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<blockquote data-quote="Taylor Bennett Jr." data-source="post: 355582" data-attributes="member: 2740">I feel like the whole Jason/Jack/Jamie thing, while not technically a retcon, was unnecessary and messed with the perfect simplicity of the Jock/Digger origin story just enough to be annoying.&nbsp;&nbsp; Maybe if the new characters had been more compelling it wouldn&#039;t bug me so much, but for the &quot;replacement hot girl&quot; from Three&#039;s Company, who was such a hit that they killed her off twice and barely mentioned her again?&nbsp; Jack had promise, but they kind of fizzled him out during the Dream Season.&nbsp; He hangs out with Jenna for a few weeks, never even kissing her that we know of (although maybe it wasn&#039;t just anti-Dack backstage bias and his style was to skip that step and go straight to the unveiling of the Taj?), and when she understandably turns him away, it being only a few months after the death of her childhood love and fiancee, he acts like he&#039;d been unjustly spurned from the love affair of the century.&nbsp; I don&#039;t think he ever regained his momentum after that, even with Grace and Martinique and all that.&nbsp; Did he even do anything in the next season?The &#039;who really owns Ewing Oil&#039; storyline was OK, but not on the level of the JR/Bobby contest and I thought the Jock/Digger feud was more interesting when the truth of what had happened was ambiguous.&nbsp; The only outside perspective we&#039;d gotten from anyone else who was actually there was from Sam Culver (something like &quot;I guess you did about as well as you could, Jock, but I could have done it without making an enemy out of him&quot;), and Sam was hardly a 100% trustworthy, unbiased observer.The &quot;real power is something you TAKE&quot; speech is much more interesting when there&#039;s the possibility that it&#039;s something of an unintended confession - &quot;you&#039;re damn right I took Digger&#039;s half - it&#039;s MINE!&quot;&nbsp; Otherwise it becomes just perhaps Jim Davis&#039;s last full-strength scene and fodder for the crowd on YouTube who seem to think fictional characters like Jock and Don Corleone of the Godfather are real-life sages dispensing the alpha male wisdom of the ages.If I had to guess, based on what we&#039;d seen prior to Jason and the sanctification of Jock, perhaps Jock was tired of Digger&#039;s irresponsibilty and was preparing to buy him out (maybe they had just an understood partnership and nothing on paper?)&nbsp; When a drunk Digger saw that Jock had put only his name on the claim, he flipped out and tried to kill Jock, who had indeed been planning to pay Digger at least for that strike.&nbsp; That was enough to change Jock&#039;s mind on the payment, and the two of them being so stubborn, they never talked it out after cooling down (although Ewing 23 must have happened years after the blowup, right?)By the time we have Donna Reed looking at an old photo like &quot;oh, of course that&#039;s Jason!&quot;, and we learn Jock had singlehandedly launched the civil rights movement in the US shortly before nearly preventing the Holocaust, some of the magic of the saga had been lost.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Taylor Bennett Jr., post: 355582, member: 2740"] I feel like the whole Jason/Jack/Jamie thing, while not technically a retcon, was unnecessary and messed with the perfect simplicity of the Jock/Digger origin story just enough to be annoying. Maybe if the new characters had been more compelling it wouldn't bug me so much, but for the "replacement hot girl" from Three's Company, who was such a hit that they killed her off twice and barely mentioned her again? Jack had promise, but they kind of fizzled him out during the Dream Season. He hangs out with Jenna for a few weeks, never even kissing her that we know of (although maybe it wasn't just anti-Dack backstage bias and his style was to skip that step and go straight to the unveiling of the Taj?), and when she understandably turns him away, it being only a few months after the death of her childhood love and fiancee, he acts like he'd been unjustly spurned from the love affair of the century. I don't think he ever regained his momentum after that, even with Grace and Martinique and all that. Did he even do anything in the next season? The 'who really owns Ewing Oil' storyline was OK, but not on the level of the JR/Bobby contest and I thought the Jock/Digger feud was more interesting when the truth of what had happened was ambiguous. The only outside perspective we'd gotten from anyone else who was actually there was from Sam Culver (something like "I guess you did about as well as you could, Jock, but I could have done it without making an enemy out of him"), and Sam was hardly a 100% trustworthy, unbiased observer. The "real power is something you TAKE" speech is much more interesting when there's the possibility that it's something of an unintended confession - "you're damn right I took Digger's half - it's MINE!" Otherwise it becomes just perhaps Jim Davis's last full-strength scene and fodder for the crowd on YouTube who seem to think fictional characters like Jock and Don Corleone of the Godfather are real-life sages dispensing the alpha male wisdom of the ages. If I had to guess, based on what we'd seen prior to Jason and the sanctification of Jock, perhaps Jock was tired of Digger's irresponsibilty and was preparing to buy him out (maybe they had just an understood partnership and nothing on paper?) When a drunk Digger saw that Jock had put only his name on the claim, he flipped out and tried to kill Jock, who had indeed been planning to pay Digger at least for that strike. That was enough to change Jock's mind on the payment, and the two of them being so stubborn, they never talked it out after cooling down (although Ewing 23 must have happened years after the blowup, right?) By the time we have Donna Reed looking at an old photo like "oh, of course that's Jason!", and we learn Jock had singlehandedly launched the civil rights movement in the US shortly before nearly preventing the Holocaust, some of the magic of the saga had been lost. [/QUOTE]

Verification

Who played JR Ewing?