We ended the last post with Lee and Amanda leaving Francine and IFF to visit Leon Sachs, the journalist.. but before I continue, I just wanted to mention the script has an extra scene here that got cut.. My goodness this episode had some re writes! [Check out Petra’s smkland for scripts if you’d like to read it all- Hi Petra!!! 
] – this scene gives a little more info on Shauna and the Senator.. When we met 
Shauna her manner was a bit unexplained.. hesitant? unsure?? I 
thought she was playing it a bit coy with Rita.. but now I’ve seen what the script says – it seems Shauna wasn’t happy with what she was a part of and Rita tricked her too– she decides to skip town and stops by the Senator’s to say bye.. they share a bit of a moment.. The bit I find interesting is the final exchange of the scene. Here: [script only!]
Hoffmeir touches Shauna’s face softly.
Hoffmeir: You’re a very beautiful girl, Shauna.
Shauna (smiles): I know. A lot of good it’s done me.
– Is it just me or is this fascinating??!!! It seems to be speaking to that theme of Superficial beauty/charms/appearances! LOL.. maybe it’s just me!
Well, back to the episode! We join Lee and Amanda as they arrive at Sachs’ apartment.. [I thought Amanda was ‘safe at the agency’- sooooo what happened with that? Why should she be leaving the agency at this point? I know they said it was to pick up her car- but couldn’t ‘one of the boys’ do that? ]
Lee and Amanda look for Sachs’ apartment.. as they arrive at Sachs’ front door- wait!!.. Holy Moly!!! Did I just see what I think I just saw?! Watch this!!!!
Right after Lee says ‘here we are’ and before he takes his hand away as he says ‘Mr Sachs’– Watch where Lee puts his hand as he guides Amanda over from Lee’s left to his right and to Sach’s door!!!!
What the heck???!!!!! I never saw that before!! Now Lee moves his hand away.. but it looks v.dodgy! 
It doesn’t seem to be reacted to by Amanda. I even checked to see if maybe his hand just hovered over her hip, but it looks to me like he touches it briefly- umm this is rather intimate no?
Lee’s hand makes a fist when he has removed it- could he be reacting to this accidentally intimate gesture? I am guessing this was by accident and not scripted at all.. but it reminds me of the fabulous moment in Utopia Now where Amanda touches Lee’s butt! baahaa! 
Anyway.. Lee and Amanda find Sachs heading out. He immediately gives Lee and Amanda attitude.. he doesn’t care who they are! If they are not John Travolta.. or Sandy?? Nah not interested!!
Lee shows Sachs your car! Greased Lightning!! Sachs: Why should I tell you anything? [The script has Amanda say here: Because someone’s been murdered. – I like that line!!! but maybe it made Sachs seem too cold hearted when he refused to co-operate.. ]
Lee flashes his Agency badge.
Lee: Well, how’s this for a reason? Now you can answer some questions here or you can come with me and answer them later but either way, you’re going to tell me what I want to know.
Sachs lets slip that he was suppose to meet 
him the day he was murdered.. and this makes him clam up even more.. At this 
Sachs starts walking off!
LOL what happened to Lee’s threat of coming with him or answering his questions?!
I had to laugh when the journalist is sticking it to Lee and he calls him ….. ” pal!” twice!! .. ouch Lee.. that’s gotta hurt!
Sachs tells Lee and Amanda he has a story to do.. and they can read what he knows along 
with everyone else. As a parting gift, Sachs suggests that if Lee wants to know about Hoffmeir, he should check out his voting record in the last year. With this, Sachs turns to leave and pow!!
Sachs gets shot right in front of Lee and Amanda!!!
Whoooo by the baddie with the mean little mouth and with the mean big rifle! .. [Wow.. Amanda was right next to Sachs when he got shot!!! Is it just me or is this really weird?? there is the woman who actually witnessed the murder of Gelles and next to her: a journalist who may or may not figure things out – and who gets shot? the journalist who doesn’t know that much! This is very strange!! I can only guess the baddie mistook Amanda for Rita – LOL! ]
Love how Lee’s first move is to shove Amanda behind some cover and protect her [You can see he has started shoving her in the pic above!] ahhh it warms my heart! there’s a good Lee!!
Foreman (the shooter) runs for it, Lee checks and Sachs is still alive!
He tells Amanda to call an ambulance and call Billy and we see her run back to Sachs’ apartment – rofl! what good would that do?! it’s locked no? [okay I guess she could be going to knock on one of the neighbour’s doors]
Lee takes off after Foreman, chasing him down- Love the wall Lee runs by- did someone decide to include a secret message to their folks back home? tee hee! Hi!!!!! LOL!!!!
Foreman leads Lee to the other goon waiting in the getaway car, only he doesn’t get in and errr getaway- he instead climbs a random staircase and lets Lee shoot him!
Ouchy!! [btw I don’t remember seeing mountains like that in Washington DC.. but then again I guess I didn’t see everything! ahem..] Lucky Lee.. two for one day for him too!
Lee holds his gun on the second baddie and warns him: Alright you can come out of this Dead or Alive it’s your choice
ROFL!! you can take BB out of cowboy land… but you can’t take the cowboy out of BB!! [Is this wishful thinking, or does BB sound like he says that with a bit of a cowboy accent?!]
Well the other baddie is not a total dummie.. and knows when to give himself up!
Whooooo intense Lee! Lee kills Foreman.. that’s interesting.. it’s not common for us to see Lee actually kill someone!
Back to IFF.. Ahh this is a new IFF exterior! [we now have a winter jogger in red pants!]
In the bullpen, Lee is in fine form.. Hmm I guess this is the next day..
Have a read of the script – this scene is completely 
different! Amanda is in it!!
Francine has an update for us.. Sachs is stable but it will be a while before they can tell us anything..
Lee to Francine: hmmm nice outfit!
Francine: oh thank you.
[wow she’s in a good mood! Francine turns and starts to walk away…]
Lee: I guess if we keep clothes long enough they actually come back in style.
Francine: Style?
[yeah.. Is ‘Star Trek’ a style?!]
Lee: ha haaaa.. gotcha!
Ohhh haaaa.. yeahhh good one.. Lee’s a funny guy.. what the heck??!!! Random!! [Anything that makes Lee smile like that though is okay by me!!]
Francine: haaa… I’m gonna remember this!
[Is this little exchange really weird???!!! they are suddenly warm buddies?..ugh! Amanda is suddenly cutsie?? double ugh!!]
Lee: I’m just kidding you! haaaa..
They share a laugh together
… and me? I squirm!!!
ROFL!!!! Lee’s line in isolation is fab!!! but that outfit was never in style and never will be in style.. ever.. [at least not in this galaxy-but if Francine scoots around the universe in the starship enterprise I’m sure she’ll find a nebular where they love it.. off you go Francine!! :)]
I have always loved that one line of Lee’s- it’s a great one liner.. but I have never gotten it’s context! or why it was a joke between Lee and Francine.. What am missing?! Reading the script this scene has Amanda in it- and Francine delivers the line as a dig to Amanda.. now that makes more sense.. but heck.. I do love to see Lee tease Francine’s conceit, so I don’t mind that I don’t completely get this moment!
Is this also a nod to the theme of superficiality?? styles change?? but they go in cycles?? I don’t know!!! Hmmm… if it were a dig at Amanda from Francine that would make more sense.. Francine has always IMHO judged Amanda superficially – and still does..
At least it shows Lee is in a good mood now – and why?? Listen to Lee’s next line!! Billy joins Lee and Francine.
Lee: ahhh!! at least it is safe for Amanda to be out on the streets again!! 🙂
LOL.. when she wasn’t safe, she was out on them anyway! – Lee’s good mood? is thanks to Amanda being safe again!!! 🙂
Remember how preoccupied and nasally congested he was before?? now he is anxiety and mucous free!!!! why.. it’s quite touching!!!!
Well this post is getting to be huge so I really should finish up there for now.. I’ll pick up right here with this line of Lee’s again next post!
As always- I am thrilled to hear from any readers anything you’d like to mention.. ask.. comment on.. you name it!! byeee and thanks sooo much for stopping by!
"Just walk with me.." 
Hoooo haaaa! Lee does run his hand over her backside!! I watched it, ahem, several times and am pretty sure you can even see the fabric of her pants move from his touch…not just from her movement. It does seem a little more intimate than their usual closeness – even for Lee and all his touchiness. And I do see Lee’s hand make a fist after he touches her, but I don’t see him jerk his hand away like Amanda does in UNow. But then again, Amanda’s hand does pretty much cover his, umm, whole right cheek, umm, ahhh, loosens collar, focus!
After Lee tells Amanda to go call Billy, I think she runs off in search of a payphone! Remember those? She uses one in SBTBells too. There is a payphone at a gas station near my closest grocery store that is just the stand but has no phone in it. My kids were asking me a couple of weeks ago what it was!!! LOL!! It still says “PHONE” on the side in big blue letters. No wonder my kids were confused. I wonder what happened to all those old pay phones. I don’t think I could even find one now if I tried.
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Hello! I am missing everyone and the blog right now….for the past 2.5 weeks I’ve either had houseguests or was traveling. I had a few minutes this morning to read this post and comments – what fun! Never noticed Lee’s hip/butt touch before either – need to investigate 🙂 I will be able to get back on the blog next week and will have time to start working again on SAABeyond stats.
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Hiya BJo!
I suspect that is the case for a lot of our community.. for most, it is summer holidays and people are out of their normal routines.. that’s okay – we’ll still be here when things calm down again 🙂
For us folks in the southern hemisphere?? we are in the middle of winter now! 🙂
Glad you enjoyed Lee’s hip touch – LOL yes it must be investigated thoroughly!! 🙂
Take care BJo! I’ll look forward to you being back soon.
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When I watch the show I try to make sense of what the producers actually aired, I try not to think that they made mistakes or tried to piece scenes together. I just take the show as a whole story and interpret it that way. I know it isn’t always perfect and it is a creation of producers and actors, but it is more fun for me to view it this way. It doesn’t bother me at all if you like to look at it other ways, its a tv show meant for entertainment so whatever makes it enjoyable, right?
So when approaching the Lee and Francine scene I take it at face value. I agree that it falls flat, but I don’t view it as the mistake of the writers, I think Lee is trying to figure out how to relate to Francine. Lee is changing how he views women, between his growing attraction to Amanda (which is not purely based on her looks) and the context of this case he is trying to figure out how to make comments to women especially the ones he works closely with. His “just kidding” sounds to me that he realized he didn’t do it too well, but he wants to be clear with Francine that he is being friendly and trying to be light in his conversation. I think he may be noticing women and how they look and how he responds to them, I think he is trying to figure himself out. And I doubt the producers did this on purpose, but in light of the way I watch the show, I love it that the part of the outfit that Francine reused was the belt from that appreciating housewives conversation in TGTN. He really is beginning to appreciate this particular housewife and her generosity, just at a less superficial level.
As far as the hand graze, I don’t think Lee was being flirty or overtly familiar with Amanda. I view it as a subconscious continuation of the way he guided her with his hand, he fisted his hand afterwards because he realized what he had done too late. I think it was just a revelation of how close and comfortable they are with each other, how much he cares for her, they have become more intimate with each other in a way. The sweet thing about these two is that they develop so many important intimacies with each other before they ever feel comfortable initiating any physical intimacy. And actually the idea of intimacy and its forms,uses or contexts are brought out in this episode as well, to a degree. Lee and Randi, Lee and Francine, the senator and Shauna, Lee and Amanda. Its is all subtly there for us to evaluate, which one is true and pure and real, and which ones are a little sex, or a little scandal.
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Very true Morley! We do watch the show differently don’t we! I think I try and combine it all.. meaning not every perspective at all times.. rather I tend to switch! One scene I’ll take it on face value and view it as character development..but other times.. It doesn’t feel right and I analyse it from a storytelling point of view… or film making point of view.. Yep this is going to be a very individual thing that’s for sure! but really glad you see things differently – that we all do!! – and that we can share it with each other! Yes I have been thinking about overall themes etc. and regardless of what I think of the rewrites or whatever I think it all still fits well with what you are thinking in terms of overall themes..
Yeah I don’t think Lee was being flirty with Amanda – just very familiar! [I like how you call it a revelation- awesome!] Nor with Francine actually.. ugh.. though I did think he was being flirty with Rita in the Senator’s office – pha pha!
bye!
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I know, I hate that Rita thing. I still haven’t figured it out enough to suit me.
But I agree that Lee wasn’t being flirty with either Amanda or Francine.
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I agree with you. Lee’s hand is definitely on Amanda’s hip (butt) and funny how both of them make a “fist” afterwards…in the script or not…I like to think it was an accident. It is amazing how much every one notice’s what is going on…I really do need to “see” the episodes. Especially one’s with hands accidentally touching or lights in the shot. I did notice the guy in Ship of Spies….thanks and await your episode 15, Conny
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Hiya Conny!!! yeah both scenes are alittle similar huh..yeah I have no idea if it was intended or what.. yes we are a little obsessed aren’t we – eek!! 🙂
You noticed the guy in ship of spies?? is that the crew member crouching waiting for KJ to climb up to the lifeboat? ohhh that still cracks me up! I think finding a crew member should be worth at least 100 bonus points! tee heeee..
Great to hear from you Conny!
Byeeeeee!
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If I ever get a minute (not likely since school finished today) I am going to have to rematch the hand scene. Playing devils advocate is it possible he’s not actually touching her and that it just appears that way because of the angle of the camera? Damn this is where I wished more episodes were on YouTube, I could check at a moments notice. I’d also never get anything done either but that’s beside the point 😉 if he is touching her then wowee that’s pretty friendly in my book!!!!
I assumed they decided to shoot Sachs because Rita maybe realised he was looking into Gelles murder and might stumble across something or at least fling enough mud to make something stick. Either that or he’s a really really poor shot lol
Hmmm, not sure about Lee and Francine teasing each other. Just seems a bit I dunno off…….maybe all this talk of sex scandals and trick books has *ahem* fired everyone up a bit.
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Hiya Jenbo! I wondered the same thing – was Lee touching her? or did it just look like he was?? I replayed it too many times.. LOL! You may disagree when you get around to watching it sometime but for me it looked like he was definitely touching Amanda, until she is to his other side and then he begins to move his hand away..but it looks like he is touching her more on the butt! [but I don’t think he is actually touching her any longer by then] To me the hip hold was intimate enough for me to go – wow!!! These two are very comfortable with each other!! and.. to question whether it was an intended touch or not..(the hip, not the butt) and so I threw out the idea of it being accidental. I don’t have a clue what it is – other than I like it! and yeah like Morely says these actors are great so maybe they are beginning to add more layers to their closeness – and this is the first step in that direction.. we shall see I guess! 🙂
but Jenbo I don’t think Lee was brushing his hand along Amanda’s butt, I think he grabbed her by the hips to move her to the other side.. and had his hand briefly on her hip – that’s enough for me haaaaaa!
Debilyn, your explanation of the Lee and Francine thing is the best I’ve heard yet!! Though, I still feel Francine digging at Amanda is more in character at this point.. Happy and Sweet Francine freaks me out.. now Frisky and snappy funny Francine I can handle! The first scene I thought was okay ( Ie wishful thinking) the second?? Maybe it ‘s just me- but it felt like the lines were for Amanda and Francine ended up deliverying them.. ie. the scene was originally an exchange between Francine and Amanda.. then it was quickly re written to be Lee and Amanda.. and then at the last moment Amanda was cut completely from the scene (KJ had to go to see a counsellor about her hair!) and Francine ended up delivering the line.. teee heeee.. don’t mind me.. Debilyn your idea about the theme could make sense – LOL I just don’t want to see that between Lee and Francine! haaa!! 🙂
By the way Jenbo – regarding Sachs getting shot not Amanda. Yes the baddie was ordered to shoot Sachs. My point (made a bit vaguely!) was that this baddie really follows orders to the letter! because he shots Sachs, and doesn’t see or shoot at Amanda — who he was ordered to kill earlier as well.. this baddie doesn’t think on his feet and improvise! He went to Sach’s to shoot Sachs.. not to shoot Amanda – who was even more dangerous IMHO as the Actual witness to the crime! but.. hey.. maybe it’s just me.. I think too much sometimes! and heck.. I don’t really want Amanda to get shot!
Hey Valerie you checked it out?? cool!!! I had never seen it before – I was stunned when I saw the picture of it!!! [I only noticed it when going through screen caps!] Yes good one Valerie! I have some vague recollections of that My mother has the same outfit comment – bad Francine!!!! 🙂 Yes – it seems forced! that’s a great way of describing it! Ahhh swoony indeed! yes by Lee’s side Amanda’s safe!! He does keep a ‘very close’ eye on her doesn’t he! 🙂
Hi Cindy!!! haaaaa glad you liked the baddie not shooting ‘Rita’! Yes! I agree… I would have rather not had the Lee/Francine exchange – we are only halfway through that scene so it will be interesting to see what you all think of the scene.. It is really strange!!! I think the re-writes went a bit awry!!!
Must get on with my work – ahhh great to hear from you all! I hope you are enjoying this episode as much as I am! Regardless of the hair-don’t!!
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Okay, so I’m in the minority. I like the teasing scene between Lee and Francine because I think it goes along with the “tackling” scene. I think Lee is simply getting back at Francine for her “you wish” remark. Also, since this show is about a “little sex/little scandal,” I think the flirting scenes are simply a little play off that theme. Since flirting can be seen as many different things, I think the writers included many of them – compliments, suggestive comments, etc. This scene works better for that theme with Lee and Francine than with Francine getting a dig at Amanda.
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And, yes, even the touching could be seen as flirting. 🙂
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I had never noticed Lee’s hand graze. I had to go back and check that out. Nice! As I mentioned that Lee and Francine scene just seemed so flat to me. It was a little weird and just was out of place.
Knowing that Amanda was supposed to be a part of it makes a little more sense. The out of style comment is similar to one Francine made in Welcome to America, Mr. Brand. At the garden party (where Lee looked rather nice in his garden attire–I digress) Francine starts by telling Amanda that she likes her outfit, but then says her mother has one like it in fuchsia or something.
With Lee and Francine the whole thing just seems forced. Other conversations they’ve had when they pick with one another seem more natural and buddy-like. I think I was annoyed by all their little interactions in this episode.
I think it was safe for Amanda to be on the streets because she was with Lee. She’s always safe when she’s with him, because he will do whatever it takes to protect her. Swoon time.
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Some random thoughts:
Amanda saved because from a distance (and that HAIR!) makes her look like Rita – LOL!
Nice shot of those famous DC mountain.s 😉
Nice shot of the butt tap!
I would have liked to have the scene when Shauna sees the senator and regrets what Rita has done. If TPTB were pressed for time, they could have dropped the Lee and Francine and fashion exchange. That always came across as forced and unnatural to me.
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I have been waiting for these two scenes… And I am glad you added that part from the script, yes, beauty is more than skin deep 🙂 Great concept, especially after the hair don’t.
I am glad you caught they way Lee touches Amanda here, I rewind that bit often. No one touches me like that except my husband and he never did until after we were married. Amanda (KJ) didn’t even flinch, but I wouldn’t say that was an accident, those two actors know what they are doing with their characters. I love it!
Funny thing about the style comment between Francine and Lee. I have never seen that dress on Francine before, but I have seen that belt. During There Goes the Neighborhood when Lee makes his comment about appreciating the generosity of the American housewife, remember that one?
Got to go, but I look forward to everyone’s responses to this as well when I sit down again this evening. Have a great day!
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