The cabbage

The show: JAG
The episode: "Bridging the Gulf," from Season 10.
What happened: Harm investigates an aviator from the USS Kennedy who authorized his gunner to immobilize an Iraqi fisherman's boat that was approaching an oil terminal. Harm concludes Lt. Gutierrez (Randy Lewis Hernandez) was correct to stop the boat, but he soon himself finds himself having to make a similar decision: while getting his F-18 quals, he's diverted to the oil terminal and shoots a Cessna out of the sky before that plane can strike the oil terminal. The plane Harm shot down then turns out to have had an Iraqi dignitary on board. Turner comes aboard to investigate and Harm is grounded but continues his investigation ashore, aided by Col. Najjar (Andrew Divoff) of the Iraqi Army, leading to a climactic shoot-out in which the Iraqi fisherman (Ahmed Ahmed) seems to die and the body of the real Iraqi minister is found in the terrorists' lair. Now cleared, Harm resumes his carrier quals, while Turner escorts the Iraqi fisherman to America to rejoin his family, who were taken over there to put them out of the terrorists' reach.
What doesn't quite make sense: As Turner gets ready to board the COD back to America, the fisherman feels compelled to explain to Turner why he's alive: in order to make sure that the terrorists wouldn't menace the man's family as they made their way out of Iraq, the terrorists had to be made to think that he had died and that therefore there was no reason to go after his family. However, this explanation is really intended for the viewers. I mean, why would Turner care if the fisherman was dead or alive? Turner's investigation was on Harm for blowing up the Cessna, not on Gutierrez for incapacitating the fishing boat. Did the fisherman come aboard the Kennedy prior to the wire operation, or did Turner go ashore at some point that we were not apprised of?
If there is a character who needed that explanation is Col. Najjar, who saw the apparent death of the fisherman and almost avenged him by killing a terrorist he irately described as "the son of a syphalitic whore" (with such badly spelled subtitles, we can only assume the spoken Arabic is not much better). Harm, who seems to have been aware of the strategy, has to make Najjar back down.
While we're on the subject of onscreen text, in the end credits, the actor Nabeel is identified as an "Iraqi soldienr." Actually, there is a character that looks like a lowercase "m" with part of the rightmost line erased to make it look like an "r." In fact that would have worked if you started out with an "n" rather than an "m." To make a mistake like that in Final Cut Pro would actually be an accomplishment, because, as far as I can tell, there is no such character in Unicode.
And another thing: According to the IMDb, an FA-18 can't fly at the same speed as a Cessna, at least not the way they're shown in this episode: Although a Cessna's maximum speed is close to an FA-18's stall speed, "the FA-18 is not flying nose high with flaps extended (to maintain minimum airspeed)." Assuming that's correct, shooting down the Cessna may have been the only thing Harm could possibly have done under the circumstances.
The IMDb also says that Turner's theory "that the Cessna was on autopilot and returned to it programmed destination after Harm tipped it off course" is invalidated by the fact that a Cessna's autopilot function is for a course, not a destination, and thus if it was possible for Harm to nudge the Cessna away from its destination, the Cessna should not have snapped back on course for the oil terminal.
On that last point I'm willing to be a little more forgiving, for after all, Turner is a submariner, not an aviator. It is understandable that he would not know the specifics of the Cessna autopilot, and it is also understandable that Harm, sullen over his career being in Turner's hands, would not volunteer to explain during the preliminary investigation that just the Cessna snapping back on target for the oil terminal was proof enough that it was intended to hit the terminal.
Lastly, if I recall correctly, there was one scene that the USS Kennedy was 47 and another that it was 72. If I'm right, this would mean that those establishing shots are of the real life USS Philippine Sea, CV-47 (decommissioned in 1958) and the real life USS Abraham Lincoln, CVN-72 (which is still in service). Don't worry, I didn't go to Wikipedia for those bits of information, I went to www.navy.mil.

I've got swine fever

Last year, when it was declared that swine flu should be called "H1N1" instead, cynics were ready to say that the CDC had capitulated to the meat industry. I'll admit that I was among those cynics. However, a seemingly prescient Season 4 (2004 - 2005) episode of Scrubs reminded me that swine flu is nothing new and that technically it's more correct to say "2009 H1N1" than "swine flu."

When Clay Aiken guest-starred on the episode titled "My Life in Four Cameras" as a hospital cafeteria worker on the brink of getting a pink slip, the most recent health panic was over SARS. The episode begins with J. D., Turk and Carla at home, when they catch on TV the announcement of an E. coli outbreak, causing them to groan as they correctly foresee Sacred Heart Hospital will be overrun with TV-susceptible hypochondriacs. Dr. Cox asserts that many animal-named flus can only be obtained by fornicating with the animal the flu is named after. Swine flu is one of the flus Dr. Cox gives in his list.

No gray on gay

Maybe the coming out odyssey of Betty's nephew on Ugly Betty is entirely realistic, for after all, given the still rather sparse presence of gay portrayals in our media (including even Broadway musicals written by gay librettists and set to music by gay composers), a young gay boy would first think that he's straight and even have crushes on girls. I know because I dated one such boy in high school.

And yet it seems to me like the writers are beating us over the head with excessively obvious hints that Justin Suarez (Mark Indelicato) is gay. In last week's episode, Marc (Michael Urie), playing a ridiculous pronoun game, got Justin to reveal the name of his acting class crush: Lily, a she. In this week's episode, however, we saw happen what the writers apparently think we couldn't see coming from a mile away: that the real object of Justin's desire in the love triangle is Austin (Ryan McGinniss), who didn't get to kiss Lily onstage but did backstage, and made sure Justin saw them. In the jealous confrontation between the boys that starts out heteronormatively enough, they kiss. It is as obvious to the viewers as it is surprising to the two characters, who had not even admitted to themselves their true orientation.

But let's not forget that straight and gay is not black and white. Whatever gay inclinations all of us have remain for most of us unacted upon to our deaths. However, prior to the new guidelines on homosexuality for the military, bisexuality was just as damning as homosexuality. With this in mind I watched on DVD an episode from JAG's tenth season, "Heart of Darkness." The main plot of that episode concerns the trial in an Islamic court of the "American warlord." In the subplot, Big Bud (Jeff MacKay) is recalled to active duty, something which he wants to avoid at all costs so that he may continue to run his bar and referee women's wrestling.

So Big Bud, after talking to his son the JAG lawyer, gets the idea of faking an addiction to meth. The female corpsman examining him medically sees right through this pretense. Frustrated, Bud claims he's gay and that he finds men attractive. So the woman gets the idea of whispering either sweet nothings or dirty talk in the man's ear (I wonder if female medical professionals in the military in real life would do that), and seeing the, ahem, tent, in the man's hospital gown, is convinced that she has completely foiled his attempt to avoid the recall by manipulating the "don't ask, don't tell" policy.

For those of us who watched the show regularly, we know that Big Bud is very much straight, fitting some of the very worst stereotypes of the salty sailor. Therefore, it doesn't occur to us that Bud could be bisexual; whether out of necessity or legitimate desire doesn't actually matter under the military's policy. But it should occur to someone evaluating the fitness for duty of a given patient. All that the female corpsman proved with her performance is that Bud finds her attractive, it doesn't rule out that some man could arouse the same reaction from the subject. Though I suppose we could argue that it is the expression on Bud's face after the corpsman points out his 'tent' that really proves that he's in fact neither gay nor bi, an expression that says "Okay, you caught me in a lie."

Meet the Stewie who loves funky fruit hats!

In last night's new episode of Family Guy, Brian's questioning of Stewie that the old baby still watches Jolly Farm deserved a better answer, for after all, at the end of "Road to Europe" (a pre-cancellation episode), Stewie declared: "The Stewie who loved Jolly Farm is dead." I wonder if the writers felt any need to explain why Stewie is watching Jolly Farm again in order to set up the story of the American version of the show, or if they simply assumed that no one watching last night would remember "Road to Europe."

However, the writers did feel the need to pre-emptively nitpick the contrivance of Karina revealing herself to really be Stewie on a live broadcast of the show, by having Brian ask why that is and having Stewie respond: "Convenience." And this is not a nit, but let me just say that Stewie's falsetto voice as Karina was one of the most grating and unpleasant things on Family Guy in recent memory.

There's flan on my computer

On last night's episode of Ugly Betty, Betty's family is temporarily living in her apartment on account of the house having burned down one or two episodes ago. For some reason, Betty's father sticks a sandwich bag filled with custard on Betty's laptop. Thus, when Betty arrives at Mode late to give a presentation regarding an upcoming photo shoot with Lady Gaga and she opens her laptop, she's horrified to find the custard on it.

Notice that shot. It looks like some of the contents of the bag have spilled onto the computer's keyboard. Betty removes the bag but on the next shot of the keyboard, it is completely and magically clean, and Betty proceeds to open a file called "Lady Gaga" which has somehow been overwritten with a video of her nephew singing along to a Lady Gaga song. I don't know if I have ever had authentic flan, but something tells me it would be much worse news for a computer it fell on than what we see here.

Lasso that shuttle!

I've been watching G. I. Joe very slowly (which is to mean that the individual discs of the series are spaced very far apart on my Netflix queue). And yet each episode that I watch provides me enough material I could write a whole Nitpicker's Guide to G. I. Joe, as each episode is jam-packed with scientific absurdities and military inaccuracies. But I'm disinclined to do that, as it would be so easy as to be boring, like shooting fish in a barrel.

However, in the first two episodes of the "Pyramid of Darkness" subseries (Season 1, Part 1, Disc 3, to use the Netflix designation) there are two nits that I feel compelled to comment on. In that first episode in which Cobra begins assembling the Pyramid of Darkness, the Joes launch a space shuttle to go over to their space station. A whole bunch of Cobra soldiers show up and assemble a net with which to capture the shuttle. So, a shuttle strapped to rockets with enough kick to escape Earth's gravity can be held up by a net? Positively absurd. Even if the net is strong enough to deal with an upgoing spacecraft, what would happen in real life is that the people on the ground throwing up the net would get taken up into the air, and out into space if they manage to hold on. Naturally Cobra fails to capture the shuttle, not because of the utter idiocy of the idea, but because the Joes cut the net.

In the next episode, the Joes show up at an aircraft carrier and talk to Admiral Ledger (Hal Rayle), who emphasizes that the Joes' use of the carrier is strictly "temporary." Never mind that the Admiral, who we're to believe is the skipper of the vessel, isn't wearing a baseball cap identifying said vessel (as we've seen so often illustrated on JAG). Why is the G. I. Joe logo painted on an aircraft carrier that is only for their temporary use!!??

A "safe" bet

Yesterday, Channel 4 news in Detroit broke the story of the three Michigan tracks fixing races. See http://www.clickondetroit.com/sports/22745239/detail.html if you didn't catch it on TV. Though on the website they don't the quote from the suit saying it's still "safe" to bet at Michigan tracks, which made me laugh. I think that if I lost a lot of money at the track, I wouldn't really care who I lost it to. The investigation is still going on, but I seriously doubt any refunds will be issued to the poor suckers who lost in the fixed races.

Changed premises on convening authorities testifying

In the JAG episode "This Just in From Baghdad," they make a big deal about General Watson (William Russ), the convening authority, testifying in the penalty phase of a court-martial for a Marine blamed for the death of civilian leader in Iraq. Watson explains that he's turned over the duty to a "backup convening authority."

Yet just two episodes later, in "Camp Delta" we have General Spinoza (Julius Carry) convening a court-martial for Army MPs who mistreat a pretend prisoner and testifying at that court-martial without any problem. The explanation that the Army is different doesn't hold any water here, since both the Army and the Navy are subject to the UCMJ (and the episode does bother to explain why a Navy Commander is defending, a Marine Colonel prosecuting and a Navy Captain judging). The only explanation I can think of is that Spinoza did defer to a "backup convening authority" but that part of the episode was cut for time. But even that explanation is lacking, since in the court-martial convened by Watson, the turning over of duties is explained with just two lines of dialogue.

And another thing: what is the point of General Spinoza wearing black stars on the collar of his camouflage jacket but silver stars on his camouflage hat? If he's not worried about snipers taking aim, why not also wear silver stars on his collar?

Just saying

It would just be Sheldon's luck that the one time he drives an actual car, he incurs a traffic violation. In last night's new Big Bang Theory episode, "The Excelsior Acquisition," Sheldon (Jim Parsons) is summoned to court on account of having crossed a red light in the earlier episode "The Adhesive Duck Defficiency" (in which Penny's emergency in the shower forced him to drive her to the Hospital, and it had been well established that Sheldon can't learn how to drive from the even earlier episode "The Euclid Alternative").

I can completely believe that Sheldon, despite his knowledge of the law and his being a stickler to its letter, would still lack enough sense to insult the very judge who has the power to decide his case. Just as Howard predicted, Sheldon is thrown in jail. However, I have a hard time believing that Sheldon would be so stupid as to claim a spot on a jail cell bench. Just saying.

The conveniently talkative doctor

One thing I find so fascinating about Medium is how often Allison's dreams are exactly correct, yet she misunderstands them in one crucial detail. Over the course of the episode, she obtains clarification on the exact meaning of the episode's first dream. There are a few stand-alone episodes (not Part I of a two-parter) that have a dream at the end. In those cases, the dream has to be perfectly clear to Allison and to the viewers.

A good example of this is the episode that was rerun last Friday, "You Give Me Fever." With the episode's running time almost up, Allison goes to bed fretting that the bad guy has gotten away scot-free. Then she has a dream in which the bad guy is in a hospital bed with a fever, unable to speak, shaking. A doctor explains to him (and to Allison, and, by extension, to the viewers) that the bad guy has a high fever, and that there is hope that he could recover. Then, when the doctor leaves, the bad guy's ex-boyfriend, who was lurking in the shadows, approaches the patient and explains how the bad guy's attempt to infect him with the virus actually backfired on him. Allison wakes up, pleasantly surprised to have learned that the bad guy does get his comeuppance after all.

It is the doctor's monologue that strikes me as unrealistic here. I get the feeling that if (Heaven forbid) I was ever in such a medical condition that I couldn't talk, my doctor wouldn't bother talking to me. My doctor would perhaps talk to my family. But this doesn't rise to the level of a nit because there isn't something in the episode to indicate that the doctor would have no reason to talk to the patient; the doctor might even think that by talking to the patient, he might be able to keep up the patient's spirits and perhaps effect a recovery. Still, the two monologues seem like a major plot contrivance in a rush to wrap everything with a neat little bow within the hour.

Thank you, Elizabeth Vargas

On This Week, ABC's national political pundit show for Sunday mornings, there is this segment called "Im Memoriam," in which those who died in the past week are remembered (this includes both celebrities, famous or infamous, as well as American servicemembers). There has been a strange attitude to this segment, sandwiched between "the Roundtable" and "the Sunday Funnies;" the host generally seems to feel that viewers need to be tricked into watching "Im Memoriam" by promising "the Sunday funnies" when "the Roundtable" is over, just before cutting to commercial (regular viewers are of course aware that this is the normal order, contrary to what the host says). This was the case when George Stephanopoulos hosted the show, and it was also the case two Sundays ago when another male ABC anchor hosted.

But yesterday, when Elizabeth Vargas hosted the show, she didn't feel that same need to try to trick viewers into staying tuned for "Im Memoriam." Though she still mentioned "the Sunday Funnies," she clearly stated that after the commercial followed remembrance of a high-ranking female Air Force officer. Admittedly this is a small detail, but on the theory that he who can't be trusted with the small can't be trusted with the large, it is refreshing to see news anchors be honest about small details like program order.