Howdy, y’all. We are back this week with “Murder, She Wrote” season 6, episode 1: “Appointment in Athens.” This is not a bookend episode, so we have the lovely JB Fletcher being shoved out of her comfort zone yet again by Michael Hagarty, MI6 agent. Spoilers ahead!
(Speaking of lovely, JB’s outfits are fantastic in this episode, and I do not say it sarcastically when I say that the ’80s matching trends are great for her. Like seriously, she has earrings that match the golden buttons on her blue linen jacket. Who does that nowadays? I wish I had the focus of those stylists on MSW. I love her party outfit, Pamela’s outfit, and Madge Scofield’s hair and jewelry.)
But to get back on track: To summarize the episode is difficult, because more shenanigans than usual crop up here. Michael is in Paris on a mission, natch, but does not have a fake wife because she has come down with appendicitis. Coincidentally, JB is leaving the hotel at the same time, and her plane to Cairo is delayed. Michael convinces her to go to Athens with him, since he has an extra ticket, and she can take a short flight from there to Cairo, and they can catch up on old times (never mind that she should have hightailed it when she saw him). Once in Athens, the reservation that should have been made for JB is nowhere to be found, and abruptly, so is Michael. Coincidentally, Harold Baines from a huge company, also coincidentally a huge fan of hers, happens to be there and offers to let her use a room at the hotel because his company keeps a hotel room saved for whoever in the company needs it (side note: he mentions first class hotel rooms. Do hotel rooms actually work that way? I know planes and trains do, with first and second class, but hotels?) Regardless, JB quickly learns that she has been flim-flammed, once again, into posing as Mrs. Reardon, Michael’s wife, in order to free Laddie Fairchild, a fellow agent, from Greek kidnappers. In order to provide more confusion, Pamela, the actress who was supposed to pose as Michael’s wife, only has gastritis (or a failed audition), and flew 36 hours to get to Athens. We have a very awkward scene with Mr. Popadopalous, the middleman for the kidnappers, who tries seducing JB while ascertaining that she is wealthy enough to pay the ransom. She manages to fool him, while looking so awkward that anyone with a brain should have been able to figure out she was lying. Then Michael and JB get back to the hotel to find that Pamela has been murdered, thus providing the requisite murder for the episode.
Okay, so let me start off the review part, so to speak, by saying that I have a love-hate relationship with the Michael Hagarty episodes. The first two, “Widow Weep for Me” and “One White Rose for Murder,” are good. In the first, Michael is retired, and meets JB by chance. The second, again by chance, but it’s less madcap spy story than he’s shoved into a bad situation and needs her help. In the third, “JB is for Jailbird,” he deliberately gives her a ride while completing part of a mission, thereby putting her in danger, landing her in jail, and then hauling her into shenanigans by his own highhandedness at assuming that she’ll be okay with it eventually. This one, he again meets her by chance, but he doesn’t even give her the dignity of explaining the situation and asking her to help. He simply take advantage of her flight situation, shoves her into danger with no warning, and expects her to float and be okay. I’m sorry, but the more episodes I see with him, the more I want to scream at the TV for JB to run, cut off ties with this dude, and never look back. He understands her enough to know that she’ll help in the middle of a situation, but doesn’t respect her enough to give her information ahead of time so maybe, you know, she doesn’t wind up dead. Like Pamela does. He cares enough to regret involving her after something happens, but doesn’t think through his actions before. Alec Scofield claims that a sense of humanity is “a liability in our profession.” How then is Michael so successful? I don’t understand. At all. This is why it irks me so much when JB tells him that he can’t blame himself for Pamela’s death. I’m like “Yes. Yes, he can. And maybe think a little harder next time.”
Moving on, the cast is pretty good. Mr. “My friend, I can assure you” Henryk Stuyvesant (Peter van Norden) does well as a weaselly informant, while not overselling it and making the character downright sneaky. He makes me think of Sydney Greenstreet in Casablanca, for some reason. (BTW, did anyone else notice that when he showed up at the party, he was next to a Greek (?) statue/bust that looked like him with a beard?) JB’s usual information-gathering tactics have no effect on such a professional. My only other notes for this are simply that Steve Inwood, as Sergeant Petrakas, has some eyebrow game.
The main problem that I have with this episode is that it doesn’t really work as a spy story or as a murder mystery story. The spy story doesn’t feel very convincing, as no one knows that Laddie Fairchild doesn’t have a wealthy sister. Maybe I’m looking at this from the perspective of someone in the Information Age. But this whole scheme wouldn’t work today, and I can’t see as how it would have succeeded back then, especially since Popadopalous is supposed to be an international criminal of sorts, and is so dense that he can’t realize JB is not who she’s pretending to be, much less that she doesn’t want any of his attentions. And why was there this whole kerfuffle over the time and ocation of the swap being changed, and how did Popadopalous learn about the Reardons’ trickery? This scene leads down a dead end, in my opinion, and seems more like trying to up the tension instead of aiding the story.
The murder part of the story is slightly better. Baines killed Pamela to keep her quiet, when she found him in the hotel room, looking for an incriminating cablegram. (not to mention, her reaction to an intruder was SUPER lackluster) So motive-wise, I can understand it. But the reveal… *sigh* The cablegram has information that Baines was… not involved with the kidnappers. Was in places where he MIGHT have been in contact with the kidnappers. So that’s very flimsy, which they admit. And there was a smudge on his white dinner jacket that JB originally thought was cigarette ash, but turns out to have been lipstick. (Do they look anything alike, color-wise?) So the forensic evidence points that out. But Pamela didn’t scratch or struggle with him at all? He’s such a super spy that he strangles a woman to death without crumpling his pristine white jacket, and only somehow get a lipstick smudge. He’s better than Michael! But they have to trap Baines in order to bring the case to a conclusion. Were they worried that him being a British agent might mean that they couldn’t get a conviction with just the lipstick smudge? I don’t know.
There is very little use for Madge Scofield. There’s a hint that she and Laddie Fairchild were in a relationship long ago, but why? To set her up as a red herring? There’s no point! The murder doesn’t happen until later, and she’s not involved at all. So they could have kept her out and trimmed the story better. Do they keep her just to help point out that Alec Scofield is a jerk, by making remarks about his manhood and courage? This is ostensibly a spy story, not Macbeth.
Also speaking of the plot holes, does JB just reek of a small-town tourist that the writers just have her accepting a stranger (Baines)’s offer to stay at his company’s hotel room? She tries to say no, but then just accepts. I can’t help but feel like this is too convenient for the plot, but maybe I’m just carrying my distrust of Michael over to this. And also, them in the taxi and walking around at the party while talking about a SECRET MISSION to save a kidnapped man, while Michael is a spy (!!), just seems like the height of folly. How do they think people actually get information? Taxi drivers and concierges and valets have ears, ya dingbats.
Lastly, my notes:
Lovely shot of Athens, if it actually is.
Michael’s Paris room has a beautiful telephone.
Baines has such a dismissive view of JB’s “potboilers.” How dare you.
Scofield [says] “I want you to stay on this like fog on Tower Bridge.” This sounds so made up.
Why so many menorahs in Stuyvesant’s shop?
Jess- you’re barely staying afloat as it is. Why are you sticking your nose into the “murder by a jewel thief” and stirring up trouble??? Especially with the other “Mrs. Reardon.”
Favorite quote from the episode: by Jessica Beatrice Fletcher. “Be assured, Mr. Baines, that I will do everything in my power to ensure [Michael’s] safe return… so that I can get my hands on him.”
Final scores:
Plot: 5/10. It was too split into madcap adventure and serious murder. It had potential, but I think it fell flat.
Guest Stars: 9/10. Everyone did a great job with what they were given.
General Enjoyability: Eh….. 3/10. Sorry to Michael Hagarty fans.
Solveability: On my first watch, I was going to say -3/10. After rewatching, I have to up that to 1/10. The camera had to ZOOM IN to the smudge on the jacket, and never drew attention to it. Not playing fair with that, or telling us what Michael’s conversation with London revealed.
Sorry for the long-winded rants. Have nothing else to add, other than I should have another MSW episode in two weeks, and maybe something else next week, if my schedule works. Until then, catch you on the flip side.
#murdershewrote
Random English Major Thoughts 