Watching Melrose Place Season 2

[abbylexis]

You meant "Alison hugged her daddy" not "Amanda hugged her daddy"

I watched this two episodes last week on soapnet. There's something interesting about the two hour melrose season finales. They tend to be the best episodes of the season.

Season 2 is full of self contained storylines and that's what Amanda's sexual harrassment lawsuit was. But remember that at the time both 90210 and Melrose Place were still somewhat connected in the fac that they aired back to back and Darren Star was working on both shows, so that "gang feel" and 1-2 episodes storylines format like (the annoying wedding planner, Ted the lurker ect) are very visible.

As for the sexual harrassement storyline, that's so 90s too. Wasn't there a movie that had come out with Demi Moore around that time, plus there was the case with Justice Clarence Thomas.

Melrose Place was very good in the early season of exploiting pop culture themes.

Hopefully you'll survive season 3 (NO SPOILERS)

[Romain]

Just one hilarious tidbit about Season 3, which I am currently watching on DVD (taking my sweet time to enjoy it before amazon finally puts up a page to pre-order Season 4) and that can't really be considered a spoiler. At some point, Billy has a large framed picture of Marlon Brando hanging in his apartment corridor: now I know that, like Brando and disturbingly enough, Andrew Shue did manage to get cast in a Francis Ford Coppola movie but do you guys think this might have been a clue from the set decorator to tell the guy to get into an acting class? Intentional or not, it just made me laugh that the show's worst actor got the picture of one of the best actors ever put right under his nose.

[Garth]

I forgot just how good season 2 was. I'm currently watching it, and am on ep.19. After getting through the 1st season, this is where the show really came into it's own. Great story lines, lots of sex, and awesome cliff hangers. Me and my buddies used to get together every week to have Melrose and 90210 parties, and this is really bringing me back to those great times. Long Live Melrose Place !!
_

[JROG]

I really loved this episode. I think it's a perfect example of when they do relationships/break-ups greatly, combined with shock-scenes, drama and irrelevant b and c plotlines, all wrapped together in a neat Cliff-hang-ER!

“Of Bikes and Men.” Wow, they just don’t care do they? So far Season 2’s episode titles have evoked literary comparisons with Shakespeare, O’Neill and now Steinbeck. It’s shameless really--which of course is part of MELROSE’s charm. It’s like a statement of intent: “We might be trash but don’t expect us to apologise for it.” The action picks up the morning after the episode before with Jake packing up his surfboard. “I can’t stay with a woman who doesn’t trust me,” he tells Jo. “You wouldn’t have thought for a second that I’d have done that [deliberately started the fire] if you had the same faith in me that I have in you.” “I do trust you,” she insists. “Don’t move out.” During a meeting with the insurance guy, it begins to dawn on Jake--via some intense close ups--that he might be responsible for the fire after all. There’s a terrific scene where he comes back to the apartment and tells Jo: “I-I think I-uh-I didn’t turn the torch off all the way before I left. I think the flame might have still been on. I think I caused the fire. I can’t believe it.” He’s near to tears, but instead punches the wall, hard. Jo tries to reassure him that it’s not the end of the world. Maybe not for her, he says, but “it was my shop!” “It was my money,” she reasons. Uh oh. “Right ... it was your money. I knew it would come to this.” He beats up the fridge until there’s food all over the floor and then hurls a bottle of wine at the wall. It’s like watching the Diet Coke Guy self destructing. There’s a similarity between a MELROSE moment like this and those Adrian Lyne movies from roughly the same period--9I/2 WEEKS and INDECENT PROPOSAL, two glossily shot, beautifully lit, seductive pieces of nonsense, but there comes a point in both movies where one of the protagonists (Kim Basinger and Woody Harrelson respectively) breaks down in a very real, very raw way. It’s like they’re being suffocated by the artifice of the very movie they exist within. Jo tells Jake to get out. “I’d like my old apartment back if it’s available,” he asks Amanda who, as landlord of the building, is sort of the God of Melrose Place. The following day, Jake apologises to Jo at Shooters. “Your temper scared the hell out of me,” she tells him. “I already lived with one violent man and I told myself ‘never again’.” The camera goes really tight on Jake’s face: “Are you saying I would hit you? ... You just don’t love me at all do you?” “I’m afraid I really do,” she replies. Later he hands her the insurance cheque. (Hey, those guys pay out quick!) When she tries to make up with him, he delivers this really sad speech: “I didn’t want your money, Jo; I wanted your heart but I think by the time I came along it was so battered and broken by other people and things that I didn’t have anything to do with, it was never really yours to give me. Keep your money, Jo. Don’t offer it to me again.” Awwww. Jake and Jo are just the best (i.e. most believable) couple on the show--partly because they’re such good actors, partly because they each come with so much baggage.

I loved absolutely every part of this. I absolutely loved how they filmed the scene were Jake realizes that he might have been the one who destroyed his life after all--and one more reason why I love this plotline. There is so much context and messiness and complexity here. Jo doesn't trust Jake, so she makes accusations. Jake comes to realize that, but then learns that of course she shouldn't trust him, he's at fault for burning the place! Of course, there's guilt, there's breakdowns, there's Jo's fear, Jake's shock at Jo's fear, money thrown in (never a good thing), the past of the characters interferes, Jake pays for other people's sins, regret, it's all so delicious.

I always find it surprising (due to my bias) when MELROSE pulls of stuff with context, subtlety (somewhat), that touches upon history, and background. I love absolutely everything between Jake and Jo because, as you said, it's all terrifically acted and the characters have so much to deal with. The sad thing is that MELROSE does context and layers and multi-dimensionality quite often--but they also sensationalize what they themselves do, and it cheapens it.

The scene were Jake breaks down is indeed very raw, very messy, so very real. But what people end up remembering is Jane and the Sauce (well, it was awesome. That scene had the air of a MELROSE moment the second it started).

Meanwhile, Jane’s mad at Sydney for telling Michael about her date with the gigolo robot and Sydney just keeps lying and lying and lying: “Michael keeps calling me. He won’t leave me alone ... Try to think how I feel. I’m losing a brother-in-law that I loved and looked up to.” “Oh please!” Jane retorts. “You never even gave Michael a second thought.” Sydney protests her sincerity but then smirks behind Jane’s back. Again, it’s the shamelessness of MELROSE. Why is Sydney suddenly so interested in Michael? Who knows? Who cares? MELROSE doesn’t apologise and doesn’t explain. (But the answer to any question on this show is usually “Sex”.) At the deposition hearing for Jane and Michael’s divorce, we get to see for really the first time just what a marvellously irredeemable shit Michael is. “This entire situation is really about Jane’s affair with the gigolo robot,” he lies shamelessly (that word again). “Are you alleging that your wife was having an affair while you were still married, Dr Mancini?” asks Jane’s attorney (that nice Stephen Eckholdt who was Greg Sumner and Maggie Gioberti’s son on THE MONROES and dated Rachel on FRIENDS). “It’s not an allegation, it’s a fact ... It’s just so ironic that the night it all started I was at the hospital. I was on call for 48 hours ...” Jane listens with blonde indignation as Michael accuses her of “making a mockery of the sanctity of our marriage.” Nice Stephen Eckholdt provides her with solid support: “I’ll just have to make sure his lies don’t sound better than your truth,” he tells her. She later runs into Michael, literally, at the supermarket and pours marinara sauce on his head. Next day, it’s Kimberly’s turn to testify: “You’re asking me to lie, Michael, in a legal proceeding, in a matter of law,” she whispers. “It’s no big deal,” he cajoles. “You do this and we’re home free.” But she cracks under the pressure and admits the truth. Ha ha! Then it’s Michael’s turn to do some wall punching: “How could you be so stupid?! ... You’ve screwed up everything!”

Jane, to me, is a weak link. It's not that I necessarily don't like her--but Bissett often leaves some to be desired. However, she is a character who throws/trashes wedding china and spreads marinara sauce over other people--you gotta love that! Infinitely better are Calabro and Cross (especially the latter). You just can't help but love it--the more horrible Michael becomes, the better! And Kimberly--well, Cross pulled off that deposition scene and that says a lot.

Seems to me like Mr. Mancini now has reason to cheat on the woman he cheated with!

The one character who does feel the need to apologise and explain--and does so constantly--is Matt, who has fallen down a televisual hole and ended up in some strange regressive sitcom. “I don’t know how to tell her I’m gay,” he kvetches about his date with Katya. “Don’t worry, I’m sure she knows,” replies Michael before proceeding on his way to a more juicy part of the show. “How?” Matt is left wondering. (By your lack of screen time, perhaps?) Over dinner, Katya asks what he looks for in a relationship. He resists the urge to say “a penis”, but then he comes out anyway and there is much stuttering and then laughing and bla bla bla.

Talk about irrelevant B plotlines. I'm already looking forward to the end of it.

As Alison’s job is hanging by a thread, what could make more sense than to call in sick for a couple of days and accompany Billy on assignment to some swanky Laguna hotel? When they get there, Billy drops the other shoe: “I forgot to tell ya, I have to check in alone. I wasn’t supposed to bring anybody.” This is the same stunt (only in reverse) that he pulled in Season 1 when he invited Alison to visit his parents for the weekend, only to tell her at the last minute that they would have to pretend to be a couple. That was a romcom subplot; this being Season 2, it now has to involve money and sex. Billy is at the hotel to interview its owner, Manny Vasquez from KNOTS LANDING (his hair greyer, but his socks doubtlessly still silk). Billy abandons Alison to have dinner with Manny and his vixenish daughter. When the conversation turns to Brazil, the daughter puts her hand on Billy’s inner thigh and asks, “What’s your favourite part?” This is the second time in a matter of weeks that Billy has been sexually harassed at work. OK, it’s official -- everyone in this show, not just those who live in the vicinity of the apartment complex, is caught is caught up in some kind of sexual delirium. This story doesn’t really go anywhere: Alison gets angry, then she cheers up; when Manny finds out about Alison’s presence at the hotel, Billy impresses him with a speech about “my best friend and the woman I love” and he offers them the run of the hotel. They’re back at the building in time to offer Jo and Jake each a sympathetic ear.

Talk about irrelevant C storylines. This was a yawner.

Jo tells Alison that the break up is all her fault, while Jake gets drunk and asks Billy, “Do you say Caribbean or do you say Caribbean?” He then knocks on Amanda’s door to tell her he’ll take the modelling job. He declines her invitation to come in, but as he staggers sadly and drunkenly down the stairs, Amanda watches him and smiles to herself. Fade to black ...

One more reason I think this story is fantastic is because it plays on and creates so many different things. While one can argue that the writers didn't know where they were taking Jake and Jo's partnership when it first started, they certainly did take full advantage of it here. There is a sense of fate here, or perhaps more accurately, a self-fullfiling prophecy: Jake had trouble with the partnership from the very beginning, so now he finds himself actually carrying out the trouble that he anticipated! Juicy. The story also manages to involve the shocking (the fire), break the characters up, give Amanda more leeway and destroy Jake and Jo's dreams and lives.

It's also so much fun to see how the writers really did bring Jake at the bottom of the barrel before he accepted the modeling job (even that is layered: Does he want the job to make a living, or does he want it to pay off Jo? Both?). Jake becoming a model is a representation of the writers' and viewers' own fantasies, and completely against Jake's character--so, to the writers' credit, he has to loose everything he loves and treasures before he begrudgingly goes for it--oh, Jake, you should have just said "yes" from the very beginning! It's all. your. fault!

And don't get me started on Amanda. When a character is almost completely absent throughout an episode, but basically comes at the end to be the reason you tune in next time, that says something.

DDD

[JROG]

I really loved this episode. I think it's a perfect example of when they do relationships/break-ups greatly, combined with shock-scenes, drama and irrelevant b and c plotlines, all wrapped together in a neat Cliff-hang-ER!

“Of Bikes and Men.” Wow, they just don’t care do they? So far Season 2’s episode titles have evoked literary comparisons with Shakespeare, O’Neill and now Steinbeck. It’s shameless really--which of course is part of MELROSE’s charm. It’s like a statement of intent: “We might be trash but don’t expect us to apologise for it.” The action picks up the morning after the episode before with Jake packing up his surfboard. “I can’t stay with a woman who doesn’t trust me,” he tells Jo. “You wouldn’t have thought for a second that I’d have done that [deliberately started the fire] if you had the same faith in me that I have in you.” “I do trust you,” she insists. “Don’t move out.” During a meeting with the insurance guy, it begins to dawn on Jake--via some intense close ups--that he might be responsible for the fire after all. There’s a terrific scene where he comes back to the apartment and tells Jo: “I-I think I-uh-I didn’t turn the torch off all the way before I left. I think the flame might have still been on. I think I caused the fire. I can’t believe it.” He’s near to tears, but instead punches the wall, hard. Jo tries to reassure him that it’s not the end of the world. Maybe not for her, he says, but “it was my shop!” “It was my money,” she reasons. Uh oh. “Right ... it was your money. I knew it would come to this.” He beats up the fridge until there’s food all over the floor and then hurls a bottle of wine at the wall. It’s like watching the Diet Coke Guy self destructing. There’s a similarity between a MELROSE moment like this and those Adrian Lyne movies from roughly the same period--9I/2 WEEKS and INDECENT PROPOSAL, two glossily shot, beautifully lit, seductive pieces of nonsense, but there comes a point in both movies where one of the protagonists (Kim Basinger and Woody Harrelson respectively) breaks down in a very real, very raw way. It’s like they’re being suffocated by the artifice of the very movie they exist within. Jo tells Jake to get out. “I’d like my old apartment back if it’s available,” he asks Amanda who, as landlord of the building, is sort of the God of Melrose Place. The following day, Jake apologises to Jo at Shooters. “Your temper scared the hell out of me,” she tells him. “I already lived with one violent man and I told myself ‘never again’.” The camera goes really tight on Jake’s face: “Are you saying I would hit you? ... You just don’t love me at all do you?” “I’m afraid I really do,” she replies. Later he hands her the insurance cheque. (Hey, those guys pay out quick!) When she tries to make up with him, he delivers this really sad speech: “I didn’t want your money, Jo; I wanted your heart but I think by the time I came along it was so battered and broken by other people and things that I didn’t have anything to do with, it was never really yours to give me. Keep your money, Jo. Don’t offer it to me again.” Awwww. Jake and Jo are just the best (i.e. most believable) couple on the show--partly because they’re such good actors, partly because they each come with so much baggage.

I loved absolutely every part of this. I absolutely loved how they filmed the scene were Jake realizes that he might have been the one who destroyed his life after all--and one more reason why I love this plotline.



There is so much context and messiness and complexity here. Jo doesn't trust Jake, so she makes accusations. Jake comes to realize that, but then learns that of course she shouldn't trust him, he's at fault for burning the place! Of course, there's guilt, there's breakdowns, there's Jo's fear, Jake's shock at Jo's fear, money thrown in (never a good thing), the past of the characters interferes, Jake pays for other people's sins, regret, it's all so delicious.

I always find it surprising (due to my bias) when MELROSE pulls of stuff with context, subtlety (somewhat), that touches upon history, and background. I love absolutely everything between Jake and Jo because, as you said, it's all terrifically acted and the characters have so much to deal with. The sad thing is that MELROSE does context and layers and multi-dimensionality quite often--but they also sensationalize what they themselves do, and it cheapens it.

The scene were Jake breaks down is indeed very raw, very messy, so very real. But what people end up remembering is Jane and the Sauce (well, it was awesome. That scene had the air of a MELROSE moment the second it started).




(kinda shaky but fits well )

Meanwhile, Jane’s mad at Sydney for telling Michael about her date with the gigolo robot and Sydney just keeps lying and lying and lying: “Michael keeps calling me. He won’t leave me alone ... Try to think how I feel. I’m losing a brother-in-law that I loved and looked up to.” “Oh please!” Jane retorts. “You never even gave Michael a second thought.” Sydney protests her sincerity but then smirks behind Jane’s back. Again, it’s the shamelessness of MELROSE. Why is Sydney suddenly so interested in Michael? Who knows? Who cares? MELROSE doesn’t apologise and doesn’t explain. (But the answer to any question on this show is usually “Sex”.) At the deposition hearing for Jane and Michael’s divorce, we get to see for really the first time just what a marvellously irredeemable shit Michael is. “This entire situation is really about Jane’s affair with the gigolo robot,” he lies shamelessly (that word again). “Are you alleging that your wife was having an affair while you were still married, Dr Mancini?” asks Jane’s attorney (that nice Stephen Eckholdt who was Greg Sumner and Maggie Gioberti’s son on THE MONROES and dated Rachel on FRIENDS). “It’s not an allegation, it’s a fact ... It’s just so ironic that the night it all started I was at the hospital. I was on call for 48 hours ...” Jane listens with blonde indignation as Michael accuses her of “making a mockery of the sanctity of our marriage.” Nice Stephen Eckholdt provides her with solid support: “I’ll just have to make sure his lies don’t sound better than your truth,” he tells her. She later runs into Michael, literally, at the supermarket and pours marinara sauce on his head. Next day, it’s Kimberly’s turn to testify: “You’re asking me to lie, Michael, in a legal proceeding, in a matter of law,” she whispers. “It’s no big deal,” he cajoles. “You do this and we’re home free.” But she cracks under the pressure and admits the truth. Ha ha! Then it’s Michael’s turn to do some wall punching: “How could you be so stupid?! ... You’ve screwed up everything!”

Jane, to me, is a weak link. It's not that I necessarily don't like her--but Bissett often leaves some to be desired. However, she is a character who throws/trashes wedding china and spreads marinara sauce over other people--you gotta love that! Infinitely better are Calabro and Cross (especially the latter). You just can't help but love it--the more horrible Michael becomes, the better! And Kimberly--well, Cross pulled off that deposition scene and that says a lot.





Seems to me like Mr. Mancini now has reason to cheat on the woman he cheated with!

The one character who does feel the need to apologise and explain--and does so constantly--is Matt, who has fallen down a televisual hole and ended up in some strange regressive sitcom. “I don’t know how to tell her I’m gay,” he kvetches about his date with Katya. “Don’t worry, I’m sure she knows,” replies Michael before proceeding on his way to a more juicy part of the show. “How?” Matt is left wondering. (By your lack of screen time, perhaps?) Over dinner, Katya asks what he looks for in a relationship. He resists the urge to say “a penis”, but then he comes out anyway and there is much stuttering and then laughing and bla bla bla.

Talk about irrelevant B plotlines. I'm already looking forward to the end of it.

As Alison’s job is hanging by a thread, what could make more sense than to call in sick for a couple of days and accompany Billy on assignment to some swanky Laguna hotel? When they get there, Billy drops the other shoe: “I forgot to tell ya, I have to check in alone. I wasn’t supposed to bring anybody.” This is the same stunt (only in reverse) that he pulled in Season 1 when he invited Alison to visit his parents for the weekend, only to tell her at the last minute that they would have to pretend to be a couple. That was a romcom subplot; this being Season 2, it now has to involve money and sex. Billy is at the hotel to interview its owner, Manny Vasquez from KNOTS LANDING (his hair greyer, but his socks doubtlessly still silk). Billy abandons Alison to have dinner with Manny and his vixenish daughter. When the conversation turns to Brazil, the daughter puts her hand on Billy’s inner thigh and asks, “What’s your favourite part?” This is the second time in a matter of weeks that Billy has been sexually harassed at work. OK, it’s official -- everyone in this show, not just those who live in the vicinity of the apartment complex, is caught is caught up in some kind of sexual delirium. This story doesn’t really go anywhere: Alison gets angry, then she cheers up; when Manny finds out about Alison’s presence at the hotel, Billy impresses him with a speech about “my best friend and the woman I love” and he offers them the run of the hotel. They’re back at the building in time to offer Jo and Jake each a sympathetic ear.

Talk about irrelevant C storylines. This was a yawner.


Check out the eyebrows! LMAO

Jo tells Alison that the break up is all her fault, while Jake gets drunk and asks Billy, “Do you say Caribbean or do you say Caribbean?” He then knocks on Amanda’s door to tell her he’ll take the modelling job. He declines her invitation to come in, but as he staggers sadly and drunkenly down the stairs, Amanda watches him and smiles to herself. Fade to black ...

One more reason I think this story is fantastic is because it plays on and creates so many different things. While one can argue that the writers didn't know where they were taking Jake and Jo's partnership when it first started, they certainly did take full advantage of it here. There is a sense of fate here, or perhaps more accurately, a self-fullfiling prophecy: Jake had trouble with the partnership from the very beginning, so now he finds himself actually carrying out the trouble that he anticipated! Juicy. The story also manages to involve the shocking (the fire), break the characters up, give Amanda more leeway and destroy Jake and Jo's dreams and lives.

It's also so much fun to see how the writers really did bring Jake at the bottom of the barrel before he accepted the modeling job (even that is layered: Does he want the job to make a living, or does he want it to pay off Jo? Both?). Jake becoming a model is a representation of the writers' and viewers' own fantasies, and completely against Jake's character--so, to the writers' credit, he has to loose everything he loves and treasures before he begrudgingly goes for it--oh, Jake, you should have just said "yes" from the very beginning! It's all. your. fault!

And don't get me started on Amanda. When a character is almost completely absent throughout an episode, but basically comes at the end to be the reason you tune in next time, that says something.





Sorry if I'm hijacking your thread!

DDD

[James from London]

Hijack away - great stuff!

[JROG]

"Hot and Bothered."

I realized, after this episode, that I love Jane. She is the trashiest character on MELROSE, and I think that's good. Being the most less-defined character of the show (after Matt, of course, whose gayness seems to be all he's about), the writers can take Jane and make her do almost anything trashy--throw plates, spread sauce all over her ex, visit her lawyer and have trashy, naughty floor sex.... Up until this point in the series, at least, you can't see Jo doing something like that, or Amanda (who has always been greatly written) or even Alisson... but Jane? Sure. We don't really know her, and who she is, so there's a sense that she can do anything! And that's why I love her! This type of thing fits Bissett perfectly.

DDD

[sunshineboyuk]

Jane is the best character , she's the Laura Avery Sumner character of Melrose. She's the only one - if memory serves- who sort of , sort of , grows and changes .....

[JROG]

Jane is the best character , she's the Laura Avery Sumner character of Melrose. She's the only one - if memory serves- who sort of , sort of , grows and changes .....

I admittedly never saw Jane as Laura... and I love my Laura. I definitely like Jane far more now, in Season 1 she was borderline annoying at times, but I was very patient with her I'm glad to hear that she sort of grows and changes as the years go on.... I will definitely look at her differently now but I'm still not convinced

DDD

[sunshineboyuk]

well she's the closest Melrose gets to a character that evolves, and she gets more wise craking as it goes along , I ended up loving her scenes around season 3.. she also ends up , if memory serves - God I must get the whole thing on dvd- being the only credible character ie she never goes into science fiction territory , i recall her being quite grounded