Friday, August 9, 2013

Dead Like Me: Season 1, Episode 12: Nighthawks



We open with George suffering from amnesia – the toll of taking the souls of the living and watching them die is bothering her and she can’t stop thinking about death. She does the insomnia work through the town, hating everyone who is maliciously sleeping while she can’t (oh I’ve done that a few times)

Everyone else was sleeping just fine – unfortunately – because Rube has called them in for a 1:00am meeting at the Waffle House. It’s time for their joyful self-assessment forms (which everyone complains about – Daisy tries to weasel out of it, Mason needs more drugs, Roxy glares at the waste of her time)

George’s wandering brings her to the Waffle House where everyone is grumbling through their exams and is bemused why she’s not involved and what people are actually doing. Rube grabs George and pulls her away and gives her a wonderfully cryptic non-answer about why she’s not taking the test in between talking about his desire to learn how to paint. George is almost offended that she isn’t taking the test.

For some reason art and George whining leads to lots of flashback clips about Rube and food. That’s the second lot of rather convoluted flashback clips that have been shoe-horned into this episode.

Which is when we switch to Roxy doing her test and get a series of clips of her as well.

Really? Really Dead Like Me? A clip show? You are actually having a clip show? A clip show on episode 12 of your first season? You don’t have enough material for a clip show!

On to Daisy – and her clips. Really? Daisy hasn’t even been in the show that long yet I get a clips recap? Mason’s recap follows before George and Rube discuss art and, seeing a picture that looks like Daisy, George corrects Rube’s opinion of her shallowness and tells him she thinks Daisy is sad. Oh, and Mason and Daisy torment the poor waitress Kiffany for test answers. She even offers to help Roxy. Rube also keeps focusing on a couple eating in the Waffle House.

And George learns Rube has a job – a soul to Reap, that morning, at her old house. George, naturally, freaks out a little while Rube lays down the law – she cannot interfere. Rube tells her it’s not about her and tells her she has a problem with rules (excuse me – one of her family could be potentially about to die and he brings it down to a “problem with rules”? That’s grossly off base for Rube). This convoluted segue leads us to a set of George flashback clips.

George goes to stalk her house to see what’s going to happen – and we get a clip show of her and her mother. And of Reggie and her mother. And Rube joins a highly emotional George who admits that she can’t save whoever it is on the post it. She cries and asks why she can’t sleep and Rube tells her that she’s too close. And Rube reaps the milkman – which is a shame because he’s a really nice guy. George reflects that even not knowing him, it’s still hard.

In the Waffle House, the three reapers are all stuck on the same question – “why are you here?”  They must deal with it because they return and Rube collects there answers.



We have some George emotion – which was well done – but it wasn’t about any issue she hasn’t already covered; being too emotionally attached to the people she’s Reaping. Hopefully this is going somewhere


The rest? Yeah, I’m not impressed. Most shows at least have the  decency to wait until season 3 before they waste my time with a clips episode. Was there a writer’s strike or something during this? I am unimpressed by these shenanigans.