into, which leads to the contract being placed on him. And the parallel to Hope is Sir Kenneth, as again since the contrast is drawn between his cosy domestic life and the murky waters he plays in – issuing the contract on Hope's life while his daughter is just in the next room, enjoying her birthday party. That's nicely done.
I also like the narrative tool of using Cowley's briefing as a voiceover while we see Bodie and Doyle acting upon it, arresting assassin Van Neikerk the moment his flight lands. It allows the story to start fast and keep moving.
Ha! How many times do we see Bodie and Doyle split up to chase a suspect, with Bodie somehow always ending up doing the hard part and bringing the suspect down before Doyle gets there? It happens a few times, I'm sure!
I wonder how they decided which of them was going to play Van Neikerk. Did they just toss a coin? Or did they have to audition their faux South African accents for Cowley and let him choose which was best?
Doyle's faux-South African accent makes me giggle every time.
Hope reckons he'll be able to write his book in ten weeks. I'm impressed! I can't even write a fic in ten weeks. Of course, Hope has the advantage of being able to write full time, not to mention being a professional…
I like that this isn't just another typical investigation for CI5, the way they have to pull evidence together painstakingly because they know a hit has been ordered purely because of Van Neikerk's arrival in the country, but have no idea who the target is. And I like that the investigation takes in different angles, with Bodie and Cowley trying to break Van Neirkerk while Doyle pretends to be him. As a plot, it all falls apart under the microscope, but I do like that it's a different twist on the usual kind of investigation.
I like a lot of the detail work in this story – things like the way Doyle flushes the toilet in his hotel room while he makes radio contact with CI5, so that no one will hear. There's a lot of incidental detail in a lot of scenes, such as the many scenes in which Hope discusses the book with his editor. A lot of those scenes are designed to deliver exposition and a lot of the detail is pure padding, but having it there really helps with the world building, makes it feel real.
It kills me that while Doyle's moping around his hotel room being bored, he doesn't notice a note being pushed under his door. So much for being on the alert! He looks very pretty as he tries and fails to get interested in his book, though…
Van Neikerk gets some fantastic dialogue – he's wonderfully snarky and that really fleshes out his character, makes him more than just a plot device.
Bodie looks lovely and moody while interrogating Van Neikerk – and I like that the story makes use of his background as a mercenary soldier in Africa.
I really love watching Cowley and Bodie working together, brainstorming over the tape recording of Doyle's brief telephone call with Van Neikerk's employer. Their banter is brilliant! Bodie's in such a playful mood and Cowley is so exasperated – yet puts up with it without too much grumbling because he knows and understands Bodie and trusts him to have his mind on the job even while joking around.
Doyle's sub-plot with the nameless Kookie Girl is just plain weird and is the weakest plot strand of the episode. Doyle finds it weird too – just look at his face when she first approaches him! She seems happy to have pulled him, mind – and who can blame her?
The sub-plot surrounding the Kookie Girl would probably work better if they just cut that line about the gun/knife and let her be what she is, a random girl that Doyle picks up in the hotel, instead of trying to make her seem suspicious just to add another layer of complication to the plot. It plays out really, really badly on screen, partly because it is very badly written and partly because the girl's acting isn't great. Although given how weird the character is, I can't say I blame her for that!
Of course, if Doyle really suspects the girl may be involved with the case somehow, he shouldn't get involved with her – but then again, we've seen him sleep with potential suspects before. Just look at Shelley in Hiding to Nothing.
While busy snogging his weird Kookie Girl, Doyle completely misses the envelope being pushed under his door – he just doesn't have his mind on this job at all!
I love the scene where Doyle sits in his car watching Martin Hope mow his lawn and chats to Cowley by radio about the case. I love the way he snarks about Hope and his wife and their garden, and the way he puzzles over the strangeness of the case, and the way he has to keep gesticulating to get rid of the kid on the bike who keeps staring at him, and how very pretty he looks. I also really like how concerned Cowley becomes when Doyle suddenly goes silent mid-sentence – Doyle's just trying not to act suspicious with the kid staring at him, but from Cowley's point of view anything could have happened! I also love the random passers-by in this scene who shout at the kid-on-bike to get off the pavement – that's another of those throwaway little incidental details that help ground this episode and make it feel real, despite the dodgy plot.
Doyle seems to get a real kick out of playing Van Neikerk, acting all arrogant and supercilious – he really gets into the part!
Man, that scene where Cowley goes to talk to Bodie, on stakeout watching the Hope house, that's another favourite. I mean, it's absolutely ridiculous that Bodie is alone on the stakeout – he definitely isn't watching that house every moment, so could be missing all kinds of important details – but it's a fabulous scene anyway, watching him and Cowley bouncing off each other again.
It winds me up a bit when Cowley says that Hope has £2,200 in a building society in his wife's name – if the money is in her name, how do they know it isn't, you know, hers? Why do they just assume it must be his? I am, however, very amused at how disappointed Cowley is with Hope, who really isn't the slightest bit interesting, from a CI5 point of view. He's so enormously ordinary – they just can't understand why someone would have taken a hit out on him.
Bodie's break-in at the Hope house cracks me up. It's the naughty schoolboy face he wears while breaking the window that does it. And the way he jumps about in a panic when he realises Mrs Hope is back already, and tries to tidy away all evidence of his presence only to knock all the files over. And the way he comes up with this whole huge sob story just off the cuff like that – unless it's a story he had already prepared for such an eventuality! It drives me mad that Mrs Hope goes upstairs to him, though – if he was a real burglar, she'd be in huge trouble, getting near him like that. One shove and she'd be back down those stairs!
Van Neikerk has a thing about covering the faces of his victims. He does it twice in this story – he kills the baby-faced CI5 agent sent to feed him, and covers him up, and then he kills Doyle's Kookie Girl, and covers her up. And sure, there are possible plot reasons that can be rationalised for both – but it does suggest a pattern of behaviour that a psychologist would have a field day with!
Doyle visiting Bodie on stakeout is the cutest scene of the episode, hands down. They are separated for almost the entire episode, so this one scene together is a valuable reminder of their partnership and is just gold from start to finish – Doyle bringing Bodie a pressie, joking about Cowley being at another funeral, bantering over the '24-hour plumber', sharing their bafflement over the case, Bodie confessing his escapades in the Hope house and Doyle laughing his head off over it…fabulous stuff, worth the price of entry alone!
The plot gets very rushed and woolly toward the end, as if the writer had spent so long building the mysterious side of the investigation he suddenly realised he hadn't left himself enough time to wrap it all up, so after all CI5's painstaking groundwork, we don't get to actually see them making any breakthroughs, they just tell us they've worked it all out while we weren't looking. It feels as if we've missed a step, jumping from Bodie noticing a few news clippings about the Fond Fighter in Hope's house to Cowley discussing Hope's book with his editor and confronting Sir Kenneth and the Swiss, without showing us how he got there on the evidence available. How did he find the link with Sir Kenneth? How did he track down the Swiss? We can guess, but we aren't told. Lazy writing. The scene with Hope's editor is especially confusing, as it opens with the editor being shocked to learn that someone wants to kill Hope before he can write his book, with Cowley having to convince him it's a genuine threat, and then ends with the editor telling Cowley about the suspicious death of another Fond Fighter whistle-blower and acting as if he's the one who suspected trouble and Cowley is the one who needs convincing.
And then there's that scene where the body of the Baby-Faced CI5 Agent is discovered and Cowley and Bodie blow their collective tops and start screaming in each other's faces. On the one hand it is an absolutely fantastic scene, showing us what these actors and these characters are capable of, really powerful stuff. But on the other hand, it blows up out of nowhere and is never referred to again – Bodie and Cowley have been getting along like a house on fire throughout the episode, with no sign of any simmering tensions whatsoever. It really makes you think – the show is very much a product of its time, with little or no continuity to speak of, by modern standards, and on the whole that's fine, it works, the show is what it is. But then you get little glimpses of what could-have-been, like in this scene, and it offers a hint of what the show might have been like if it had been made 20 years or so later, when character and storyline arcs were becoming all the rage. In a modern show, this confrontation between Bodie and Cowley wouldn't just blow up out of nowhere and vanish again just as fast, it would be the culmination of an episodes-long build-up and would continue to have repercussions in episodes to come…
Ah well, no point dwelling on what might have been but never was. It's a fantastic scene that allows both characters to react powerfully to the developing situation, with Bodie in particular so horrified at the danger they've exposed his partner to that he completely loses control. Excellent stuff – great work by Gordon Jackson and Lewis Collins.
I'm…not entirely sure why Van Neikerk bludgeons Doyle over the head and then stashes him in the boot of the first unlocked car he finds instead of just killing him outright (stashing him out of sight is entirely in keeping with his predilection for concealing the faces of his victims, mind), but the view of Doyle's backside, slung over the assassin's shoulder, is so fine I really can't bring myself to care. Besides, when there's h/c on offer, who really cares about plot logistics?
The hoodlums who steal the car with Doyle in the boot have got to be the sorriest excuse for teenage louts I have ever seen on TV. They'd be eaten alive by any real hooligan! They come to a sorry end, though, so I won't criticise them too much – nor mention the infamous head-falling-off moment as their car goes over the cliff for its stunt. TV shows were not made for re-watching in the '70s and we weren't supposed to notice these things!
I suppose apart from generating a teeny bit of plot complication early on, Kookie Girl's sole purpose for existing is so that Van Neikerk can kill her in Doyle's hotel room, thereby causing Bodie a moment or two of angst when he finds a corpse with dark curls poking out from under a towel. It's a shame, therefore, that more isn't made of the moment – it was an opportunity to really show Bodie worrying, but as it is, it's totally blink-and-you'll-miss-it. '70s TV really wasn't big on dragging out the emotional moments.
Hope and his wife are really cute together. I like them. I'm glad they both survive!
This show has a really bad habit of showing two different sides of a telephone/radio conversation in which the dialogue doesn't match. They do it again here with Mrs Hope and Van Neikerk. How hard is it to script a conversation that makes sense and then make sure your actors stick to it?
Bodie picking Doyle up from the middle of nowhere has got to be the cutest scene in the episode – now this is how h/c should always be handled! Bodie has been frantic with concern for Doyle, we've seen that, but doesn't say a word about it once he's actually reunited with him, although he does comment on Doyle's head injury in passing. Instead he channels his relief into ridiculously exuberant glee and is just the biggest kid he could possibly be, while poor Doyle is sore and grumpy at him.
Why does Hope agree to meet Van Neikerk? Did he phone CI5 to tell them he'd arranged to meet the assassin, is that why they all turn up there? Did they not have time to organise something better than allowing an armed assassin to walk into a building full of potential hostages? Could they not get there in time to intercept Van Neikerk before he met Hope? Who knows? We aren't told. All we are shown is Van Neikerk meeting Hope with nary a CI5 agent in sight, Hope being bright enough to get the hell out of dodge at the first opportunity – although in the process he leaves an armed assassin alone with a couple of unsuspecting women, not very gentlemanly – and then Bodie and Doyle seeming surprised when they walk into the middle of this crisis.
Still, there's a nice, tense chase through the print room, we'll just enjoy that instead of worrying about the plot.
I like that Bodie wounds rather than kills Van Neikerk, which means he is re-captured to stand trial for his crimes.
I also like that Doyle has blood on his collar as evidence of his head wound, nice attention to detail.
I have absolutely no idea why Bodie picked up the Kookie Girl's headband or why he thinks it would be fun to put it on at the end there. Doyle reacts badly, as he should, since his involvement with that girl got her killed, but how does he even know about her death? Bodie told him, presumably – it's just another detail in this episode that we are neither told nor shown. And as endings go, it's a bit of an odd one, to say nothing of downbeat.
Quotable Quotes
VAN NEIKERK: What is this?
BODIE: It's a welcome party. Welcome to England, Pete.
DOYLE: What you doing here?
VAN NEIKERK: Business.
BODIE: What sort?
VAN NEIKERK: Travel.
BODIE: Trouble with your travel is, no one ever comes back.
VAN NEIKERK: First the bull at the gate, then comes the china shop.
KOOKIE GIRL: I'm not very good at picking up men.
DOYLE: Well, you're not really built for it, are you?
KOOKIE GIRL: That isn't very nice.
DOYLE: No, no, it's a joke. You know: muscles, built for it, picking up.
KOOKIE GIRL: Oh, do warn me. I'm not very good at getting jokes like that.
KOOKIE GIRL: Do we have to talk?
DOYLE: Yes, yes, I'm a compulsive listener.
COWLEY: Oh, let's say the GPO are being very co-operative.
BODIE: Wish you'd have a word about my post.
COWLEY: Maybe she doesn't love you any more.
BODIE: Cruel.
BODIE: Oh, it's you.
DOYLE: It's me. Come to see how the other half grafts.
BODIE: Whatever she's selling, we need it.
DOYLE: She'd stiffen up your chewing gum for you, wouldn't she? Pound over penny, she's selling double-glazing.
BODIE: Nah, she's a twenty-four hour plumber, mate. They're the rage around here, you know.
BODIE: I did a bit of the old B and E, you know.
DOYLE: Oh, Bodie. What, the amateur cracksman? Poor man's Raffles?
BODIE: Only he was never nicked.
DOYLE: You--? [laughs] How did that happen?
BODIE: Because she came back, didn't she.
DOYLE: God, George is going to love that, isn't he? He's going to be really thrilled when the local bobbies get him on the phone, isn't he.
BODIE: Oh, no, they weren't involved.
DOYLE: Why not?
BODIE: Well, I did my down-on-me-luck bit, didn't I? You know: wife, two kids and an aged mother.
DOYLE: And she bought it?
BODIE: Yeah, soft heart.
DOYLE: It's not her heart that's soft, mate.
BODIE: Like Churchill said, if you can't stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen--
COWLEY: Kitchen, yeah, and it wasn't Churchill, it was Harry Truman.
BODIE: Oh, so what, who cares. The point is, we've left Doyle hanging by his thumbs in the middle of all this.
COWLEY: So we warn him.
BODIE: If it's not too late. Another foul up, another piece of incompetence.
COWLEY: Another piece?
BODIE: Yeah, that's what I said, yeah.
COWLEY: When was the last?
BODIE: Well, who remembers, it's all the same, isn't it? Sending boys to do a man's job. And look at this one, he hasn't even begun to shave yet.
COWLEY: You never fouled up? Your record so immaculate--
BODIE: Look, if you want my resignation, just ask for it! All right? That's all I--
COWLEY: I'll tell you what I want! I want you to get on that phone, warn Doyle and stop behaving like a prima donna.
BODIE: I mean what I say.
COWLEY: Now! Is that clear? Oh, remember, the world is full of Monday-morning footballers. On your bike, boy.
BODIE: Aw, you banged your head.
DOYLE: I'll bang yours in a minute.
The Verdict
Overall and on the whole, for me there are enough fabulous scenes in this episode to outweigh the weaknesses of the plot. It's one I always enjoy watching!
Overview
I watched this episode in the company of Sue, Carol and Marnie over a show-oriented weekend together in the mountains. None of us were organised enough to take notes, but the consensus of opinion was that this is a bit of a schizophrenic story. On the one hand, the plot is full of so many gaping holes and implausible contrivances that it appears to have been cobbled together out of the fragments of ideas rejected from other stories, but on the other hand, it is stuffed full of wonderful little scenes and moments that no fan can help but love.
This is the one where Doyle goes undercover as a South African assassin while Bodie interrogates the actual assassin, and the intended victim turns out to be an unassuming journalist about to write an exposé of some highly flawed aircraft or other, whose investors want him silenced before he loses them a lot of money. That's about as much plot as anyone needs to understand about this story – just focus on the good bits and ignore the rest!
Like I said: schizophrenic. It is, therefore, something of an opinion-divider. Some fans hate it for its nonsensical plot, while others – myself included – love it for the character moments. Which side of the fence do you fall on?
Observations
Random thoughts while watching:
I quite like the way the plot is set up, establishing that Hope is an utterly normal man who leads a totally humdrum life, utterly oblivious to the murky waters he has strayed into, which leads to the contract being placed on him. And the parallel to Hope is Sir Kenneth, as again since the contrast is drawn between his cosy domestic life and the murky waters he plays in – issuing the contract on Hope's life while his daughter is just in the next room, enjoying her birthday party. That's nicely done.
I also like the narrative tool of using Cowley's briefing as a voiceover while we see Bodie and Doyle acting upon it, arresting assassin Van Neikerk the moment his flight lands. It allows the story to start fast and keep moving.
Ha! How many times do we see Bodie and Doyle split up to chase a suspect, with Bodie somehow always ending up doing the hard part and bringing the suspect down before Doyle gets there? It happens a few times, I'm sure!
I wonder how they decided which of them was going to play Van Neikerk. Did they just toss a coin? Or did they have to audition their faux South African accents for Cowley and let him choose which was best?
Doyle's faux-South African accent makes me giggle every time.
Hope reckons he'll be able to write his book in ten weeks. I'm impressed! I can't even write a fic in ten weeks. Of course, Hope has the advantage of being able to write full time, not to mention being a professional…
I like that this isn't just another typical investigation for CI5, the way they have to pull evidence together painstakingly because they know a hit has been ordered purely because of Van Neikerk's arrival in the country, but have no idea who the target is. And I like that the investigation takes in different angles, with Bodie and Cowley trying to break Van Neirkerk while Doyle pretends to be him. As a plot, it all falls apart under the microscope, but I do like that it's a different twist on the usual kind of investigation.
I like a lot of the detail work in this story – things like the way Doyle flushes the toilet in his hotel room while he makes radio contact with CI5, so that no one will hear. There's a lot of incidental detail in a lot of scenes, such as the many scenes in which Hope discusses the book with his editor. A lot of those scenes are designed to deliver exposition and a lot of the detail is pure padding, but having it there really helps with the world building, makes it feel real.
It kills me that while Doyle's moping around his hotel room being bored, he doesn't notice a note being pushed under his door. So much for being on the alert! He looks very pretty as he tries and fails to get interested in his book, though…
Van Neikerk gets some fantastic dialogue – he's wonderfully snarky and that really fleshes out his character, makes him more than just a plot device.
Bodie looks lovely and moody while interrogating Van Neikerk – and I like that the story makes use of his background as a mercenary soldier in Africa.
I really love watching Cowley and Bodie working together, brainstorming over the tape recording of Doyle's brief telephone call with Van Neikerk's employer. Their banter is brilliant! Bodie's in such a playful mood and Cowley is so exasperated – yet puts up with it without too much grumbling because he knows and understands Bodie and trusts him to have his mind on the job even while joking around.
Doyle's sub-plot with the nameless Kookie Girl is just plain weird and is the weakest plot strand of the episode. Doyle finds it weird too – just look at his face when she first approaches him! She seems happy to have pulled him, mind – and who can blame her?
The sub-plot surrounding the Kookie Girl would probably work better if they just cut that line about the gun/knife and let her be what she is, a random girl that Doyle picks up in the hotel, instead of trying to make her seem suspicious just to add another layer of complication to the plot. It plays out really, really badly on screen, partly because it is very badly written and partly because the girl's acting isn't great. Although given how weird the character is, I can't say I blame her for that!
Of course, if Doyle really suspects the girl may be involved with the case somehow, he shouldn't get involved with her – but then again, we've seen him sleep with potential suspects before. Just look at Shelley in Hiding to Nothing.
While busy snogging his weird Kookie Girl, Doyle completely misses the envelope being pushed under his door – he just doesn't have his mind on this job at all!
I love the scene where Doyle sits in his car watching Martin Hope mow his lawn and chats to Cowley by radio about the case. I love the way he snarks about Hope and his wife and their garden, and the way he puzzles over the strangeness of the case, and the way he has to keep gesticulating to get rid of the kid on the bike who keeps staring at him, and how very pretty he looks. I also really like how concerned Cowley becomes when Doyle suddenly goes silent mid-sentence – Doyle's just trying not to act suspicious with the kid staring at him, but from Cowley's point of view anything could have happened! I also love the random passers-by in this scene who shout at the kid-on-bike to get off the pavement – that's another of those throwaway little incidental details that help ground this episode and make it feel real, despite the dodgy plot.
Doyle seems to get a real kick out of playing Van Neikerk, acting all arrogant and supercilious – he really gets into the part!
Man, that scene where Cowley goes to talk to Bodie, on stakeout watching the Hope house, that's another favourite. I mean, it's absolutely ridiculous that Bodie is alone on the stakeout – he definitely isn't watching that house every moment, so could be missing all kinds of important details – but it's a fabulous scene anyway, watching him and Cowley bouncing off each other again.
It winds me up a bit when Cowley says that Hope has £2,200 in a building society in his wife's name – if the money is in her name, how do they know it isn't, you know, hers? Why do they just assume it must be his? I am, however, very amused at how disappointed Cowley is with Hope, who really isn't the slightest bit interesting, from a CI5 point of view. He's so enormously ordinary – they just can't understand why someone would have taken a hit out on him.
Bodie's break-in at the Hope house cracks me up. It's the naughty schoolboy face he wears while breaking the window that does it. And the way he jumps about in a panic when he realises Mrs Hope is back already, and tries to tidy away all evidence of his presence only to knock all the files over. And the way he comes up with this whole huge sob story just off the cuff like that – unless it's a story he had already prepared for such an eventuality! It drives me mad that Mrs Hope goes upstairs to him, though – if he was a real burglar, she'd be in huge trouble, getting near him like that. One shove and she'd be back down those stairs!
Van Neikerk has a thing about covering the faces of his victims. He does it twice in this story – he kills the baby-faced CI5 agent sent to feed him, and covers him up, and then he kills Doyle's Kookie Girl, and covers her up. And sure, there are possible plot reasons that can be rationalised for both – but it does suggest a pattern of behaviour that a psychologist would have a field day with!
Doyle visiting Bodie on stakeout is the cutest scene of the episode, hands down. They are separated for almost the entire episode, so this one scene together is a valuable reminder of their partnership and is just gold from start to finish – Doyle bringing Bodie a pressie, joking about Cowley being at another funeral, bantering over the '24-hour plumber', sharing their bafflement over the case, Bodie confessing his escapades in the Hope house and Doyle laughing his head off over it…fabulous stuff, worth the price of entry alone!
The plot gets very rushed and woolly toward the end, as if the writer had spent so long building the mysterious side of the investigation he suddenly realised he hadn't left himself enough time to wrap it all up, so after all CI5's painstaking groundwork, we don't get to actually see them making any breakthroughs, they just tell us they've worked it all out while we weren't looking. It feels as if we've missed a step, jumping from Bodie noticing a few news clippings about the Fond Fighter in Hope's house to Cowley discussing Hope's book with his editor and confronting Sir Kenneth and the Swiss, without showing us how he got there on the evidence available. How did he find the link with Sir Kenneth? How did he track down the Swiss? We can guess, but we aren't told. Lazy writing. The scene with Hope's editor is especially confusing, as it opens with the editor being shocked to learn that someone wants to kill Hope before he can write his book, with Cowley having to convince him it's a genuine threat, and then ends with the editor telling Cowley about the suspicious death of another Fond Fighter whistle-blower and acting as if he's the one who suspected trouble and Cowley is the one who needs convincing.
And then there's that scene where the body of the Baby-Faced CI5 Agent is discovered and Cowley and Bodie blow their collective tops and start screaming in each other's faces. On the one hand it is an absolutely fantastic scene, showing us what these actors and these characters are capable of, really powerful stuff. But on the other hand, it blows up out of nowhere and is never referred to again – Bodie and Cowley have been getting along like a house on fire throughout the episode, with no sign of any simmering tensions whatsoever. It really makes you think – the show is very much a product of its time, with little or no continuity to speak of, by modern standards, and on the whole that's fine, it works, the show is what it is. But then you get little glimpses of what could-have-been, like in this scene, and it offers a hint of what the show might have been like if it had been made 20 years or so later, when character and storyline arcs were becoming all the rage. In a modern show, this confrontation between Bodie and Cowley wouldn't just blow up out of nowhere and vanish again just as fast, it would be the culmination of an episodes-long build-up and would continue to have repercussions in episodes to come…
Ah well, no point dwelling on what might have been but never was. It's a fantastic scene that allows both characters to react powerfully to the developing situation, with Bodie in particular so horrified at the danger they've exposed his partner to that he completely loses control. Excellent stuff – great work by Gordon Jackson and Lewis Collins.
I'm…not entirely sure why Van Neikerk bludgeons Doyle over the head and then stashes him in the boot of the first unlocked car he finds instead of just killing him outright (stashing him out of sight is entirely in keeping with his predilection for concealing the faces of his victims, mind), but the view of Doyle's backside, slung over the assassin's shoulder, is so fine I really can't bring myself to care. Besides, when there's h/c on offer, who really cares about plot logistics?
The hoodlums who steal the car with Doyle in the boot have got to be the sorriest excuse for teenage louts I have ever seen on TV. They'd be eaten alive by any real hooligan! They come to a sorry end, though, so I won't criticise them too much – nor mention the infamous head-falling-off moment as their car goes over the cliff for its stunt. TV shows were not made for re-watching in the '70s and we weren't supposed to notice these things!
I suppose apart from generating a teeny bit of plot complication early on, Kookie Girl's sole purpose for existing is so that Van Neikerk can kill her in Doyle's hotel room, thereby causing Bodie a moment or two of angst when he finds a corpse with dark curls poking out from under a towel. It's a shame, therefore, that more isn't made of the moment – it was an opportunity to really show Bodie worrying, but as it is, it's totally blink-and-you'll-miss-it. '70s TV really wasn't big on dragging out the emotional moments.
Hope and his wife are really cute together. I like them. I'm glad they both survive!
This show has a really bad habit of showing two different sides of a telephone/radio conversation in which the dialogue doesn't match. They do it again here with Mrs Hope and Van Neikerk. How hard is it to script a conversation that makes sense and then make sure your actors stick to it?
Bodie picking Doyle up from the middle of nowhere has got to be the cutest scene in the episode – now this is how h/c should always be handled! Bodie has been frantic with concern for Doyle, we've seen that, but doesn't say a word about it once he's actually reunited with him, although he does comment on Doyle's head injury in passing. Instead he channels his relief into ridiculously exuberant glee and is just the biggest kid he could possibly be, while poor Doyle is sore and grumpy at him.
Why does Hope agree to meet Van Neikerk? Did he phone CI5 to tell them he'd arranged to meet the assassin, is that why they all turn up there? Did they not have time to organise something better than allowing an armed assassin to walk into a building full of potential hostages? Could they not get there in time to intercept Van Neikerk before he met Hope? Who knows? We aren't told. All we are shown is Van Neikerk meeting Hope with nary a CI5 agent in sight, Hope being bright enough to get the hell out of dodge at the first opportunity – although in the process he leaves an armed assassin alone with a couple of unsuspecting women, not very gentlemanly – and then Bodie and Doyle seeming surprised when they walk into the middle of this crisis.
Still, there's a nice, tense chase through the print room, we'll just enjoy that instead of worrying about the plot.
I like that Bodie wounds rather than kills Van Neikerk, which means he is re-captured to stand trial for his crimes.
I also like that Doyle has blood on his collar as evidence of his head wound, nice attention to detail.
I have absolutely no idea why Bodie picked up the Kookie Girl's headband or why he thinks it would be fun to put it on at the end there. Doyle reacts badly, as he should, since his involvement with that girl got her killed, but how does he even know about her death? Bodie told him, presumably – it's just another detail in this episode that we are neither told nor shown. And as endings go, it's a bit of an odd one, to say nothing of downbeat.
Quotable Quotes
VAN NEIKERK: What is this?
BODIE: It's a welcome party. Welcome to England, Pete.
DOYLE: What you doing here?
VAN NEIKERK: Business.
BODIE: What sort?
VAN NEIKERK: Travel.
BODIE: Trouble with your travel is, no one ever comes back.
VAN NEIKERK: First the bull at the gate, then comes the china shop.
KOOKIE GIRL: I'm not very good at picking up men.
DOYLE: Well, you're not really built for it, are you?
KOOKIE GIRL: That isn't very nice.
DOYLE: No, no, it's a joke. You know: muscles, built for it, picking up.
KOOKIE GIRL: Oh, do warn me. I'm not very good at getting jokes like that.
KOOKIE GIRL: Do we have to talk?
DOYLE: Yes, yes, I'm a compulsive listener.
COWLEY: Oh, let's say the GPO are being very co-operative.
BODIE: Wish you'd have a word about my post.
COWLEY: Maybe she doesn't love you any more.
BODIE: Cruel.
BODIE: Oh, it's you.
DOYLE: It's me. Come to see how the other half grafts.
BODIE: Whatever she's selling, we need it.
DOYLE: She'd stiffen up your chewing gum for you, wouldn't she? Pound over penny, she's selling double-glazing.
BODIE: Nah, she's a twenty-four hour plumber, mate. They're the rage around here, you know.
BODIE: I did a bit of the old B and E, you know.
DOYLE: Oh, Bodie. What, the amateur cracksman? Poor man's Raffles?
BODIE: Only he was never nicked.
DOYLE: You--? [laughs] How did that happen?
BODIE: Because she came back, didn't she.
DOYLE: God, George is going to love that, isn't he? He's going to be really thrilled when the local bobbies get him on the phone, isn't he.
BODIE: Oh, no, they weren't involved.
DOYLE: Why not?
BODIE: Well, I did my down-on-me-luck bit, didn't I? You know: wife, two kids and an aged mother.
DOYLE: And she bought it?
BODIE: Yeah, soft heart.
DOYLE: It's not her heart that's soft, mate.
BODIE: Like Churchill said, if you can't stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen--
COWLEY: Kitchen, yeah, and it wasn't Churchill, it was Harry Truman.
BODIE: Oh, so what, who cares. The point is, we've left Doyle hanging by his thumbs in the middle of all this.
COWLEY: So we warn him.
BODIE: If it's not too late. Another foul up, another piece of incompetence.
COWLEY: Another piece?
BODIE: Yeah, that's what I said, yeah.
COWLEY: When was the last?
BODIE: Well, who remembers, it's all the same, isn't it? Sending boys to do a man's job. And look at this one, he hasn't even begun to shave yet.
COWLEY: You never fouled up? Your record so immaculate--
BODIE: Look, if you want my resignation, just ask for it! All right? That's all I--
COWLEY: I'll tell you what I want! I want you to get on that phone, warn Doyle and stop behaving like a prima donna.
BODIE: I mean what I say.
COWLEY: Now! Is that clear? Oh, remember, the world is full of Monday-morning footballers. On your bike, boy.
BODIE: Aw, you banged your head.
DOYLE: I'll bang yours in a minute.
The Verdict
Overall and on the whole, for me there are enough fabulous scenes in this episode to outweigh the weaknesses of the plot. It's one I always enjoy watching!
