So Lee and Amanda are working as a team again – to prove that Lee’s parents were not double agents! Hooray!!! Sooo glad that distance between them has been closed 🙂
Time to check in with the baddie of the week! [the BOTW!]
We find Blackthorne is inside a room with a glass of alcohol (another thing smk baddies seem to love!).
[Check out this room! They say a man’s home says a lot about who he is. Umm..
I think Blackthorne’s home says he’s over compensating for being rather boring 
tee hee.. If we need this overload of dramatic over the top props – it’s usually a sign the baddie isn’t going to hold our interest without them haaaa..
Bet he would envy Lee’s Tibetan ram’s horn!
Is that Billy’s season 3 marlin on the wall in the top right corner?] 
(Blackthorne walks over to his fireplace.. and a pair of massive tusks. )
[Ugh! the man is a hunter! No animal is safe!
Is it just me or is the Mr Blackthorne in the above shot, not actually Mr Blackthorne?! He may need a stunt man to drink the booze and walk past that scary tiger!]
(Landers the trusty dogsbody/henchman enters the room.)
Landers: Mr Blackthorne?
Blackthorne: Did you find our man?
Landers: Yup, he’s a real pro. He thinks killing Sinclair is his one way ticket to heaven… 
(Hearing this, Blackthorne is gleeful)
…and he is not going to blow it. He just wants to know where and when. [Whoa.. this dialogue is rather.. current! 
]
[someone tell this wannabe assassin not to be reincarnated as a spotted leopard!]
Blackthorne: The “when” will be the day after tomorrow. As to the “where”, you tell me.
Landers: There’s an empty office building across from the Plaza Hotel.
Blackthorne: Good. I want your man to check it out tonight. I don’t want any screw-ups. 
[Yup, as I suspected.. this baddie is rather bland (beige!): dialogue boring, delivery predictable and cliché.
LOL kudos to the decision to use these crazy props – totally saves this scene for me! whahahahaaa!!!
Although.. given how he likes to decorate, I’m now holding grave fears for our little cutie:
Free Goldie!!! Before it’s too late!! Run Goldie! Run!!!!!
One last random thought before I move on..
given this was Blackthorne 31 years earlier:
And he looks like he has barely aged.. I suspect this Blackthorne is some kind of stuffed taxidermy version of his former self!! Whoooooo…. – maybe someone told him to ‘get stuffed’! (Maybe not a phrase Americans are familiar with, but Brits and Aussies use it)]
Moving on.. Lee and Amanda are back at IFF.
[Drug Dispensary? lol! Why is it not a medical clinical or something? whatev. this IFF building must be massive!]
Lee: Now you know what you have to do?
Amanda: Yeah. I know what I have to do.
[LOL what is she gonna do??!!! 
]
Lee: You’ve got it?
Amanda: I got it.
[LOL Amanda isn’t moving, and I think Lee is telling her go. Maybe she is hesitating and building herself up to it.
Lee ends up motioning for her to go]
Lee: OK.
Amanda: OK.
[LOL at his expression.. he’s a little nervous!]
(Realising where he is, he tries to collect himself)
[I guess people are walking past and may notice something is up.]
(Inside the drug dispensary, we see a lab coat dude. There’s a knock at the door.)
Anderson: Yeah, come in?
Amanda: Hello. Excuse me, Dr Anderson?
Anderson: Yeah, come on in.
Amanda: Well, uh, my name is Amanda King.
Anderson: How do you do?
Amanda: I don’t think we’ve met.
Anderson: No.
Amanda: It’s very nice to meet you.
Anderson: Pleasure.
Amanda: Thank you. Well, um, I have a question to ask and it’s something that I’ve been wondering about for a long time. 
(The door behind them starts opening.) 
[LOL!]
…Now, I know it may sound silly but I’m just gonna go ahead and ask it.
(As she speaks, Amanda puts her arm over her head, pointing awkwardly and then scratches her upper back and half-laughs.) [Oh dear Amanda! Act normal! err.. try to act normal!!]
Dr Anderson: Right.
Amanda: ‘Cause I’ve been wondering for a long time, you know; when we have a headache, we take an aspirin.
(Amanda moves around resulting in Dr Anderson following her, and keeping his back to Lee as he moves further into the room behind them) 
Dr Anderson: Uh-hmm.
Amanda: And when you have a muscle ache, you take a-an aspirin…
…You know, we just take an aspirin, take an aspirin, take an aspirin…
(Lee sets to work on the drug cabinet lock)
…And…well, I was just, uh wondering…how does it work?
(Amanda peeks over Dr Anderson’s shoulder quickly.. )
[LOL Dr Anderson must love the chance to discuss asprin, or… he thinks Amanda may have taken one too many asprin!]
Anderson: That is an excellent question, Mrs King.
[Okay, why does Dr. Anderson call her ‘Mrs King’ – she introduced herself as Amanda King!]
(Progress!)
…Acetylsalicylic acid, or ASA as we pharmacists call it, is a very effective analgesic…
[Dr. Anderson is so chuffed to talk drugs. LOL! Amanda is suitably fascinated! ]
…which is rapidly absorbed from the gut and is hydrolysed to release salicylate shortly after entering the bloodstream.
(Lee gets the drug ampule he was after.. and turns back to look at Amanda with a big grin. He sets to work closing the drug cabinet door quietly)
[I think the grin is partly hooray I have the drug, and partly haa haaa.. listen to Amanda being excited over asprin! haaa]
Amanda: Ohhhh.
Anderson: Interestingly enough, the exact mechanisms of action are unknown. We just know that it works.
[LOL at how Amanda suddenly moves so Lee can walk behind again! Dr Anderson doesn’t miss a beat nor notice a thing..]
(Lee crouches and creeps back to the dispensary door.)
Amanda: Uh-huh.
(Amanda lifts her right arm above her head and indicates towards the door as Dr Anderson continues talking.)
[It’s hilarious.. and kinda ridiculous that Dr. Anderson doesn’t really notice she’s giving someone directions ]
Anderson:…I mean, there’s one theory that say that, uh,..
…ASA decreases the synthesis of prostaglandins, lipoperoxidases…[Is he expecting Amanda to know what any of this means? LOL he’s in his own little world!]
(Lee disappears out the door) …but I don’t think anybody really knows.
Amanda: Well, that certainly clears it up for me. Yes. Thank you so much. [rofl! Yep clear as mud!]
Anderson: You’re more than welcome.
(Amanda notices her right hand is doing something weird) [–rofl! There’s a meme in this shot! 
maybe feeling for a shoulder pad which – hoorah- is not there!!!] (She puts her hand out to shake to doc’s hand)
…And now you haven’t heard anything yet. You come back here tomorrow, I’ll tell you all about acetaminophen.
[whoa! How exciting!!! what an offer!!! Maybe she can take him up on that tomorrow if Lee decides he needs to return the ampule!]
Amanda: Wonderful. Thank you. That’s very nice of you, Dr Anderson.
Anderson: You’re welcome.
Amanda: And…if I don’t make it tomorrow, it’ll only be because my boys have a ball game. Really…
Anderson: No problem.
Amanda:…I mean if you see me, I’m here.
Anderson: OK. Stay well. Bye-bye.
Amanda: All right. Bye-bye. Thank you.
(Amanda leaves)
[LOL Dr Anderson seems to act so normally here, it’s like agents come by and do this all the time! I wonder how many other agents are sneaking behind his back to get drugs? ]
The scene ends here.
I do like how this scene is Amanda, still quirky and she’s not 100% a polished professional at this lying business – but she gets through it and does what she needed to do – all while giving us a laugh! A really wonderful balance to this scene – gives me hope that season 4 won’t be as bleak as I remember hearing it was.
Looking forward to hearing from ya! If you come back to read the next post I promise I will not tell you all about acetaminophen.
"Just walk with me.." 
I think Amanda’s way more nervous because they’re lying to get into the medication cabinet and steal a dangerous medication. If they get caught they are going to be in way more trouble than in their usual escapades. And how do you distract a doctor of all things?
Re Season 4 – I haven’t seen all of it, but aside from the obvious Amanda absence later (and I’m willing to give that slack under the circumstances as opposed to something like Mission Impossible’s inconsistencies with characters appearing and not appearing) I actually like a lot of the season and don’t understand the backlash. I won’t get into specific spoilers, but Night Crawler, DYTTS, Unfinished Business, and the Stemwinders are AMAZING. I liked Man Who Died Twice and the one just before Bad Timing with the skeleton a lot and the Christmas ep looks terrific (I haven’t watched it yet). One Flew East was wonderful. Even Mission Of Gold was well done considering the circumstances and very well written. I think the only ep I found dragged somewhat of the ones I’ve seen (I still have one on Disc 1, 1 on Disc 2, and 1 on Disc 3 besides the Christmas ep, plus everything post One Flew East) was Billy’s Lost Weekend.
I just wanted to add that I think it is so awesome that of all eps, Kate gets to direct one that’s such a personal case. I’m so glad that’s how it worked out.
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Amanda’s very odd arm/hand movements really don’t work for me here. Amanda has grown so much professionally and she’s gotten very comfortable with lying that I just don’t get why she needed to regress to S2 Amanda here. Even S1 Amanda would have not used these hand motions IMHO. I get that perhaps she’s nervous and feeling guilty about lying to this very nice, polite Agency pharmacist, but these hand motions are way over the top. Lee certainly does not need Amanda to make any hand motions, not even subtle ones. He probably knows Dr. Anderson (and that his hearing obviously stinks) and knows how good a confuser Amanda is, so he does not need her to give him such noticeable hand signals. Geesh!
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Hey BJo! Loved reading your thoughts!
I can see how you’d find the odd arm/hand movements not working for ya! they are weird! I don’t know why but it tickled my funny bone!! I love that we can all find different bits funny.. or irritating! 🙂 and that we can share it with each other!
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Agree 100%, BJo! Amanda’s hand motions here drive me nuts!!
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You voiced what I was thinking about the present day Blackthorn; he doesn’t seem old enough. In the flashbacks he looks like the Stetsones’ age so he should look more like Dotty’s age now.
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Perhaps Blackthorn is some kind of barely aging Immortal, like Connor McLeod in the film “Highlander” ? 😉
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I love it when you write hysterical posts for the scenes that bore me or make me cringe. Both of these scenes are ones I would skip right over, but your posts had me cracking up out loud so much that my kids had to ask me what was so funny. Thank you Iwsod!
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KJ does a great job at the dispensary. It’s not the style of comedy I personally prefer but she’s very good at it. Would this be classified as slapstick humour? Feels a bit Mr Bean-ish. I do feel sorry for poor, very earnest Anderson who gets gently “mocked” by the director (who is also the actress in this case 😀 ). If I was a pharmacist, I’d feel a bit peeved that the appearance of my profession on SMK was less than glorious (but you could say that about the appearance of many professions on SMK including nurses, doctors and psychologists)
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Good point. I just assumed that Kate’s odd arm & hand contortions, while distracting the D3 (Drug Dispensary Doctor), were actually for Bruce who was deliberately ignoring her subtle directorial cues. Another idea: she was trying to get that D3 to break down and laugh; after all, he was quite serious and, from watching old interviews, they had a lot of fun making S&MK.
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If you come back to read the next post I promise I will not tell you all about acetaminophen.
You won’t tell us all about it… Does this mean, you’ll tell us only the half about it? 😉
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Maybe it will help with Amanda’s, apparently involuntary, arm jerks and jestures😀
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[I think the grin is partly hooray I have the drug, and partly haa haaa.. listen to Amanda being excited over asprin! haaa]
This grin means ‘hooray, my blackbelt-confusor is working perfectly (yep, I knew it!) and I got what I came for!’.
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What’s weird is how these animals seem to be placed. They seem to be in the way and you sort have to walk around them.
So Blackthorne really isn’t happy with Sinclair. I guess he doesn’t want to wait to see how the election turns out or help the other guy win. This is another one of those baddies who really doesn’t want to get his own hands dirty. He has some minion handle all the details.
I think Lee’s look when Amanda finally goes into the dispensary is more like, “what have I gotten myself into?” Love Amanda here. She goes back into nervous mode. The doctor is so clueless. Love Lee’s look and smile at Amanda.
Hey, Amanda’s wearing her badge again! The colored stripe must mean something. The doctor has either a green or blue stripe at the top of his badge.
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Where’s the buffalo from “There Goes the Neighborhood”?
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It could be to the right of the tiger. There is something dark and vaguely buffalo shaped. There is a kangaroo to the left! Who stuffs a kangaroo? ( or I could need glasses)
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I was going to say something silly about Goldie possibly burying it (or anything else he doesn’t want in there) in the back yard, but I think that’s too much even for the best member of the Blackthorne family. 😉
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Is there any chance that Thomas Blackthorne is in any way related to that Airforce guy in ARS – you know, the baddie who was one of Lee’s uncle’s best buddies?
Those stuffed animals remind me of the room Amanda, Lee and his uncle were tied up.
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rofl L&A this is starting to feel like star wars with intergenerational enemies!!!
Oh yeah! that was in ARS – a coincidence??
I don’t think this is the same room, but they are very similar for sure!
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Yep, I only meant the stuffed animals, not the room itself.
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It probably made Dr. Anderson’s day to have someone come and ask him a question. And I agree that both scenes were over the top but I did laugh how Amanda wanted to spare Dr. Anderson’s feeling by telling him that if she didn’t show up it was simply because she wasn’t in that day and not because she really wasn’t interested in the biochemical pathways of pain killers. 🙂
I am not sure if we discussed this before but I looked up officium in umbris (the official seal of the agency with the NASA looking font) and google translate came up “Agency Shades.” Other sources translate umbris to ‘darkness’. From angelfire dot com “Agency in the Shadows” which makes more sense than talking about curtains.
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Thanks for sharing this Cindy, this is new to me!
What about.. the Shady Agency? 🙂
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Umbris tends to mean shadow. You can see it when you take a flashlight into a dark room and place something opaque over the lens. It creates a rim of gray light on the wall. That is Umbris. So the Agency is an office or agency of these types of shadows which makes good sense when you think of spies… Sorry – I like Latin and greek 😉
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This was showing up in the side bar on my computer and of course I noticed it because of this conversation. The Umbria Ring. See the ring of blue? That is the rim that I was talking about in the dark room with a covered flashlight. Its the spies in the shadows…
https://www.brilliantearth.com/The-Umbria-Ring-Platinum-BTR62012V/?utm_source=criteo&utm_medium=retarget&utm_campaign=lower_funnel_multibox_no_pendants
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The ridiculousness of Blackthorne looking the same as he did 30 years ago is my pet peeve (so far!) about this episode. Was the actor some kind of big-name personality who could say, “I’ll take the part but I refuse to be made up to look old”?
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Of course it is ridiculous but it doesn’t really bother me. The over the top dungeon of hunted animals does! A springing tiger, a spotted leopard and tusks that must have come from a mammoth. Its too much even for humour. The baddie sipping his whiskey and planning a human kill in this room of horrors just doesn’t work. He does look too bland. He sounds too bland. I think he should show more enthusiasm and glee in his evil ways to fit in to such a scene.
I am not really happy with the stealing of the drug either.
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The ridiculousness of Blackthorne looking the same as he did 30 years ago is my pet peeve (so far!) about this episode.
Yep, pretty weird for sure. Maybe he will get a special longevity award when the Golden Teacups rolls around.
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A special longevity award? I love it!
Gravity defying badness!
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He must have one heckuva dermatologist! Or plastic surgeon!
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I’ll have what he’s having!!! 😉
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I’m still pondering what we are dealing with.
Is it a case of 2 fathers and 2 sons? Both sons the spitting images of their fathers? And both sons having ‘inherited’ their father jobs, too?
In 1955 the baddie father killed the good one (and his wife/partner) leaving their son orphaned.
Now in 1986 the goodie’s son starts investigating his parents (last?) case and comes up with what?
Otherwise I can hardly explain
1) Blackthorn looking the same as in 1955 (about 30 years prior)
and
2) The source’s name in Jennie’s file (Joseph Blackthorne) and the name Thomas Blackthorn from the newspaper article.
Or did they just change the given name of our baddie and forgot changing it in the file, too? Wouldn’t be the first boo-boo in SMK-land…
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You’re on to something with the 2 fathers & 2 sons theory. What if Joseph Blackthorne (father) made the initial accusation against Matt & Jennie Stetson decades ago. Maybe even while they were still alive, which is why they were investigating him. Years later, Lee heard hearsay about his parents being double agents and put in a request to the C.I.A. to get to the truth many months (even a year) ago. Government bureaucracy moves slowly going through the channels to redact sections of the document, in order to authorize its release. Lee didn’t forget about it, but he at least put it on the back burner knowing that the C.I.A. may never release it and/or hoping there was nothing to release because it was just false hearsay. By then, Joseph Blackthorne was dead and his son Thomas was running the illegal “family business.” He would have informants, who told him his father’s accusations were being questioned, so he reiterated the charges against Matt & Jennie Stetson. That would explain the two sources with the same last name on the same document.
I suppose it could happen this way because, IIRC, when Amanda first handed Lee that manila folder, he waved it off in favor of playing hooky with her. He clearly wasn’t eagerly waiting for the imminent arrival of important documents. It wasn’t until she said, “It’s from the C.I.A.” that he suddenly was pushing her out the door.
PS: I do have a rather active imagination so feel free to poke holes in this theory!
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PS: I do have a rather active imagination so feel free to poke holes in this theory!
Oh, I like your active imagination very much, Nancy. 🙂
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Whooo you’re brave L&A I sort of replied to this with the next post 🙂 and.. you sort of read my mind..:)
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Also a pet peeve of mine. Couldn’t they just add a bit of baby powder to his hair???
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And he would smell so lovely!
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