Episode 4: Rules of Engagement Review by KT

Click here for screengrabs from this episode

Okay, here we go again with the “big picture” recap. Again focusing on Jane from the very beginning and how Tarzan changed her world. And again in the recap we get some scenes we haven't seen before.

Then we go into “Previously on Tarzan” and they show scenes from last week.

Once again the new ep starts with a pretty shot of the Empire State Building . Someday I hope we get a big ol' gorilla hanging off it, perhaps in some nightmare of Tarzan's, dreaming of his old momma at home.

Night shot of Kathleen's building. Switch to inside the conservatory jungle up at the top of her house. Kathleen is walking through the jungle (now WHY didn't that put that song on the soundtrack—“Run Through The Jungle” by Credence? I guess they're TOO OLD to be featured…or maybe anti-war songs are a leeeetle too controversial right now?) with a plate of food on a silver tray. Kathleen is looking around and up into the trees, calling, “John? Knock-knock!” John being a sullen type, refuses to play and doesn't answer, “Knock-knock who?” Undaunted, Kathleen calls out again, “Jo-ohn. You up there?” She wanders around for a little bit. John Tarzan suddenly jumps down from the trees behind her and Kathleen flings the tray at him. (Talk about fast food…) Oh WAIT—he SCARED her. Now let's see, she's looking for John, figuring he's there and yet when he suddenly pops in she's so startled she jumps and dumps the tray. (WHO is writing this stuff…?)

John crouches down, grabs the food up off the floor and begins to eat like an animal. Well, an animal with thumbs. Kathleen (obviously not having watched the pilot ep and so not knowing his dining habits), holds up a knife and fork and asks him, “Do you remember what these are?” (She doesn't say this sarcastically, like my mom used to. She's honestly asking.)

He just looks at her and continues to eat. He's probably thinking fondly of his last meal with the wild dog pack, getting take-out from the local meat market and chowing down without being harassed over his table manners by his bachelorette aunt.

Kathleen then says, “So I guess you didn't like those shirts I got ya, huh?” He says, “I do now.” This is a reference to him wearing a new shirt but not buttoning it, just letting it hang open to show his pecs.

She gives a lovely short little almost under her breath laugh and then moves very slowly towards him, gesturing with a “Wait-keep calm” movement and saying, “Just…let me, okay?” and then she begins to button his shirt for him. He stills for a second and gives her a wary look, but he does “let her”. I think this is the first time she's touched him, except for that almost involuntary grasp of his arm when he was first brought to her house, wounded.

She tells him “Now this is okay for the time being. But when the winter comes, you're gonna have to get used to wearing a lot more than that”. (My honey interjects, “Hey—I bet she used to say the same thing to Gabrielle.”)

Then she asks him if he remembers winter. He just stares at her, and continues to chew his cud. And then she asks, “You remember your parents, don't you?” Kathleen says this with a soft, very hopeful look and voice. He brats, “Too many questions” and then runs off. Kathleen chases after him and asks, “Can you tell me where you go every night?” (Boy, that Kathleen is sure getting this mother stuff down, ain't she? I bet she sent Maid Mary over to Barnes and Noble to get her a copy of “How To Talk To Your Gen Y Kids”.)

So as always, the kid ignores mom and just drops away, over the edge of the roof. Since this is Tarzan dropping over the edge of the roof, Kathleen doesn't scream in horror but just runs to the parapet and leans over looking for him. But he is already out of sight. Cut to a high wide shot looking down on her as she walks dejectedly back inside, gesturing with her right arm as if she's talking to herself. Scolding herself for being too pushy, perhaps? Or just cursing the kid out? (“Yeah, well g'head—starve and freeze your tight little butt off, Jungle Boy! You'll be sorry someday you didn't listen to what I told ya! You mark my words!”

Tarzan is hanging out on a rooftop, enjoying the sight of the city at night. Then he walks off and in the next shot he's suddenly up on a fire escape. He notices a man mugging a woman for her purse down in an alley. Tarzan jumps down and confronts the man. From somewhere behind Tarzan, a shot is fired and the man gets hit. He jerks up in the air and lands with a big splash in a puddle. Tarzan turns and scans the surrounding buildings behind him but doesn't find the shooter.

End of teaser.

Shot of tall buildings at night. Cut to Jane's sitting at her kitchen table writing on a pad of paper. (“Dear Diary, You'll never guess! I met this wild new boy the other night on the roof…I think he wants to kiss me. Maybe he'll ask me to the annual Police Person's Ball!”) Nicky comes in and begins to ask Jane where various things are since Jane has moved everything in the house. They have a little sisterly argument about Jane making lists again after Jane had promised not to. Jane says this is just an attempt to organize the house better after the chaos of the last few weeks and that this is not technically a list, but a set of guidelines.

Nicky says that what's really bothering Jane is “John Clayton”. Jane admits that she is right. It's bothering her that she has feelings for this guy, so soon after losing Michael. She asks, “What kind of person am I?” Nicky answers, “A human person?”

The phone rings. It appears that Sam is the only person who ever calls her because she picks up the phone and without taking any time for listening says, “Hey Sam, what's up?” She leaves, telling Nicky that there's been another sniper attack.

She gets to the crime scene. She and Sam engage in cute little partner dialogue. It's reminiscent of the first scene in every original Law and Order episode, with Sam in the Jerry Orbach role making sarcastic comments. Sam tells her they haven't found the bullet.

Jane walks down the alley, looking up at the roofs. She spots Snoopy Tarzan crouching up there looking down at her. Next scene, she comes out unto the rooftop. Tarzan does a nice little swing out from under an I-beam platform roof structure to stand in front of her. She gives a happy little smile and says, “Hi John.” He says, “Hi” very softly and happily back. There's actually some chemistry there! Finally!

He moves towards her, she moves away. She says she worries about him being on the roof. Because someone might see him and his uncle has many people out looking for him. He says he wants to help her. He reaches to stroke her hair and neck. She grabs his hand and says, “This isn't helping.” He gives her a look like, “C'mon. You gotta be kidding.”

She backs away again and says they need to lay out some rules. Like there should not be anymore touching between them. He says, “I like it.” (The touching he means, I realize belatedly, not the rule to not touch.) She says, “Okay. I don't”. Tarzan says, “Yes you do.” She says again, “No.” She says there is right and wrong and touching between them is wrong. Because of Mike. (How come they're suddenly calling him Mike and not Michael? Is this disrespect for the dead? “Well, he's not here now, we can call him anything we want to! Yay!”) Tarzan looks resigned.

She turns away, saying they can talk about this later and that she has to get back to work. Tarzan puts his arm lightly around her. He opens his hand and shows her a bullet casing. (Perhaps Tarzan shoved the bullet back in?) He tells her he was there at the scene. She says he has to tell her everything he saw. Tarzan smiles, knowing he's going to get some face time with Jane now.

Cut to daytime at the police station. We hear Sam yelling, “What? WHAT? Look, how am I supposed to watch your back if your front keeps running off to talk to John Clayton?” (Nice line and nice reading by Miguel.) Jane tells him to play chaperone some other time. And adds that John has seen the whole thing. That the guy was attacking and robbing a woman when he was shot. Sam asks where the woman is. Jane says she ran off.

She says that the first sniper victim was a total dirt bag with a record. And now the second victim is a bad guy too. Sam asks if she thinks it's a vigilante thing. She asks if he thinks she should tell the lieutenant. Sam replies sarcastically, “Yeah, tell him that the bare footed wild man who's supposed to be dead jumped off the roof and whispered it in your ear.”

Cut to the lieutenant filling in the troops. He says that the murder weapon is a precision sniper rifle, a pretty rare type. The profile is a psych case, possibly a veteran working alone. That he's killing random targets based on opportunity.

One of the cops objects that Mike's murder investigation shouldn't be taking second place to this. Jane looks guilty. The lieutenant says that Mike's case is cold right now and that Sam is still the point man, so any new leads should go through him. Sam and Jane both look grim and guilty.

Next scene, Sam is listening to phone messages on the tip line for Mike's murder case. Jane walks up. More sarcastic partner jiving from Sam. Jane has dug up info on the first sniper victim. He beat his girlfriend to death with a nine-iron. He was holed up in his apartment and a swat team came to flush him out. The sharpshooter for the team was a guy named Howard Rheinhart and he used the same type of rare rifle as the current sniper. He's now retired. They head off to go question him.

Cut to outside shot of Kathleen's home. Tarzan is looking out the window. Kathleen comes into the room and asks him if he's going to just stand there looking out the window all day. (NOW she's channeling my mom.)

Tarzan says, “So this is my father's house.” Kathleen answers, “It was yours too, when you were a little boy.” Tarzan asks her if she was close to his father. She says he was twelve years older than her but she adored him. That he used to run her up and down the stairs on his shoulders. (Probably teasing Richard the whole time—snatching at his hair and calling him names. I bet this is why Richard is bald and is so bitter today.)

Tarzan asks if his father was like Richard. Kathleen says, “No, not a bit”. Tarzan asks “Did he love my mother?” Kathleen replies with a smile and a nod, “Yessss. Very much.” Tarzan asks if he had rules about loving his mother. Kathleen says she doesn't know what he means. Tarzan tells her he wants to know more about his father. Kathleen says she can tell him stories about him. And that she has some of his clothes upstairs. And asks, “Would you like to see them?” Tarzan gives her a “Yes Mother, may I?” smile.

Cut to Jane and Sam checking at Rheinhart's house for him, claiming they want to see him about an old case he worked on. They're told by Rheinhart's wife and son that he is in Canada on a hunting trip. Jane notes that he left the day of the shooting. Sam is concerned that Jane looking into a vigilante cop situation is not going to make her popular around the coffee machine. She says she needs to dig into it. He tells her to dig into it “quietly”.

Cut back to Kathleen's. Nice, quiet piano music begins to play on the soundtrack. Tarzan is looking at his father's many suits which are hanging in a closet. (And which amazingly look brand new, not like they're 20 years old. They don't even have indentations in the shoulders from hanging on hangers since 1980 or so. GOOD suits…)

Tarzan sniffs at a sleeve. And then puts the jacket on. Kathleen is watching him. She says it fits perfectly. He asks, “I'm like him?” She nods with a happy smile and says, “Very.” Tarzan smiles also. She explains, “I was just a teenager when he died. And had a bad case of big brother hero worship. I never knew exactly what happened to the plane. So I spent years hoping that he'd walk through the front door one day, safe and sound. That's the hardest thing to let go of—the hope.” She looks so vulnerable as she shares this with her nephew, almost as if she's afraid that he'll laugh at her. She asks Tarzan how the jacket feels. He answers, “Scratchy”. She gives a small laugh and stands looking at him with a happy, indulgent, joyful face and a somewhat diffident stance.

Tarzan plays dress-up with his father's clothes, his sweaters, shoes and a fedora.

Cut to Jane getting home. She goes to her bedroom and begins to undress. Tarzan suddenly appears on her window sill. Jane gasps like a girl. He comes in and asks about the sniper case. He says, “The sniper only hurts bad men”. (Now how does HE know that?) Jane says, “Yeah”. He says that's good. Jane replies that no, it's against the law and that makes it her job to stop him. Tarzan says that HE hurts bad men and she doesn't stop him. The doorbell rings. Jane starts to leave to answer it. Tarzan goes with her. She holds him back and says that Tarzan has to stay where he is. Tarzan smiles happily and proudly at her and says, “You're touching me.” Jane gives a small smile, says, “Right” and turns away.

Nicky has opened the door for Sam. Sam tells Jane that a witness has come forward who saw Michael die. He said he saw a white man, mid-twenties with long hair, barefoot. And a white female with brown hair, also mid-twenties on the roof with Michael. Sam says, “This is it Jane. I think you're busted”. Jane stares at him and whispers, “Oh my god.” Close up of Tarzan's face in the bedroom.

Commercials.

Exterior day shot of a building. Inside, Jane steps out of an elevator. She knocks on a door. She identifies herself as a police officer. The door is opened and a man peers out. She asks something I can't make out, probably says his name? and then says she needs to talk to him. He recognizes her as the “Lady on the roof” and slams the door on her. He asks why she needs to talk to him when she knows what happened. She says the police department needs his help. He asks if she's been around any sick people—he phobic about germs. She says no and he lets her in. He's a very nervous type of guy.

He tells her that he saw “the dark haired man attack the blond one.” And that in the struggle, they rolled over the edge of the roof and the blond haired one tried to save him. But he fell. Jane calls him Donald and repeats that “From what you saw, it was an accident”. Donald says yes and then says he's told her everything so now he doesn't want to get involved anymore. He never leaves his apartment. He doesn't want to go to the police station and give a statement since he's already given the info to her. He tells her he'll get heart palpitations if he has to leave his home.

Cut to outdoor scene, Jane and Sam walking around the street. Sam and Jane argue because she doesn't want to make Donald testify. Sam thinks she's nuts since this proves that it was an accident and clears John of homicide charges. Jane argues that John could still be charged with assault. And that some of the cops are real hotheads who just want revenge for Michael's death.

Sam asks her if she intends to ignore the witness. He tells her this is a crime. It can ruin her career. It could ruin HIS career. He says it's his investigation and he has to take this to the lieutenant. She says that John is different, that if they put him in jail, he will die. Not to mention that Richard will find him. Sam asks why she feels it's her job to protect John Clayton. She answers, “No one else is going to get hurt because of me.” Sam is totally exasperated. And silent.

Cut to Jane and Sam in their office. Sam has searched the police data base for all of Rheinhart's swat assignments and then pulled up cases that were not prosecuted due to technicalities. Case number two is the older brother of victim number two, Damien Flicker. Damien was an accomplice in mugging and killing an old lady with his older brother. He had gotten immunity for testifying against his older brother. And because he was a juvenile, his records were sealed. Jane congratulates Sam for having found the connection between Damien Flicker and Rheinhardt. Jane notices that the first victim on the list was the first guy killed and the second was the second. They set off to check on the next guy on the list, Steven Bolinsky.

As Jane and Sam drive away, Tarzan watches them from a nearby roof. Jane and Sam go on a boat (again a boat!) with a lot of workers on it and ask to speak to Bolinsky. A young worker suddenly jumps up and runs off. They chase him but he's getting away. Suddenly Tarzan jumps down from the top deck of the boat and with some lovely somersault, chimpanzee arm motion type moves, catches Steve. Jane and Tarzan glare at each other. Sam takes Steve off to the police station.

Jane goes up to the pilot house where Tarzan has gone. She says that it's hard to tell him to stop following her when he does good things like catch the bad guys. And that it's not easy to tell the good guys from the bad guys on this one. Tarzan says, “I can tell.” She says she wishes she could see things as clearly as he does. He says, “So do I”. They exchange meaningful glances.

He walks towards the door of the pilothouse. We suddenly see Jane framed in a telescopic sight. Tarzan suddenly “feels” the danger, looks to his left and we get a shot of an eye looking through a scope and a finger pulling on a trigger. Tarzan screams, “JANE!” but it's too late. Jane gets shot and jerks up and backward with a really neat slo-mo blast response move. Tarzan runs to her side. His face is red, there are tears in his eyes, he stares down at Jane with an anguished look.

Commercials.

Tarzan is panting with fear and horror as he pulls open Jane's shirt—she's got a bullet-proof vest on. He pulls that open also (leaving her in a little white tank top) and there is a big bruise just above her left breast where the bullet hit her. He holds her hand and pants. She suddenly gasps, the force of the bullet having knocked the wind out of her. Tarzan is WAY relieved. And then WAY mad at the guy who did it. He once again smashes through a window (though he had just been standing in an open doorway) and runs along the decks. (Barefoot and yet he NEVER stubs his toe. Nor steps on any shards from his endless window breaking. And, as a friend of mine noted, his feet never get dirty either.) He sees a man with a gun case running away on the docks. He dives off the ship but by the time he climbs out of the water, the perp has gotten into a car and roared away. Tarzan is left on the docks, dripping wet, absolutely furious and VERY buff.

Cut to the lieutenant's office where Jane is lying on his couch with an ice pack over her bruise while Sam stands by. The lieutenant tells them that Rheinhart just agreed to turn himself in. Jane and Sam ask why. The lieutenant says he hopes it's a question of conscience.

Cut to Rheinhart's house where uniformed cops are taking him to a patrol car. Sam and Jane come out of the house and Sam notices Tarzan coming down the alley. Jane runs into the alley to keep Tarzan there and out of sight of the police officers in front of the house. Sam helps hide him by blocking the view into the alley. Jane tries to calm Tarzan down, telling him that they've got the guy. Tarzan says it's not him, that the guy who shot her was a young boy. Jane says that even if the boy's guilty, they cannot go in there and arrest him without a warrant. They have to wait. Tarzan asks if this is one of the rules. Jane says yes. Tarzan says, “Your rules are lies” and runs away. Jane stares after him open mouthed.

As Jane and Sam get into their car, we see the son watching from the upstairs window.

Cut to a room in the police station. Rheinhart is saying, “This is harassment. I signed a confession.” Jane tells him yes, but that they have credit charge slips that prove he was in Canada until that morning. She suggests that like all cops, when Rheinhart came home from work, he would rant against the system. Talking about how criminals always walk. And his son heard him and tried to do something about it to make his dad proud. And then his son flunked out of the police academy. And Jane says there's always been something wrong with the boy. He's sick. And she shows pictures of the dead, bloodied victims as she says this. Rheinhart keeps telling her she's wrong and that there's nothing wrong with his son. Jane and Sam leave to go pick up the kid.

Cut to the main office. Sam is talking to another detective. He comes over to Jane and says, “Flew the coop”. He says they've alerted customs, the port authority, and the state police. And now they will just have to wait.

Jane says she wishes she knew where John went. Sam comments, “Takes a vigilante to catch a vigilante?” Jane says that John is not a vigilante. And that it's not fair to judge him by their rules. She says he's unpredictable and wild but that he never lies. “His moral compass doesn't waver. Unlike mine. I think John might be right. My rules are lies. I've crossed the line so many times lately, I don't even know where it is anymore.” Intense face shots of both Sam and Jane.

Cut to Richard's office. Two men tell him about Donald Ingraham, whose apartment looks over the roof where Michael was killed. They followed Detective Porter there. Richard says that if this guy is talking to Porter, then maybe they should too.

Cut to Jane, walking around a flea market, talking on the phone to Sam who's still at the station. She suddenly spots Rheinhart's car. She says to Sam, “The kid followed me.” Sam orders her to leave and yells for back-up to go help her. She says she's got to draw the kid away from the crowd. They make an agreement to not let the kid get away this time. Sam is screaming over the phone, telling her to run to safety. Jane runs away from the crowd. A shot rings out and a bullet shatters a glass bus shelter next to Jane. She drops to the ground. The crowd begins screaming and running. Sam is screaming her name over the phone and still yelling for help from the other police officers.

Cut to commercials.

Jane has rolled under a stone bench. She dropped her cell phone on the way. Can't hear her now. Sam is trying to call her. She reaches out for the ringing phone and the sniper takes a shot at her. While he reloads, she gets up and runs away. We see him on a roof, trying to get a bead on her, but she is running too fast and gains the safety of a building. The kid is frustrated. He breaks his gun down to put it away in a case. He starts to rapidly leave the area. Suddenly Tarzan is there.

The kid grabs the gun out of the case but Tarzan reaches him before he can get a shot off. He grabs him as the kid says that he's seen Tarzan hunting criminals too, “just like me.” The kid keeps saying that he and Tarzan are alike, that they know how to get things done. Tarzan is WAY pissed because he hurt Jane. He drags the boy across the roof with a very determined air, obviously about to throw him off the roof. Just as they reach the edge, Jane runs out onto the roof, followed by Sam, and asks Tarzan to please stop. Tarzan dumpss the kids down with great contempt. He and Jane stare at each other as Sam comes up and mentions that the cops are coming up the stairs. He begins to read the kid his rights. Jane stares at Tarzan open-mouthed. Tarzan gives Jane a stony look in return. Jane says, “I don't want them to hurt you” and opens her mouth again. We hear a helicopter's blades beating. Tarzan climbs up on the roof parapet. Jane says, “John”. Tarzan drops over the edge. Jane shuts her mouth.

Cut to nighttime shot of Greystoke building. We see the feet of a man pacing a wooden floor. The camera pans up and we see it's Donald. Richard comes into the room. Donald asks to go home as he wipes his hands with a tissue. Richard assures him he will. Then he begins to question him about what he saw from his apartment the night Michael died.

Cut to Kathleen's apartment. Maid Mary shows Jane into a large foyer. The foyer opens into a room that Kathleen is sitting in. Kathleen is facing away from the entrance looking at…picture proofs? Stamps? And also sporting a pair of glasses and looking VERY school-marmish. Jane walks into the open entrance of the room and says “Good evening, Miss Clayton.” Kathleen turns and stares blankly at her for a minute. Then she takes off her glasses and says in a somewhat surprised manner, “Jane!” (I think maybe those are just “play” glasses. She probably stole them from Richard. They obviously don't help her to see very well.)

Jane asks how it's been with him here. Kathleen says that it's been an adjustment. And that John's been through a lot as has Jane. Jane asks what Tarzan has told her. Kathleen says just about everything. (Which is pretty hard to believe, seeing as how monosyllabic Tarzan has been everytime we've seen him. That scene could have been a whole ep on its own.) Kathleen says to Jane, “I'm very sorry.” Jane says that Michael's death was an accident and that there's nothing anyone can do about it. Kathleen says in a kind of snotty way that John seems to want to do something about it. And that he wants Jane to be happy. She says, “He seems to care a great deal about you.” Jane replies, “I know”. And starts to say, “A part of me fff…”. Then she stops. And then she says, “It gets a little hard sometimes.” She asks if Tarzan is home and Kathleen says, “He's upstairs” in a still somewhat snotty tone. Jane leaves the room. Kathleen sits on the sofa in thought.

Up to the jungle. Jane is amazed to see it. John is squatting up on a ledge. Jane says she's come to apologize. Tarzan jumps down and Jane gives a little smile. She says that when she's confused, she needs rules to tell her what to do. She talks about how lately she's breaking rules she believes in and making up rules she doesn't. She says she's been trying to explain right and wrong to Tarzan, but that he knows the difference already. They stare soulfully at each other. She starts to leave, he calls her name and kisses her hand. (VERY suave. The Cary Grant of chimps must have taught him that move.) Jane whispers, “John, I can't.” John REALLY wants a kiss and leans very slightly towards her. She whispers again, “John, I can't”. John brushes her cheek with his finger and then leaves. And godsdamn it, Jane starts to cry again. Phhhftt! Tarzan walks off.

Music starts. Pretty nice this time. Jane walks around the jungle, then steps out on the patio. The camera pans up and away. Fade to black.

Graphic comes up telling us that the music tonight was from Longview and Casey Stratton. And again you can buy them at the WB site.

When this ep ended, I was surprised and said, “What? It's over?” It didn't really seem to be a finish. I guessed it was considered finished because the case of the week was over but I sure didn't feel there was much resolution or ANY real forward movement of the human story. I felt we'd just had more JaneAngst, more Tarzan inarticulate longing, more evidence of Richard's manipulating side. Kathleen was the only character who was opening up and expressing her feelings, explaining her history and her painful response to the family tragedy. She was letting us in, showing and telling us new stuff about herself. The other characters were just kind of standing still. Or at the very most, just reinforcing what we already knew about them without revealing anything new.

But then as I watched it again to write this review, I saw more in it and enjoyed it more than I had the first time I watched it. But it was mostly Lucy's scenes that I saw a lot more in. And I enjoyed watching Miguel at work again also.

You know, they just talk too much in this series. They don't show enough. And there's no subtext in this series. Everything IS on the surface. Everything is said, not shown. There's no complexity, no layers of texture, nothing goes on underneath.

I think the best new show of the season is “Karen Cisco”. By far. And when the show opened last week, Cisco was standing on an air boat with a bunch of other law folks racing through a swamp. And she was just standing so cool, so tough, so “You-do-NOT-want-to-mess-with-me,-Buddy”. She's giving out so much information about herself in how she presents herself to the world, just with the way she's holding herself and experiencing the ride. Tarzan needs more of showing and much less of talking.

I think Cisco is the first true daughter of Lucy as Xena that I've encountered on TV. The one who comes closest to her impact and her characterization of a strong, complete, intriguing and complicated female warrior. I enjoy that show VERY much.

Interesting how the cops are presented in Tarzan as vengeance filled out-of-control guys. That they won't listen to the full story of how Michael died but will go for vengeance no matter what and that if Jane tries to investigate a renegade cop, they will give her a hard time over it. And Jane has done something REALLY bad in terms of her job. At the very least she can be fired for what she did, at the worst she can go to jail for it.

This is the first ep that improved upon second viewing to me. So I would say that the show's getting better. BUT…

Tarzan is a total cipher. All we know of him is that he took one look at Jane and became nothing more than some kind of a hound on a relentless search. We see some feelings in him for his dead father (he NEVER asks about his mother) but other than that, his whole world revolves around this woman he just met who keeps telling him she wants nothing to do with him. Yeah, he squeezes out a few snarls at Richard's name and mostly stonewalls Kathleen but other than that, he's just a totally obsessed stalker after Jane. Blech. WHAT is it he sees in Jane that she has become his holy grail? We have no idea.

Richard is still enigmatic. He wants Tarzan for some reason that we're not totally sure of yet. He's another closed off person who is not much more than a cardboard stereotype of the bad guy. In episode one, we saw Richard showing some tenderness and compassion towards the downed Tarzan when he first captured him, but we haven't seen any sign of that again.

Miguel (Sam) really appeals to me. He has some very dramatic phrases to say also, but he makes them seem very natural. He's VERY good in the scene where he's on the phone with Jane as the bad guy is shooting at her. There's a lot of high drama in it and he plays it very believably. He's excited, protective and screaming for help and he makes it work very well.

He's just an excellent, natural-acting actor. He's another real bright spot in the series for me.

But of course, once again, the highlight for me was the Lucy scenes.

Lucy scenes:

She's the first person we see in this ep—it opens with her walking around the jungle-in-a-penthouse-in-the-city. YAY! I LIKE seeing her the first thing.

Lucy is just soooo good. At the beginning when she's calling for John in the jungle, her voice has a very gentle, very maternal tone. It's soft and caring yet playful and upbeat at the possibility of being with John.

In the scene where she's talking about her brother John to his son, Lucy physically plays it understated. She holds her hands behind her back, in an almost confessional pose. She plays Kathleen with an undercurrent of her being somewhat apprehensive, a little afraid and very aware that she can well be hurt by Tarzan's response. Or his non-response. She's the “needy” one here. She's the one who wants the connection between them. And she is thrilled that John Sr. is a bridge between them. She's ready to give Tarzan anything he wants of his father's—she will tell him stories about him, talk about his character and history, even offer Tarzan his clothes to wear.

We find out that Tarzan is very like his father. And in this same scene Kathleen talks about how she had hoped for years that the front door would open and her brother would come home. And now his son IS here, he has come home, and he's looking just like his father. She is just so happy that Tarzan has come into her life.

I love Lucy's small gestures and little sounds of delight or frustration. People do communicate that way. Often unconsciously, but it's very natural and true for people to do this as they interact with others. Lucy has these natural moments down pat.

The scene with Jane in Kathleen's house was just odd. For the first time, I couldn't figure out what Kathleen was feeling or rather, WHY she was feeling that way. I don't know what's going on in this scene. She seems angry at Jane but her words are sympathetic. It was very puzzling. I thought Sarah did a very good job in this scene.

Tough o' meter: Jane once again comes up with a mixed bag. She displays lots of smarts in figuring out who the bad guy REALLY is and she shows great courage when she knows she's a target and she wants to draw the sniper away from the crowd. But then Tarzan captures the bad guy at the end, not her. And once again, she's whining to her sister, spends most of the episode in high angst and yes, cries again. *sigh* She just seems far too wussy for a New York detective.

This is not totally the actor's fault by any means. I think Sarah does a good acting job. She plays a worried woman really well. But the scripts are poor. The dialogue between Tarzan and Jane is generally kind of high-faluting, often melodramatic. Some of the lines were those kind of obvious clichés that the audience says with the actors. (But sometimes we did that with Xena too.)

Though as I said before, to me both Lucy and Miguel come off as very natural in their scenes, so they seem to be able to plow through the dialogue without stinking the place up. I still hope for a scene between Kathleen and Sam someday. A nice LONG scene.

There is just not enough HUMOR in this series either. Cisco makes me laugh out loud every episode. Lucy and Miguel manage to inject some everyday humor into the series with their acting skills but not nearly enough. Life is funny. Always.

They don't seem to be having a lot of fun in this series.

We've heard on Xena lists that the first five eps were written before Lawless came on board. And that the focus of the show will be changing to showcase more of the conflict between Kathleen and Richard. I think they definitely need to focus on something that is ongoing and that grows from week to week, something that unfolds into new and intriguing possibilities for future stories. To me right now it seems the main line of the story, the relationship between Tarzan and Jane, is pretty stagnant. Jane says things about Tarzan, gives us her take on him all the time, cries over him and his impact on her, but nothing changes from week to week, nothing gets resolved, not even a little. As I said, it reminds me of a soap opera not an evening drama series.

The show still isn't quite “there” yet. This ep had some better scenes than the other eps. But the series still seems to be kind of circling around looking for its feet.

It's still totally prosaic in its visuals. On Xena, just about every week there would be at least one shot if not more that was stunningly beautiful. Absolute eye-candy that the mind could savor in memory, hell for years for some of the visuals.

There is no use of lighting to starkly delineate a shot or to suggest themes, like on Xena where characters were often shown in light or in shadow and sometimes with bars of alternating light/shadow across their faces. The composition of the scenes and the use of light in both Xena and X-Files was outstanding. And this show has nothing remotely as eye-catching as those shows regularly gave us.

Oh well, hope springs eternal. There's always next week. And more Lucy to watch for.

KT