"Law And Order SVU" went on some kind of hiatus in November--I think--saying it would return in January. But with all the happenings in between, I was not really aware of its return. Besides, the episodes up till then had been pretty bad, except for Whoopi Goldberg's grandstand turn.
So, when my beloved reminded me, this past Wednesday evening, that the show was returning, I was, like, "Oh. So what?" Nevertheless, I had to watch; I had hoped that some improvements had been made in the writing and acting departments. And I wanted to see what happened to Noah.
Let's answer that question first. He was not on, at all, so he has probably gone AWOL< or he is off at college, already. Or at some school, just like Belle Watling's boy in "Gone With The Wind."
As for the episode, "Catfish Teacher," I thought, even from the promos, "Oh no! Not the Mary Kay Letourneau thing all over again!" Well, it turned out to be a bit of that, and then some!
The Mary Kay figure was named Phoebe Burnap, and was played by Kelli Barrett, a nobody going nowhere fast. In the golden days of this show, an A- lister would have been tapped for this role, but, since the quality has gone down so much, no one wants to be on it. Celia Keenan-Bolger was a real coup, and they are lucky to get Virginia Madsen, and Lindsay Pulsipher as Amanda's White Trash mother and sister, Beth Anne, and Kim.
Speaking of Amanda, she is headed for trouble, which will mean a visit from the aforementioned--which will liven up things!!!!!!-- because she is having too romantic feelings for Carisi (Peter Scanavino, who is easy on the eyes, anyway!). He loves babies, but I don't think he wants to have any, with Amanda! Wait till she finds that out!
Still, it will be a change of pace from the glum and dumb Olivia, who still has not gotten over Elliot, and won't admit it. That is her PTSD problem, not dealing with nuts. Hell, we who live in NYC deal with nuts all the time--on the trains, at work--and not all suffer from PTSD. So, once more, the show is tanking.
I learned from this episode that teacher-student molestation is called "catfishing." I never knew that, before. They kept talking about a twist, which turned out to be so incredulous it was almost not worth the watching. It turned out there were two predators in the school--Phoebe, who took care of the horny straight boys, and the wrestling coach, Donald Basinski, played by Michael Gaston. Phoebe blew the whistle on him, because she implied--and this was bad writing--that wrestling coaches are always under suspicion. Turns out she was right; he absconded with a sweet boy named Zach, who was only 15, wanted to be on the team, and was forced to do more than he bargained for to be on it. As soon as this story came up, Phoebe's was buried; I hope she got hauled off to some women's prison, where the dyke inmates cut off her hair.
And I loved when Nat Dennehy, played by Noah Fleiss--another role that, in another time, would have gone to a more noted actor, though he gave a find performance--came in with the video where he tortured the coach to death, eliciting a confession out of him. Of course he got hauled off, too, but you know, it was worth it! I enjoyed seeing that scum get tortured, and Nat getting something of his esteem restored. This was not a twist, but a surprise, because I thought the coach, who seemed more vulnerable emotionally than Phoebe, was going to commit suicide.
Even if he had, the episode still would not have added up to much. It seemed like re- dos of other episodes from the "Law And Order" franchise.
Get with the program, and your public, Warren Leight! Either improve the overall quality, or stop beating this already dead horse even deader!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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