Yes, I had the same reaction. It was going to be my big takeaway from the episode until she suddenly confessed to watching Dallas and Knots Landing! ("I've had a lot of time on my hands these days.")
Following on the Knots Landing revelation this was an appropriately soapy episode, "Secrets" in fact also being a Knots episode title. Michele Lee would have eaten up those scenes if she had gotten the part.
The preview, I presume intentionally, does mislead the viewer into expecting a much lighter episode.
It did slowly occur to me that we only had her word, and through that, how difficult proving these cases is.
The closing scene, when the light returns to her eyes as she puts two and two together and realises that he's tripped himself up, was wonderful. Although, it is primarily a relationship drama, her police skills should never be discounted. If there's a hall of fame for fictional detectives, Christine Cagney surely deserves a place in it.
Much more relatable now that we're 30 years older, sad to say.
Just why does Alice Christine have blonde hair? Mary Beth remarks quite unthinkingly that she could be Chris's daughter, and she could.
Thornton is played by James Stephens of The Paper Chase, another of my favourite 80s shows, making it quite impossible for me to dislike him.
Isbecki's reaction was hard to read. It could have been dismay or just surprise. Catholicism is obviously a genuine part of his own life. Perhaps his father actually converted. An ethnic Jew isn't necessarily observant of the faith of Judaism.
I've long suspected that the Australian run of this show finished with a batch of episodes left unseen. I think we may be entering that period now. I'm sure I would have remembered Isbecki getting married and David proposing to Chris. And James Stephens in two episodes as well for that matter.
Agreed. Also it saves them the cost of hiring him as a guest star.
With the arrival of Verna, the dynamic of the Ladies' Room has changed. Verna just pops in at one point, which she has every right to do, but it suddenly means that it is no longer their exclusive preserve. I wonder if that will be addressed in a future episode.
I wondered at the naming of the final DVD season as "Winding Down" because I had assumed that the third cancellation was as unwelcome as the first two but there is a sense of things drawing to an end as various ongoing plot threads are brought to closure.
In a way, Stephen Macht directing is another link with Knots Landing, paralleling John Pleshette's and Joan van Ark's directorial returns after leaving as actors. And that's in addition to the more obvious facts that Macht is a Knots alumnus and "Land of the Free" is also a Knots title - although I'm sure it's one that's been used by many others as well.
Although the word "class" has a different connotation here, it still sounds like a continuation of "School Daze"
I honestly can't remember whether I've seen these episodes before or not but there aren't many to go so I don't know how much further the relationship can go.
I knew it was some kind of game but I thought there was also some Cold War reference there.
Like the apartheid episode, this is a rare one that now feels dated - in a good way.
And Chris remarks that you never think of the woman. After all they've been through breaking down barriers over the past six years it's still true.
It occurred to me that, as with Christine's rape, we didn't actually see the shooting. The difference was that, while with Christine as viewers we were conditioned to believe her, Thornton's previous appearances conditioned us to assume his incompetence. As you said, a twist.
The term "friendly fire" is not an unfamiliar one but, strangely, Barney twice calls it Friendly Smoke in his notes on the DVD cover.
For some reason this and the next episode were freezing and skipping rather badly (despite there being no sign of damage to the disc) so I must have been too distracted to notice that. It should have been obvious that it wasn't the roof of a house.
Same for me. The original term was Young Upwardly-mobile Professional but I've never heard it called YUP, always yuppie.
I like the way that we saw Esposito and Corassa step up as a working team in a couple of episodes. Pity that Isbecki and Jordan didn't receive the same treatment. I noticed that Samuels told Cagney to turn her second whip duties over to Corassa for the duration, which gives an indication of his seniority. I still wonder who was second whip before Christine's promotion; I'm sure they never mentioned the position before that.
Yes, it's not really a season finale at all. Almost like a standalone movie. According to the air dates, it was originally shown on night so I broke my usual rule and watched it that way ...
Again a Knots Landing parallel. But there's also something of the cliffhanger regarding the choice they will make so - like Dallas - I'm not sure they were necessarily planning on not coming back
Indeed, yes. I've seen them relatively recently via the original 4-disc boxed set but it will be a pleasure to rewatch with the memory of the series now fresh.
It's seems weird to be going back to the Lost Episodes set for them, with Loretta Swit and Meg Foster on the cover.
Avoiding the more obvious The Return of Cagney & Lacey.
James Naughton will always be astronaut Pete Burke from the Planet of the Apes TV series to me. I like him but I didn't find them especially compatible. Marriage seems an unnatural state for Chris and it already seems shaky. There is certainly none of the joy she exhibits when reunited with Lacey in the driving scenes. No mention of what happened to Nick either.
And Corassa, too. it's almost lost in the throwaway party talk but it seems that Verna Dee is now in charge of the squad. Didn't see that one coming.
Only the first two were broadcast here - and closer together that six months. They had the air of a four-hour miniseries. Rewatching now, I realise that this one also sows the seeds for what's coming next.
I think the scene was worthwhile to see Chris's reaction to the other woman. There was no real surprise. I might have imagined it but I thought I detected relief. Relief that she had an excuse to end what already wasn't working for her.
At first I had assumed that the drink was non-alcoholic. It took that look on Mary Beth's face to convey that it wasn't.
Nice observation. I hadn't put all that together.
Is it recorded anywhere whether they had a firm order for the four?
At some point Chris's ambition appears to have changed. I'd have to rewatch to be certain but I'm pretty sure that originally she said she wanted to be the first woman chief of police. At some point this changed to commissioner. The difference as I understand it is that chief is the highest rank in the force whereas commissioner is a political appointment. (Think Gordon and O'Hara in Batman.)
Although I've seen this before, I didn't remember the very young Sandra Oh in this role. In hindsight it's wonderful to see Gless and Daly acting opposite someone who has in a sense become their spiritual heir.
Really? I didn't notice.
That's one reason I'm not sure the six-monthly format was entirely working. As Tyne says in the accompanying interview, the first one was good in that it caught us up on what was happening in their lives. But I don't think that works as a regular formula. Unlike weekly episodes, they're too far apart to flow directly into one another but too close together for their lives to have changed markedly in between. On the other hand, completely self-contained, probably mostly procedural, stories would not have been worthy of the characters.
In her interview, Tyne Daly expresses regret that there was no proper series finale. She says that they all knew that it was the final season but Barney couldn't accept it. I've been thinking that a novel tying up that cliffhanger and explaining how Chris came to be working for the DA would be something I'd like to read.
I'm going to contradict myself here. On reviewing, the first two movies and to an extent the third form a continuous thread. The last now seems the most self-contained - perhaps giving an idea of what an ongoing movie series might have looked like. Apart from an early reference to a maturing joint investment being the last vestige of Chris's marriage, there is no baggage from the past or portent of the future. Even though it's not intended as a finale, I found it an oddly pleasing ending. We're left with the picture of them still plugging away, knowing they'll keep making mistakes but they'll keep backing each other up. And that goes for Chris and Mary Beth, and for Mary Beth and Harvey as well. But I'd still like to see that one last revisit.
