Tag Archives: Robert A. Silverman

Late Night Retro Television Review: Pacific Blue 2.6 “The Enemy Within”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Tuesdays, I will be reviewing Pacific Blue, a cop show that aired from 1996 to 2000 on the USA Network!  It’s currently streaming everywhere, though I’m watching it on Tubi.

Okay, let’s do this again.

Episode 2.6 “The Enemy Within”

(Dir by Stephen L. Posey, originally aired on September 28th, 1996)

A group of masked men are breaking into the homes of wealthy Vietnamese immigrants and stealing their money and jewelry.  We are told that the men are specifically targeting the Vietnamese because Vietnamese people do not trust banks or the police.  I have no idea if that’s true or not.  I just know that the show insisted that this is true with a bizarre vehemence.  To be honest, I’m Irish-Italian-Spanish in descent and I don’t trust banks or the police either.  That said, I would be kind of offended if something bad happened to me and the cops responded by going, “Eh.  It’s because she’s Irish-Italian-Spanish, what can you do?”

Kelly Hu, who is not Vietnamese, plays Wendy Trang, the granddaughter of a Vietnamese couple of have been robbed.  Her grandfather does not want to talk to the police so Wendy instead talks to her grandfather and then meets with TC to tell him what her grandfather told her.  From what Wendy tells him (which I think would be considered hearsay in a court of law), TC decides that only one of the thieves is Vietnamese and that the head of the robbery crew is probably an American who served in Vietnam and who harbors resentment towards immigrants.  Seriously, he figures that out from just having one conversation.

(Actually, maybe it was Palermo who figured it out.  Once they get on their bikes and put on their helmets, Palermo and TC are pretty much indistinguishable.)

TC recruits a psychic named Leslie Quint (Ken Weiler) to handle a knife that was left behind at the scene and to pick up on whatever psychic residue has been left behind.  Chris smirks and calls the guy a fraud because, two seasons is, the writers still haven’t bothered to give Chris a personality beyond being bitchy.  The psychic not only reveals that the leader of the gang is a big white guy but he also tells Chris that she needs to go to the dentist because she has a cavity.  (Ewwww!  Brush your teeth, weirdo!)  He also tells Cory that her never-before mentioned brother is involved in some trouble.

The psychic’s right!  Peter McNamara (William Bumiller), Cory’s brother, is a corrupt narcotics cop!

Anyway, things worked out.  The bag guys were captured.  Cory realized her brother wasn’t perfect.  Chris learned a lesson about dismissing secret powers.  TC smirked in that oddly humorless way of his.  As Palermo, Rick Rossovich seemed to be begging someone to remember that he had been in both Top Gun and The Terminator before allowing himself to get sucked into the world of Pacific Blue.

Along with Kelly Hu, this episode featured Cronenberg favorite Robert A. Silverman, playing an eccentric on the beach.  It’s always nice to see Silverman!

Otherwise, this was another stupid episode.  At some point, these characters are going to have to develop personalities beyond riding bikes and getting annoyed, right?

 

Late Night Retro Television Review: Friday the 13th: The Series 3.7 “Hate On Your Dial”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Fridays, I will be reviewing Friday the 13th: The Series, a show which ran in syndication from 1987 to 1990. The entire series can be found on YouTube!

This week, Johnny screws up, making the type of mistake that Ryan never would have!

Episode 3.7 “Hate On Your Dial”

(Dir by Allan Eastman, originally aired on November 6th, 1989)

This week’s cursed antique is an old car radio from 1954.  Smear it with the blood of someone who has just died and the car will transport you back to …. 1954.  That seems like an oddly specific curse and a kind of pointless one.  What if the car radio ends up in the possession of someone who doesn’t care about 1954?

(And, to make clear, Jack does specifically state that the curse involves going back to 1954.)

The car radio does end up in the possession of Ray Pierce (Michael Rhoades), a racist auto mechanic who uses the car to go back to 1954 so that he can hang out with his father in Mississippi.  His father (Martin Doyle) is a member of the Klan, along with his friend, Joe (played, in an early performance, by Henry Czerny).  The 1954 scenes are filmed in black-and-white.  When the show travels back 1954, the first thing we see is an “I Like Ike” billboard, featuring Dwight Eisenhower and a Confederate flag.  Obviously, someone in the show’s Canadian writer’s room didn’t know who supported segregation in 50s and who didn’t.  There was a political party wrapping itself in the Confederate flag in 1950s Mississippi but it wasn’t the Republicans and their candidate wasn’t Dwight Eisenhower.

This episode features Johnny making another one of his trademark mistakes, this time selling the cursed radio to Ray’s “slow” brother, Archie (played by Cronenberg regular Robert A. Silverman).  Only after Johnny sells it does he realize it was probably cursed.  Micki yells at him for not checking the manifest before selling it.  Then Jack yells at him too.  Jack remains angry with him for nearly the entire episode.  It’s understandable that Jack would be upset but then again, maybe they shouldn’t have left inexperienced Johnny alone in the shop in the first place.  Maybe they shouldn’t even be selling antiques at all.  That would definitely solve the problem.

Anyway, this episode featured some of the worst Southern accents that I’ve ever heard and it also featured a cursed objects that didn’t make much sense.  Johnny learned an important lesson about being careful about selling things and I guess that’s a good thing.  That said, Ryan never would have made that mistake!

Late Night Retro Television Review: Friday the 13th 1.12 “Faith Healer”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a new feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Fridays, I will be reviewing Friday the 13th, a show which ran in syndication from 1987 to 1990. The show can be found on YouTube!

This week, David Cronenberg directs a story about a cursed glove.

Episode 1.12 “Faith Healer”

(Dir by David Cronenberg, originally aired on February 8th, 1988)

After being absent for the last few episodes, Jack has returned to the antique shop and he’s back just in time to investigate a faith healer named Stewart Fishoff (Miguel Fernandes).

Fishoff started his career as a phony evangelist, one who was exposed by one of Jack’s friends, Jerry Scott (Robert A. Silverman).  However, Fishoff is back and now, it appears that he truly does have the power to heal the sick.  Jack can’t help but notice that Fishoff is now wearing a white glove, one that was purchased from the store.  The glove can take away someone’s illness but then it then passes on that illness to the next person that it touches.  With Micki busy researching the store’s history and Ryan suffering from a cold, Jack pays a visit to Jerry to plot how to get back the glove.

The problem is that Jerry wants the glove for himself and he’s willing to kill not only Fishoff but also Jack to get it.

Faith Healer was directed by David Cronenberg, one of the many prominent Canadian horror filmmakers who directed an episode or two of this show.  Not surprisingly, the episode is full of visually striking images, from Fishoff’s church and the member of his cult to the scenes of suddenly sickened skin erupting and then rotting away.  Indeed, if you watched this episode and somehow missed the directorial credit, you would still be able to guess that it came from the mind of David Cronenberg.  It’s full of moody Cronenbergian images and themes, as the rational skepticism of Jerry goes to war with the faith of Fishoff’s cult and both turn out to be equally destructive.  A good deal of this episode focused on showing how both Fishoff and Jerry were seduced by the cursed glove and its promise of power.  If you’ve ever wondered why everyone on this show is so quick to use the antiques for evil, this episode seems to suggest that the antiques are a bit like a powerful drug.  Once you give in to the temptation, the addiction quickly follows.

This episode was well-acted by both Cronenberg regular Robert A. Silverman and Chris Wiggins.  Silverman turns Jerry into a compelling villain, one who falls victim to the same dark magic that he previously made a career out of debunking.  This episode ends with Jack in a particularly dark place and Chris Wiggins does a great job of capturing Jack’s disillusionment.  As Jack points out, all of his friends are either evil or dead or both!  This episode explores the pain that comes from both owning the antiques and tracking them down.

Next week: Micki and Ryan travel in time to pursue a vampire!