Maybe week's episode will just be a full hour of backstory, rhetoric, and "Previously." Could anything be cheesier than this opening exposition? "John Clayton -- a man raised in the jungle, then brutally abducted by his uncle -- finds himself thrown into a battle for the Greystoke empire. Falsely accused of murder, he and Jane form a bond of mutual protection to rise up against those who might harm them, protect those in need, and secure a future neither could have foreseen." To ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this season of The WB's Tarzan.
We open at Aunt Xena's jungle. Xena gets the first proper name in: "John? Knock, knock!" She's brought food to the jungle. How many weeks did she keep Tarzan locked in a room, forgetting she had a jungle in her house where he could live? Xena can't find Tarzan anywhere in the 6" x 6" greenhouse. "John?" Just as she's about to give up -- "John?" -- Tarzan does what he does best: he falls from the sky right to her. Xena drops the silver tray of food. Actually, she kind of hurls it toward Tarzan, who falls to the ground and begins eating hungrily. As far as I can tell, this is the first time anyone's fed Tarzan in a month. No wonder he's hungry. Tarzan has no table manners, which is how we know he's not able to live free on his own in the jungles of Manhattoronto (shout-out to the forum posters who came up with that moniker). Tarzan's wearing a button-down shirt with the sleeves ripped off. Still no shoes. Xena bends down and watches Tarzan eat. It appears she's served him about seven string beans. "Glad you like it," Xena says. She teases him about forks and spoons. Tarzan stands up, and Xena teases him for ripping up the shirts she bought him, saying he must not have liked them very much. "I do now," Tarzan says. Still has no problem communicating, as far as I can see. Xena then buttons the front of his shirt, saying that it's okay to dress like that right now, but that when the winter comes, he'll have to get used to wearing more clothes. No, Xena! Bad! Get away from the nakedness! You're ruining everything! Xena flirts with Tarzan much more than Jane ever does, by the way. "Do you remember what winter is?" Xena asks Tarzan, who is currently grunting, for some reason. Tarzan looks up with his innocent face. It comes and goes, the dumbness -- just like the nakedness and the plot. "You remember your parents, don't you?" Xena asks. "Too many questions," Tarzan says through a full mouth, and backs away. Xena, of course, then says, "No, John. Wait a minute, John. John, wait." What's his name again? Tarzan then executes Obligatory Tarzan Shot #1: Tarzan perched on the edge of a roof, night shot of city skyline behind him. Xena asks where he goes every night. And for some reason, they let us see Travis Fimmel awkwardly descend the ladder leaning against the "rooftop." Xena then runs up to execute Obligatory Tarzan Shot #2: A woman leaning over a rooftop/window looking down to find out where Tarzan has gone off to. This is accompanied by Obligatory Tarzan Background Sound Effect #1: a police siren.
Tarzan takes a seat on another rooftop somewhere. He looks around. He walks. He stares down the night sky. We watch the wind whip around his hair. Tarzan is truly free! Then "[woman shouting in Spanish]" happens. Go, SuperTarzan! Go! SuperTarzan takes the fire escape down to a darkened (incredibly clean) alley, where a woman is struggling with an attacker over her purse. He flings her to the ground and she screams, but she's still holding onto her bag. The guy kicks her; she screams. Where are you, SuperTarzan?! There he is! SuperTarzan leaps to the ground, growling. The attacker knows that the only thing wussier than an old Spanish lady is a shoeless pretty boy. SuperTarzan stands, and gives a total Blue Steel face to the attacker. Then-- a gunshot! The attacker flies backward, making a yelping noise. He falls to the ground. Splash! Into a puddle. The Spanish lady screams and runs away. SuperTarzan looks upward, trying to figure out where the gunshot came from. Rapid shots of some other skyline somewhere in StockFootageLand show us that SuperTarzan is confused. SuperTarzan slowly walks toward one of the brick walls, staring up at what we're supposed to think are darkened buildings, but they just showed us that where he'd be actually staring is at the fire escape of the building he just dropped down from. Well, maybe SuperTarzan can also see through buildings. SuperTarzan makes his ugly face (the one where you can see all of his teeth) as he leans into some kind of alcove, worried about someone stronger than SuperTarzan out there, fearful of SuperTarzan's latest foe.
Pamie's greatest foe is the jackhole who created these opening credits. I'm currently hiding in an alcove of my own. Finally the closed captioning confirmed my suspicion: that these were the worst opening credits lyrics of all time. Behold. "If we took all the pieces from the moon/ all these little slivers rise." What the fuck does that mean? "If you could look me in the eyes with love./ And tell me what you want to see./ If you could look me in the eyes with love./ And make me how you want to be./ And try to make me what you want to see./ And try, try, oh."
We open at Jane's. It's night. As Jane writes a to-do list (I only know that's what it is because I've already watched the episode once), the song tells us, "I can't remember what I planned tomorrow." This is a huge pet peeve of mine: having the lyrics of a song illustrate exactly what we're watching. MTV does it all the damn time. Nicki walks in, sees Jane writing, and says, "Uh-oh." That's Nicki's response to people writing in a notebook. She opens a cabinet and asks where the plates are. Jane says she moved them to the right so they'd be closer to the dishwasher. But the cabinet Nicki opens is both to the left and away from the dishwasher. Good job, everybody. The glasses are now moved closer to the sink, but Nicki re-opens the first cabinet she opened and finds them there. She asks where the silverware is now. Jane opens the drawer by her stomach and says they're closer to the table now, and everything is much more efficient. Nicki grabs some silverware and tells Jane that there are great medicines for people with her condition. Jane goes into the fridge and says she's trying to get her life organized after the "chaos of the past few weeks." Jane says it feels good.
Nicki checks the oven and comments that Jane is working on another list. Jane says there's nothing to worry about; she's just writing down a few chores. Nicki says they had agreed there would be no lists. Jane makes a list to say that "A -- [she] never agreed to a list." And she's actually making a set of guidelines. Nicki asks if Jane would like to talk about what's bothering them, but I'd rather talk about the acting business they're doing. Nicki has scraped a plastic plate of Mexican food leftovers onto her actual plate. Did she have the plastic container in the oven? That doesn't sound too safe. Jane is either making herself a glass of chocolate milk or she's about to pour maple syrup into some orange juice. Maybe she's on that cayenne pepper/maple syrup fast that's become so terribly trendy these days. Jane says she doesn't want to talk about anything, but that she's trying to get a grip because there are a few things on her mind. Be careful not to hurt yourself on the painfully bad writing that's fixing to blast your precious ears. "Let me guess," Nicki brats. "John Clayton." "Wrong," Jane says immediately. She then gingerly takes the spoon out of Nicki's hand as a piano plinks somewhere. "Okay, right," Jane says with a pout. She admits that she has feelings for Tarzan, and feels that she shouldn't, because it's so soon after Michael's death. "What kind of person am I?" she asks. And I know that Nicki's going to say "Human" because that's what ScriptWriter HackPro demands, but I don't predict the redundant twist on the English language that Nicki comes up with: "A human person." Luckily, Jane's reaction to that is wide-eyed silence, so it doesn't interrupt the strange guffaws that have me doubled over on my couch. Jane's cell phone rings. "Hey, Sam," she answers. We hear him say, "Hey." Because that's how every conversation on this show starts. Sam then says, "Get down here. There's been another one." Jane somehow knows exactly where to go and what Sam's talking about, because she simply says, "All right. All right. I'm on my way." Nicki asks what's going on, and Jane says there's been another sniper attack. Nicki stares, wondering what she's doing on this show.
Jane teleports to wherever it was that she instinctively knew to go. It's the alley from earlier, and there's a blanket over the body. Sam and Jane do that fake cop flirting that people do when first arriving on a crime scene. The dialogue is so retarded that I refuse to recap it here. Sam tells us that this is "victim number two." So how did they know this was a sniper attack if there weren't any witnesses? And how do they know there's a sniper on the loose if this is only the second person to be shot? The victim's name is Damon Flicker (which makes me giggle). He's twenty-one and goes to City College. You know the one. ["That actually is the real name of a real college in New York City." -- Wing Chun] Jane immediately looks upward and asks if they found a bullet. Sam says no -- that it sliced clean through him. How did they know what kind of gun shot him, then? If there are no witnesses, how do you know it's a "military round" gun? Jane says she's going to have a "look around," but if it's just an alley, where the heck is she going to go?
Jane walks three steps away, and immediately sees Tarzan. It's kind of creepy, the stalking, isn't it? I'd start to assume that Tarzan was killing people just to get Jane to come out to where he is and flirt with him for information. Tarzan leans down from his rooftop perch and stares at Jane. Jane stares back. Wind pipes and cymbals crash. Pianos plink. Jane makes a quick glance over at Sam, who is apparently the only cop on the scene, and then walks toward the fire escape. She's going to climb that entire building?
And here we are on the one rooftop in New York, the one where all action happens, but which we're supposed to think is a different rooftop every time. Yeah. Too bad they haven't done a thing to make it look any different. Anyway, Jane walks through that one door people are always entering from and looks around trying to find Tarzan since he continually plays hide and seek from her. Why even bother recapping? If they aren't going to change this show from episode to episode, what's the point? Tarzan whips into frame and the music tries to scare us, since he didn't. Jane is momentarily frightened, pants, and then says, "Hi, John." They smile at each other. "Hi." Dammit, why does every scene start with people saying hello and then just a slew of first names? Gah! Jane then AGAIN reminds us that Tarzan's uncle is looking for him, so it's dangerous for him to be out in public like this. I've seriously recapped that line of dialogue at least seven times in four episodes. Jane looks over the rooftop because there are more police sirens in the distance. When she looks back up, Tarzan strokes her neck and says he wants to help her. I know I've recapped that sentence three times already. Jane takes Tarzan's hand and says this isn't helping. Tarzan smiles. Jane circles Tarzan and says it'd be a good idea if they set up some rules. She doesn't want them to touch anymore. Blink. Blink. "I like it," Tarzan says. "Okay. I don't," Jane says. Blink. Blink. "Yes, you do," Tarzan argues. "No, look..." Jane says. Then there's this piece of brilliance as she walks to the other side of him again: "There is right and wrong and touching between us is wrong." Tarzan asks why. Jane lowers her head solemnly and says, "That has to do with Mike." That's the first time he's been called by that affectionate nickname. Tarzan still doesn't lose his smile, even when talking about a man he "killed." Jane then realizes that now might not be the best time to talk about their relationship and touching, because there's another dead guy on the street below them, since Jane is at "work." This makes Tarzan go, "Jane," which makes Jane go, "John." Tarzan grabs Jane from behind and holds her, and Jane scolds, "John, this counts as touching!" Tarzan opens his hand, the one at Jane's breast, and shows her the bullet /rifle shell/ whatever- I'm-not-a- member- of-the-NRA- but-I-know- enough-to-know- Tarzan-just- seriously-tampered- with-some-evidence- and-now- the-sniper- will-roam- free-forever. I don't know why Jane would be surprised that Tarzan was close to the crime scene and saw the entire thing go down, since he's killed half of his witnesses and the other half mysteriously don't talk about how they got their asses kicked by Tarzan. But anyway, Jane talks to Tarzan like he's a retarded dog and orders him to tell her everything he saw. This turns Tarzan on, but before anything can happen, the scene just ends with the two of them heated, excited and smiling over a bullet. What-to-the-ever, y'all.
12th Precinct. Day. Sam is following Jane around and is just now getting to the question, "How am I supposed to watch your back if your front keeps running off to talk to John Clayton?" Making no sense, Jane tells Sam to be her chaperone some other time. She says "the point" is that Tarzan saw the entire thing. She tells Sam that Flicker was assaulting and robbing someone when he was shot. Sam asks where the woman is. They're interrupted by an actual woman who goes for the file cabinet between them. This forces Sam and Jane to find another quiet corner to botch the good name of police work everywhere. "She ran off," Jane confesses. "Aw, Jane," Sam says. "Come on." Jane says, "Sam, think about it." She tells us that the first guy who got shot was also some kind of "dirtbag" who had a record "as long as your arm." This show makes me long for the intelligent, Peabody-winning dialogue of Boomtown. Jane says that now Tarzan has proved to them that the second victim "was a bad guy, too." Sam, just to reiterate, asks Jane if she thinks that the sniper has "some vigilante thing going on." Jane says there might be, and asks if he thinks she should take it to "Connor," who I guess is the Lieutenant. "Absolutely," Sam says. "Absolutely. I think you should go right in there and tell him that some barefooted wild man who's supposed to be dead jumped off the roof and whispered it in your ear. Yeah, go in there and tell him that. Please."
But Connor is busy giving a lecture to the force, holding up the front page of Xena's paper, The New York Star. Today's cover announces a sniper, with "DEATH FROM ABOVE" the headline. Not that they're jumping to conclusions. Connor says there's lots of panic out there, and he now wants all hands on this case. He then tells us this is an HJ-130 precision sniper rifle. They've apparently been pretty rare since '98, when they were banned from being imported: "Slug's full metal jacket, military round." Some lumberjack in the back takes notes. "The profile's a psych case, possible veteran acting alone, random targets based on opportunity." What? Two targets, one in an alley? Jane asks what makes Connor think it's random. He asks her what makes her think it isn't. Sam begs Jane not to say anything. Jane apologizes for interrupting. Gene says here that he doesn't want to see Mike's murder investigation take second place to this sniper. Connor calls Gene "Taylor," and says he understands. Sam and Jane make guilty faces. Connor says that Mike's case is cold right now, with no new leads, so until something happens, it's time to focus on the sniper.
Sam's listening to a tape, on which a man says that if there's a reward for information on Mike's death, then he can come up with something. Jane walks over and listens smugly for a little while before asking who that is. Sam turns off the tape and says it's one of his "many concerned wackos." He was listening to the tip line. He says that as long as he's running a pretend investigation, he has to follow up on all the pretend leads. Jane thanks him and says she owes him one. "No, you don't," Sam says. "You owe me more than one." Jane makes a shitty "our friend Flicker" joke before showing Sam the rap sheet on Lancaster, the first victim. He beat his girlfriend to death with a nine-iron, but the Miranda warning was botched, so he walked. Hmm, did Sam or Jane work on the case? Might explain things. Jane explains that the sharpshooter on the S.W.A.T. team who got Lancaster out of his apartment to arrest him was named Harold Rhinehart. Rhinehart's gun registration shows an HJ-130 precision sniper rifle. He's a retired cop. Jane asks if that's enough to take to Connor. It's certainly not enough to warrant this entire B-plot. "Nope," Sam says. But it's apparently enough for them to go searching his house without a warrant, without backup. Yay, cops.
Club Xena. Tarzan stares out a window until Xena walks into the room and asks if he's going to stare out the window all day. Tarzan answers by getting closer to the window. "So this is my father's house?" he asks, about three weeks later than he should have. Xena admits that it was Tarzan's house, too, when he was a little boy. Tarzan's turned toward the window here, soap opera-style, so he can't see that before each of Xena's lines, she stares at his ass and smiles. She talks about life with Tarzan's dad. Tarzan asks if Tarzan Sr. was like Uncle Skinner. "No," Xena says after an ass-check. "Not a bit." Tarzan touches things as he walks the perimeter of the room. Tarzan may not use a fork, but he seems pretty familiar with a comb. "Did he love my mother?" Tarzan asks. "Yes," Xena says. "Very much." Tarzan's panting again, and he leans in close to Xena to ask, "Did he have rules? About loving her?" Xena -- who's thisclose to tongue-kissing our clothed simian -- says, "I don't know what you mean." Tarzan is leaning so close that he slowly has to stand back up in silence. I love how he uses his knuckles as tiny canes as he walks, leaning against the couch as he says he wants to know more about his father. Xena whips her head around and says she can tell him lots of stories and show him some of his things. She says she has some clothes upstairs in a closet, but that most of the stuff is in storage. "Do you want to see that?" Xena asks with a bit of an accusation. Tarzan leans back and smiles. Um, I think those two are gonna do it.
B-story bullshit. Sam and Jane are at Rhinehart's house, asking to speak with Harold. Mrs. Rhinehart says he's been out of town since Thursday. A kid -- let's just call him Sniper -- walks to the front door and says, "Hey. What's going on?" Hey. Mrs. Rhinehart says they want Sniper's father. Sam says they want to talk to him about an old case. Sniper says that Rhinehart's on a hunting trip in Canada. Well, that's not too far away from Manhattoronto, now is it?
Walking back to the car, Jane jumps to seven conclusions, saying that since they said Rhinehart went out of town a few days ago, then he must have left Thursday, which is when "the shooting started" as if there's been more than two deaths, and then decides, "He's hunting, all right. But he's not in Canada." I can think of someone else who deserves to be shot. Sam says, "I don't know, Jane." He asks if she really wants to take down a vigilante cop: "It's gonna make you very unpopular around the coffee machine." Jane says Obligatory Tarzan Line #37: "I don't know, Sam. But I gotta feeling about this. I gotta keep digging." Sam tells her to dig quietly. They get in the car.
Tarzan is busy sniffing what's supposed to be twenty-five-year-old clothes, but they sure look current. It's a gigantic closet full of suits, button-downs, ties, and shoes. No casual clothes for the original John Clayton. Tarzan takes a suit jacket off the hanger and tries it on as Xena watches. NO! WHAT THE HELL? AN ENTIRE CLOSET OF CLOTHES FOR TARZAN?! FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT IS GOOD AND SEXY ABOUT THE WB, WHY!?! WHY!?!?!? "Fits perfectly," Xena notes. The semi-sweaty Tarzan tucks his hair behind his ears and looks up at her. "I'm like him?" she asks. "Very," answers a breathless Xena. "I was just a teenager when he died. I had a bad case of big-brother hero worship." She says she never knew exactly what happened to the plane, so she spent years hoping he'd walk through the front door one day safe and sound: "That's the hardest thing to let go of. The hope." I am vomiting and bleeding from the ears. Tarzan pushes out his hands to show that the jacket's a little snug around his massive muscles. "How does that jacket feel?" Xena growls. Tarzan caresses the sleeve of his jacket, moving his arm in and out of the hole. "Scratchy," he finally admits. TAKE. IT. OFF. Xena giggles and checks out Tarzan's package.
Montage of bad music and Tarzan fingering fabrics. Shoes! Tarzan find shoes! He is so confused by them. "Though you've not said much/ You've said it all," sings the song as Tarzan finds a fedora and plops it on his head. Isn't he so simple and cute? The monkey-man put the hat on over his eyes and now he can't see, but he doesn't understand hats! He's so silly, that monkey-boy. I love how randomly stupid he can get. Eyes covered, physical-comedy bit "executed," Tarzan walks off frame, presumably right into a wall.
Jane walks into her darkened apartment as the song keeps wailing. "In four weeks it starts to show/ Lost a line for you I know." Jane takes off her jacket, hangs it up by her bike helmet, and walks through her massive New York apartment. "Though you've not said much/ You've said it all." Jane walks into her bedroom and takes off her gun. She takes out the ammo. She stares in the mirror, as she does many times a day. She begins taking off her shirt. We see more of Jane's skin than Tarzan's, and that shit ain't right. Since Jane has her back to the window, it's time for Obligatory Tarzan Shot #12: Tarzan jumps onto an open window, startling Jane, who had her back turned. Jane gasps. "One of these days I'm gonna get used to you doing that," she says. Tarzan's growling and grunting again. I don't know why he only does it sometimes. Still no shoes on the man, even though he just inherited seventeen pairs. He did comb his hair again, though. And his bullethole is looking fly. "You caught the man," Tarzan says simply, as he stands up. "The sniper," Jane corrects. "Um. No. No, we're still working on it." Tarzan: "The sniper only hurts bad men." "Yeah," Jane concludes, a little too early, I think. Tarzan: "That's good." Jane: "Well, I know it seems that way, but uh, no. What he does is against the law, which makes it my job to stop him." Obligatory Tarzan Line #24, when Jane tells us about "the law" and "her job." Tarzan flirts like crazy, grinning and smirking as he approaches Jane, saying, "I hurt bad men. And you don't stop me." Jane pants, blinks, pants. The doorbell rings. Blink. Blink. "I'll be right back," she says. Tarzan does that thing where you're trying to get through but there's someone in front of you and you kind of dance around each other trying to pass, each step getting more in the way. So Jane calls Tarzan "John" again, and says again she needs him to stay there. "You're touching me," Tarzan groans. Jane blinks a lot and walks away.
"Sam's here," says Useless Nicki, on her way back to bed. "Hey," says Jane, trying to giggle, for some reason. "What's going on?" Sam looks right over to where Tarzan is standing and then says he wanted to tell Jane something right away. He checked the tip line on Mike's case. "Somebody witnessed the whole thing." "Tell me it's another wacko," Jane says for no reason. I like how Sam couldn't just call her to tell her this. People really show up at Jane's place at all hours. Poor Nicki. Sam says the guy described "a white male, mid-twenties with long blonde hair. Barefoot. A white female. Brown hair. Also mid-twenties." Oh, well, that's not Jane at all. She's got "red" hair, and is seriously in her thirties. "This is it, Jane," says Sam, who's pretty much just whispering now. "I think you're busted." Jane gasps, "Oh, my God."
In the other room, SuperTarzan makes the ugly Spicoli face as the music swells, attempting to get us to be worried or concerned. Sam and Jane break the law every five minutes. Why can't Sam just lose this guy's message?
So, whatever. It's the day and Jane decides to break protocol once again and threaten the witness in person. Jane's at his apartment and knocks on the door. There's the sound of dogs. "Who is it?" someone barks. Jane holds up her badge to the door and says she's the police and needs to ask a few questions. The door opens. A man opens the door (but keeps the chainlock on) and stares at Jane. She asks if he's Donald S. Ingram, and asks if he could put away his dogs. The man clicks his remote -- the dogs stop. We can see in his arms a notebook with tiny Se7en-ish writing scribbled in the margins. "You're the lady on the roof," he says to her. Jane nods and says she was there. The man slams his door and asks why she needs to talk to him, since she was there. She says she just has a few questions: "Donald. The police department needs your help." The music tries to make it seem like this is a pivotal moment. Donald opens the door and asks Jane if she's been around any sick people, or has any germs. She says she hasn't, even though she's been around junkyards, monkey-men, science labs, and whatever else Tarzan's been running through. "Donald," Jane says. So he lets her in after taking a deep breath and running to the other side of the room. He asks her not to touch anything as she shuts the door.
Cut to "later." Donald finishes the story that we've been flashing back to with every episode. You know it, I know it, everybody knows it. He says that the blond man tried to save the other man, but that his hand slipped. And for some reason, in this version of the flashback, Jane screams "Michael!" with much more emotion than she did in the actual episode. Donald says that the detective fell, and that he didn't look after that. Jane leads the witness thusly: "So from what you saw, it was an accident." Donald folds a paper and agrees. "So, uh, that's it," he says. She asks what he means. He says he told, so it's over and he doesn't have to testify. He says he doesn't want to get more involved, because he doesn't ever leave his apartment, so he can't go to the police station to record anything because he'll get heart palpitations: "Please don't make me go." And that's enough for Jane, who doesn't want to tape him talking, video or audio, or make him sign some kind of statement or whatever. She just lets it go.
Back in "Manhattan," according to the building behind Sam and Jane, Sam can't believe that Jane is considering letting Donald off. Sam reminds Jane (after saying her first name) that Donald is a witness who confirms that Michael's death was an accident. Jane says that maybe Tarzan would get charged with assault instead: "Or maybe, Sam, there are some hotheads up in there who don't care what he was charged with. They just want revenge for Michael's death." Sam: "Or maybe everything will work out." Jane: "Sam, that's too many 'maybe's." Oh. My. God. What the hell is going on? How do these things get made? Seriously. Do you know how many pilots get written every year, and how many of those pilots get made, and how precious few of them ever make it to air? And then somehow those precious few that make it, how do they suck so hard like this? How do lines like "Sam, that's too many 'maybe's" actually get past every single person whose job it is to say no? How does that happen? Sam asks if she's going to ignore the witness and pretend it never happened. Jane: "I don't know, Sam. I don't know." Sam whispers, "Jane, that's a crime. And you could ruin your career. Hell, you could ruin mine. I'm sorry, but this is my investigation, and I gotta take it to Connor." Jane: "Sam, you can't do that. You don't understand. John's different." She says that if they come to question him, Tarzan will attack them and he'll end up in jail. I am starting to think that Tarzan belongs in a cage, and not in the light, because if he can't deal with anyone other than Jane without almost killing him, then perhaps he shouldn't be allowed to roam free. Jane reminds Sam that Tarzan's uncle is still "out there" waiting for Tarzan "to surface." She concludes: "Sam, it's too dangerous." He asks why it's her job to protect John Clayton. "No one else is gonna get hurt because of me," she answers, but I'm not really sure what that means. Neither is Sam, who just looks around instead of getting the last word in and the scene ends. I'd like to count how many times they've started a sentence with someone's first name. Because it's a LOT.
Jane "works." Her pen is in her mouth. She looks up and sees Sam on his computer, typing. Jane looks down and blinks a lot as she sighs. Guess what Sam says ? "Hey." Jane looks up and sets her jaw. "Talking to me again?" she asks. Man, this show. You guys, come on. Let's get out of here. When was he not talking to her? For the two seconds at the end of the last scene? They've been together presumably since then. Whatever. WHATEVER. Sam says he was going to make Jane suffer a little longer, but he just did something so cool that he has to tell somebody. He says he'll come to her. He walks over and types something on her ancient computer. He says he searched "our database" for all of Howard Rhinehart's S.W.A.T. appointments. He then pulled up all of the cases of that list that got dismissed for crap police work. Twenty-seven cases were listed. "That's depressing," Jane notes. This database is called "City of New York POLICE DEPARTMENT." And the search that Sam did was "Howard Rhinehart's E.S.U deployments." Sam tells Jane to look at #2: "Thomas Flicker." It says "Robbery and Homicide, sliced victims throat [sic]." Sam says that Flicker mugged and killed "an old lady." Thomas is doing twenty-five years to life because his accomplice and young brother, Damon Flicker, squealed on him in exchange for immunity. Wait, I thought this was a list of cases that got dismissed because...oh, whatever. "And because Damon was a juvenile, his records were sealed." They share a high-five as Jane says, "Sam, that's perfect. Ties Rhinehart to Flicker." Sam says, "Hey." Then Jane says, "Hey." I'm not kidding. Jane asks if Sam put the list in this order. Sam says that it's chronological. Jane points out the first name on the list: Lancaster. I'd like to tell you that according to the list, Samuel Lancaster is in for "grand theft, Drug Trafficing [sic], Ressisting [sic] arrest..." Jane asks Sam if he thinks the sniper is taking this list out in order -- this list that Sam came up with using the police database. Whatever. Sam asks again if she thinks that the sniper is just checking these people off of the list. Jane says that if there's one thing she knows, it's lists. They go to the third name on the list: Steven Bolinsky. "Possesion [sic]." Someone needs to buy the NYPD's database a spellchecker. Jane can read things we can't, and tells us that "Possesion" and "Automatic Weapons" actually means "Sexually assaulted a thirteen-year-old kid." Do they think we can't read the words on the screen? "Walked after the lab lost the evidence. He could be our shooter's victim." Sigh. "Think we should track him down?" Jane asks. "Yeah, it's worth a shot." Sam apologizes for the unintentional/intentional joke. Keep apologizing, Sam.
Tribal music and police sirens begin as Sam and Jane go to their car. It races off through the empty New York City streets, and we pan up to find Tarzan (Or Tarzan's stunt double, since it's only a shot of his hair) standing on a rooftop, staring at the car as it drives away. He walks out of frame.
Sam's car pulls up to some dock. How did they know where this Bolinsky guy was? They just walked away, got in the car and drove here. Sam parks his car not in a spot, but in the middle of the street. Jane and Sam get out. They walk up some nearby stairs. We hear a boat horn and some seagulls.
Shot of the side of a ship. How the heck did they know to come out to a shipyard? A construction crew works on the ship. Jane walks out and flashes her badge. She says to a man in a hat, "Hi, there." That's a variation on "Hey," at least. She says she's looking for a Steven Bolinsky. The man says he's around somewhere, and then points at the man standing right below him: "There he is." As he calls out to Steven, Jane starts to protest, and for some reason when Steven sees two plainclothes-dressed people, he books it as fast as he can, running away from his job. I guess he's still guilty of something, huh? "He's running, he's running," Sam tells us. Steven's last job was playing one of the thousand Eminems that followed him into the Radio City Music Hall a few years ago for the VMAs. Jane runs after Steven, and the music kicks it into high gear. Steven falls, as all people who run must do. He gets back up again. Sam just now takes off and shouts that he will stop chasing Steven if he goes into the water. So now Steven knows how to get the cops off his tail. Steven hits the deck (heh) and it looks like he totally smashes his face on the ground. Jane and Sam are still running down steps. Steven runs, and all these big strong men just watch him run by, all with dumbfounded looks on their faces. Maybe one of them should stop him? Whatever. Steven runs and runs and runs and then --
SuperTarzan's on top of the ship! How? Who cares! He jumps down each floor with one leap (Sam and Jane are taking those slow stairs!). Bam! One floor. Bam! Another floor. The music is so happy to have something happening! Bam! He leaps another bar for no reason and runs. SuperTarzan runs.
Sam's just now getting to the flat part of the ship.
SuperTarzan runs and leaps, somersaults, runs and leaps. Steven runs, panting. SuperTarzan leaps into the air, goes into slow-motion, and tackles Steven to the ground! Jane is just now catching up and shouts, "John! Stop it!" Tarzan leaps up, panting, sweating, and looks at Jane like, "Woman, are you serious? I just caught your bad guy. AGAIN." Sam slows down as he approaches. Steven shouts, "Get this guy off of me!" But nobody's on him. "Shut up, Bolinksy!" Sam says. "Get up! Making me run. We come all the way out here to help you and you run away like you got a guilty conscience." Bolinsky asks what they're here to help him about. Sam says he's got a giant target painted on his back. Jane tells them to go back to the precinct, and she'll meet up with them once she's finished with her boyfriend. She and Tarzan haven't stopped making eye contact.
Shot of a rifle! Slow-motion! Music swells!
Sniper-Cam of Sam and Steven walking away, their heads mostly obscured by other shipyard workers.
Shot of the muzzle of the rifle. It moves...
Sniper-Cam of Jane's head. Tarzan is to her. Workers checking out Tarzan's ass block the sniper's view.
Somewhere. In the ship somewhere. Whatever. It appears to be the captain's room. Jane walks in, and somehow Tarzan's sitting in an open window. Jane walks forward and spews, "It's hard for me to tell you to stop following me when you do really helpful things like catching that guy." I'd like to remind everyone that Bolinsky had done nothing wrong. Tarzan was actually sitting on the edge of the ship, near an open door. He now walks through it over to Jane, who's still babbling. She says it's not easy to tell the good guys from the bad guys on this case. "I can tell," Tarzan says. Grab yourself a white bag from the seat pocket in front of you: "I wish I could see things as clearly as you do," Jane says. Tarzan makes the ugly face to say, "So do I." Staring. More staring. Tarzan backs away.
Sniper-Cam of Jane. She turns toward the Sniper-Cam. She looks up and appears to see the sniper.
And somehow Tarzan can hear the sniper. SuperTarzan looks up.
Strange shot of the sniper's eyeball enlarging through the Sniper-Cam.
Shot of sniper's finger on the trigger. Slow-motion.
SuperTarzan turns to Jane. "Jane!" he shouts. But the closed-captioning says it was "No!"
Gunshot. Glass shatters.
Jane flies backward. Slow-motion. She hits the ground. Tarzan runs to her and checks her pulse, exactly what five-year-old monkey-boys instinctively do. Tarzan crouches over her, panting and tearing up. Commercials!
Through the gunshot hole in the window, we see Tarzan pawing at Jane. He rips her shirt open and we see her bulletproof vest. Now, we all know how low Jane wears those shirts, so...Yeah, moving on. Tarzan's still panting as he un-Velcroes Jane's vest to reveal a nasty bruise by her camisole top. He touches and paws, touches and paws, pants and pants. He leans over and listens to her right boob. He picks up her hand and holds it to his open mouth. Panting, panting, rocking back and forth. Finally Jane opens her eyes like a zombie. Her mouth is open. Tarzan pants some more. Then Jane gasps for one breath, and inhales. Tarzan makes a brushing motion with his hand, like he's trying to fan oxygen toward Jane. There are too many hands in this scene. I guess Tarzan has taken Jane's hand and put it to his shoulder. Then there's a hand on the ground to Jane's left shoulder, and also a hand by her face, and a hand under her chin. Oh, wait. That one by her shoulder might be Tarzan's foot. His clean-ass foot. Then Jane starts coughing, and Tarzan lifts her head, as if he just rescued her from drowning. It's every saving scene in one, here. Tarzan makes some gasping noises as he lifts Jane. She's coughing, clutching him, repeating that she's all right. Then she grits her teeth and shouts, "Ow!" Where's the rest of this shipyard after the gunshot was fired? Jane holds her chest and pants. Does someone want to find the bullet? Tarzan looks up, now that he knows Jane is okay, and he's hella mad, yo. He looks at the bullethole and stands up. As Tarzan dives head-first off the third story of the ship, through the glass (always taking the smartest route out of the room), Jane of course screams, "John! Don't!" Couldn't breathe, but now she can scream. Then she doubles over in pain, apparently unconcerned that Tarzan might have leapt to his death on this one.
They don't care if we can figure out that "leap" in logic. SuperTarzan's running in slow-motion, but he's wearing that damn shirt, so what's the point? If I wanted to watch Chariots of Fire, I'd just rent it. Running, running, leaping, jumping. The same shot, but in the other direction. They add little lion noises here and there for reasons they'll never explain to us. Running, running, jumping. Tarzan flings himself high up another boat, high enough that when he looks down, the "bad guy" is running away with his "bad guy suitcase." How high up did Tarzan jump, and how did he know where the bad guy was, and why is the bad guy running but nobody's stopping him in this busy shipyard and how did Sam drive so far away so quickly? Why do I bother asking questions? Tarzan gives the bad guy a good staredown, because the dumbest thing would be to follow the man when he can actually see him right now, and instead we watch the bad guy drive off in his old green car. Oh, wait. SuperTarzan leaps off the edge of the boat, music going all old-school '70s on us, like the Six Million Dollar Man was throwing something, and SuperTarzan dives into the water.
The bad guy backs his car up and hits a few things, as bad guys are prone to do. SuperTarzan pulls himself out of the water, somehow, right onto the street where the bad guy is driving. But SuperTarzan is seconds too late, and can only hit the trunk of the bad guy car as it drives away. A wet, clothed SuperTarzan pouts.
12th Precinct. Overhead shot of Connor getting off the phone and walking over to the couch where Jane is resting, ice pack to titty, and Sam watches intently. Connor asks Jane if she's sure she's okay. "I'm fine," Jane says. "Feel like I've been kicked by a horse, but I'm fine." Connor: "Well, I've got something that might make you feel better." Jane: "Yeah? What's that?" Not this dialogue. Connor says that Rhinehart just called to turn himself in. That was him on the phone? Can I talk to him? I'd like to understand what happened in the last scene. He says that Connor might have had an act of conscience, and perhaps an ex-cop draws the line at taking out another police officer. The closed-captioning and I both go, "[scoffs]." Connor says there are units on the way, but that this is Jane's "collar," so she needs to go. Sam makes a "I just act here, I don't write this shit" hand movement toward Jane.
Rhinehart's. We see his ugly green car. A man gets led off in handcuffs by a cop. Sam and Jane are at the front door. Mrs. Rhinehart looks on calmly from behind the screen door. Jane touches her chest as Sam makes a phone call. He hangs up when we hear a trashcan fall over to the house. Coming up from the alleyway at Rhinehart's house is Tarzan, climbing the walls. "Man, this dude is relentless," Sam says to Jane. "Sam, we gotta stop him," Jane says, terrified. "John, stop right there!" Jane uses a technique she learned in college to keep would-be assailants from harming others: the Arms Out move. It works great in small alleys like this. Tarzan reminds Jane that Rhinehart tried to kill her. "But he didn't," Jane says. "I'm fine. John, it's over. The cops are here. We got him. Look." Shot of Rhinehart in his car, looking rather calm. "That's not him," Tarzan pants. Jane: "It is, John. I swear to you." Tarzan: "I saw. That's not him." Jane: "John, he confessed. It's him." Tarzan says that the sniper was young, not old: "A boy was driving the car." Sam finally decides to get involved, spouting off a few "Hey"s on the way. He tells Tarzan to calm down. Tarzan is panting now. His Snipey Sense is tingling. "Sam, I think he's talking about the kid," Jane says. Sam says he doesn't care what Tarzan's sniffing, but that they have to get him out of there before he kills someone. Tarzan: "No! Jane!" "John!" shouts Jane. Kill me. Jane says they can't go in and get the kid with no warrant and no proof. Really. Tarzan: "Why?" Jane: "Because that's the way the law works." Tarzan asks if that's a rule. Jane says it is. Tarzan gets snarky: "Your rules are lies." This stops Jane in her tracks. Blink. Blink. Tarzan runs away. TAKE OFF YOUR SHIRT.
From the top room -- the place where bad guys hide out -- Sniper the young Rhinehart watches the elder Rhinehart get led away in a squad car. He watches Sam and Jane walk to their car. Before getting in, Jane turns and stares down Sniper.
Seconds later, in an interrogation room, Rhinehart accuses Jane and Sam of harassment. He says he already signed a confession. Jane says it's weird because she has airplane tickets, motel reservations, and credit reports that show he was in Canada until this morning. "I don't know anything about that," Rhinehart says. It's that easy. He says he knows all the tricks, and he knows soon Sam will be playing the bad cop angle. Sam says that Rhinehart doesn't want to see Sam being bad cop. Jane says she's going to tell Rhinehart what she thinks happened, and then he can tell her if she's right. "Like all cops, you come home and you rail about the system. 'The law protects the guilty' and 'criminals get away with murder.' Your kid idolizes you, so [Sniper] wants to do something about it, and he wants to make his dad proud. And then he flunked out of the police academy. Your son [Sniper] has always been a little bit off." Oh, this is a way to win someone over isn't it? "Wrong," says Rhinehart, understandably. Jane: "You hoped he would grow out of it. Unfortunately he didn't." Rhinehart repeats that Jane's wrong, which leads her to this: "Mr. Rhinehart, covering it up isn't going to fix what's wrong with your son." Rhinehart says there's nothing wrong with him. Jane shows Rhinehart photos of the two dead men on the table. "Your son is sick," she says. "And he needs help." And you need proof, Jane. Rhinehart looks at Doe-Eyes and says that he already confessed to the crime. "Congratulations," she says. "Let's pick up the kid."
Oh, but too late. Sam walks over to Jane and says, "Flew the coop." Now, if they were assuming it was the kid, why wouldn't they have someone stick around to watch for him? This makes no sense at all. And how did he find this out from a phone call? Did someone go over there already? Did they call to tell the kid they were coming to pick him up? Jane asks what they do now. Sam says he's alerted Customs, the port authority, and the state police. Now they just wait. "I almost wish I knew where John went," Jane says. Because Tarzan's the real cop here. Sam asks if Jane thinks that Tarzan could find the kid. "I don't know," she says. "Takes a vigilante to catch a vigilante?" Sam asks. Jane says she doesn't think of Tarzan as a vigilante: "I don't think it's fair to judge him by our rules. I know that he's unpredictable." Sam: "Yes." Jane: "I know that he's wild." Sam: "Yes." Pamie: "I know that this show is poo on a plate." Jane says that Tarzan never lies, ever: "His moral compass doesn't waver. Unlike mine." Blink. Blink. Get ready for this: "I think John might be right. My rules are lies." I am ready to confess to the sniper killings if it would get me away from Jane's dialogue. "I've crossed the line so many times I don't even know where it is anymore." NO!
I forgot Mitch Pileggi was even on this show. He gets briefed by a pair of suits about Donald Agorophobic Witness. Donald A.Witness "works out of his apartment. Hardly ever leaves the place." He tells Clayton that the man lives over the rooftop where Michael Foster "was killed." He then says, "We followed Detective Porter there like you asked. You think he saw something?" So Clayton already knew about this guy, and that Jane saw him, and they're just now getting around to talking about it? Clayton says that if Jane was talking to him, then they should, too. They ran out of dialogue, but Pileggi gets a full sixty seconds per episode guaranteed, so they just show him staring at nothing for a little while.
Like all cops in the middle of a case, Jane has decided to stop by a flea market. DON'T QUESTION THE LOGIC! She answers her cell phone: "Hey, Sam." Sam says it's been an hour and wants to know where she is. Jane says she's at a flea market on Grant (closed-captioning says "Greenwich") and West 10th. Sam asks her to bring him "one of them big-ass cookies." He then tells her to take her time, and that he'll call if anything breaks on Rhinehart. "Okay, fair enough," Jane says for no reason. Jane is then stunned into silence, because in the middle of this flea market somehow, Sniper's green car is parked. Jane: "Sam? Something just broke. The kid followed me." Sam: "Jane! Listen to me, listen to me. You get the hell out of there right now." Jane: "No, Sam. I can't. I'm in a crowd. I've gotta draw him away from these people." Several shots of buildings, none of them showing a kid with a rifle. Sam tells Jane not to look up. Sam hands someone a piece of paper and tells people to roll up on that address right now: "Please tell me you're wearing your vest, Jane." Jane: "I'm wearing my vest." Sam: "No, seriously, Jane, are you wearing your vest?" Jane: "No, Sam, I'm not." Sam screams for units to roll on that address right now. Jane: "Sam, do me a favor, all right? Just keep talking." Sam says he's there. Jane says she doesn't want "this guy" to get away this time. Sam promises her that they'll catch him this time. Jane says that it's time for her to run. Fuck all these people. "Don't talk about it," Sam says. "Just do it. Run! Go!" Jane hauls ass, prompting the sniper to fire into the crowd. Everybody screams and hits the deck, and maybe someone's been shot. Birds fly away, Jane leaps, people scream, glass shatters. Sam stares at his phone and then shouts, "Shots fired! Move!" Jane goes into slow-motion, hits the ground, and rolls under a park bench. So much for protecting or serving. It's mass hysteria, with people running and screaming, but not really leaving the scene since there are only about thirty extras and they all need to be in the shot to make it look convincing. Sam screams into the phone, "Jane! Jane!" Commercials! I'm so breathless!
More screaming, cars honking. Seriously, there's one agonizing scream. But wasn't there only the one shot and it hit the glass? What's everyone still screaming about? Jane is hiding underneath a bench, her cell phone inches away, but she knows that if she reaches out to grab it, somehow the sniper will kill her. People run past Jane, screaming. Jane searches more buildings -- nothing. Her cell phone rings.
"Come on, come on, Jane!" says Sam.
Jane wraps one wrist protectively around her temple as she finally gets the courage to grab the cell phone. BOOM! The phone is shot. We have a cell phone down! We have a cell phone down! Another crazy scream.
We can see that the sniper is about three feet away from Jane in a building just above her park bench. He's aimed his rifle at her bench. As he goes to reload the rifle, sweat pouring down his head, there are more sounds of sirens. More screams. The sniper looks around, now that he hears the approaching sirens. He cocks his gun again.
Jane's making a run for it for no reason at all! She rolls out, and luckily the sniper's rifle is stuck or whatever it is that always happens to bad guys and their guns.
We see it in Sniper-Cam as Jane run right past the sniper, but his gun won't go off!
The sniper curses, fiddles with his gun, and takes it apart. He gingerly packs the rifle in his suitcase as the sirens come to a stop nearby. The sniper turns and starts to run, but he's on a rooftop, so that must mean...SUPERTARZAN! They stare each other down for a bit. The kid -- who looks a little like Frankie Muniz -- drops to his knees and begins unpacking his rifle again. SuperTarzan leaps down from his slightly higher rooftop. But the kid's rifle is still sticking, dammit! They're so tricky, these high-powered rifles. Tarzan grabs the rifle out of the kid's hand and holds him up by the collar. The kid starts talking -- fast. He says they're just the same: they're both bad guys who like to kill, and they're on the same side. How does the kid know that? This makes Tarzan angry. He throws the kid to the ground: "You hurt Jane." The kid says the cop was getting too close: "She was getting too close!" As Tarzan drags the kid over to the edge of the rooftop -- a place he likes to toss people from -- the kid repeats over and over that they are the same. And somehow Jane's now up here on this rooftop, however that happened, and she's shouting, "John!" as she's prone to do. "Don't. Please." Tarzan's got the kid by one leg and his shoulder, and he turns to Jane. More sirens. Now Sam's up on the roof. Tarzan and Jane stare at each other, panting. Tarzan throws the kid to the ground, pouting. A little tantrum. Sam tells Tarzan that there are "about two thousand cops" coming up the stairs behind him. "You're under arrest, you psycho," Sam says to the kid, fucking up Miranda once again. "You have the right to remain silent," he says while inflicting a little police brutality. Jane and Tarzan are still staring at each other. Blink. Blink. "I don't want them to hurt you," she says. Tarzan makes the ugly face, and leaves. Blink, blink, BLINK, blink. He crouches on a rooftop edge. The wind from some helicopter somewhere picks up his hair. "John," Jane whispers, mouth still open. Tarzan pouts and does a little head nod. He leaps and falls out of frame so hysterically that I can't stop laughing. Oh, man. So funny. Blink. Blink. Jane swallows, and walks away. Helicopters.
Greystoke. Night. I guess Mr. Ingram doesn't truly have heart palpitations and can leave his apartment because here he is at Clayton's place. "Donald," says Clayton. "Richard Clayton," says Donald Ingram. Now that once again we all know each other's names. Clayton tells him to sit. Twice. Ingram says he'd like to go home. Clayton says he will soon, but he wants to talk first. He asks about Jane and what he saw the night Michael was killed. Ingram says he saw the whole thing. "I want you to start at the beginning," Clayton says with a smile. "Tell me everything." Well, he won't be there too long. And this concludes your Minute with Mitch Pileggi.
Xena's. Everything's back from storage, which Jane sees as she enters. She says, "Good evening, Miss Clayton." Xena, after a long time, says, "Jane." Jane asks if Xena's moving. Xena: "Oh, no. That stuff belongs to my brother, John's father." Yeah, in less than a minute everybody had to re-identify themselves and how they are all related to each other. How dumb do they think we are? Jane asks how it is with Tarzan there. "It's been an adjustment," Xena says, meaning it's not much longer before she jumps him. She says she knows he's been through a lot lately, as has Jane. Blink. Blink. Xena says she knows just about everything, and that she's sorry about Jane's loss. "None of it was John's fault," Jane says. "Michael's death was an accident, and there's nothing anyone can do about that." Xena says that Tarzan appears to want to do something about it. Where is he now, at the top of the stairs? Blink. Blink. Xena says that Tarzan only wants Jane to be happy: "He seems to care a great deal about you." Jane says it gets a little hard sometimes. I'll say. Xena knows that Jane loves Tarzan, and tells her that he's upstairs. Jane leaves. Xena stares.
Fake jungle. Wind. Sirens. Jane enters the jungle. "John?" She looks around. She can't believe this jungle! She touches it with awe. "John?" She wanders around. She sees Tarzan crouched on a shelf. "I came by to explain," she says. "And to apologize." I grab a couple of Tums. Tarzan leaps down a little. "Um. Sometimes when things get confusing for me, I need rules to tell me what to do. But lately I've found myself breaking rules that I believe in and making up ones that I don't." Tarzan leaps forward -- and HE'S SHIRTLESS! LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, WE HAVE SKIN. Blink. Blink. Jane: "I've been trying to explain right and wrong to you. But I think maybe you already know the difference. I should go." Jane tries to leave, but Tarzan has her by the wrist, and pulls her back: "Jane." He's all sweaty for some reason. He takes her hand and kisses it. Blink, blink. "John, I can't." Someone stop that stupid music! Tarzan takes Jane's hand and places it on his shaved chest. They stare at each other. Blink, blink. "John, I can't." Jane starts bawling. Lord. "[sobs]." Tarzan takes Jane's hand and puts it back somewhere, and strokes her cheek. He leaves. "[slow-tempo music plays]." Hee! Jane turns to what should be a pane of glass, but for some reason it's not right now, and a blast of wind hits her, whipping her hair up. She walks out to the edge of the roof. She looks around, but Tarzan is gone again. She clutches herself with both arms and looks up at the night, and this show once again ends with Jane looking out into the night, wondering what happened to Tarzan. I'm wondering what happened to Tarzan, and why we're watching a lame cop show instead.
week I'm sure it's all lies, but apparently Tarzan's wet, Xena and Clayton have a showdown, Nicki meets Tarzan, and Jane gets pissed off. We'll see. If you're not cancelled by then.