Season 1 Episode 7--"Hostage Hearts"

In today's episode, an entire crime fighting organization is brought to its knees by the ropey planning of a debutante!

 SYNOPSIS

 We open with another day in Not Vancouver, wherein, pampered heiress Kim is getting ready to go on a shopping trip, only her chauffeur has been replaced by a guy who seems to be a younger version of WWE wrestler "The Funkasaurus" Brodus Clay. The kidnapping never makes it past the parking garage (the chauffeur, despite being knocked out, is amazing competent for 90's genre televisions) and her father, noted industrialist Mr. Asher (who, unlike the other moneyed gentry in Bay City ISN'T an arms dealer or whatever (seriously 88% of Bay City's economy seems to be balanced on the back of one criminal enterprise or another. And it looks like such a clean place) who wants his daughter protected long enough to get some real estate project sorted out. Apparently he's big in real estate and even built Cobra's Avery Tower.

 You see, apparently he's gets really focused on business to the exclusion of everything else, and his daughter feels a bit left out. This may or may not be important later.

 It is decided that they'll keep Kim secure in the Tower. Meanwhile, Scandal gets a cue stick delivered for his swank pool table and Danielle and Kim bond over going to the same girl's school. Scandal makes the mistake of challenging Kim to a game and he gets hustled out of two paycheques. Danielle gets hustled into leaving Kim alone so she can sneak out to a dance club and meet her boyfriend Kelso (not the guy from That 70's Show, but even more stupid) who seems scummy but has a Heart of Gold and her father doesn't like very much. Fortunately Scandal thought to plant a tracking device on her, and they round her up at the most ridiculous idea of a rave club I have ever seen (seriously, what was the guy on the orbital machine doing there?) Mohawk Guy's there to and Scandal gets to prevent a kidnapping and bring Kelso into it as a second-act complication.

 Meanwhile, Kim monologues about her dad never really being there and she bonds with Danielle about their respective daddy issues (seems like this would be a good time for Scandal to weigh in with his, but he's off actually solving the plot for this week) and all of this is REALLY trying to be a heartwarming story of a father and daughter reconciling and the father learning that life is NOT all about profit, but I am not buying it. 

 After some hopping and reeling and Non Brodus Clay braking into Cobra (for a security organization, this is getting ridiculous), Scandal twigs out that Kim arranged her own kidnapping, partly to derail the real estate deal (apparently it would destroy the habitat of an endangered animal which was a thing people worried about in 1990s when they payed attention to the news of the world, and because it seems like the sorta nonsensical twaddle that kids would pull a grandstand play like this for. Naturally, because fake crimes organized by young ladies in their junior year of boarding school tend to skimp when it comes to vetting their employees, the phony kidnapping becomes real and Kelso and Kim are ransomed, but fortunately, the bad guys aren't really super competent this close to the end of the episode and the day is saved the deal tanks and everyone learns a valuable lesson about love and lovers loving love and we're out at last.

 ANALYSIS

 This is pretty much an identikit episode, full of random elements out of a generic genre scriptwriter's handbook, driven by a generic plot that barely involves the main characters, except to make them look like fools (even moreso than usual) and there's something kinda icky about some one per center chic arranging her own ransom just because her daddy doesn't love her enough. Plus, this whole plot lurches from coincidence to coincidence in whatever configuration most useful to advance the plot from act to act, whether it makes sense or not. All of a sudden Not Brodus Clay is a security systems super genius because we need him to break into Cobra HQ and kidnap Kim right under everyone's noses. Kelso's a moron who helped Kim (poorly) arrange her own kidnapping, but he loves her and so it's OK and blarrrrrggghh.

 It's so bland and shapeless, in fact that it fails even at the basic gut-level  that programs like Cobra are supposed to work at--it doesn't really fill a half hour as much as drag on so long that writing this review felt like it took several soul-crushing hours to get through and I found myself grateful when my phone went and I didn't have to pay attention to this episode for a bit and could hit "pause". I realize this is a pretty egregious flouting of my professionalism as a reviewer, but honestly, this episode was poo and did not inspire me to do my best work. It's not editing. It's just there and it won't leave. 

 I don't really have much to say about this episode. Thankfully this will not be a problem next week.

 DAD WISDOM/THE QUOTABLE COBRA

 "I want to go out"
 "Mohawk Guy would like that too. Fortunately I don't work for either of you."

 "Anyway, I couldn't possibly take your money. Not without winning it fair and square, right?"

 "Never been to a girl's school, but I snuck into a few of 'em."

 "Think again, hoss."
 "Let's dance, tough guy!

 "Get anything on that skull and crossbones emblem?"
 "Yeah, 6,000 different organizations and one breakfast cereal use that."

 "NO I WANT YOUR BEER!"

 "Folks, I got two hard and fast rules: I don't do windows and I don't drink anything that glows."

 "Let's huff and puff and blow their brains out!"
  
 "I suggest you miss!"

 NEXT WEEK

 Cobra taketh away and sometimes Cobra giveth. Next week we have one of my favorite episodes of the whole run because it is so damn loony.

 Join us next week when a cold case from Dallas' past comes to a head. When the murderer of beloved pop singer Mindy Lake (who is the most important person you've never heard of until right now) is due to be executed, a mystery is uncovered and we hear the drippiest phony pop song of all time several times in the bewilderingly, hilariously, insane episode they HAD to call "I'd Die For You." Cross the great divide with me in seven, y'all!