Episode Report Card Sobell: A | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Missing The Corner Pocket Shot
By Sobell | Season 1 | Episode 2 | Aired on 08.28.2005
Cue the flashback: Michael's sitting at his desk in his stylishly modern apartment, reading blueprints. We see a drawing of a 7/16" x 6" machine screw. Michael stares at it so that we know he's serious, and then writes 11121147 next to it. An actual machine screw then drops on the blueprint. Okay, then.
Michael scales the bleacher and begins unscrewing the bolt. Just then, someone sneers, "Wrong piece of real estate, Fish. It belongs to T-Bag." Michael's all, "Who?" The guy turns around and snarls, "Best speak with respect. Guy kidnapped half a dozen boys and girls down in 'Bama, raped and killed them. Wasn't always in that order." Michael stares, as if to say, "And he's not on death row for this because...?" Or maybe he's thinking, "Gosh, everything I read when preparing for this caper told me that prisoners generally regard pedophiles and pederasts as the lowest scum. So why is this one such a big deal?" Or maybe he's wondering, as I am, "First a prisoner from Boston, then one from New York, now one from Alabama. Am I the only one in an Illinois state prison who's actually from Illinois?" Michael asks, "Does T-Bag have a real name?" and then some anorexic hillbilly drawls, "That is mah rill name." Behind him, someone who is plainly his prison bitch giggles and fawns. The prison bitch bears a distance resemblance to Adam, a.k.a. "Hornio" of The Amazing Race's sixth season. So I dub him "Adam." I know! My inventiveness boggles me too. T-Bag comes on over, Adam holding fast to his pocket, and sits down with "So yuhr the new one Ah've been heahing all the rave reviews about." What, in Fox River's Fresh Fish Weekly? Just in case we're confused about T-Bag's sexual proclivities, he says, "You're just as pretty as advertised. Prettier, even." Adam doesn't know whether to cry or giggle. Anyway, in addition to his kid-murdering tendencies, it turns out that T-Bag's also a galloping racist. Michael lets him yammer on in that general vein while he continues to work the screw out of its hole -- and wow, does that sound unsavory in this context -- and then T-Bag pitches sweet woo: "[The impending race riot] is going to be nasty. But we'll protect you. I'll protect you. All you gotta do is take this pocket right here. I walk, you walk with me. You're close, and no one up in here can hurt you." Adam is looking increasingly upset at this development. It's unclear whether that's because he's genuinely besotted with T-Bag, or because he fears what happens to him once T-Bag's fickle appetites are sated elsewhere. Michael checks out Adam and tells T-Bag, "Looks to me you already got a girlfriend." T-Bag passes up a chance to lift the late, great Mitch Hedberg with "I don't have a girlfriend. I just know a girl who would be really mad if she heard me say that." Instead, he smacks Adam's hand away from his left pocket, stands up, and cheerfully points out, "Ah got a whull notha pocket raht heah." One imagines the harem that the lucky inmate wearing cargo pants could assemble.