Monsters of Television

“Jerry would never let you get that far.”

What a bunch of crap led up to this episode. White Collar needs to stop doing favors for their actor friends.

Letting Tiffani Thiessen’s husband be the villain-of-the-week a couple episodes ago pushed the show off the very thin tightrope they walk every week above Campy and made it come off as a monster-hybrid short of a Syfy original. And Eliza Dushku last week, bless her heart, those pouty lips, and her perky — well, everything, but, when miscast, she has the delivery of day player given her first speaking role (I honestly cringed when she quoted The Book of the Dead). Unfortunate timing for her to be in scenes where they reintroduce the closest thing to a big bad White Collar has had since Fowler.

Yeah, the lead up to the summer finale wasn’t stellar. But they have to give us something and the White Collar Writer’s Room kept demanding via Twitter for East Coast not to ruin the episode for the West Coast. So I assumed that something good had to happen, that the art treasure storyline was going to finally come to a head.

I need to stop listening to Twitter.

The top of the episode would have you suspect that something was about to jump off. Mozzie gives an ultimatum and puts a literal clock on it, a novelty hour-glass, for him to make a decision. It’s one of those weird props that pops up in media every once in a while where it makes you wonder when the character had the time to fashion such a thing. But then you can’t think too hard because “blue skies” con artists are just like spies on other shows: superheroes with inexhaustible means. The point is that Mozzie wants to make Neal decide. Except, despite physically representing old screenwriting trick and adages, we know the decision Neal is going to make. He made it weeks ago.

We knew what he was going to do when he started dragging his feet in trying to move the merchandise (we saw the same behavior when Neal stopped really caring about what happened to Kate). We knew when he found the manifest at Peter’s and lied to Mozzie. We knew when he and Sara broke up. There was no way Neal was going to leave. His repeated sentiment of never being able to return to New York if he leaves is the sad buzzkill to any suspense the show tried to develop.

As far as suspense goes, all that’s left is Neal and Mozzie getting caught. What a cliffhanger that would be, right? Neal finally gets caught red-handed with the treasure, gets sent to prison again? Or maybe Neal and Mozzie find a way to transfer the blame to someone else? They certainly try to set that one up all episode-long, too, with Beau Bridges insisting that Peter has to protect himself against these snake-in-the-grass CIs. Like Rachel’s mom says, “once a cheater, always a cheater.” Or con artist as the case may be.

And that’s when the “blue skies” part of White Collar takes the wheel. FBI hot on the trail, Neal concocts a plan just crazy enough to work. And that’s when you know that they’re totally going to get away with it. Had they created a plan that was rock solid, there might have been a chance that Peter would get wise and ruin everything. That Neal has to parachute from the 43rd floor in order to escape with the real Degas (after taking just an evening to create an expert forgery) could only mean that the boys of summer were going to get away with this (for now).

And I’m not hating on the outlandish things that happen in this show like impromptu base-jumping or an hourglass that Kanye West would think is too gold and garish. We watch this show for certain things: banter, clever ways to catch the bad guys, Matty Bomer’s baby blues. All of them are sometimes over the top. What’s disappointing is the pretense of pathos swallowed almost instantly by a predictability through the knowledge we have, as an audience, of the show’s storytelling. If the plan is just crazy enough to work, it’s going to work. That’s just how things are.

So it all wraps up. Kind of. Neal and Mozzie are not the official suspects anymore (even if Peter is skeptical). There’s this whole business about Mozzie leaving but you don’t really believe that crap, do you? Especially not with that ending.

Other than Neal, the only person Mozzie has any attachment to is Elizabeth (we’re ignoring any sentimentality from “Dentist of Detroit” because I’m trying to forget it happened). And Keller kidnapped her. So. Mozzie’s probably not going to actually leave unless they need someone to take the treasure out of the country since Peter’s going to want whatever will make Keller deal his wife back to him. Remember when Mozzie was shot for a finale cliffhanger? Remember how you might’ve been worried for a second when you realized they probably wouldn’t kill off their best character? It’s like that. Also, Mozzie can’t leave because it would hurt my feelings.

What we do know for sure is that the pathos that could be used to rebuild the emotional capital they had at the beginning of the season, since, ostensibly, El getting kidnapped is kind of Neal’s fault, will be frittered away. Makes for a heck of a cliffhanger but any darkness that could create complexity will be beat down after a loud conversation, one that’s stopped when Neal mentions that yelling at him won’t get El back.

I kind of want to watch the alternate universe of this show, one that maybe airs on AMC or TNT even.

Other things:

• I don’t know if I’ve taken the time to mention how much I appreciate the fans voting the old opening sequence back into things. That paintings nonsense was horrific.
• Jeff Eastin mentioned on Twitter that Rusty is one of his favorite characters on the show. The guy has like three lines and shambles through Bryant Park only to get caught by Neal, who apparently shifts time and space to step in front of him. Did I miss an episode somewhere where he is awesome? Or is the bar really low for awesome non-Mozzie characters on this program?
• Yeah, I want Neal and Jessica to hook up. Two episodes and I like them better together than any of the episodes with Sara. I don’t know. Maybe it’s because she wears glasses. I have a problem.
• “You’re not who you think you are.” While running out the door. Passive aggressive, Mozz. Even for you.
• I think I might’ve liked it better if Keller had just used threats against his family to force Peter to help him out. Kidnapping seems so gauche. And tired.
• During the briefing on Richmond, did you guys hear the worst ADR of all time? That was plain ridiculous.
• I like to think the hot dog guy would risk his life for Mozzie. Only because I would like to be in the position that the guys and gals in my favorite taco truck would dive in front of a bullet for me. Okay, that might be pushing it. Maybe I would just like for them to put extra avocado on my nachos. I mean, I am the mayor.