Karen and Sarah Talk About TV: An Ongoing Series

[karenhealey]

Regarding Leverage, a show we like.

But we feel that it focuses WAY TOO MUCH on manpain stalwart Nathan Ford. His son being dead (and he felt the agony much more than anyone else, no one could understand, including his WIFE, whose son it ALSO WAS) time to kill his dad! At least it wasn't ladies in fridges, points there, I guess?

But honestly I like Nate so much more when he is not the damn focus of the show.

Sarah: 'What we need is more focus on Nate. And additional manpain for Nate.' No. Leverage. No.
Me: AUGH the worst seriously. And this right after the episode where Nate Is Right About Hardison Not Being Ready To Run A Job
Sarah: That smug fucker. I left the room in the middle of that episode. HARDISON COMPLETED THE JOB AND IT ALL WENT GRATE, THE END!
Me: And the thing it BROKE on was so stupid!
Sarah: I don't know what you're talking about because it went grate!
Me: "I've seen you before." DUH PART OF THE SUSPENSION OF DISBELIEF IS THAT THEY NEVER EVER RECOGNISE THEM
Sarah: Ha, I can't believe it, I really didn't see it, but that is some weak sauce. Sophie's only been on TV 14 thousand times as a foreign dignitary and a press secretary and a hostage!
Me: Yes, it was super great, Nate told Hardison he would never have thought of such an interesting plan and he'll be making use of these game techniques for future jobs
Sarah: My feeling is that Nate was like I am a loser, I leave you all now, you do better without me. And they privately knew he was right but urged him to stay out of pity

Comments

[trouble]

ARG NATE AND HIS SMUGNESS AND NATE. ARG.

[labellementeuse]

Me: Yes, it was super great, Nate told Hardison he would never have thought of such an interesting plan and he'll be making use of these game techniques for future jobs

This is definitely, totally what happened.

[dysprositos]

My annoyance with the ending of that episode was that every single time Nate runs a con, it goes wrong, and usually Elliot is left to pick up the pieces. Has Nate ever run a con that went exactly the way he expected it to all the way through? So the "failure" of Hardison's con was not a good reason for Nate to be all smug.

Yes, it's true that it was ridiculously complex. But it's also true that every step of it worked, up until the end. So maybe instead of being all "this is why you can't have nice things" at him, Nate could give him his due for excellent con-running tactics, and include him in the planning stages more as a result, only not letting him do the whole overall strategy again. (Or, here's a thought, consider the possibility that one of the smartest people on Earth could maybe learn from his mistakes, and come up with simpler plans in the future!)

Nate's smugness is endlessly annoying. Nate's manpain doubly so. Probably my favorite part of Sophie's interactions with him is when she is clearly annoyed at him for it.