Back to IFF.. Billy and Lee head into Billy’s office.
Lee: Gregory couldn’t give you a single clue.
Oh noooo Gregory didn’t tell?!
I guess he is enjoying torturing Billy..
Billy: Let me tell you something. The Russian Tsars used to tease their guests with 20 appetisers before they served the main course. My hunch is they got somebody…
(the phone rings and Billy answers)
…Melrose here.
Rhonda: Lee Stetson please.
Billy: It’s for you.
Lee: Yeah Stetson.
Rhonda: Lee, it’s Rhonda. I got a name, and a meet.
Lee: Go.
Rhonda: The guy’s name’s Towne and he’s going to meet a KGB Agent at 1.00 outside a Chinese Restaurant – Xin Hua’s on Third.
[Towne? as in the guy Amanda was doing her work on?! Well gee who would have thought the two jobs could be somehow connected?! lol…
This smk pattern of coincidence… maybe for once it is not a coincidence? and there is a puppet master here bringing to two together? i.e. Gregory – he did seem to want vengeance and he has Lee and Amanda in his sights. To be honest though, I have no idea what the big overall plan is here.. I’m looking forward to it hopefully all coming together and making sense – I have just a little plot crater trepidation..]
Lee: Thanks Rhonda. It’s a good thing the KGB takes such bad care of its cars. You sure it’s legit?
Rhonda: They were talkin’ like there’s no tomorrow but I’m not the one who has to decide to believe ‘em or not. Have a good day.
[I like Rhonda! She makes an excellent point. I pass on what I hear. It’s your job to analyse it!]
Lee: Yeah.
(Lee hangs up)
…That’s one of my sources – says there’s some kind of a drop going down. Look, can you get a surveillance team to this location in half an hour?
Billy: You got it.
Lee: Okay.
Lee leaves Billy to organise things. lol. Thanks Boss!
We cut to Xin Hua restaurant. The place is under surveillance..
..lots of agents blending in (sorta) and big camera in a van. LOL.. nothing suspicious looking bout that.
Lee: Give me a 30° right and left…
…Still camera – cover the reverse….
[I don’t remember having seen this agent before.. but he seems to be following Lee’s fashion sense with that jacket of his]
(Lee observes Towne approaching)
…It’s Towne coming from the east… [of course he’s coming from ‘the east’ it’s a Chinese restaurant 
]
…Lock in on him.
(Lee starts to change location.
We see another guy refocusing with his camera.
[Is he an agent too?]
He takes a photo of Towne.
Lee pauses near a sign.. and watches the hammering real estate guy approach the Chinese restaurant)
…Okay, the man coming from Pennsylvania in the grey coat, that Edgar, the KGB’s local number 5 man.
[number 5 man?! lol…]
…Looks like a pay-off stash.
[Oh my.. how shiny is Lee’s jacket?!]
(Edgar lifts a newspaper stand lid, puts it down and crosses the road)
…I’m going to check the newspaper rack. Get stills of this….
(Lee heads over, looks between the newspapers and see’s some cash stashed)
[If KGB guy saw Lee wouldn’t he know something’s up?]
(Lee takes a paper and heads to another location to continue watching.
Edgar checks his watch, and starts heading toward the front of the restaurant..
while the guy takes more photos.)
…Coming out of the restaurant – that’s Towne…
(Towne exists the restaurant and Edgar walks into him.
They both drop their identical brown paper bags.)
…There’s the drop. Everybody on it?…
[Actually that’s funny.. the drop- is a drop!
LOL at the close ups on the cameras.. I mean: who could have missed it?! This all seems hard to miss.. ahem.. almost like someone wanted Lee to come and see this not so subtle drop. Part of me thinks: Rhonda hearing about this drop was a set up!!! Part of me thinks: well this stuff happens on smk all the time and it’s legit and we are suppose to buy it! lol.]
[Hoooo haaaaaa… Stop the Press!!! Just check out Lee’s ‘I’m gonna eat these guys for breakfast’ pose!!]
…Towne’s picking up his money – cover him. I’m going after Edgar. 
[uh oh.. he did go to the newspaper thingy – if he wasn’t picking up $$ this is a biiiig coincidence! 😉
LOL at Lee’s determined and stealthy stalking of Edgar!]
Edgar rounds a corner with Lee following close behind. As Lee rounds the corner he finds Edgar is on to him and shoves some boxes at Lee and he runs off.. Lee catches up and they fight over the paper bag.
Is it just me or is this pretty lame?
The way Lee reaches over the balcony like that to grasp the bag?? when he could have just whacked Edgar’s arm?! Since Lee has his hands on the bag, Edgar picks him up and dumps him onto an awaiting mattress.. my my.. almost like he wanted Lee to have the bag! so good of Edgar to provide Lee with a mattress to avoid any more ouchies.
(Another agent I haven’t seen before rounds the corner.)
…Go on! He’s up there – get him!
Lee sends the agent after Edgar. Whoo and there’s another agent… the second camera guy. Okay so we have a moustache agent too.. 
Lee opens the bag to check out the contents while the two agents return.
Lee: What?… (they motion that they’ve lost Edgar) … Damn it!!
Lee opens the piece of paper and finds a coded message..
whoooooo.. It looks like this Towne is sharing secret logarithms! Gasp! The world might need protecting ‘from a renegade arithmetic teacher.’ after all??!!
And.. I can’t believe this little stake out took about 4 minutes! With the 4 minute intro of Francine in the desert that’s 8 minutes of this ep that’s been pretty… not riveting.. The Lee and Amanda scenes are smk gold! but.. so far this ep seems to have lots of filler!
Amanda: I’m not sure what filler is. I’m not sure I wanna know what filler is but it doesn’t matter because mighty meaty doesn’t have it and believe me, that’s better for you!
It smells like a set up.. but.. if Towne is not a baddie, why would he be involved in setting himself up?! [looks like he took the cash no?] And why would he be eating Chinese take away 2 days in a row?!!
I know I know.. you can’t tell me.. sorry.. just thinkin out loud.. and trying to stay with the story.. Frankly, at this point. I’m confused 
Anyone remember seeing this episode for the first time? Anyone else confused??
"Just walk with me.." 
I am back.. for a minute. Lets see if I can even remember my login info… Iwsod. I love the way you handle scenes like this. The narration is priceless, and it makes watching these more tedious scenes worth while.
I like Rhonda too, and I really like the way Lee hasn’t flirted with her at all 😉
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I approved your comment Morley.. it had gone into moderation. I’ll try and get back here later to enjoy everyone’s thoughts 🙂
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It had been so long that I wasn’t logged in anymore and I had forgotten my password. Lesson: don’t go so long between JWWM comments, even when life conspires against you. 🙂
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This episode is far and away the most confusing plot of all to me so far. So I went looking for the script at Petra’s site and happened upon this phone conversation between Lee and Rhonda (script spells it Ronda). I’m really glad we got the ending of the phone conversation that we did, because the script indicates instead of “Ronda’s” response being, “I’m not the one who has to decide to believe ‘em or not,” it indicates “(fans herself with a fistful of bills) Guess they keep us all busy.” Errrgggghhh! I’m glad we didn’t get that, because I would hate to have to decide whether she was flush with cash from a whole lot of mechanical work on the Russians’ car or because they bribed her! I really like Rhonda too and what we got makes it much easier to do so!
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Thanks for that tidbit, ruthp. That is a rather ambiguous response from R(h)onda. And the alternate spelling reminds me of musical form (a rondo) which scrambles my brain further….
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Yeah, we don’t need another refrain from her if she’s not on our side!
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ROFL, ruthp
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Yes, that makes it sound like Rhonda was “working both sides of the street”. Suddenly I’m not liking Rhonda so much. Confusing messages from the script and what was filmed…
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Just adding my 2 cents that I’ve watched this episode many times and still don’t completely understand the plot! Happily, as we have seen, there are redeeming L&A moments!
Interesting script note about Rhonda, Ruth — hmmmmmm.
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Thanks sooo much for sharing this Ruth! How interesting!!! they really decided to change the direction they took Ruth’s character in IMHO – I think the old concept was discarded because they wanted more ambiguity.. if the audience knew Rhonda was being paid by the Russians to set up Will Towne, we may not be along for the ride so much.. As things currently stand we don’t know what Will is.. but we did see him take that money.. so it ups the tension here – and the stakes for Lee and Amanda.. Maybe Amanda is wrong??!!!!
If we knew Rhonda had been paid we would be less likely to think so – at least this is my take on it.
Because we didn’t see Rhonda receiving any $$ I choose to go with Rhonda being on the barnstorm list.. helping Lee out for the good of her country… err that is unless there’s more to come about Rhonda in this ep that reveals what was removed from the script!
I like Rhonda too.. and that doesn’t change for me because I know that once she was written as a little greedy double crosser! that’s not who she ended up being when the episode played out.. I’m really glad they didn’t go with the script.
And I like how they hinted that maybe Lee should not be certain Rhonda’s information is correct – we are yet to see if it is correct or not.. so the question lingers! 🙂
I’m actually really enjoying the plot with this ep so far! whooo hoooo!!! 🙂
bye!
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lol! I mean’t to say Rhonda not Ruth oopsie!
I bet you all knew what I mean’t anyway! 😉
hope you are all well!
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Oh crud! Am I glad they changed that!! I like her better as a good guy. If they wanted to go this route I’d have voted for putting Auggie in this story instead.
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Am a huge Rhonda fan – I think she needs to join my list of favourite non-regular good guys (with Emily, Leatherneck and TP). And she seems quite sensible. Plus her hair reminds me of S1 Amanda (I loved that updo and I miss it 😦 )
This whole drop thing bored me. It seems like a series of male models “posing” as agents in their matching plastic jackets. The one in the pale grey plastic jacket is very striking….
Poor Towne – I find it hard to believe he’s really bad. Bumbling is closer to how I see him.
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Yes, Rhonda is probably the best part of this scene. All those Agency lads, including Lee, seem more than a bit incompetent here. And the beige plastic jacket is hideous. Let’s hope this is the first and last we see of it…. I’m warning you Lee. 😎 Damn these new smilie thingees, this one just isn’t as menacing as the old one. 8-( < my attempt at a more menaching Fashion Police un-smilie.
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‘ male models posing as agents in their plastic jackets’ loved it 😊😊😊perhaps the fed ‘men in black’ of the 80’s were the men in plastic😊
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Pale grey plastic.. Aie!!! I tried not to focus on it.. but it’s so darn shiny!
I’m sure the dust just slides right off 😉
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Sorry, just a silly random thought until my coffee kicks in. Lee stands in front of that “For Lease” sign and at one point, briefly blocks the ‘A’ and the ‘S’ so it’s just “For Lee.” It would have been cute if Amanda was standing there instead. 😉
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Awwwww! For Lee. 🙂 The rest of the scene left me confused as well. 🙂
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Somebody could do a photo edit on it and fix that. 😉
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Go for it!! could be fun 🙂
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