By Djb
Fade up on a clichéd stock footage satellite shot of the planet Earth, an image which, in my pseudo-hippie collegiate experience, was most often hanging as a dog-eared poster on a dorm room wall with a stern eco-warning of the "Reuse, Reduce, Recycle" or "Be Good To Your Mother" variety written just below it. Because the director of this episode is way too enamored of the opening credits sequence of The Thomas Crown Affair, each shot following takes us closer to the surface of the planet, and finally to a skyline of New York City, a turn around the top of the Empire State Building, and inside of an elevator containing King Max "Vulcan of Brunei" Evans and the King's too-faithful blonde bride, Tess "Rodham" Harding. Because New York is the center of the universe (well, that's true) and so is Max Evans (whatever the exact, undebatable antithesis of "true" is). As the floors of the elevator climb through the 50s, Max palpitates that "this is a mistake." Tess reassures him, "You've been looking forward to it all day," but Max clarifies loud enough for the packed soundstage marked "Genuine New York City Elevator" to hear, "I mean this whole thing. Coming here. The City. Rath, Lonnie. It's a mistake." Who? Um, who again? I went a little nickname crazy last week, I'll admit, and I seem to have eliminated the doppelgangers' actual character names from my short-term memory. Hopefully the creators of this show will have realized by now that it's time to metaphorically push the rest of these misfiring "Dupes" in front of a slow-moving truck and be done with this whole silly, campy plot altogether. I'm not kidding, here. If it gets any campier on the Roswell set, I think the only big scary war the aliens all have to be concerned about is "Color War."
Scaredy Max continues his tirade: "What do I know about war and peace and politics?" Max turns to come face-to-face at close range with an elderly African-American man, who nods his head noncommittally and does his best to ignore Max's lingering "I've read about people like you in my history books!" glare. Welcome to New York, Max. Multiculturalism's a bitch, ain't it? But, in fairness, the New York segments of this two-parter have already featured more extras-of-color than the cumulative run of Jack & Jill and Seinfeld combined. Max continues for the benefit of the sullen and disaffected New Yorkers (whatever. It's a tourist attraction. Like one person in that elevator isn't also from New Mexico), "I'm gonna blow it. I'm gonna sit down at this meeting and I'm gonna meet these people and they're gonna look at me and they're gonna see this kid from New Mexico who doesn't have a clue, and…" The elevator begins to slow down and Max freaks out anew, but Tess again reminds him, "We're almost there." The elevator doors open on the eighty-sixth floor, and as a native New Yorker who expresses his love for his city by not taking the time to learn anything about it, I have no idea whether or not if that's the top floor of the Empire State Building, but I have a sneaking suspicion that it's not. I'm also pretty sure that, as befits the observation deck at the top of every tall building I've ever gone to the top of, the elevator does not spill directly out onto the observation deck without the visitor first having to walk through a museum detailing the construction of said building and a hilariously overpriced gift shop where you can pick up a Statue of Liberty foam finger or a ten dollar set of "I Heart New York" shot glasses for your loved ones back in the sticks. Max and Tess walk to the railing that overlooks one of New York's many beautiful blue-screen skylines, and they stand apart as Tess observes, "This is where you belong, Max. Up here with the world at your feet." She pauses a Royal Pause. "Like a king." Max stares silently over the non-city for a moment, then smiles (Drink! Shudder!) and notes, "I'm the King of the World." James Cameron begins the process of filing an intellectual property suit, then stops himself when he remembers the humiliation of putting that dialogue in Leo's mouth, or himself uttering such an inexcusable line at the Oscars to begin with. Which he should feel. And which he should continue to feel. Tess observes, "Yes, you are. Just not of this one." I'll never let go, Max. I'll never let go.