September 5, 2006: Cindy Plumb (Season 4 Premiere)
Can you believe it's been eight and a half months since we last saw a new episode of this show? That's more than twice the amount of time we have to wait to see the
average show when it goes on hiatus. But as we all know,
Nip/Tuck is no average show. Was it worth the wait? Absolutely... and I, of course, will tell you just why:
First of all, you knew it had to be good since
Ryan Murphy came back to write and direct it. Oh, wait a minute - I take that back. Ryan wrote and directed last season's lackluster finale, the one where we found out (what a shocker...
not) that Quentin was the Carver. Ugh! But since the "C" word was never mentioned in tonight's entire hour and 10 minutes (the actual episode was under an hour, but with all those movie promos and ads, I'm glad I added in time at the end via my TiVo), I'm going to cut (or rather, nip) Ryan some slack here. And speaking of Ryan, how many of you are looking forward to seeing his new flick
Running with Scissors, brilliantly promoted tonight? Can't wait.
Can we please talk about the caliber of guest stars this season? Everyone and their brother and their sister and their gay lover is guesting on
Nip/Tuck this season, and I'm like a kid in a candy store just eating them all up. I won't go into the rest of the season, but just tonight (take a deep breath, Dave) we have:
Kathleen Turner,
Brooke Shields,
Larry Hagman,
Tracy (frickin' Dynasty II: The Colbys) Scoggins,
Amanda Pays,
Bree Walker and the beautiful
Sanaa Lathan from
Love & Basketball. Now let me dissect....
What a perfect role for Kathleen Turner: a phone-sex voice artist needing a "voice lift" since booze and cigarettes have turned her voice into
Bea Arthur's. I predict an outstanding guest-actress-in-a-drama nomination for Kathleen next year. Her Cindy Plumb was plum good.
Brooke Shields (as Christian's new therapist, Faith) has never been better. I loved that she suggested Christian might be in love with Sean, which, needless to say, freaked Christian out. Suddenly he's asking Amanda Pays (Mrs.
Corbin Bernsen) to "butch up" his très gay apartment. What an awesome ending, where we saw Christian having sex with Faith in her office - and not the way Faith suggested (you knew they
had to do it
Christian's way). I would've had George Michael playing in the background: "Cause I've got to have Faith.... I've gotta have Faith to Faith to Faith - uh... baby!!"
OK, I'll say it. The Larry Hagman story line really took balls.
Each passing season of
Nip/Tuck just gets dirtier and dirtier (not that I mind). Since it's on basic cable, I just picture my mother (Joan) going "Oh my!" Did we ever think we'd see a mother and daughter team that was into threesomes? Nice job, Tracy Scoggins. Good to see you back on TV! Best line that I can type here without getting censored: "Kids! Let Mommy, honey." Nice.
Great casting job with former news anchor and
Carnivale cast member Bree Walker (someone who really has the genetic hand-and-foot irregularity called ectrodactyly that Julia and Sean's baby has). But, although my heart goes out to Bree, I can't help but think "What the
hell happened to her lips?" Now, before you say, "Dave, how insensitive can you be?!" please go
here.
You know Sanaa Lathan's character, Michelle, is nothing but trouble, especially for Christian. McNamara/Troy being bought out by J.R. Ewing, I mean, Burt Landau, will be quite interesting.
Now that I've focused on the guest stars, let me just say how nice it is to see Julia and Sean back together, as well as Christian and Sean back as partners. I had a double dose of tears tonight - first the scene where Sean told Julia he wanted to raise the baby with her and then when Sean and Christian hugged. Those two scenes reminded me how frustrated I get each year at Emmy-nomination time when
Joely Richardson,
Dylan Walsh and
Julian McMahon (in that order) continually get snubbed.
I thoroughly enjoyed all the '70s tunes tonight like "Boogie Oogie Oogie" by A Taste of Honey, "Love is in the Air" by John Paul Young and "You Sexy Thing" by Hot Chocolate. Most appropriate: "Tired of Being Alone" by Al Green being played at the end.
I really liked how they continually juxtaposed Sean's sex life with Christian's - from Sean taking off his pajamas to reveal boxers underneath while Christian simply removed his briefs to reveal his weekly butt shot, to Sean picking out his nose hairs while Christian picked out his condoms.
OK, peeps - time to chime in. Tell me what you don't like about yourself. Or better yet, tell me what you thought of
Nip/Tuck's Season 4 premiere. Ready, set, go....
