Oz Rewatch: S1E5 Straight Life
This was another one of those episodes where a lot of things happened that I really didn't remember. I'm glad I'm doing this rewatch!
- Okay, while JD Williams has a nice ass, I did not need to see Kenny get a cavity search, and I definitely did not need to see him pooping out a balloon of herion. Sometimes I'm in the mood for gritty realism and sometimes I'm... not.
- RE: the bare-bones special effects. The slo-mo used to simulate being high is one thing, but the voice distortion that sounds like the "wah-wah-WAH" of Charlie Brown's teacher is cracking me up.
- Is Tim just starting to realize that his guards have been doing a shitty job of watching the prisoners? Uh, where has he been? At least he has the awareness to feel sorry about Beecher's branding and Miguel's face-slashing.
- Love the cutaway to this shit-eating grin on Tim's face when he sends all of Nino's lieutenants away.
- Hmm, I have no recollection of this arsonist Ronald Poklewaldt character.
- Hee! I love how Nino and Markstram and Adebisi keep excluding Kenny from all the drug business dealings. BE GONE BRICKS
- OMG Toby grabbing Ryan's pec and squeezing it. There is so much sexual tension here! In a way, it's a shame that Keller arrived on the scene and sucked away (LOL) all of Toby's affections, because Toby and Ryan would've made a great slash couple. Well, except for the fact that, you know, Ryan CLEARLY is not gay IN ANY WAY.
- Whoops! Another Em City death! This time by hanging! That's rather unoriginal by Oz standards.
- WOW I DID NOT REMEMBER THAT MARKSTAM WAS A NARC. I don't blame Tim for being pissed.
- I love it when they do these scenes in the commons area where they zoom in on all the different characters' faces to get reactions. Word travels fast at Em City High School, doesn't it?
- Groves and Alvarez really are perfect for each other. Maybe Groves seems normal when he's viewed through an LSD hallucination. Heh.
- Has anyone ever written Schillinger/Ross slash? O_O
- Oooh, Tim and Diane... busted! Like I said, word travels fast at Em City High.
- And who are you? Where's Dr. Nathan and what have you done to her?!
- OH, listen to the Gov. Devlin gossip playing in the background on the TV! Apparently, he had a wife named Evangeline who left him over an affair? Somehow, this seems like important canon information, but I don't really know what to do with it.
- Healy got busted for being the drug runner? So that's what happened to him. I guess I'm OK with that, although it would've been nice if he'd suffered a little more.
- WOOT! O'Reily in the hole! The moment we've all been waiting for! OZ MAKES HISTORY
- Because, yes, while we get a nice butt shot...
- ... it's the FULL FRONTAL that's even better! :D
- (Did Tim really leave O'Reily in the hole for a whole month?)
- It's weird... clearly, Lee and JK didn't actually kiss when Vern asks Toby for his goodnight kiss (JK's back blocks the shot). I wonder why? They didn't want to "go there"? I guess at this point they didn't know all the things Fontana had in store for them.
- Toby has siblingS? As in plural? I wonder if Toby and Angus know that.
- Gee, do you think the fact that Beecher has a drug problem might be connected to that swastika burned on his ass? And the fact that he's clearly being raped on a regular basis by a Nazi sociopath? But, hey, why address it from that angle where you could easily make things better by moving Beecher to another pod or cellblock, when you can make him feel 10 times worse by guilting him with a visit from his mother? What a dumb strategy. And I blame Sister Pete and Tim equally here. I think this was the point when I started to not like Sister Pete so much.
- I love Toby's mother. Which is probably why I keep wanting to write stories about her. LOL
- Going off on a tangent here... I will forever be grateful to the Oz Fandom's original members Trasker & friends for writing and compiling the transcripts for each Oz episode. I refer to them ALL the time, whether I'm trying to understand a bit of dialogue, or I'm trying to track down a specific scene and can't remember what episode it's from, or I just want to see what happened when. I'm so glad they exist! But every now and then, there's a mistake (as you'd totally expect), and there's one for this scene with Toby's mother. When Toby tells his mother he'd prefer to hear about his "Grandmother's lumbago," it was transcribed as "Grandmother's Winnebago," and I probably laughed for a good five minutes the first time I read it. I mean, just imagine Toby's prim & proper blue-blooded grandmother driving across the country in an RV, staying at campgrounds and visiting the World's Largest Ball of Yarn. At one point, I wanted write an AU where Chris and Toby steal his grandma's Winnebago and do that just, but I never got around to it. (Which also reminds me that lisacali once wrote a great oz_magi story where Toby's grandmother hooks up with Chris's grandfather... I wonder what year that was... )
- Whoops! Continuity error! Here's Ronald Poklewaldt in group counseling looking healthy as a horse when a couple of scenes ago he'd had the shit beaten out of him.
- Oh, Toby. *pets him*
- So, do we ever find out how Nino is getting the drugs into Em City? I guess I'll have to wait and see.
In Conclusion:
Episode Rating: 8/10
Lee Rating: 9/10 (I'm subracting one for the lame kiss-that-wasn't)
Lee's Hair Rating: 4/10 (Well, we got something different! I actually like the style, but that coloring is just ALL wrong for him.)
- Okay, while JD Williams has a nice ass, I did not need to see Kenny get a cavity search, and I definitely did not need to see him pooping out a balloon of herion. Sometimes I'm in the mood for gritty realism and sometimes I'm... not.
- RE: the bare-bones special effects. The slo-mo used to simulate being high is one thing, but the voice distortion that sounds like the "wah-wah-WAH" of Charlie Brown's teacher is cracking me up.
- Is Tim just starting to realize that his guards have been doing a shitty job of watching the prisoners? Uh, where has he been? At least he has the awareness to feel sorry about Beecher's branding and Miguel's face-slashing.
- Love the cutaway to this shit-eating grin on Tim's face when he sends all of Nino's lieutenants away.
- Hmm, I have no recollection of this arsonist Ronald Poklewaldt character.
- Hee! I love how Nino and Markstram and Adebisi keep excluding Kenny from all the drug business dealings. BE GONE BRICKS
- OMG Toby grabbing Ryan's pec and squeezing it. There is so much sexual tension here! In a way, it's a shame that Keller arrived on the scene and sucked away (LOL) all of Toby's affections, because Toby and Ryan would've made a great slash couple. Well, except for the fact that, you know, Ryan CLEARLY is not gay IN ANY WAY.
- Whoops! Another Em City death! This time by hanging! That's rather unoriginal by Oz standards.
- WOW I DID NOT REMEMBER THAT MARKSTAM WAS A NARC. I don't blame Tim for being pissed.
- I love it when they do these scenes in the commons area where they zoom in on all the different characters' faces to get reactions. Word travels fast at Em City High School, doesn't it?
- Groves and Alvarez really are perfect for each other. Maybe Groves seems normal when he's viewed through an LSD hallucination. Heh.
- Has anyone ever written Schillinger/Ross slash? O_O
- Oooh, Tim and Diane... busted! Like I said, word travels fast at Em City High.
- And who are you? Where's Dr. Nathan and what have you done to her?!
- OH, listen to the Gov. Devlin gossip playing in the background on the TV! Apparently, he had a wife named Evangeline who left him over an affair? Somehow, this seems like important canon information, but I don't really know what to do with it.
- Healy got busted for being the drug runner? So that's what happened to him. I guess I'm OK with that, although it would've been nice if he'd suffered a little more.
- WOOT! O'Reily in the hole! The moment we've all been waiting for! OZ MAKES HISTORY
- Because, yes, while we get a nice butt shot...
- ... it's the FULL FRONTAL that's even better! :D
- (Did Tim really leave O'Reily in the hole for a whole month?)
- It's weird... clearly, Lee and JK didn't actually kiss when Vern asks Toby for his goodnight kiss (JK's back blocks the shot). I wonder why? They didn't want to "go there"? I guess at this point they didn't know all the things Fontana had in store for them.
- Toby has siblingS? As in plural? I wonder if Toby and Angus know that.
- Gee, do you think the fact that Beecher has a drug problem might be connected to that swastika burned on his ass? And the fact that he's clearly being raped on a regular basis by a Nazi sociopath? But, hey, why address it from that angle where you could easily make things better by moving Beecher to another pod or cellblock, when you can make him feel 10 times worse by guilting him with a visit from his mother? What a dumb strategy. And I blame Sister Pete and Tim equally here. I think this was the point when I started to not like Sister Pete so much.
- I love Toby's mother. Which is probably why I keep wanting to write stories about her. LOL
- Going off on a tangent here... I will forever be grateful to the Oz Fandom's original members Trasker & friends for writing and compiling the transcripts for each Oz episode. I refer to them ALL the time, whether I'm trying to understand a bit of dialogue, or I'm trying to track down a specific scene and can't remember what episode it's from, or I just want to see what happened when. I'm so glad they exist! But every now and then, there's a mistake (as you'd totally expect), and there's one for this scene with Toby's mother. When Toby tells his mother he'd prefer to hear about his "Grandmother's lumbago," it was transcribed as "Grandmother's Winnebago," and I probably laughed for a good five minutes the first time I read it. I mean, just imagine Toby's prim & proper blue-blooded grandmother driving across the country in an RV, staying at campgrounds and visiting the World's Largest Ball of Yarn. At one point, I wanted write an AU where Chris and Toby steal his grandma's Winnebago and do that just, but I never got around to it. (Which also reminds me that lisacali once wrote a great oz_magi story where Toby's grandmother hooks up with Chris's grandfather... I wonder what year that was... )
- Whoops! Continuity error! Here's Ronald Poklewaldt in group counseling looking healthy as a horse when a couple of scenes ago he'd had the shit beaten out of him.
- Oh, Toby. *pets him*
- So, do we ever find out how Nino is getting the drugs into Em City? I guess I'll have to wait and see.
In Conclusion:
Episode Rating: 8/10
Lee Rating: 9/10 (I'm subracting one for the lame kiss-that-wasn't)
Lee's Hair Rating: 4/10 (Well, we got something different! I actually like the style, but that coloring is just ALL wrong for him.)