Episode Report Card Megyn: B | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Do you like gladiator movies?
By Megyn | Season 4 | Episode 12 | Aired on 01.27.2001
Ah, here we are in solitary, just in time to witness Alvarez going big potty. He gets up, and I think it's bad enough that he doesn't wipe, but then he pauses as he's about to flush. The bells start going off, and I know that it's all about to get real, real bad. He reaches inside the toilet, picks up a Mr. Hanky, and proceeds to wipe it everywhere. I realize I have to recap this, but I want you all to know that my gag reflex is currently being tickled not only by the visual, but also by the recall as I type. Gaaah!! A guard looks in the room; we see him first see, then smell, the shit job Al did redecorating, and then he closes the little window as Al wipes it all over his face. What is it with Al and his bodily waste? Y'all remember season three? He drank his own piss in front of Father Mukada because the hacks weren't giving him water or food? I am so never making out with HIM again! Anyway, after the guard shuts the window, he walks back down the hall, past a forlorn Busmalis.
We fade from him to Rebadow, breaking the sad news to Norma that her fiancé is currently in solitary confinement and not allowed to get married. Norma asks why, and Rebadow regales her with the saga of boy-digs-tunnel, boy-meets-girl, boy-promises-warden, boy-tries-to-fill-in-tunnel-but-hits-a-water-main, boy-loses-privileges. We've all heard it a million times. Norma implores him to do something. Rebadow promises he will.
In the warden's office, Rebadow is just finishing the whole saga, and Glynn says, "That's a lovely story…why should I believe you?" The warm fuzzy factor rises as Rebadow reminds Glynn that, in thirty-five years of being in Oz, he has seen murders, riots, and had a hundred different cell-mates, but not once has he "stepped up on another prisoner's behalf." Glynn sort of nods and glazes over until Rebadow finishes, then says, "Okay. But no more goddamned tunnels!"
Cut to the geri-pod as Busmalis enters and thanks Rebadow profusely. "I don't know how you got me out, or how I'll ever repay you." Rebadow clucks that that's all stuff and nonsense since it was no big thing. Busmalis walks to the sink to splash his face as Rebadow wags a finger. "No more tunnels!" Busmalis waxes philo-not!-phical about tunnels and how he figured out in solitary that they're extended graves. But he's not dead yet! No sir! Off he goes to call Norma, and Rebadow smiles at the sheer whimsy of it all.
Staff meeting. McManus holds court with a grandiose explanation of good versus evil and how he plays a part in everything that ever was. He laments the aging pill, currently being tested, and how the fact that the inmates will be freed "invalidates the whole purpose of our jobs." Stupid itchy McManus. Murphy breaks in with, "Tim's right, a killer at twenty who is in for twenty, turns forty and goes free -- he's still a killer." Tim then goes on to say that the pill is an admission to their failure, that they can't rehabilitate them so why even try? His plea? To stop the program. Gloria fumes, "Leave it to you, Tim, to turn a disagreement between us into some self-righteous crusade." Then to the rest of them, "He's making speeches because he didn't want the O'Reily brothers included." Sister Pete says she thinks Tim "brought up some good points" Gloria balks at this, but Pete stands her ground. He does actually bring up some points, but I hate him, so I'm automatically on Gloria's side. Claire pipes up to ask, "Which one of you can claim to have turned one of these fucks around?" LoPresti agrees with her, and Murphy tells him to go back to selling used cars. Can you not totally see LoPresti in a plaid sports jacket? He's such a cheese-head. Where was I? Oh, right, Glynn wakes up and announces to the table of bickering fuckwits that he'll "call the commissioner" on this, but until he decides to "pull the plug," the program continues. Way to rule, Leo.