The Search

Bobby Southworth

Bobby Southworth

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What a wonderful episode and tribute to Jim Davis. It moves me whenever I watch it. Something that I've noticed over the years was that out of all the characters that had flashbacks of Jock, Lucy did not. It seems only fitting that being Jock's granddaughter, she would have had one. At first, I thought that maybe it was because they never really had a moving scene together, but..... what about when Jock decided at the last minute to go to Gary and Val's wedding? "I believe I have a son getting married today". That would have been a perfect memory for Lucy. Any thoughts?
 
Snarky Oracle!

Snarky Oracle!

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On the DVD, they've removed some of the score -- when Ellie wakes up and goes downstairs to the dining room, has her final flashback, and then they boys return home. The music doesn't return until JR goes out back and looks at Jock's lion medallion and gets his freeze frame.

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I actually like the silence as Ellie wakes up an goes downstairs, but the score needs to resume as she goes into that last "I have the rest of my life to listen to you" flashback.

It's one of DALLAS' most important Broughton compositions.

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James from London

James from London

International Treasure
Bobby Southworth said:
what about when Jock decided at the last minute to go to Gary and Val's wedding? "I believe I have a son getting married today". That would have been a perfect memory for Lucy.
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That scene wouldn't quite work as a memory because Lucy wasn't present for it. She was deliberately kept in the dark about Gary and Val's reconciliation so she could turn up in Knots Landing asking, "What the ...?"

I think the overall theme of The Search, and of all those flashbacks, was "putting differences aside in times of crisis to come together as a family" aka "Ewings Unite". (If I recall correctly, there are a couple of times, as Ellie is exiting a scene, her back to camera, where they dub in an extra line of her dialogue just to underline that theme. As she's leaving JR's bedroom after asking Sue Ellen to stay on at the ranch until the men return, you hear her disembodied voice saying, "The family should stick together when there's trouble.") However, Jock and Lucy never really shared any scenes pertinent to that theme so there's nothing that significant of theirs to flashback to. So I imagine when they were assembling the episode, deciding which clips to use and which to leave out, that Lucy's weren't considered a priority.
 
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Bobby Southworth

Bobby Southworth

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I agree that it's disappointing that the score has been removed on the DVD. That last flashback Miss Ellie had was very touching, and the original score helped convey that emotion. I also have to say that when the boys start explaining to Miss Ellie that they couldn't find Jock, and J.R. just walks away in the middle of the conversation, and walks outside and looks up at the sky. That was one of the most touching, heartbreaking moments of the series. Very well done by Larry Hagman.
 
Snarky Oracle!

Snarky Oracle!

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Bobby Southworth said:
I agree that it's disappointing that the score has been removed on the DVD. That last flashback Miss Ellie had was very touching, and the original score helped convey that emotion. I also have to say that when the boys start explaining to Miss Ellie that they couldn't find Jock, and J.R. just walks away in the middle of the conversation, and walks outside and looks up at the sky. That was one of the most touching, heartbreaking moments of the series. Very well done by Larry Hagman.
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But, again, I do like its removal when Ellie wakes up, recalls Jock sleeping, and then goes downstairs -- the new-found silence actually makes those scenes more effective... But the score should be reinstated once she sits down at the dining table.
 
Bobby Southworth

Bobby Southworth

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Wow. I guess it's been too long since I viewed the episode where Gary and Val got married. I thought for sure that Lucy was there. My mistake.
 
Billy Wall

Billy Wall

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Lucy’s relationship with her grandfather was complicated. She most certainly loved him. Jock and Ellie raised her. But as she told Sue Ellen, Pam and Donna. All your men have fond memories of Jock. What about her father? What does he have?

A scene they could have had with Lucy and Jock was a scene where Jock scolded her and it drove Lucy to run away.
 
Barbara Fan

Barbara Fan

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The Search is a wonderful epiosde, in my top 10 Dallas favs and a very fitting tribute to Jim Davis
Im sure he would be proud of it and all the cast were excellent acting it out.

However I think that WB had no right to change episodes and that the very beautiful background score should have remained in. They should have kept it as it is and that how it was at the time shown in 1982,

In the DVD tapes i watch it first in English then i watch the scenes from where Miss Ellie is in bed and on wards in French as they did keep the score in and its wonderful, poignant and very moving ending with the photo of Jim and his timeline.
 
Seaviewer

Seaviewer

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Snarky's Ghost said:
On the DVD, they've removed some of the score -- when Ellie wakes up and goes downstairs to the dining room, has her final flashback, and then they boys return home. The music doesn't return until JR goes out back and looks at Jock's lion medallion and gets his freeze frame.
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What would be the reason for that? It can't be copyright issues - I presume the score was purpose-written. Technical fault or did someone make a conscious choice to remove it?
 
Snarky Oracle!

Snarky Oracle!

Telly Talk Supreme
Seaviewer said:
What would be the reason for that? It can't be copyright issues - I presume the score was purpose-written. Technical fault or did someone make a conscious choice to remove it?
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Someone somewhere must have decided that "less is more" (which is sometimes true, but they took it too far ---- they also removed the music from the scene in which Sue Ellen caught JR with Holly, also a mistake). Someone probably got permission from somebody else.
 
Billy Wall

Billy Wall

Telly Talk Dream Maker
lbf522 said:
I liked "The Search" it was nice tribute to Jim Davis as Jock. Shame the writers on Dallas TNT could not do the same with JR when Larry Hagman passed.
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It wouldn’t have been the same. But they should have come up with a better storyline.
 
Snarky Oracle!

Snarky Oracle!

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lbf522 said:
I liked "The Search" it was nice tribute to Jim Davis as Jock. Shame the writers on Dallas TNT could not do the same with JR when Larry Hagman passed.
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Billy Wall said:
It wouldn’t have been the same. But they should have come up with a better storyline.
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I actually thought JR's Masterpiece was one of the best things nuDALLAS ever did.

Mostly, though, nuDALLAS didn't work for the same reasons later-oldDALLAS didn't work. They got away from the core family dynamic... Audiences like well-cast stories with family skeletons and buried treasure (even literally), and whenever DALLAS (or the other shows) got away from that, the series tended to falter. Later-oldDALLAS and nuDALLAS didn't adhere to that concept, disowned earlier details, and so the audience loses interest.

You can't help actor defections and whatnot, but when a show starts looking too outward, such that the past seems to have been lost, it's just a matter of time until it's all gone.
 
Kenny Coyote

Kenny Coyote

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Snarky's Ghost said:
I actually thought JR's Masterpiece was one of the best things nuDALLAS ever did.

Mostly, though, nuDALLAS didn't work for the same reasons later-oldDALLAS didn't work. They got away from the core family dynamic... Audiences like well-cast stories with family skeletons and buried treasure (even literally), and whenever DALLAS (or the other shows) got away from that, the series tended to falter. Later-oldDALLAS and nuDALLAS didn't adhere to that concept, disowned earlier details, and so the audience loses interest.

You can't help actor defections and whatnot, but when a show starts looking too outward, such that the past seems to have been lost, it's just a matter of time until it's all gone.
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I think JR's Masterpiece was the best story TNT Dallas had too.

TNT just changed history whenever they felt like it. We know that John Ross and Christopher didn't grow up with Elena, and we know Theresa was the Ewing's maid - not Elena's mother. We know Cliff didn't adopt a kid from the Middle East, at least not when they said he did.

They brought in Cally for the funeral, but she never mentioned her son and nobody asked her about him. They brought Ray in, briefly, and Bobby never asked him about Lucas. Ray never mentioned Margaret either. That didn't make sense.
 
L

lbf522

Telly Talk Well-Known Member
Yes TNT did change history which did not add to the show. Dallas is supposed to be about the trials and tribulations of the Ewing Family not this never before mention Ramos Family and watching them walking all over the Ewings. Making Cliff this monster was awful to watch and if what I have read that Ken Kercheval was not coming back to the show is true, I don't blame him. They destroyed his character. And don't get me started on what they did with John Ross. They made him a constant loser. Everything he did blew up in his face. Also, making him a cheater was laziness on part of the writers. Of all of JR's personality traits to give to John Ross, they could have come up with something better.
 
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