Jim Thorburn – Through the Shattered Lens

Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Sunday, I will be reviewing the Canadian series, Degrassi: The Next Generation, which aired from 2001 to 2015! The series can be streamed on YouTube and Tubi.

If you’re a fan of the Emma Nelson death stare, this episode is for you. Emma spends the entire episode giving Sean the death stare.

Episode 3.13 “This Charming Man”

(Dir by Stefan Scaini, originally aired on December 10th, 2003)

Emma says she’s ready to move on from Sean, and for her, that means dating Chris (Daniel Keith Morrison). Chris is happy to finally be with Emma, but it soon becomes obvious that she’s not done being obsessed with Sean. Convinced that Sean and Jay are responsible for stealing both Snake’s laptop and the school’s DVD player, Emma tells Mr. Raditch that she and Chris saw Sean and Jay putting the DVD player into Jay’s car. When Sean learns he’s been fingered by an anonymous tipster, he figures out it was Emma. “You know I’m on probation!” he shouts at her. Raditch tells Sean to calm down. Sean tells Raditch to go to hell. Sean gets two months of morning detention, while Emma smiles.

This is a good example of how Emma is never really held responsible for any of her actions. The truth of the matter is that Jay and Sean are the ones stealing stuff from the school. However, Emma still lied about seeing Jay and Sean with the DVD player. Chris calls Emma out for lying and breaks up with her. After Emma apologizes to him (but not to Jay, Sean, or Mr. Raditch), Chris takes her back. Chris doesn’t seem too worried that Emma literally tried to send her last boyfriend to jail.

From the start of this season to her final appearance on the show, the perpetually self-righteous Emma really did become insufferable. Fortunately, this episode has an amusing B-plot in which Spinner, Paige, Hazel, and Jimmy all take driver’s education together. The problem is that their instructor, Mr. Falcone (Jim Thorburn), is a total hunk, and Paige gets so distracted by his presence in the car that she runs over several orange cones. Spinner, meanwhile, gets so jealous that when it’s his turn to drive, he runs over a cardboard cutout of a family trying to cross the road.

“Really, Spin!?” Paige says from the back seat. “A family!?”

Spinner then accidentally crashes into a parked car. No license for him!

Oh, this plot made me smile. I had such a hard time with driver’s ed, and it was mostly because the instructor wouldn’t stop talking. “Both hands on the steering wheel.” “Watch the road.” “You’re on the wrong side of the street.” “YIELD!” Bleh!

I actually came home from driving school in tears once. My mom immediately went down to the school and yelled at the instructor. Then the owner of the school rode with me to see if I was really as bad a driver as the instructor claimed. Her verdict was that I had a lazy eye, which I definitely don’t. Anyway, the important thing was that I eventually got my license and now I speed everywhere.

Where was I? Oh yeah, Degrassi. Emma’s the worst, but at least this episode featured some quality time with Paige and Spinner.

(Lisa recently discovered that she only has about 8 hours of space left on her DVR! It turns out that she’s been recording movies from July and she just hasn’t gotten around to watching and reviewing them yet. So, once again, Lisa is cleaning out her DVR! She is going to try to watch and review 52 movies by Thanksgiving, November 24th! Will she make it? Keep checking the site to find out!)

I recorded Who Killed My Husband off of the Lifetime Movie Network on October 16th.

Who Killed My Husband opens with Detective Douglas Howell (Jim Thorburn) on top of the world! He’s recently married a fellow detective, Sophie (Andrea Bowen). He’s got a teenage daughter named Chloe (Yasmeene Ball) and Chloe may have extremely severe asthma and she may be having a hard time adjusting to her new stepmother but everything’s going to be okay, right? After all, it’s her birthday! All Doug has to do is drive out to the local bakery and pick up her birthday cake!

Doug’s life is so perfect that I’m surprised that he doesn’t have a personalized license plates that read, “Live4Eva.” Because, seriously, when everything’s going this perfect, there’s no way that some sudden tragedy could occur, right?

Well, if that was the case, there wouldn’t be many Lifetime movies. And, just because of this movie’s title, we already know what’s going to happen to Doug before he even steps into that bakery…

Doug picks up his cake but then he notices that a mysterious man in a hoodie is loitering inside the bakery. “Hey,” Doug says, “this place is closed.” (That’s not an exact quote and no, I’m not going to rewatch the damn film just to get the exact quote. It’s close enough.) The man turns around, draws a gun, and shoots Doug!

TRAGEDY!

Anyway, Sophie spends a while on desk duty but eventually, her brother — who also happens to be her boss — gives her an undercover assignment. Apparently, someone is embezzling money from the local cybertech company. Sophie’s given a job at the company and she’s also given an office! Fortunately, everyone who works at the company is always having incriminating conversations right outside her office. That should make it easy to solve the case. Except…

That’s right, there’s a twist! First off, the owner of the company is mysteriously blown up and his wife doesn’t seem to care. Sophie finds herself attracted to a coworker but wonders if she can trust him. Then, when she’s climbing a wall as a part of team-building exercise, she nearly plunges to her death! There’s more than just embezzlement going on at this company and somehow, it’s related to her husband’s death.

Does that sound complicated? It really isn’t. This is pretty much a typical Lifetime film and you’ll be able to guess who the bad guy is pretty easily. Probably the most interesting thing about the mystery subplot is that it gives us a chance to view Lifetime’s version of what it’s like to work for Google. You thought that the companies portrayed in Silicon Valley were cut throat? Just check out Who Killed My Husband!

I did, however, like the film’s other subplot. After her father’s death, Chloe resents her mother and Sophie struggles to connect with her stepdaughter. Chloe is taken seriously ill during the investigation and Sophie has to balance solving the mystery with taking care of her daughter. That was sweet. I have asthma and I was a rebellious teenager so I related to Chloe.

Otherwise, this was pretty much a typical and kind of forgettable little Lifetime film. If you enjoy Lifetime films, this is a pleasant little time waster. If you’re not into Lifetime movies, Who Killed My Husband probably won’t change your mind.