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Message: <blockquote data-quote="James from London" data-source="post: 238510" data-attributes="member: 22">Close Encounters (DALLAS, 15 Nov 85) v Collateral Damage (DALLAS, 18 Jul 12)If Pam’s Dream really was an attempt to turn DALLAS into a KNOTS/DYNASTY hybrid, then Close Encounters, in which the show celebrates its two-hundredth episode with a rodeo at Southfork, is probably the highpoint of that experiment. It’s certainly more expensive-looking than any episode of DYNASTY (except maybe the Pilot) and it’s inventively filmed — the camera is constantly moving, putting a fresh and surprising spin on familiar sets and locations. (Southfork looks huge.)There’s less of a sense of the traditional tight-knit Ewing family and more of a feeling of an extended community, like in the middle years of KNOTS. Besides Clayton and Ellie, and Ray and Donna, all of the characters attend the rodeo with someone other their most familiar partner — Pam is with Mark, Sue Ellen with Dusty, JR with Mandy, Jenna with Jack — which somehow makes them all seem more adult, less umbilically tied to the past. Additionally, the variety of supporting players, from Angelica Nero to Patricia Shepard, and even a cameo from real-life Governor of Texas Mark White (a post that will be fictionalised in New DALLAS to allow Sue Ellen to have a crack at it), all contribute to the sense of a wider canvas. And yet the rodeo setting still makes it feel like classic DALLAS.In terms of plot, surprisingly little happens — there’s more focus on competitive calf-roping and ladies’ barrel-racing than actual storylines — but there are some interestingly rare encounters, most notably between Pam and Jenna (their first meeting since Bobby died), and Sue Ellen and Mandy (their first meeting ever). Even by her own standards, Sue Ellen is remarkably self-absorbed in Close Encounters, but in a way that feels authentic for someone fresh out of rehab who is accustomed to taking their emotional temperature every five minutes.Collateral Damage is the first time Sue Ellen gets mean in New DALLAS — she coerces a reluctant Elena to help John Ross out with his oil shortage. Southfork may not look quite as grand as it did in Close Encounters, but it’s even more beautiful, in an autumnal sort of way. Lucy remarks that John Ross is no longer the drunk little boy she found passed out on the floor, just as Christopher is no longer the freckled-faced kid who hero-worshipped Mark Graison at the rodeo. Now the cousins are fully grown and fighting over Elena — at least until Christopher finds out Rebecca’s carrying his twins. While Close Encounters has foreign-accented femme fatale Angelica Nero taking a mysterious interest in Jack, Collateral Damage has foreign-accented femme fatale Marta Del Sol luring John Ross to her hotel room by pretending to have kidnapped Elena. Whereas Close Encounters feels impressively epic, the strength of Collateral Damage is the narrative cord getting pulled tighter and tighter around John Ross’s neck right up to the final moments of the ep when he gets taken away by the police under suspicion of Marta’s murder.And the winner is … it's very close, but Marta landing splat on top of a car wins out over Donna getting rammed by a bull … Collateral Damage[MEDIA=youtube]XogujO9Cuko[/MEDIA]</blockquote>

Verification: Who played Sue Ellen in Dallas?