Episode Report Card Chuck: C- | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT The Naked and the Dead
By Chuck | Season 5 | Episode 1 | Aired on 01.05.2002
Schillinger refuses, but Pete keeps at him, reminding him that he once asked Said to represent him, that he came to her looking for help in making sense of his life, that this will help him find peace, and that he can express what he is really feeling inside. I feel rage, says Schillinger. But, says Pete, you're smart enough to know that there's no comfort in rage and that rage destroys the soul. Crafty nun. She then moves on to Said's pod, as Beecher watches from the card table, and soon emerges with a thumbs-up.
And so Sister Pete's interaction begins -- Sister Pete makes her opening remarks, about understanding the skepticism with which they approach this summit and her appreciation for their willingness to try. As Said and Schillinger exchange words, Pete jumps in to remind them of the rules: each gets a chance to speak his mind, starting with Beecher, who admits feeling responsibility for what happened, since Said was defending him from Schillinger and Robson's tormenting when the stabbing occurred. He believes that Schillinger was justified in his happiness that Beecher's parole was denied, and that Said was justified in coming to his defense. Schillinger asks if he'd have been justified in stabbing Said if the tables were turned; Beecher says yes, which Schillinger thinks is "horseshit." According to Beecher (who desperately needs a haircut and is stuck delivering lame lines like "You'll want Sister Pete to send me to the state asylum for this"), this is so because Schillinger and Said are exactly alike (why, he is crazy!) -- they're strong men who have powerful visions, who want the best for their people, and who believe their people deserve full and satisfying lives, and on and on and on until he sputters to a stop. Pete steps in to end today's session -- after approximately one minute, which seems a bit counterproductive, but then, these guys do have nothing but time on their hands and can drag this kind of thing out interminably, a minute each day -- and calls for some introspection before tomorrow's sixty-second powwow.
Hill's talking about rapists, pedophiles, male hustlers -- the sex criminal litany -- as naked men mill about behind him. A much better choice than the fey costumes. Men who have turned sex into a crime deserve to be punished, says Hill, but sex is not always love, yet love itself can get a man incarcerated -- just look at Oscar Wilde (and it's costume time again, as Hill rubs a feather along the lips of another man, lisps about lips against lips being more lethal than a gun, and turns the back of his head to the camera as he leans in for a non-kiss with feather boy). I've now seen more dicks in thirty seconds than I have in all of the "respectable" television and movies of a lifetime. Bravo.