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After yesterday's post, I of course had to go home and watch some Pretender. It turns out I was confusing his devirginifying episode with his only other love interest on the show.
"Ranger Jarod" - The season one pop the cherry episode. Just as awkward as I remembered, but the woman is not actually annoying in anyway. She's self-assured, confident, and independent. She clearly likes Jarod immediately, but doesn't put any demands or make any moves on him. She has a tragic past, but it actually plays okay. This doesn't mitigate how kind of uncomfortable the sex scene still is (and by sex scene, I mean pan to campfire). More uncomfortable are the flashbacks to young Jarod meeting young Miss Parker for the first time and popping a boner--I'm sorry, and having his heart race. Those are just--squirm. Also of note, Jarod goes shirtless and he is...hirsute. I don't know if there was any manscaping going on, but that man has some chest hair. It's just unusual to see given how much modern shows only show hairless chests. I thought it was mostly hairless by the nineties, but Pretender is apparently an outlier.
"Road Trip" - This was the romantic episode of EXCRUCIATING OMG. It was season four, which is already a bad indicator as that whole season was pretty worthless. And Zoe is manic pixie on steroids. She's on the run from her cop ex-boyfriend in a red convertible with a suitcase full of money! She kisses Jarod to hide from ex! She gives $200 to girls at a lemonade stand because she wants to see "what a dream coming true looks like"! She is a few miles from being out of crazy cop ex-boyfriend's jurisdiction by crossing state lines but decides no! She will be spontaneous! They will go north instead! She introduces Jarod to her grandmother as her husband, the aerospace engineer! She sees signs for a carnival and they most go win all the games! She sees a pool and they must skinny dip! She and Jarod sleep together and she handcuffs him to the bed and runs out on him! And of course she is dying of cancer and has an identical twin who died tragically.
And, of course, Jarod falls in love with her. For only the second time in the series, Jarod's in love. And it's with this hyperactive psychopath.
It's just--blergh. There is no Mary Sue fanfic I have ever written that is as bad as that.
I also watched "Gigolo Jarod" and I will note that Jarod very explicitly does not sleep with anyone while being a gigolo. The woman he's stalking trying to help hires him to stand around and look pretty. A housewife hires him to make her husband jealous, and Jarod nobly doesn't sleep with her but instead fixes the marriage. And the client we see him with at the beginning just "talked." Because if I paid $5,000 for a gigolo that looked like Michael T. Weiss, I would totally spend the evening talking to him because that's all women really want, right? A man who listens? Not, you know, cunnilungus?
This brings me to another thing about Pretender. Person of Interest is a similar show--tall, dark and scary dude poses as different things to help different people each week. Except on PoI, the people he's trying to help most often go WHO THE FUCK ARE YOU and/or run away. Whereas everyone immediately trusts Jarod. Yes, if there was a tall, muscular man wearing all black, a leather jacket, wrap-around sunglasses and spiked hair lurking around my apartment building my first instinct would be to tell him my life story. Not to think he's a hitman. *headdesk*
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"Ranger Jarod" - The season one pop the cherry episode. Just as awkward as I remembered, but the woman is not actually annoying in anyway. She's self-assured, confident, and independent. She clearly likes Jarod immediately, but doesn't put any demands or make any moves on him. She has a tragic past, but it actually plays okay. This doesn't mitigate how kind of uncomfortable the sex scene still is (and by sex scene, I mean pan to campfire). More uncomfortable are the flashbacks to young Jarod meeting young Miss Parker for the first time and popping a boner--I'm sorry, and having his heart race. Those are just--squirm. Also of note, Jarod goes shirtless and he is...hirsute. I don't know if there was any manscaping going on, but that man has some chest hair. It's just unusual to see given how much modern shows only show hairless chests. I thought it was mostly hairless by the nineties, but Pretender is apparently an outlier.
"Road Trip" - This was the romantic episode of EXCRUCIATING OMG. It was season four, which is already a bad indicator as that whole season was pretty worthless. And Zoe is manic pixie on steroids. She's on the run from her cop ex-boyfriend in a red convertible with a suitcase full of money! She kisses Jarod to hide from ex! She gives $200 to girls at a lemonade stand because she wants to see "what a dream coming true looks like"! She is a few miles from being out of crazy cop ex-boyfriend's jurisdiction by crossing state lines but decides no! She will be spontaneous! They will go north instead! She introduces Jarod to her grandmother as her husband, the aerospace engineer! She sees signs for a carnival and they most go win all the games! She sees a pool and they must skinny dip! She and Jarod sleep together and she handcuffs him to the bed and runs out on him! And of course she is dying of cancer and has an identical twin who died tragically.
And, of course, Jarod falls in love with her. For only the second time in the series, Jarod's in love. And it's with this hyperactive psychopath.
It's just--blergh. There is no Mary Sue fanfic I have ever written that is as bad as that.
I also watched "Gigolo Jarod" and I will note that Jarod very explicitly does not sleep with anyone while being a gigolo. The woman he's stalking trying to help hires him to stand around and look pretty. A housewife hires him to make her husband jealous, and Jarod nobly doesn't sleep with her but instead fixes the marriage. And the client we see him with at the beginning just "talked." Because if I paid $5,000 for a gigolo that looked like Michael T. Weiss, I would totally spend the evening talking to him because that's all women really want, right? A man who listens? Not, you know, cunnilungus?
This brings me to another thing about Pretender. Person of Interest is a similar show--tall, dark and scary dude poses as different things to help different people each week. Except on PoI, the people he's trying to help most often go WHO THE FUCK ARE YOU and/or run away. Whereas everyone immediately trusts Jarod. Yes, if there was a tall, muscular man wearing all black, a leather jacket, wrap-around sunglasses and spiked hair lurking around my apartment building my first instinct would be to tell him my life story. Not to think he's a hitman. *headdesk*
The Dreamwidth copy of this post has
comments. Comment there or here.