Mutiny! I haven’t been around so much lately. My chronically bad hands hit a bad spot right before I started traveling for book promotion in April. When I returned, the SAJA Convention was waiting. These things were fun, but I’ll admit that I missed the Mutiny somethin’ turrible. I have quite a backlog of posts I’ve been meaning to write. So I am glad glad glad to be back. (Thanks to all those Mutineers who said hey at various readings! It was nice to meet you.)
I had a first-post-back all ready, and then I started getting e-mails from Sri Lankan pals and journos. They said: Did you know that there is a Sri Lankan-themed episode of Law & Order: Criminal Intent? Indeed, I did not. It first aired on Sunday, on USA Network, and I missed it. Fortunately, it will be aired again tonight, at 11 p.m. So a heads-up to all those of you who might be interested. I’ll update this post with my thoughts after I watch it. (It’s Season 7, Episode 14, entitled “Assassin.”) There will be a few repeats this week.
UPDATE: 10:26 p.m. For entertainment value, I’m actually going to try to live-blog this. Incidentally, have just seen “Get Smart,” which has The Great Khali in a key role.
Live blog below.
11 p.m. Opening scene in Sri Lanka with “Mrs. Khan.” Chanting in the background. Cut to the airport. JFK. Mrs. Khan’s arrival there. Addresses people greeting her, including reporters. “I will never feel free until there is a free democratic Tamil homeland.” She is making a personal visit and not supposed to engage in political activity. Talks to relatives. She promised she wouldn’t engage in political activity, but promises made to one’s captors are not meant to be kept.
11:02 Scene with dying mother and ravishing young niece.
Speech at political rally. “We will win our struggle not with bombs and bullets but through diplomacy. The only route to freedom is through nonviolence. Thank you.” Applause at clearly underground rally. Shots fired as she tries to exit through back kitchen. Aide (?) falls. Credits. Hello, Chris Noth.
11:08 Credits show Indira Varma. Noth and partner on the scene. Aide gave her life to save Khan.
11:10 Creepy guy in Heathrow with beard. Oh, those beards. So sketchy. / sarcasm. His picture is taken. There is a briefcase handoff.
11:10 Khan’s list of enemies includes “Sri Lanka hardliners, Tamil terrorists… militia.” It was bodyguard’s idea to go through the kitchen.
11:11 Interrogation of bodyguard. Where’d you learn to shoot like that? “Indian Army, Special Forces.”
Noth: “He’s either embarrassed about how he screwed up or he’s hiding something.” Reference to Jackson Heights (?). Questioning of another witness (?). Someone whose husband’s family was cheated out of his ancestral home by the Khans. Cabdriver from the same village who could not ascend in the army because of that. Ohhhh, this is the slain assassin’s wife.
11:14 Back with the Khans in fancy apartment. Khans say the bodyguard could not have been complicit. Noth: cancel all public appearances. Khan: Do you believe in destiny? Noth: I believe you make your own destiny. Khan: My destiny is already written.
11:15 Cut to creepy bearded guy shaving, and pictures of Khan. Canada.
11:19 Noth’s investigation goes back to brother of bodyguard, who was under a death sentence… until three weeks ago, when a judge in Sri Lanka ordered his release, apparently in exchange for this attempted hit.
Bodyguard cracks. “I was told no harm would come to her.” He keeps referring to her as “Madam.”
Who was your contact? Various details exchanged. Reference to someone named Hari Jindal.
“They won’t stop,” the bodyguard says of the assassins. “They will try again.”
11:21 Young bearded guy sans beard! With briefcase! Alarm! Briefcase responds to remote, opens to reveal gun.
11:21 Noth and others talking about Nick “The Mechanic,” who is an assassin, and apparently the Formerly Bearded Guy.
11:23 Khan: I was born in privilege… this carries great responsibility. Yup, I’m going to have to agree with my friend M who thinks that the stock footage shown is not from Sri Lanka. M’s guess was Kabul. Maybe we’re wrong. Later I’ll have to check IMDB and Google around to see if there’s any indication.
11:24 At consulate, Noth asks questions of Khan’s husband, Ajay. (AJ?)
FBG checks gun.
Rosemary’s funeral. Khan speaking. Intercut with shots of bodyguard in prison vehicle, being transferred.
Khan: “Rosemary, daughter of Tamils, you join those martyrs will be remembered when this struggle is over….” Further speechifying about how what slain Rosemary would want would be people to unite behind her homeland. No more bloodshed! Tamil homeland!
Bodyguard is assassinated on the way into prison by sniping FBG while Rosemary’s relative is incorrectly accosted at funeral. Noth! I expect better! Was it because he had a beard? Poor Uncle.
11:30 Noth and partner at scene of sniper shooting. Suspicion turns to lawyer, who is paid for by sympathetic Khan. Upon further investigation, we learn that everyone in the office knew about the bodyguard’s courtdate. But the brother Khan protests that no one in the family would be interested in revenge—they are pacifists.
Noth and partner go to check on blonde ex-wife of brother Khan. The ex-Mrs. Ronnie Khan is a former schoolmate of Bela Khan’s. Oldest brother was killed in the crash of a plane owned by Ronnie. Ronnie only cares about money, ex-wife says. His sister, on the other hand, is a remarkable woman.
“It’s expensive liberating a country,” says Noth Partner. Apparently brother accused Ajay (AJ?) of embezzlement before. Maybe this is all the brother’s doing? He wants his sister and her husband out of the way so he can get the money?
Now the going theory is that brother wants her to die before her mother so that he gets whole inheritance.
Noth and Partner go to talk to Khan. She reacts badly to the idea that her brother is involved. Oh, my faaaaaamily. Our booooooond. It’s so saaaaaacred. Her brother has picked all the venues, arranged the security. She is going to speak tomorrow, despite Noth reminding her that he asked her to cancel.
11:36 Club with dancers, drinks, FBG. Yup, there are exotic things in Amrika too.
11:37 Hudson U. location of speech. Guy in wheelchair comes in and is frisked. FBG comes in in wicked disguise—looks like an older guy, balding, with kid on back.
Apparently Ms. Khan is an alum here.
President of Hudson U. introduces her as future president of an independent “Tameeel” homeland. Ugh. This is probably one of the most realistic moments of the whole episode. :)
Noth and partner have spotted FBG. Noth’s nostrils flare alarmingly when he is on the scent of danger.
Noth takes FBG away as Khan is thanking her brother, who has done so much to support her. But who cares about FBG? The guy in the wheelchair takes a shot and someone is down. In the ensuing chase, the shooter is shot. The brother is revealed as the first casualty. Indira Varma (Ms. Khan) looks distraught.
11:44 Khan talking to reporters about her brother’s death. Noth and partner getting reamed by boss. How did this happen? What slackers they are. Now, if wheelchair guy had had a beard…
Move to investigation. FBG there. FBG is glib. They say they are going to send him places and say they have never heard of him. Rendition. He throws a fit, possibly yelling in some unintelligible, exotic language, and sits back down.
He cracks and says that Ronnie was the target. Bela Khan was never the target.
Noth et al go to Ms. Khan’s apartment. They tell Ms. Khan that they think she was not the target, and remind her that her husband had a falling out with her brother. They resolved that, she says! No, they say, the records reveal that her husband had to pay her family trust back $25M.
“This is impossible! Ajay is the love of my life!”
“Forgive me for saying this, but wasn’t that an arranged marriage?” Noth asks.
“The moment our eyes met, I knew he was the one.”
This might be the money scene of the whole episode. ;)
Back at office, Noth and partner rewind tape to see what Khan and her husband did during the scene of the shooting. Husband ducks out of the line of fire before the shooting. Khan pushes her brother away from her.
They go to confront her. First they arrest her husband. Then her! Apparently she planned to wear a pink suit to get her brother’s blood to show up well for the newspapers.
The niece is present for all this. Her grandmother suspected, she says: when she heard the news of her remaining son’s death, she screamed and said that now Bela had taken both of her sons.
Noth says, You didn’t see this coming, Bela? This was your destiny. It was already written. Oh, you are so Eastern in your wisdom, Mr. Big.
As Bela is arrested, she says,
“I will continue to fight for an independent Tamil homeland for the Tamil people… They will never stop me.”
Okay. Seriously? SERIOUSLY?! END CREDITS?!
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So, teewee is teewee and not journalism. From a plotting point of view, the sewing together of clues, etc. was pretty tight, as it usually is with L&O.
But why go so far afield from fact and then say it’s about a Sri Lankan leader? Why NOT just make up a country, as ptr_vivek suggests below? Does calling it Sri Lanka lend the show a note of believability it needs? From a purely artistic point of view, a storytelling point of view, is this a better choice? I wonder how the writers’ thinking went. Perhaps Sri Lanka is just familiar enough to most people for it to make things more believable? To make a little country name-dropping worthwhile? Most viewers would have heard of it, but not to the extent that they would second-guess the writers’ knowledge. (Unlike Pakistan, arguably.) References to the “struggle” and to “Tamil terrorists” might resonate in a way that references to Sri Pakanka would not. By saying it’s Sri Lanka, you get all the benefits of the viewer knowing there’s a real country with that name—and very little of the baggage a better-known country would carry.
I’m trying to play devil’s advocate here, but my major reaction is: Ugh. (Except to you, Mr. Noth. We’re still friends.) I would like to live in a world where most people second-guess stuff like this because they know a lot about Sri Lanka (and yes, Pakistan, since the episode was clearly about the Faux Bhuttos). But can teewee dramas be held responsible for this? Actually, what would be great would be more international coverage on the NEWS. Sigh. And while I’m at it, I would like a pony.
Lastly… I have new respect for the people who do Television Without Pity.
