Episode Report Card Sobell: A | 2 USERS: A+ YOU GRADE IT He is a man of constant smirking
By Sobell | Season 1 | Episode 1 | Aired on 08.28.2005
Commercials. Is it just me, or does "Never-Ending Pasta Bowl" from the Olive Garden seem to have been devised as a punishment? Also, I have yet to see a Lexus commercial that doesn't make would-be Lexus owners out to be rapacious jackals.
Meanwhile, back on the outside...Veronica and Victor Von Doomed are busy trying to pick out stationery for the wedding that'll never happen. Victor wonders if maybe Veronica's stalling, and she tacks the sail before resuming her cruise down the river Denial.
And now, Sucre is busy ripping on Michael for alienating and confusing his girlfriend with words like "passion." Michael is unruffled. Well, it helps when the prison doctor is busy doodling hearts all over your medical chart. We then find out that Maricruz (the girlfriend) is scheduled to come for a conjugal visit, but she hasn't dropped the customary phone call beforehand. Sucre huffs, "You spooked her." Or someone in the Illinois penitentiary system finally realized they were giving conjugal visits to someone who is only now proposing to his lady. Before this discussion goes any further, a cranky guard comes by and tells Scofield to pull it together because "Pope wants to see you." Sucre nervously exposits that an audience with the Pope is generally not considered a blessing.
Hey, it's Mike Hammer! He's now the warden, Henry Pope. He opens with, "Top of your class at Loyola. Magna cum laude, in fact. I can't help wondering what someone with your credentials is doing in a place like this." What he's doing is five years. Or so Judge Hardass thinks. Anyway, Pope explains that he called Michael into the office because "I noticed in your I-file, under occupation, you put down 'unemployed.' That's not true now, is it? I know you're a structural engineer, Scofield." Then the music gets vaguely eastern as we head over to a model of the Taj Mahal, made entirely out of coffee stirrers. Or toothpicks. Tiny slivers of wood, at any rate. It's a mind-boggling testament to the power of weird hobbies. Pope explains that "Shah Jahan built the Taj Mahal as a monument to his undying love for his wife. My wife is quite fond of the story. It appeals to the romantic in her. Being married to someone in corrections [is] a terrible job. I wouldn't wish it on anyone." And it never occurred to him to quit? Oh, I'm interrupting a giant chunk of establishing monologue. Pardon me. Here we go: "And yet, in 39 years, my wife has never complained. And the worst part of it is -- I've never thanked her. So because I couldn't say it, I thought, you know, I could build it. Come June, it's our 40th anniversary. But look -- the problem is, I build anymore, it's all going to come down like a house of cards. And that's where I hope you can be of assistance. I'll give you three days of work a week in here, and it'll keep you off the yard."
Michael winces. You can tell it's killing him to say no, because the warden is the one guy nobody wants to piss off, but for whatever reason, he needs to be on the yard and in Abruzzi's PI crew. Pope is surprised, disappointed, and very curt as a result. ["Probably because the writers saddled him with one of Gandolfini's 'personality traits' from The Last Castle." -- Sars]