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Message: <blockquote data-quote="James from London" data-source="post: 184157" data-attributes="member: 22">25 Apr 91: KNOTS LANDING: The Last One Out v. 26 Apr 91: DALLAS: The Decline and Fall of the Ewing Empire... aka the 300th episode of KNOTS versus the penultimate episode of DALLAS.When DALLAS hit its tricentennial, it marked the occasion by trapping JR and Bobby in the Ewing Oil elevator overnight. For this episode, KNOTS does something similar — it confines most of its characters to the top floor of the Sumner Group for an evening.The given reason, a security precaution following “a very localised fire on the third floor”, serves the same dramatic purpose as the hurricane in “Wedding Bell Blues” (DALLAS Season 11) and the thunderstorm in “Stormy Weather” (FALCON CREST Season 7) — it’s an external event that forces all the regulars into close proximity.A comparison can also be made with KNOTS’ 200th episode, “Noises Everywhere”, which likewise brought everyone together — but whereas that instalment found ways of exploring familiar characters anew, this one mostly goes over old ground. The ep also seems intent on demonstrating how smartly self-aware it is: Mort makes another gag about rushing home to watch LA Law, Anne and Claudia have two more superfluous “thought bubble” scenes, and Gary becomes the latest person to make the disingenuous observation that “this is like living in a soap opera” — which was funny the first time someone in Soap Land said it, either Eric Fairgate or Maggie Gioberti, back in the mid-eighties — but has become progressively less so ever since. The highlight of the episode is a clash between Karen and Linda in which Karen gets on her moral high horse as only she can. “You are a hateful person,” she tells her occasional daughter-in-law. “You think people will just put up with you and not notice your duplicity, your hypocrisy … You’re just plain manipulative.” Much as Abby used to, Linda observes Karen’s indignation with detached amusement before moving in for the kill. “Exactly how wicked can I be if both of your sons fell in love with me?” she asks. “What does that say about them? Either they like strong-willed women like me, like you, or they’d do anything, including marry someone as awful as you think I am, to get out from under your thumb.”Linda’s words hit a nerve and Karen spends the rest of the episode doubting herself as a mother. After a season spent watching from the sidelines while Mack got all the juicy stuff, this affords her the opportunity to reassert herself as the KNOTS Everywoman. After all, what parent watching wouldn’t be able to identify with her current predicament? “Michael is not tied to your apron strings,” Mack assures her. “But sometimes I act as if he is!” she realises. “I love him and I want what’s best for him, but I’ve got to trust him … I can’t make choices for him.”A week after James Beaumont turned his back on the oil business to start a new life in Nowheresville with Debra Lynn and their son, Michael Fairgate decides that he too has had enough of climbing the corporate ladder and quits the Sumner Group. “I’m gonna take some time off, read … I do know that I’m not gonna work here and I’m not gonna see Linda again,” he tells his mother who is as relieved by his decision as JR was dismayed by James’s.After being dumped by James last week, Michelle got drunk and woke up to find herself married to Cliff Barnes. There’s another wedding this week on KNOTS, just as unexpected, but at the same time inevitable (indeed, the show has been teasing us with the possibility of it for the past seven years). While everyone else is stuck in the Sumner building, Val and Gary are wed on the spur of the moment. Gary gets a little teary, which is sweet, but otherwise, it feels oddly anti-climactic.Arguably, Steve Brewer and Paige are KNOTS’ two most intriguing characters at present, but in this ep, they are placed in a conventional romcom “opposites attract” scenario whereby each spends the episode bitching about the other (Steve to Kate, Paige to Mack) before inevitably facing up to their mutual attraction. Admittedly, the scene where they finally kiss is a bit sexy.Whereas the vibe of this week’s KNOTS is reflective, DALLAS is all action. From the moment Michelle is carted off to jail in the opening scene (after murdering The Kidnapper Formerly Known as Sheila Foley on the cardboard patio), the race is on between JR and Cliff as to which of them will get their hands on her share of Ewing Oil. From behind bars, Michelle (clad in grey prison smock and hardly any makeup, she’s never looked lovelier), manages to outwit both men by selling each of them fifty per cent of the company for what she paid for the entire thing — and she also manages to wangle her freedom into the bargain. Not bad for a money-hungry little nobody. Sure, she ends up miserable and alone, but also very, very rich — which in Soap Land terms, counts as a major victory.The scene where Cliff and JR simultaneously realise they’re equal partners in Ewing Oil is very funny (and not a thought bubble in sight). That would be a satisfying enough conclusion to their story, but then JR is approached to become Chairman of Board of West Star. He agrees but is obliged to sell his half of Ewing Oil to avoid a conflict of interest. As he makes the deal with Cliff, he rationalises the decision thusly: “This is not Ewing Oil anymore. Ewing Oil is wherever I am and that is not in a partnership with you.” However, he realises too late that he’s been set up — something to do voting rights, which I don’t quite understand — by Carter McKay … and Dusty Farlow!While we get a nice little cameo from Dusty (“So long, JR. Give my regards to Sue Ellen. Oh that’s right, I forgot — she dumped you”), the memory of Lilimae is also evoked when Val delivers a pretty decent impression of Julie Harris as she and Gary take a trip down memory lane.Meanwhile, Sly has a surprise of her own for JR: “I’m getting married … He’s an engineer in the oil business.” Whether he was busy engineering during her and JR’s recent one night stand isn’t clear. More pertinently, she’s off to the North Sea with him. JR assumes Phyllis will take over her duties, but Phyllis has other ideas: “JR, I’ve been waiting to tell you this for a long time — Hell would have to freeze over before I’d ever work for you.” As exit lines go, that’s not bad.While almost everyone on KNOTS is trapped inside the Sumner building, almost everyone on DALLAS is running out on JR: Miss Ellie, James, Jimmy, Sly, Phyllis, even John Ross, who calls his daddy from England to tell him, “I’m not coming back to Dallas ... You don’t have any rights over me so why don’t you play with James and that stupid baby?” The Ewingverse’s teetotal tycoons each fall off the wagon this week. Greg uses the situation at the Sumner Group as an excuse to break open “my earthquake supply kit, in which I had this beautiful bottle of Beaujolais … Here’s to being trapped in a building with a beautiful woman,” he says, clinking glasses with Linda. Meanwhile, Sly finds JR drowning his sorrows in his office. “How many bottles do you have hidden in here?” she asks him angrily. “947,” he snaps before ordering her to get out and stay out. While Greg gets tipsy enough to consider “addressing the troops” while wearing Linda’s dress, JR ends up drunkenly contemplating oblivion as he cradles his father’s gun. The same gun that Digger Barnes used to shoot Hutch McKinney with in 1952? I’d like to think so.And this week’s Top 2 are …1 (2) DALLAS2 (1) KNOTS LANDING</blockquote>

Verification: Who played JR Ewing?