Forgive me, readers, but with all going on last week--Musical Theater Week, and birthday celebrations--I had forgotten to write about the 'SVU' episode, "We Dream Of Machine Elves." First of all, why reference "The Wizard Of Oz?" And what do "Machine Elves" have to do with Munchkins? I mean, let's face it, dolls, this was the show's take on the NXIVM sex cult. It also tied in to that bogus business still in operation, The Landmark Forum, which it is time to take down!!!!!!!!!!
The beginning was obvious--a young girl named Emma (cue in Aunt Em) from Kansas (cue in Dorothy Gale) is wandering the streets of Oz, (cue in downtown Manhattan) having no idea, like Dorothy, where she is. A Glinda-like figure, Anais Adler (Eve O'Brien) turns up, offers her a place to stay. She says she is taking her to "the Wizard," (but you can bet, no Frank Morgan!) summons a coach cab with a guy wearing a hat--just like in the movie. They go to a brownstone, where a hallucinogenic nightmare begins.
The rest of the show is spent unspooling all this. What is most important are two chilling performances, by Eve O'Brien, as Anais, and Adam Arkin as Julius Adler, who is Anais' father. How I hate these recruiting women, whom I feel are as guilty as the perps they work for. The viewer saw no one being hauled off to jail, at the end, which would have been satisfying. I would like to have seen Anais in an interrogation room, tied to a chair, and smacked across the face!!!!!!!!!!!!! That is what she deserves. She may be a victim, but she is more a betrayer of her own sex, having been brainwashed by her father. Julius Adler, at one time, according to Amanda Rollins, was a great thinker and teacher. When his wife, Kathleen, succumbed to psychosis--probably from being married to him--he incarcerated her in a mental health facility, only telling his young daughter that her mother had died! Nice, huh?
The more Arkin is on camera, the more he begins to unravel. So, by the time he is climbing the window in the interrogation room, screaming all sorts of gibberish, I first thought he was faking. It does turn out he is succumbing to a psychosis, having evolved over the years of his work, and the loss of his wife. He is hauled off to the loony bin, and I hope Anais gets put in the slammer, where the female inmates will make mince meat of her! She is no better than a child killer or a pedophile. They are betrayers to their own sex.
Emma is rescued, goes back to Kansas, but there is no bedroom scene with Toto!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
This show cannot afford having a canine upstage Mariska! Which it would!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Know your audience lol
ReplyDeleteVictoria,
ReplyDeleteI certainly try to!