Welcome to my first attempt at recapping Prison Break. Umnata did an awesome job last week, and I just hope I can get from A to B without dropping the ball. I have never recapped a show this dense, or, actually, any show that wasn't completely mindless drivel. If I get stuff wrong, please let me hear about it! Anyway, I'm excited to be here. On with the show.
Previously: Lincoln learns that L.J. has been arrested for the attempted murder of the evil Secret Service guy and is also being charged with the murders of his mom and stepdad. Geary, the crooked prison guard, accuses Bellick of also being crooked; Bellick spits back that he doesn't get caught, meaning that Geary is dumb enough to get caught. Michael ditches Tweener during the escape, and Tweener hitches a ride toward St. Louis in the back of some dude's truck.
Still previously (this update was long, but I appreciated it): C-Note confronts Michael about the $5 million that Westmoreland, a.k.a. D.B. Cooper (?!), hid in Utah before he bit the big one. Veronica totally gets killed while she is on the phone with Lincoln. Abruzzi chops off T-Bag's hand, and T-Bag forces some poor innocent South Asian vet to sew it back on. Michael tells Link about the getaway car he has set up for, well, just the two of them. The FBI dude, Agent Mahone, almost catches the escapees at the cemetery, because he has Wentworth's crazy tattoo all figured out.
Now, no longer previously, Mahone is on the phone in what appears to be a backyard. I know that this actor's name is Bill Fichtner and he was in Invasion, but I have never seen that show, and all I can think about when I look at this guy is that he's a perfect Christopher Walken lite. Not just his appearance, but the way he moves and everything too. To summarize: He's awesome.
Mahone asks to have the Mexican police set up some checkpoints fifty miles inside Mexico. He also says that Warden Pope should be cut out of the loop. While Mahone is on the phone, we keep getting this weird close-up of a birdbath in the yard. He hangs up and walks over to the birdbath in this significant, weighty manner. He stares into it. He sees his own reflection. That's deep. It's almost as though he's trying to see inside of his soul. Do you think maybe we're supposed to get that Mahone is a DEEP and REFLECTIVE guy?
O, Birdbath, when wilst thou reveal thy holy mysteries unto thy faithful servant?
Wentworth Miller is standing in a public place wearing a stupid disguise. I mean, he's wearing the same suit he had on last week, but he's doing this ballcap-and-glasses thing that is only ever done by people in disguise, or else possibly by Matt Damon. He's reading a newspaper. It has a headline about the manhunt for himself and his colleagues. He watches some guy unloading some picnic stuff from the back of his minivan.
Meanwhile, Link and Sucre and C-Note are hiding in a dark and dingy little room, and they're starting to argue. C-Note is breaking it down for Sucre about the fact that Wentworth and Link are going to leave them hanging. Abruzzi is just listening, which you know is totally the smartest thing to do. C-Note starts to talk smack about how maybe he and Sucre will just go and get the $5 million themselves. Link loses his temper and some minor scuffling breaks out. This is such a horror-movie cliché, how these guys in a tense situation and a small space start to turn on each other, thereby leading to their own demise. Just then Michael busts in. He looks like a total dork in his stupid hat and glasses. He makes them stop fighting, because he is their Charismatic Leader.
(By the way, I started out calling Lincoln "Linc," and then all I could think about was Link from The Legend of Zelda, so I just changed it to "Link." I like to play the Legend of Zelda music in my head when he comes onscreen.)
The minivan guy discovers that some stuff is missing from the back of his minivan. Turns out that that sneaky Michael has run off with the minivan family's pic-a-nic lunch, just like Yogi Bear. Cut to Abruzzi scarfing down the minivan family's chicken. Ah, nothing like a nice meal to calm everyone's nerves. It doesn't last long, though, because Abruzzi quickly starts calling C-Note and Sucre "amateurs." Meanwhile, Link sees in the paper that L.J. is about to have a hearing.
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Comments (20)
Great job Amanda. This is a lot different than passions but still not that logical.
1 of 20 | Posted by campfiregirl
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Posted on August 30, 2006 3:03 PM
I love love love Prison Break...but my big issue with this ep. was how Michael & Link knew exactly when LJ would be in the elevetor REGARDLESS of the previously unscheduled visit by agent Mahone. T-Bag is the best...if anyone can get their hand sewed on by a vet without anesthesia and live to murder again, it's him. By the way, if that hand isn't a shriveling green stump soon, I'm going to be pissed.
2 of 20 | Posted by suedisco
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Posted on August 30, 2006 3:31 PM
Killer recap, Amanda!
I bet it's poor Sucre in the flaming ditch car. Boo! Why can't they kill one of the not hot guys?
3 of 20 | Posted by Strock9
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Posted on August 30, 2006 3:47 PM
Bellick's home life has me way confused. I could have sworn that when he didn't show up for work back when he was tied up underneath the break room, there was talk of calling his wife to find out where he was. Anyone else remember this? Now all of a sudden he only lives with his mom??
4 of 20 | Posted by fycin
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Posted on August 30, 2006 5:27 PM
Excellent recap! I thought I was the only one who was confused why they kept talking about Utah like it's a city and not an entire state. I also didn't buy one minute of T-Bag's miraculous hand recovery. I doubt the hand would have been any good since it took a while before T-Bag put it on ice. And there's no way a vet would have been able to do the complicated micro vascular surgery needed to reattach the hand. I went along with PB last year when they had death row Linc working alongside the normal prisoners, but this deal with T-Bag's hand seems to be asking a bit much of us viewers.
5 of 20 | Posted by Aries
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Posted on August 30, 2006 6:17 PM
I'll add my name to the list of people who are annoyed by people going to the land of Utah. T-Bag should have said, "Lead me to Xanadu!" Maybe I wasn't paying attention, but I thought the vet's car was a Jeep Grand Cherokee, and Jeep's don't offer OnStar. That's a pretty minor quibble compared to T-Bag's hand that magically works good as new 10 minutes after the surgery. Oh well, I suppose you can't make a good thriller anymore if it's realistic.
Amanda, not a bad job for a first effort. You're snarky without sounding like you loathe the show, a la Kat. Are there any plans to recap Vanished? This seems like it could be a good show, although Rebecca Gayhart annoys me already.
6 of 20 | Posted by Elder Young
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Posted on August 30, 2006 9:12 PM
Or maybe he thought that the Hippocratic Oath, or whatever oath vets take, obligated him to sew on this psycho's hand, just as a favor.
I think vets take the Hippopotamus Oath :-P
7 of 20 | Posted by joyfulchicken
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Posted on August 31, 2006 1:32 AM
Joyfulchicken (#7), your comment about the oath is hilarious!
Amanda, dear, you're great! Very insightful, just-the-right-amount-of- snark commentary. I don't have anything to add and wasn't even going to comment, and restating the obvious would only take up space. Keep up the great work! Too bad "Rescue Me" and "Entourage" are done for the year, but maybe you can take over those shows also when they restart.
Your English and sentence structure are awesome, beating even the legendary J-Unit and B-Side.
Just one little doubt. Are we sure Veronica is dead? Her shooting was the only one not shown. All we saw was the bad agent shoot SOMEBODY (maybe).
They'd better get to reality soon or just start doing the show as an animated comic book.
8 of 20 | Posted by Tony A.
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Posted on August 31, 2006 4:42 AM
Are we sure Veronica is dead?
TonyA, Veronica was shown with big bullet holes in her face. She is dead. She's not a Terminator, she's not Lazarus, she's just DRT, taking the dirt nap, expired.
9 of 20 | Posted by carewski
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Posted on August 31, 2006 7:02 AM
Great job Amanda!
As much as I love this show, it is starting to get utterly ridiculous. You don't break out of prison and hang out within a 100 mile radius of the prison for as long as these knuckleheads are doing.
TBag is freakin' hilarious....I wonder how many takes he needs to deliver his lines without laughing everytime they shoot his scenes.
10 of 20 | Posted by fulfill_the_dream_78
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Posted on August 31, 2006 8:58 AM
On a show where a vet at an animal clinic can successfully reattach a hand thats been chopped off with an axe with some gauze, chewing gum and a rusty knife and Dr. Tancredi can lie dead and rotting of an overdose in her apartment for 12 hours and then magically come abck to life with nothing but a headache, I don't think a few bullets to the brain can stop Veronica. ANd judging from her actions over the last season, her brain probably wasnt her most vital organ.
If it wasn't for Wentworth Millers smoldering sexuality, I'd have given up on this show.
11 of 20 | Posted by EdHill
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Posted on August 31, 2006 9:09 AM
There seems to be quite a bit of dissent over T-Bag's miraculous recovery. Just how many hours post-severing did his hand lie around? A lot it seemed, considering it happened in the nighttime. It didn't go on ice until the next morning. Oh, and there's the whole bloody stump thing.
GM vehicles have OnStar, not Jeeps.
T-bag's recovery has set the show back a bit.
12 of 20 | Posted by BigTeebo
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Posted on August 31, 2006 9:12 AM
I liked the episode a lot, it was a quick hour. I am such a baby, I teared up when L.J begged his dad to let him go (in the elevator). I'm glad Bellick didn't off himself.
My big issue with the episode is T-Bag's damn hand! But I'm gonna let it go because it's probably on the show for comic relief. Actually, my main issue is that freaking Mahone getting the deal with the elevator so fast. GRRRR! Shut up, guy!
fycin (#4); When Bellick was stuck under the breakroom last season, they called his mom and she said he saw him leave for work. So they got that part right. :)
Great job on the recap, Amanda! Can't wait for next week!
13 of 20 | Posted by stacyrocks
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Posted on August 31, 2006 9:14 AM
I have to admit Amanda, I was skeptical at first b/c I havent' seen your other recaps. Plus Prison Break is often my favorite and you did a great job.
Seriously, why was it necessary for the vet to be stripped down on the table? So ridiculous.
This might be weird but I think that LJ got hot all of a sudden! I mean he's no Wentworth, but something happened to him in between taping last season and this season.
Hopefully its not Sucre in the car dead, b/c they showed him driving a car in the preview. Classic Prison Break obvious mis-direction.
And lastly, Mahone is going to be the one to uncover the government conspiracy right?
14 of 20 | Posted by noodle
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Posted on August 31, 2006 10:07 AM
OK, OK, so I missed the scene showing a dead Veronica! Sheesh! Must have been when I went to the medicine cabinet to get some Valium to get through these episodes without losing my mind. I even yelled out loud "Oh, Come ON!" when the hand was reattached and the Otis thing went down.
I thought Fox had us suspend reality enough with the "24" series, where we're willing to forgive all kinds of weird, impossible things to enjoy the action. Re T-Bag's hand, there is absolutely NO F____ng way a vet could reattach it without all sorts of support staff, special tools, anesthetics, a proper O.R. and hours and hours of surgery. Once the surgery was done the hand would have been wrapped with layers and layers of gauze and the patient would have had to recuperate for days, if not weeks, at the hospital. Instead, a light bandage suffices and we're expected to believe the thing won't just fall off. The entire thing would have been rendered moot by the time that passed between its being chopped off and the time T-Bag got it in ice water. Dammit, I said I wasn't going to restate the obvious, but I'm so mad I'm never going to watch this stupid show again.
15 of 20 | Posted by Tony A.
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Posted on August 31, 2006 10:26 AM
Comment #4, I agree, I am pretty damn sure that Bellick had a wife. Also, I think its alittle weird that LJ got the whole 3rd Otis Wright thing...seriously..maybe I'm not that bright, cause I would have never seen it. I also thought it was strange that Abruzzi was so quiet, he usually always has some stupid thing to say.
Amanda, great job, you had me laughing out loud at work.
16 of 20 | Posted by mstar1
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Posted on August 31, 2006 10:40 AM
"I have to have the coordinates of the restaurant tattooed on my ass in the form of a fake phone number."
Nice work, Amanda. Thanks for reminding me about the whole Fibonacci thing, apparently the writers have forgotten as well.
I must be a nerd, because I actually thought of elevators as soon as Lincoln mentioned it on the phone. Otis is the grandaddy of elevator companies. LJ was surprisingly unretarded this episode.
17 of 20 | Posted by brilliantmistake
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Posted on August 31, 2006 11:24 AM
I was laughing when Tweener was in the train station, getting all paranoid. For a minute, I thought I was watching "Get Shorty."
Tony A (#15): Your sentence about T-Bag's hand falling off cracked me up. Now I won't be able to watch T-Bag without thinking of Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Hang in there, dude, and keep watching (read: snarking) with the rest of us.
Awesome recap, Amanda.
18 of 20 | Posted by HicksPub
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Posted on August 31, 2006 11:48 AM
Maybe Michael isn't telling him about Fibonacci because the whole jet escape thing was a bust.
19 of 20 | Posted by noodle
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Posted on August 31, 2006 2:13 PM
The whole Fibonacci thing is a dead deal anyway, since Veronica was Abruzzi's "insurance". He has nothing over Michael anymore, not that he probably knows it, but Michael does.
As for the lack of the President appearing, it seems the actress playing her quit the series prior to this season. Then again, they dug up a new actor to play Terence, so who knows.
20 of 20 | Posted by Romulus
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Posted on September 8, 2006 6:49 PM