This marked another strong use of Cole, even if his motives are a little muddled at this point. Is he just enjoying being evil -- or does he still want to make the sisters kill him? Is he still pursuing Phoebe -- or does he just want to kill her? He's become a confusing character, but as a standalone piece, The Importance of Being Phoebe has an interesting concept, with Cole wrapping the sisters up in various legal problems in an attempt to seize control of the Manor and therefore the Nexus. The story rapidly falls apart as the episode goes on, but at least it's something different.Like so many season five episodes, this is designed as a showcase for Alyssa Milano. But her acting as Kaia-as-Phoebe is decidedly weak, relying on the most basic level of character contrivance to work (Kaia plays with her hair a lot). And, just like last week, we once again have gratuitous Alyssa nudity, this time in that gross lap dance that opens the show. And she goes down on him too, right? Why do they do this to us? Do they want our collective eyeballs to melt?
While the episode unravels nicely, it's another Charmed hour where the writers paint themselves into a corner and then come up with some contrived means to get back on track. So Leo tells his charges that they can just 'reverse' Cole's machinations with their magic, and I guess we're supposed to forget about the woman Cole killed, or the lady who was suing Phoebe, assuming she even existed? Gah. This episode has some interesting ideas, but falters too much to make it a total success. C
Credits
Guest stars Erik King (Dex); Angela Little (Kaia); Rebecca Balding (Elise Rothman); Armando Valdes (Officer Garcia); Steven M. Porter (Health Inspector); Christopher Darga (Bail Bondsman)
Writer Krista Vernoff Director Derek Johansen
While I agree Phoebe is yet again showcased wayyyyy too sexually, Max we can't today that the opening strip club scene is one of Alyssa Milano's hottest scenes! She looks beautiful!
ReplyDeleteI agree this episode kinda falls apart as the legal side has a lot of potential to it that is not really maximized but I always enjoy it. It must be mentioned (as always by me) that this episode probably has Charmed's most technically proficient fight scene EVER! It's wonderfully edited and you can barely even catch stunt doubles (which was always the case on Buffy). All in addition to the fact that it was played out by Alyssa Milano on her own! Must give props to that!
Alyssa's obviously attractive, but I never thought she was "sexy". Maybe it's the amount of times the show forced her "sexiness" down our throats, both with the constant nudity as well as all the dialogue about how irresistible she is. I always hated her baby-voice stuff too. Crazily annoying.
ReplyDeleteThat baby-voice!!! AAAAAAKKKHHHHH!!!!!!! Oh and Alyssa's arm hair was quite the turnoff as well! It would distract me a lot in many episodes!
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