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rfmcdonaldI got to the laundry in time to catch the beginning of the latest episode of Law & Order: Criminal Intent. The fourth-season rerun episode ("Great Barrier") began interestingly enough, showing an Asian-American woman of indeterminate age being coached by a white man in his 30s how to behave like an upper-class Japanese woman, trying on clothes and wigs, and finally appearing at a jeweller's store with her coach as an escort, stealing three yellow diamonds worth a quarter-million dollars, and then walking on by in the subway as her coach collapses dead.
The following hour of television was remarkable. The identity of the coach was discovered thanks to a false business card in his possession, copied subtly off of the card of a man who had earlier met the coach in Osaka. Nothing was said about how the two men met, apart from a single observation of Vincent d'Onofrio's eminently sentient detective ("Wedding rings are lighter in Japan, aren't they?"). The theme of a corrupt, destructive and out-of-control sexuality was carried on elsewhere, as the theme of a possessive lover/partner was expanded upon--the Asian-American woman was only 19, she had viciously hurt her family, and, it turned out, there was a woman watching, Nicole Wallace as played by the decidedly attractive Olivia d'Abo. Wallace claimed to have almost a mother's love for her young lover. It turned out, over the course of the episode, that love wasn't enough to save Wallace's closest ones, with partners of all kinds murdered left and right, even breaking the neck of her own toddler daughter when Wallace thought her daughter was usurping her place. The episode ended with Wallace's lover dead, trachea crushed and then drowned after an abortive sting. Wallace's body wasn't found, though she was presumed dead--or did she die?
Is this biphobia? I leave that to the reader to decide, though it certainly seemed to hit all the high points listed in Marjorie Garber's Vice Versa, particularly of the woman as a vampire and of the bisexual as an agent sapping life from all she encounters. I do know that "Great Barrier" certainly was excellent television--I stayed ten minutes after my load finished to see how the episode ended.
The following hour of television was remarkable. The identity of the coach was discovered thanks to a false business card in his possession, copied subtly off of the card of a man who had earlier met the coach in Osaka. Nothing was said about how the two men met, apart from a single observation of Vincent d'Onofrio's eminently sentient detective ("Wedding rings are lighter in Japan, aren't they?"). The theme of a corrupt, destructive and out-of-control sexuality was carried on elsewhere, as the theme of a possessive lover/partner was expanded upon--the Asian-American woman was only 19, she had viciously hurt her family, and, it turned out, there was a woman watching, Nicole Wallace as played by the decidedly attractive Olivia d'Abo. Wallace claimed to have almost a mother's love for her young lover. It turned out, over the course of the episode, that love wasn't enough to save Wallace's closest ones, with partners of all kinds murdered left and right, even breaking the neck of her own toddler daughter when Wallace thought her daughter was usurping her place. The episode ended with Wallace's lover dead, trachea crushed and then drowned after an abortive sting. Wallace's body wasn't found, though she was presumed dead--or did she die?
Is this biphobia? I leave that to the reader to decide, though it certainly seemed to hit all the high points listed in Marjorie Garber's Vice Versa, particularly of the woman as a vampire and of the bisexual as an agent sapping life from all she encounters. I do know that "Great Barrier" certainly was excellent television--I stayed ten minutes after my load finished to see how the episode ended.
