Episode Report Card Erin: C+ | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Phantom of the Spy Opera
By Erin | Season 1 | Episode 18 | Aired on 04.06.2002
Parking Lot Of Unrequited Love And Jilted Forehead Jockeys. Agent Amorous is chatting Sydney up about her trip to Vienna. He then moves on, oh-so-subtly -- except, you know, NOT -- to the subject of Bucky and how Syd mentioned him in her initial report on SD-6. "We met when I was a trainee," says Syd. Then there's this pause and Syd suddenly blurts out that she and Bucky actually dated for awhile. Like, is that even relevant here? What, is Agent Amorous her sorority sister or something? There's all this sexual tension now, except for the fact that, you know, THERE ISN'T, and Vaughn quickly asks if Syd's talked to her father lately. She has. Vaughn wants to know if she has any idea where Spy Daddy is and if he's okay. Syd searches the gravel for the map to Spy Daddy's whereabouts.
The map leads directly to Murphy's Bar, where Spy Daddy's enjoying a tasty single malt at around two in the afternoon. Not a good sign. Syd suggests that he talk to a professional. No, not a hooker -- a shrink. Sydney blithers on about how they're becoming closer or something, but she still doesn't know what their relationship's all about. Spy Daddy cuts her off with: "What's happening, between us, Sydney, is temporary." Ouch. Anyway, Syd's all, GO SEE A SHRINK. Spy Daddy's all, go play with Willage and Francie and all the other idiots in the spy-world sandbox and leave me the hell alone. Syd tells him that she thought he might act this way, so she already set up a shrink meeting for him through Devlin. D'oh!
The Office Of Double Agents And The Bucktoothed Men They Secretly Adore. Bucky's working at a computer when Syd enters. He mushmouths something about decoding the microchip, but it's really just a feeble excuse to get Bucky and Spy Barbie into close confines and thus facilitate a useless music montage. Actually, I'm grateful for this music montage because it takes about a minute or so to recap, and any minute I don't have to spend recapping this show is utterly precious.
At the end of the montage, Bucky and Syd go back and forth about their past. Blah blah and BLAH. I so don't care about this "relationship." Of course, I so don't care about ANY relationship right now, fictional or otherwise. But that's a different story, which I'll tell to my therapist this coming Thursday afternoon. Note to self: Request prescription for Paxil. Also, note to self: Ask shrink if okay to mix Paxil with vast quantities of Stolichnaya.
Center For Chick Music And The Guys That "Dig" It, But That Doesn't Mean They're GAY. Willage is pressing Francie to hurry up or they'll miss the previews. Francie's scrambling around, looking for a coat, and finally winds up just borrowing one of Syd's. Right. Because Syd's not, like, HALF HER SIZE OR ANYTHING. Not that Merrin Dungey is a big fat article or anything. Not even close. It's just a really stupid plot contrivance created so that Francie can dig into Syd's pockets and find one of her ticket stubs. A ticket stub, in and of itself, isn't telling, but when Syd's just informed her friends that her latest trip was to Seattle and the ticket stub says "Italy" on it, well, that screams volumes.