“That’s not the same thing — what’s wrong with you?” – Eliot to Parker, when she compares her burying herself alive to overcome her fear of darkness, to his overcoming his claustrophobia by staying in a dark shed
As big a fan of Leverage as I am, I admit I was a bit disappointed in the few episodes following the season two premiere. They were entertaining, don’t get me wrong, but they were missing the magic of season one. I couldn’t quite put my finger on it, but something wasn’t gelling for me.
Well, last week all those feelings were gone, and this week just confirms it: Leverage is back and better than ever, and not one bit inferior to season one’s near perfection. The fun part about tonight’s episode is that it had all the unique quirk that is classic Leverage, but it pleasantly reminded me of many distinctive shows from the past.
Am I stretching just a little bit when I say Hardison’s line, “How do you like me now?” was a shout-out to Keen Eddie‘s “How do you like me so far?” Yeah, I probably am, but it still made me smile to be reminded of one of my favorite short-lived shows.
Eliot and Parker were the quintessential Bert and Ernie tonight. Parker (Ernie) poking Eliot (Bert), Parker’s “Does that hurt? (poke) How ’bout now (poke)?” was topped off perfectly with Eliot’s tattling: “She’s poking me.” The only things missing were rubber duckies and pigeons … although there was a dove and a rabbit….
And no one will argue that the gummy frogs were a quirky riff on MacGyver, right?
The bits that are all Leverage, and that I am so, so glad to have back, are at least better than ever:
There were so many great moments in this episode, from Parker and the “homeless” guy on the bench, to Hardison and Parker taking down the magician for assault. What was your favorite?
Clacked by Debbie McDuffee
on Aug 20, 2009 @ 09:00 EST5EDT
It was a great episode, except for one small nitpicky detail on my part: patents are public record. They aren’t holed up in some safe by the company that holds them. Anyone can go to https://www.uspto.gov and see every patent out there. If they were kept secret we wouldn’t have people sued for patent infringemnt.
Like I said, nitpicky detail. I can’t imagine being a doctor and watching medical shows, it must drive them nuts…
That bugged me too. Seems they mixed up their copyright law a little — they meant trade secrets.
Parker is awesome
As a photographer, it drives me nuts when I see the dumbest things people with cameras. Holding them wrong, things in Photoshop and etc.
Any crime show comes to mind when they are doing crime scene photos and using the pop up flash and holding the cam wrong.
Deb, I’m with you… There seemed to be some fun missing out of the last several episodes that was most definitely back this week.
In a episode of great lines, my favorite was a call back to Eliot’s … uh … experience with fighting styles and such: “You can tell they’re CIA by their stance?” … “Its a very distinctive stance!”
(Oh, and the Bert & Ernie stuff was hilarious, too!)
actually y’all are half right. Not all information is put into patents … especially when it comes to trade secrets. Y’all have heard about the formula for COKE, KFC’s secret recipe, etc … these things are all withheld from patents as revealing the info would be detrimental to the company owning said “secrets”.
I’m trying to remember the episode from season one in the bank. I think they showed us just about everything they planned with the bankrobbers/hostage takers who were just trying to get the money to pay a ransom for their mother/wife.
I found that episode to be especially great because it mixed the idea of being someone who’s not really involved in the Leverage group but tries to work with them. It gave a sense of getting in on the heist/plan and become a substitute player or part of the team. I think the episodes this season also lacked this way of getting in on the plan/being part of the group, not just the flashbacks.
A lot of “A-Team” episodes involved this and made the show so extremely fun to watch.