Marlon's Brando

[greenbeing]

bjobsessed said:

ashatan said:

I just watched that bit again and I relate it to the earlier scene where Nancy asks Karen " So it takes a woman cop now to even look at me?". If I were her I'd be thinking " I look so bad they have to send a BLIND one?

Never thought of that! She must have felt more comfortable though. She did talk to him about what happened.

Yes! I've been wondering that for a while. Why she didn't put up a stink about his blindness. Maybe she thought she could flirt even though she was all cut up?

--GB

[anna]

maggiethecat said:

anna said:

The only time I got kicked out was the scene in which Jim is making absolutely sure that Nancy knows he is blind in Marlon's Brando. The writers and director and maybe RE were so over the top. Ok, we get it already! The white cane would have done it. You didn't have to intentionally fall over a chair, too.

housemouse said:

I agree with this assessment. I think it was showing Dunbar wanting to use his blindness, but not being exactly sure how. I think Eldard played it the exact right way and that scene never kicked me out of the story.

And here's my two cents . . .

Who knows if Jim could have gotten what he wanted out of Nancy Dressler if he hadn't gone as far as he did? It was an interesting idea, and I think it works in context. . . . I always thought it was a rather tasty little scene . . . and a nifty contrast with using his cane to whack a perp.

I had not thought about it this way, and I think that you are all probably right. However, I was too busy pulling my head down between my shoulders and thinking, "Stop it!" to consider it that logically. Whatever the reason for it, it annoys me so much that it kicks me out of the story.

[mlm828]

ashatan said:

I just watched that bit again and I relate it to the earlier scene where Nancy asks Karen " So it takes a woman cop now to even look at me?". If I were her I'd be thinking " I look so bad they have to send a BLIND one?

I think the same thing every time I watch the scene where Karen suggests that Jim should talk to Nancy. I try to overlook the faulty logic, because otherwise it's such a nice scene between Jim and Karen.

[maggiethecat]

mlm828 said:

One thing in "Marlon's Brando" has always bothered me. When Jim and Karen return to the squad after Condell's suicide, everyone is concerned about Karen's emotional well-being . . . but no one, including Karen, even asks if Jim is okay. Why? Do they think the incident didn't affect him, because he couldn't see it? . . . Or is it a sexist stereotype -- they expect the incident to upset the woman, but not the man? Or do they just not care whether Jim is okay?

Or D, all of the above.

First of all, I love, love, love that this thread has leaped back to life for the simple reason that "Marlon's Brando" is right up there in my top three along with The Pilot and "Up on the Roof."

Why did no one think to console Jim? Good question! I always ascribed it to the stereotypically macho, "balls of steel" primarily male culture -- and mindset -- of the NYPD. Flip the scenario for a minute, if you will, and imagine any other male tec of the squad in Condell's apartment. Can you imagine Dunbar or Fisk or Selway asking Marty Russo how he was, if he was okay, if he'd been affected by seeing a man blown away before his eyes? Hmmm. Don't think so.

I always ascribed Marty and Tom's solicitousness toward Karen as an offshoot of their protective Big Brother attitude towards her -- to which we add a dash of chauvanism, as witness Marty referring to her in The Pilot as "that little female." Karen was a girl, female, small, weak, and so they worried about her mental state as they would have never worried about another man's. Worry about Dunbar? Why? He had those famous balls of steel, he'd seen men gunned down in front of him before, he couldn't actually see Condell blast himself with a gun under his chin . . . so why worry?

Only Galloway has the intuitive sensitivity to realize that Jim experienced exactly what Karen did but in a different way. Marty and Tom? Not gonna happen.

[housemouse]

maggiethecat said:

Only Galloway has the intuitive sensitivity to realize that Jim experienced exactly what Karen did but in a different way. Marty and Tom? Not gonna happen.

In a way, this might have been harder on Jim than it was on Karen. Can you imagine being a newly blind man in that situation? As a cop, Jim has been used to situations where he can look, assess, figure out exactly what is happening, in Condell's apartment that certainly wasn't the case.

He is sitting there talking with Condell. Suddenly Condell pulls the gun. Jim doesn't know where the gun is pointed. He doesn't know exactly where Condell is. Has he moved from his original position? Could he have shot Karen and now have the gun pointed at Jim? Those couple of seconds before Karen answered him must have been sheer hell for Jim. Also the images he formed in his head were likely to be as bad or worse than the real thing.

I agree that it is the whole macho guy thing that keeps everyone from thinking about how it affected Jim.

[mlm828]

"Marlon's Brando" is one of my favorites, too -- and there's still a lot in this episode to talk about.

I want to revisit, just for a minute, Jim's questioning of Nancy Dressler to add that "playing up the blindness" worked. It just didn't work for the illogical reason Karen gave when she suggested it. I think Jim's "newly-blind" act diverted Nancy's attention from her own situation, enabling her to answer his questions.

[housemouse]

mlm828 said:

"Marlon's Brando" is one of my favorites, too -- and there's still a lot in this episode to talk about.

I want to revisit, just for a minute, Jim's questioning of Nancy Dressler to add that "playing up the blindness" worked. It just didn't work for the illogical reason Karen gave when she suggested it. I think Jim's "newly-blind" act diverted Nancy's attention from her own situation, enabling her to answer his questions.

Excellent point. For the first time since the attack, Nancy thought about someone else's situation. Not that she should have been thinking about other people, she had every right to be where she was with it - but meeting Jim distracted her, if only for a second. That is key. Karma to you!

[kytdunne]

mlm828 said:

"Marlon's Brando" is one of my favorites, too -- and there's still a lot in this episode to talk about.

I want to revisit, just for a minute, Jim's questioning of Nancy Dressler to add that "playing up the blindness" worked. It just didn't work for the illogical reason Karen gave when she suggested it. I think Jim's "newly-blind" act diverted Nancy's attention from her own situation, enabling her to answer his questions.

Bettancourt didn't seem that at-ease with the woman, and was looking for an angle to avoid going in there again. She did choose well, as evidenced by Nancy talking.

While Dunbar overplayed it, in doing so, he established that he can't see Nancy. It may be a moot point to most people, but anyone familiar with the varying levels of blindness, as Dunbar would be, would know full-well that not all people who need a cane for travel, would be incapable of seeing the woman's face. Necessary or not, he knocked that potential concern right out the window.

Which brings us back to: Nancy focused on the questions and not on his reaction to her appearance.

Too bad he didn't stay so focused himself. (I should put Moaning Christie in the kicked-out thread.)

Kyt

[kytdunne]

maggiethecat said:

mlm828 said:

One thing in "Marlon's Brando" has always bothered me. When Jim and Karen return to the squad after Condell's suicide, everyone is concerned about Karen's emotional well-being . . . but no one, including Karen, even asks if Jim is okay. Why? Do they think the incident didn't affect him, because he couldn't see it? . . . Or is it a sexist stereotype -- they expect the incident to upset the woman, but not the man? Or do they just not care whether Jim is okay?

Or D, all of the above.

Dunbar wasn't exhibiting any outward signs of distress and, more to the point, he already had a shrink.

Wasn't Russo more concerned at this point, of the potential cost to Bettancourt, than he was to Dunbar's well-being? And Selway was often on the same side as Russo. I'd have to rewatch, but wasn't Fisk's shrink-announcement sort of generic, rather than 'for Bettancourt only'?

maggiethecat said:

I always ascribed Marty and Tom's solicitousness toward Karen as an offshoot of their protective Big Brother attitude towards her

Agreed there. But...

maggiethecat said:

to which we add a dash of chauvanism, as witness Marty referring to her in The Pilot as "that little female."

That reference was specifically to goad the suspect. If Russo believed Bettancourt was really a little, needs protecting female, he wouldn't be working with her. But that doesn't preclude him from still doing the big brother thing from time to time.

maggiethecat said:

Only Galloway has the intuitive sensitivity to realize that Jim experienced exactly what Karen did but in a different way. Marty and Tom? Not gonna happen.

But he didn't experience the exact same thing since it was absolutely 'in a different way'. Dunbar didn't have the comprehension of what was transpiring that Bettancourt did. He was afraid for Bettancourt. Bettancourt wanted to stop Condell from offing himself.

Both detectives got a few really ugly moments burned into their memories. Bettancourt's was a dying man she'd failed to stop. Dunbar's was uncertainty, fear and the bone deep proof that he was helpless while his partner's life may well have been on the line.

Kyt

[hoosier]

Today was Maarlon's Brando's turn and I noticed for the first time that Dennis Dennehy had been released from the jail in Hoboken. Hmmm. Dennis was in Hoboken on a drug charge. Bud Kessel decided to hide his drug stash in the empty lockers in a yard in Hoboken. Wonder if he learned about that abandoned area from Dennis and filed it away for future reference?

[maggiethecat]

kytdunne said:

Both detectives got a few really ugly moments burned into their memories. Bettancourt's was a dying man she'd failed to stop. Dunbar's was uncertainty, fear and the bone deep proof that he was helpless while his partner's life may well have been on the line.

Kyt

Since I haven't the faintest idea to what hoosier refers (sorry!), I'll "talk" to Kyt.

"Bone deep proof that he was helpless?" Beautifully worded, Kyt, and one of the few -- or perhaps the most memorable -- instances in which Dunbar is forced to admit that, successful lawsuit notwithstanding, there will always be lingering doubts as to his efficacy on the job.

What would he -- or could he -- have done if Condell had turned the gun on Karen?

I believe the British phrase is, "Bugger all."

Apart from the last episodes when he reaches the decision to stop carrying, is this the only time Dunbar admits his vulnerability?

Just checking.

Mags

[mlm828]

hoosier said:

Today was Marlon's Brando's turn and I noticed for the first time that Dennis Dennehy had been released from the jail in Hoboken. Hmmm. Dennis was in Hoboken on a drug charge. Bud Kessel decided to hide his drug stash in the empty lockers in a yard in Hoboken. Wonder if he learned about that abandoned area from Dennis and filed it away for future reference?

I don't think Dennehy was in jail in Hoboken. He lived there, then abandoned his apartment, owing several months' rent. I think Mattis's reference to the Hoboken "joint" is a reference to that place, not jail. Tom and Marty found him in an SRO in the South Bronx. I don't see anything to suggest a connection with Bud.

Correction: It was Marty, not Mattis, who referred to "the Hoboken joint." My bad! But I still think it's a reference to Dennehy's apartment there, not to jail.

[mlm828]

maggiethecat said:

"Bone deep proof that he was helpless?" Beautifully worded, Kyt, and one of the few -- or perhaps the most memorable -- instances in which Dunbar is forced to admit that, successful lawsuit notwithstanding, there will always be lingering doubts as to his efficacy on the job.

What would he -- or could he -- have done if Condell had turned the gun on Karen?

I believe the British phrase is, "Bugger all."

Apart from the last episodes when he reaches the decision to stop carrying, is this the only time Dunbar admits his vulnerability?

Just checking.

Mags

A couple of other moments come to mind. Neither is quite the same, but they're similar.

In "Seoul Man," Jim admits to Galloway, and later to Karen, that he's "messed up" about losing the perp.

In "Doggone," he tells Christie, when he comes home at the end of the day, that he's not sure he can do his job without Hank.

[bjobsessed]

maggiethecat said:

Apart from the last episodes when he reaches the decision to stop carrying, is this the only time Dunbar admits his vulnerability?

Just checking.

Only one I can think of at the moment. If not, certainly the most memorable.

[Katryna]

maggiethecat said:

Apart from the last episodes when he reaches the decision to stop carrying, is this the only time Dunbar admits his vulnerability?

Just checking.

How about at the end of Marlon's when he tells Christie "This isn't easy". I took that as an admission of vulnerability.