|
'Jack Of All Trades' Way-ho, slow the plot down, laddie, slow the plot down.... Well, tonight was SubG laundry night. So I grab myself a quarter case of Sam Adams and my dirty clothes, pile into Siege Perilous and head off for the washateria. Now, normally I like to fold my clothes as soon as they get done dryin', so's I don't get any wrinkles (SubG can't abide by lookin' shabby) but seein' as the only other folks using the place at the time were a couple of fat Meskin homaseckshuls who were making me awful nervous (I think they were talkin' about me, but I can't be sure...`no speako dego,' and all that), I carted the SubG wardrobe home unfolded. As chance would have it, I therefore found myself home just in time to catch Ch. 3's latenight Monday offering, Sweating Bullets. I was a bit worried at first, as one of the bits of it in the credit sequence has a tatoo on her bicep which is a big SubG hangup, but the numerous (albeit bikini-clad) garbonzas more than made up for it. What we have here is a show about this private investigator guy called (I shit you not) Nick Slaughter (apparenly there's some sort of rule mandatin' that all the heroes on CBS latenight shows have to be called `Nick'). He hangs out on a beach with his gun, drinks presumably alcoholic libations (although most of 'em do have those little umbrella things in them, so it's possible Nick here is a poof) and solves problems for all the folks that come to him for help there on the beach. I'd seen another episode of this here show a couple weeks back, and was a bit disappointed in it, 'cause they'd obviously stolen the plot from an old episode of Scoobie-Doo. No such problem this time around---there's no plot to speak of. Apparently someone's stolen a necklace that's worth a bundle from some bit of it, who got snuffed during the robbery. Everyone suspects Nick's old man (played by some old fart who can't seem to make up his mind whether he wants to pretend he's Jack Palance or Lee Van Cleef) is guilty, so of course we know he ain't. But as it turns out, the old guy has to steal the thing later on anyway, in order to pay off some gambling debt he has with some fat furriner who conducts all his binness next to a swimming pool with lots of babes lounging around it. In order to prove his old man's innocence, Nick runs around for a while interviewing women in lacy bras and then has a conference with his partner to decide who the bad guy is. They determine that it's some fellow who we met earlier in the show for about thirty seconds, so Nick pops over to his place to point his gun at him. The bad guy, devious sucker that he is, throws his scotch and soda at Nick, rendering him helpless, so the bad guy gets Nick's gun from him. Fortunately, the old guy was lurking in back of the soundstage, and manages to bean the bad guy on the back of the skull with a vase or something. Having solved the crime, one would think that the show would now be over. Instead, some random bad guys in the employ of the fat furriner pop out from exactly the same place that Nick's dad was hiding (must be a big soundstage), and take them back to the pool with the chicks to have a word with the big man. Nick tries pulling his gun on the fat guy with the funny accent, but he gets his gun kung-fu'd out of his hand (I don't see why Nick bothers carrying the bloody thing, since someone always takes it away from him before he can waste anybody with it). Fortunately, Nick (as is befiting tough private investigators who have kinda faggy ponytails, fashionable stubble and who drive Jeeps) knows a bucket of ninja toe manoeuvres himself, and winds up kung fu-ing the bad guy right into the pool. (Which sorta puzzles me. If I was in the same position, I'd immediately notice the large number of bits of it hanging around the pool and jump in my own self, and use all my fu tricks against anyone who tried to drag me away, but maybe I'm just missing some subtle plot twist. It's mighty hard to concentrate on the coaxial carnivore when I've got all the Palestinians this side of the West Bank yammering outside my window, with the exception of the two that are running wind sprints up and down the stairs twenty-four hours a day). That's about the size of it. What we have here is only one body (snuffed at the very beginning), no beasts (unless we count this guy called `Spider' who hangs out at the same beach as Nick does, and spends his time thinking up ways to get the spandex-clad babes to bend over and/or jiggle their groceries for him) and a sizeable number of sizeable breasts but, as this is the network tiny screen, they're all concealed in scraps of stuff (although from all evidence, that there is the chilliest beach in the world, if you know what I mean and I think you do). No blood to speak of. Kung fu. Statue fu. Pistol whip fu. Mixed drink fu. SubG Academy Award nominations for various random bits of it for saying, `Let me see your thighs,' `Is it true you've gotten bigger?' and `I'm no good with clothes,' and for Nick's old man for taking one look at his son and commenting, `I like the Steven Segal look.' Applause for the wardrobe designer, for making all the bad guys wear black sports jackets over black t-shirts (on the beach), and all the good guys wear Hawaian prints and muscle shirts. It aint' no Forever Knight, but Sub Bob sez what the hell, check it out anyway. -SubG |