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louuuu skagnetti (& other stories)
And now it is time for s4, or, as I like to call it, "Oh my god, a string of twelve episodes in a row all of which are my favourite." Hilariously enough the only one I am not over-fond of is Dr. Longball, because I am completely fail at being from the United States and I will never ever understand the innate appeal of baseball no matter how many times friends whose good taste I trust tell me about its joys and wonders. This does not, however, mean I cannot appreciate the joys and wonders of Ray Kowalski in a Mexican poncho.
4x01 Dr. Longball
Assuming that all of these episodes take place a fairly short time one right after another, we can assume that this one comes fairly close on the heels of MotB. This means we've got buddy breathing almost directly followed by Ray taking a vacation in Mexico with some chick he busted for having bad checks. Can anyone say desperate rebound? Also, I like that apparently Fraser comes into the station even if the partner he's officially liaising with has run off to Mexico. I imagine it has a lot to do with the Consular work being painfully boring.
I am endlessly amused by the sheer surreality of Ramona Milano the deputy sheriff and Dean McDermott the gum-chewing baseball player and Camilla Scott the reporter. Like, really, you wanted your regulars in the episode so you had them play other characters for the lols? It simultaneously cracks me up and makes my head hurt.
One thing I do love about this episode is getting to see Welsh's fairly run-of-the-mill but still kind of tragic daddy issues. I think in light of it I am even more fond of the way he kind of plays grumpy uncle to the entire division -- and to Ray particularly, probably because he recognizes that Ray needs it. (Not that he ever tried to be particularly father-figure for Vecchio, or that he really does for Fraser, but then I don't imagine either of them would take to it very well.) I also kind of love that Fraser tries to well-meaningly project his own daddy issues at Welsh at the end, and Welsh just tells him that giving advice to your elders is unbecoming. If their situations were all that similar I'd probably be sad, but since Welsh's father was an absent alcoholic rather than an absent workaholic, I think he's well within his rights to call Fraser's bullshit this one time.
Ray is so completely not broken up about the bad checks girl dumping him. "So you didn't get the girl, then." "Nah, but I got this poncho." And it is indeed a fetching poncho, Ray! Of course I suspect this is because Fraser and I are in agreement that Ray could wear pretty much anything and still be fetching. I also love that when Ray's trying to tell Fraser that he was just making shit up about being any good at baseball, he just sort of gently tries to hint that maybe he was exaggerating, because god forbid Fraser should ever suspect that Ray's deceitful.
...You know what, it is a damn shame they never came up with an excuse to have Paul Gross and Camilla Scott sing a duet. I mean, seriously. Her voice is incredible.
And I suspect that people who care more about baseball than I do are way more thrillingly pleased about Ray hitting that home run, but I figure that even if I don't appreciate it properly, it's still worth noting that yet again Ray is able to do something he didn't think he could because Fraser tells him the right thing beforehand. <3
4x02 Easy Money
Hi, Doral! Here is Matthew Bennett, who is apparently not a Cylon but a man name of Jack Goody. He is still in Public Relations, though, so I do not trust him, and also I adore what a total jerkface he is. (My irrational love for Cylons, let me show you it. I fully blame due South for said irrational love anyway. Although ... given my track record re: people like the Master in Doctor Who, I probably would have liked Leoben regardless. Moving on!)
I love it when old friends of Fraser's turn up; they provide lots of awesome context. Quinn, for example, takes off after the jewelry thieves just as fast as Fraser does -- I don't think responsibility and duty are strictly things Fraser learned from his father. Yes, Bob acted them out, but I suspect it was people like Quinn who were doing the actual hand-holding. I also love that we get to see tiny Ben in this episode; the child they got does not look much like Paul Gross, but he is kind of unnaturally pretty and also has the stubborn-polite-asking-questions thing down, so I buy it. Also aww he tries to lie and does the EYEBROW RUB. And the ear tug! They got the kid to do it well, too, because they're not really obvious gestures. Okay, I heart baby Benton. And of course he ran away from home because proving himself was more important than obedience. I suspect Fraser always feels like he has something to prove.
Here's the story of Ray and his father! I know a lot of fandom insists that it was a screaming fight, but I think it was more like Damien was just quietly horribly disappointed and that made the decision to retire to Arizona easier. It's not like Ray's been disowned -- considering that his mum still reports back to him with Stella news, they evidently talk on the phone pretty regularly, so it's not like he's entirely cut off, just that he and his dad have no idea what to say to one another. I love that Ray readily tells this story to Fraser; it's not new, obviously, because his willingness to spill his guts to Fraser about personal stuff is pretty much par the course, but he hasn't done it in a while and I think it means he's done with the MotB partnership freak-out.
"You shoot anybody, I'll kill you myself." OH RAY. He says it so matter-of-factly, too, and I am pretty sure that if Kelly had killed Fraser, Ray would have gone through with it. Also, exhibit A: he hears a gunshot and DRIVES A MOTORCYCLE THROUGH A WINDOW. That is devotion, kids.
Oh wow, I am actually quite fond of the scene with Ray's parents. Part of it is the way his face suddenly looks all uncertain and about ten years younger (mad skills, Mr. Rennie, and also will I ever stop wanting to give you a hug); Barbara probably babies the poor man so much that it's where his kind of twitchy self-sufficiency came from, and could he and Damien be any more inarticulate with each other. Seriously, they exchange roughly a sentence. But that's okay, because they managed about as much as Bob and Benton manage in a couple of paragraphs; isn't that just typical. Anyway, a GTO: best apology gift ever.
4x03 A Likely Story
God, I adore this episode. Louuuuuu Skagnetti! The entire opening sequence is lovely; Ray is willing to indulge Fraser's desire to go out into the wilderness, even if a park is ... not. He's even willing to try Fraser's fire-toasted tubers before he discovers that Dief dug them up right over there. One of the reasons I think Ray probably could hack the Territories is that he's okay with this little camping trip they're doing, and the parts he's not okay with basically come down to the fact that there's not enough actual wilderness in their wilderness.
Also, I want Paul Gross to tell me campfire stories. Complete with sound effects and asides about lichen and choke-cherries. <3
Ray, by the way, absolutely has a type, and it is put-together blondes. (Watch this space later for Maggie Mackenzie. Heh.) I'd like to state for the record that I'm quite fond of Luanne Russell; she's sharp, she's actually genuinely interested in Ray when Fraser is in the room, she's genuinely concerned for Mrs. Tucci, and she's emotionally self-aware and self-sufficient enough that she doesn't try to give Ray another chance after he fucks up.
Heh. "I don't know who has less sex, me or you, but at least I still think about women. Is that better or worse?" Fraser says that's an interesting question, but I think it is a trick question, and has an easy and nicely utilitarian answer. I am tempted to say that Fraser already knows this answer too (hint: stop thinking about women entirely and have sex with each other, duh) considering the fact that he develops an irrational aversion to Luanne. It's certainly not wounded pride, because I suspect that it's a profound relief when a woman doesn't throw herself at him; rather it's the same sort of coldness he shows around Stella -- nothing overt, but an absence of warmth. He even goes so far as to use those subtle passive-aggressive Fraser-hints to make Ray believe that Luanne's guilty, even though he can't substantiate it and of course tries to warn Ray when he discovers the real killer.
In any case, Ray picks up on the fact that Fraser's jealous, but he mislabels the underlying cause -- and I am pretty much always happily pushing the Fraser/Ray agenda here, but I really do think that in this case particularly the subtext is valid. Nothing we know about Fraser from anything that we've seen so far would suggest that he's likely to develop sudden jealousy because for once it's not him getting noticed -- that's Ray's insecurities speaking. But neither does it make much sense that he'd be interrupting or chaperoning Ray's overtures to the degree that he does simply out of concern for Ray's getting involved with a potential suspect, witness his relative passivity when Ray Vecchio fell in love with an apparent criminal in You Must Remember This. At the very least, Fraser's taken on Ray's emotional well-being to the extent that he's attempting to shield him from potential heartbreak, but normal Fraser MO at least allows people to make their own mistakes. He's absolutely managing Ray here because he's jealous of Luanne. (There are probably other readings that I cannot do because the slash goggles are welded to my head, but I am still pretty sure the this-subtext-is-seriously-considering-becoming-just-text reading is also valid.)
Haha, god, I love Frannie totally being Ray's bratty kid sister. "You're not deformed or anything ... really. I don't know, I mean, it really depends. Did you show her your disgusting tattoo or how far you can spit or, y'know, that charming thing where you kick holes through the ceiling tile --?" Okay, I mostly want to know the story behind that last remark, but I also love how Frannie has obviously put Ray in the 'not totally hopeless but also my brother so obviously doomed to loserdom' category. Ray's question about love at first sight, on the other hand, kind of makes me facepalm, because all his Stella stories make that sound like it was love at first sight for him, anyway, and meanwhile Fraser has his Epic Love Story going on and wants to insist that he felt like he knew Victoria across a thousand lifetimes and things, and part of me feels that it is damn good they will eventually go looking for the Hand of Franklin together because nothing else will be enough like an epic wacky fairytale for the two of them
I am irrationally sad they cut away before Ray got to read more than one line from Sword of Desire. Do I think it would be hilarious to listen to CKR reading purple prose? Why yes indeed!
Fraser just still wants to be a child on camping trips with his friends, exhibit A:
"Let me see if I got this right, Fraser. Luanne is a beautiful woman, therefore she must be bad. And since she's a really beautiful woman, she must be really bad, is that how it goes inside your brain?" "Are you sure it's my brain we're talking about?" Give them points for mutual projection! Ray is indeed talking about your brain, Fraser, but also about his own. Mm, I do love most of the women on this show, but they certainly do a lot of emotional clobbering on our poor beleaguered heroes, and it may be consistent but that doesn't mean I have to be particularly happy about it. On the other hand, Luanne really is just a fairly awesome person who absolutely does not deserve to have Fraser and Ray project their issues all over her, so it's sort of their mutual fault for Ray screwing up with Luanne, not hers.
I love how even Dief is chaperoning Ray. I know there is a running kind-of-joke in the fandom about how Dief doesn't get what's so complicated and wants to know why Fraser and Ray aren't together already, but seriously, he's actually warning Ray off Luanne here? Diefenbaker doesn't usually care about the complexities of fraternization. This is ridiculous, show.
I also love how Ray reads the romance novel, and then formulates a murder theory based on the romance novel. I LOVE HOW RAY'S BRAIN WORKS, okay. I think in the main Fraser would be a lot quicker and more adamant about cautioning Ray off a line of questioning inspired by a work of fiction, but since he -- somewhat rationally, to be fair, because his list of evidence at least has things like spirit gum and pillows and tape decks -- thinks Luanne might be guilty, he's allowing it more than he should. This is probably a great example of how Not Talking About Your Feelings can lead to bad things like Almost Convicting The Wrong Person Of Homicide. Or maybe Fraser is just having an off day and I'm reading it wrong, but seriously, s4 is one big subtext party.
Oh, Fraser saying the right thing. Ray wants to know what it says about him if a beautiful woman is interested and right away he wants to know what's wrong with her; all it really says is that his self-esteem is shot to hell, which is the usual, and not a helpful thing to point out. Nor would saying empty words about it not being Ray's fault be helpful. So Fraser merely tells the story of Louuuu Skagnetti again -- which turns out in the end to be about love, in however deeply weird and Frasery a fashion -- and gets Ray to kind of 'ooo' along, and coaxes out one of those ridiculously brilliant Ray-smiles.
4x04 Odds
This episode is a lot about Fraser being, surprise, human. He throws out his back in the first few minutes, and while Lady Shoes never actually fools him, I think he's more attracted to her than he'll admit. Denny Scarpa is sort of Victoria-lite, actually, by which I don't mean that Fraser does anything stupid, but that I suspect he does still have some measure of feeling for her even after he's figured out what she's up to and has meticulously planned how to take her down. Oh Fraser.
Ahh, Fraser corrects Dewey's misogynist assumptions, gives a history lesson, and does a hilarious French accent, all in the space of a paragraph. Perhaps that is what I should hold up as exhibit A if anyone wants to know why I love him.
I also kind of love Denny Scarpa, absolutely irrationally, entirely on the basis that Lilah Morgan is one of my favourite characters in Angel. And now I move on before I start figuring out how Fraser would attempt to take down Wolfram & Hart. Ohh Stephanie Romanov.
By the way, Ray cleans up nice. I mean, I am all for the jeans and t-shirt, but I think I am also all for the tie and dress shirt. I am not really going anywhere with this, but I think it should be on record that, out of the many reasons I am irrationally sad there is not a whole season of Fraser and both Rays, one particular reason is that I would love to see them all dressed up and solving crime. (Like in Three's a Crowd, which is kind of that and also with bonus Elaine POV. Sorry, my OT3 is showing. Moving on.)
Oh my lord, I did not realize how much time Fraser and Ray spend in s4 bonding over being jaded. "It might be love; then again, it might just be worms," Fraser says of Diefenbaker's infatuation with Ante the poodle; "What's the diff?" Ray replies, to Fraser's brief expression of wry assent. Now where the hell is that Clue Bat I was looking for half a season ago? Interestingly enough, too, when Ray notices Fraser's interest in Denny, he doesn't spend a lot of time acting jealous or trying to convince Fraser she's bad news -- the latter possibly because it's just self-evident. The point is, Ray's actually better at acting like an adult about Fraser's interest in a woman than Fraser was about the same in the previous episode; I mostly get the impression that Ray's just trying to protect Fraser from doing something stupid and getting hurt. I suspect there's probably a little jealousy mixed up in it too, but surprisingly little considering the sort of person Ray is. I don't know if this just means he's better at being an adult than I give him credit for, or if he's just not self-aware about this, but I think part of it is certainly that he's still a hell of a lot better about the emotional stuff than Fraser is.
This is also the episode that Frannie is thinking about going to the Police Academy! I am still wildly sad that they didn't have her do that at the end; she would be a hilarious but surprisingly effective cop, I feel. (For your Frannie-the-cop needs: An Officer and a Gentleman, about Frannie the beat cop and her accidental romance with Welsh. If you know of any others, tell me them!) Anyway, I love her scene asking Welsh to give her advice; Welsh is kind of bewildered but also kind of charmed. Seriously, she leaves and he sits there with this flummoxed almost-smile and it makes my heart glow.
It's possibly worth note that Ray tells Fraser one of the great things about him is his willingness to take people at face value. I don't think Ray Vecchio ever thought that was a particularly admirable trait, and that Ray Kowalski does is ... different. Part of it's probably that he's noticed it works for Fraser, but I think a larger part of it is the fact that Fraser's taken Ray at face value too, and the fact that he's done that and still likes and trusts Ray is really important to Ray, and thus something that he puts it in the 'good things about Fraser' column. Meanwhile in my own 'good things about Fraser' column we have "has most of Paradise Lost memorized". Nngh.
There are so many little random things about this episode that I adore, Frannie's ambitions to become a cop aside: there's Meg drunkenly traipsing around the Consulate, which fills me with warm fuzzies; there's Ray and Welsh hanging out on Welsh's couch, commiserating about Fraser's honesty and what jackasses the Feds are, which makes me kind of want to snuggle them. Lots of s4 makes me happy, but this one particularly is up there.
I really do think Fraser's ability to bluff is new. He's almost always been able to use honesty as a weapon, and he likes to prevaricate and evade and act oblivious and lie by omission, but the ability to pull off what he did with Scarpa -- I think that actually is new. I don't know whether or not I like it, but I do know that I really dig the whole James Bond thing he had going on there.
I am pretty sure that crashing recklessly through glass things is the way Ray declares his love and devotion at this point. I don't think that's good for his physical health but I adore it anyway. And then of course they play poker for air; it's another one of those single favourite scenes I have -- Ray looks so happy, and they're both bantering, and there's some universe in which Fraser did get the IOU on that air. After all, Ray already owes him a bunch from the buddy breathing.
4x01 Dr. Longball
Assuming that all of these episodes take place a fairly short time one right after another, we can assume that this one comes fairly close on the heels of MotB. This means we've got buddy breathing almost directly followed by Ray taking a vacation in Mexico with some chick he busted for having bad checks. Can anyone say desperate rebound? Also, I like that apparently Fraser comes into the station even if the partner he's officially liaising with has run off to Mexico. I imagine it has a lot to do with the Consular work being painfully boring.
I am endlessly amused by the sheer surreality of Ramona Milano the deputy sheriff and Dean McDermott the gum-chewing baseball player and Camilla Scott the reporter. Like, really, you wanted your regulars in the episode so you had them play other characters for the lols? It simultaneously cracks me up and makes my head hurt.
One thing I do love about this episode is getting to see Welsh's fairly run-of-the-mill but still kind of tragic daddy issues. I think in light of it I am even more fond of the way he kind of plays grumpy uncle to the entire division -- and to Ray particularly, probably because he recognizes that Ray needs it. (Not that he ever tried to be particularly father-figure for Vecchio, or that he really does for Fraser, but then I don't imagine either of them would take to it very well.) I also kind of love that Fraser tries to well-meaningly project his own daddy issues at Welsh at the end, and Welsh just tells him that giving advice to your elders is unbecoming. If their situations were all that similar I'd probably be sad, but since Welsh's father was an absent alcoholic rather than an absent workaholic, I think he's well within his rights to call Fraser's bullshit this one time.
Ray is so completely not broken up about the bad checks girl dumping him. "So you didn't get the girl, then." "Nah, but I got this poncho." And it is indeed a fetching poncho, Ray! Of course I suspect this is because Fraser and I are in agreement that Ray could wear pretty much anything and still be fetching. I also love that when Ray's trying to tell Fraser that he was just making shit up about being any good at baseball, he just sort of gently tries to hint that maybe he was exaggerating, because god forbid Fraser should ever suspect that Ray's deceitful.
...You know what, it is a damn shame they never came up with an excuse to have Paul Gross and Camilla Scott sing a duet. I mean, seriously. Her voice is incredible.
And I suspect that people who care more about baseball than I do are way more thrillingly pleased about Ray hitting that home run, but I figure that even if I don't appreciate it properly, it's still worth noting that yet again Ray is able to do something he didn't think he could because Fraser tells him the right thing beforehand. <3
4x02 Easy Money
Hi, Doral! Here is Matthew Bennett, who is apparently not a Cylon but a man name of Jack Goody. He is still in Public Relations, though, so I do not trust him, and also I adore what a total jerkface he is. (My irrational love for Cylons, let me show you it. I fully blame due South for said irrational love anyway. Although ... given my track record re: people like the Master in Doctor Who, I probably would have liked Leoben regardless. Moving on!)
I love it when old friends of Fraser's turn up; they provide lots of awesome context. Quinn, for example, takes off after the jewelry thieves just as fast as Fraser does -- I don't think responsibility and duty are strictly things Fraser learned from his father. Yes, Bob acted them out, but I suspect it was people like Quinn who were doing the actual hand-holding. I also love that we get to see tiny Ben in this episode; the child they got does not look much like Paul Gross, but he is kind of unnaturally pretty and also has the stubborn-polite-asking-questions thing down, so I buy it. Also aww he tries to lie and does the EYEBROW RUB. And the ear tug! They got the kid to do it well, too, because they're not really obvious gestures. Okay, I heart baby Benton. And of course he ran away from home because proving himself was more important than obedience. I suspect Fraser always feels like he has something to prove.
Here's the story of Ray and his father! I know a lot of fandom insists that it was a screaming fight, but I think it was more like Damien was just quietly horribly disappointed and that made the decision to retire to Arizona easier. It's not like Ray's been disowned -- considering that his mum still reports back to him with Stella news, they evidently talk on the phone pretty regularly, so it's not like he's entirely cut off, just that he and his dad have no idea what to say to one another. I love that Ray readily tells this story to Fraser; it's not new, obviously, because his willingness to spill his guts to Fraser about personal stuff is pretty much par the course, but he hasn't done it in a while and I think it means he's done with the MotB partnership freak-out.
"You shoot anybody, I'll kill you myself." OH RAY. He says it so matter-of-factly, too, and I am pretty sure that if Kelly had killed Fraser, Ray would have gone through with it. Also, exhibit A: he hears a gunshot and DRIVES A MOTORCYCLE THROUGH A WINDOW. That is devotion, kids.
Oh wow, I am actually quite fond of the scene with Ray's parents. Part of it is the way his face suddenly looks all uncertain and about ten years younger (mad skills, Mr. Rennie, and also will I ever stop wanting to give you a hug); Barbara probably babies the poor man so much that it's where his kind of twitchy self-sufficiency came from, and could he and Damien be any more inarticulate with each other. Seriously, they exchange roughly a sentence. But that's okay, because they managed about as much as Bob and Benton manage in a couple of paragraphs; isn't that just typical. Anyway, a GTO: best apology gift ever.
4x03 A Likely Story
God, I adore this episode. Louuuuuu Skagnetti! The entire opening sequence is lovely; Ray is willing to indulge Fraser's desire to go out into the wilderness, even if a park is ... not. He's even willing to try Fraser's fire-toasted tubers before he discovers that Dief dug them up right over there. One of the reasons I think Ray probably could hack the Territories is that he's okay with this little camping trip they're doing, and the parts he's not okay with basically come down to the fact that there's not enough actual wilderness in their wilderness.
Also, I want Paul Gross to tell me campfire stories. Complete with sound effects and asides about lichen and choke-cherries. <3
Ray, by the way, absolutely has a type, and it is put-together blondes. (Watch this space later for Maggie Mackenzie. Heh.) I'd like to state for the record that I'm quite fond of Luanne Russell; she's sharp, she's actually genuinely interested in Ray when Fraser is in the room, she's genuinely concerned for Mrs. Tucci, and she's emotionally self-aware and self-sufficient enough that she doesn't try to give Ray another chance after he fucks up.
Heh. "I don't know who has less sex, me or you, but at least I still think about women. Is that better or worse?" Fraser says that's an interesting question, but I think it is a trick question, and has an easy and nicely utilitarian answer. I am tempted to say that Fraser already knows this answer too (hint: stop thinking about women entirely and have sex with each other, duh) considering the fact that he develops an irrational aversion to Luanne. It's certainly not wounded pride, because I suspect that it's a profound relief when a woman doesn't throw herself at him; rather it's the same sort of coldness he shows around Stella -- nothing overt, but an absence of warmth. He even goes so far as to use those subtle passive-aggressive Fraser-hints to make Ray believe that Luanne's guilty, even though he can't substantiate it and of course tries to warn Ray when he discovers the real killer.
In any case, Ray picks up on the fact that Fraser's jealous, but he mislabels the underlying cause -- and I am pretty much always happily pushing the Fraser/Ray agenda here, but I really do think that in this case particularly the subtext is valid. Nothing we know about Fraser from anything that we've seen so far would suggest that he's likely to develop sudden jealousy because for once it's not him getting noticed -- that's Ray's insecurities speaking. But neither does it make much sense that he'd be interrupting or chaperoning Ray's overtures to the degree that he does simply out of concern for Ray's getting involved with a potential suspect, witness his relative passivity when Ray Vecchio fell in love with an apparent criminal in You Must Remember This. At the very least, Fraser's taken on Ray's emotional well-being to the extent that he's attempting to shield him from potential heartbreak, but normal Fraser MO at least allows people to make their own mistakes. He's absolutely managing Ray here because he's jealous of Luanne. (There are probably other readings that I cannot do because the slash goggles are welded to my head, but I am still pretty sure the this-subtext-is-seriously-considering-becoming-just-text reading is also valid.)
Haha, god, I love Frannie totally being Ray's bratty kid sister. "You're not deformed or anything ... really. I don't know, I mean, it really depends. Did you show her your disgusting tattoo or how far you can spit or, y'know, that charming thing where you kick holes through the ceiling tile --?" Okay, I mostly want to know the story behind that last remark, but I also love how Frannie has obviously put Ray in the 'not totally hopeless but also my brother so obviously doomed to loserdom' category. Ray's question about love at first sight, on the other hand, kind of makes me facepalm, because all his Stella stories make that sound like it was love at first sight for him, anyway, and meanwhile Fraser has his Epic Love Story going on and wants to insist that he felt like he knew Victoria across a thousand lifetimes and things, and part of me feels that it is damn good they will eventually go looking for the Hand of Franklin together because nothing else will be enough like an epic wacky fairytale for the two of them
I am irrationally sad they cut away before Ray got to read more than one line from Sword of Desire. Do I think it would be hilarious to listen to CKR reading purple prose? Why yes indeed!
Fraser just still wants to be a child on camping trips with his friends, exhibit A:
"Let me see if I got this right, Fraser. Luanne is a beautiful woman, therefore she must be bad. And since she's a really beautiful woman, she must be really bad, is that how it goes inside your brain?" "Are you sure it's my brain we're talking about?" Give them points for mutual projection! Ray is indeed talking about your brain, Fraser, but also about his own. Mm, I do love most of the women on this show, but they certainly do a lot of emotional clobbering on our poor beleaguered heroes, and it may be consistent but that doesn't mean I have to be particularly happy about it. On the other hand, Luanne really is just a fairly awesome person who absolutely does not deserve to have Fraser and Ray project their issues all over her, so it's sort of their mutual fault for Ray screwing up with Luanne, not hers.
I love how even Dief is chaperoning Ray. I know there is a running kind-of-joke in the fandom about how Dief doesn't get what's so complicated and wants to know why Fraser and Ray aren't together already, but seriously, he's actually warning Ray off Luanne here? Diefenbaker doesn't usually care about the complexities of fraternization. This is ridiculous, show.
I also love how Ray reads the romance novel, and then formulates a murder theory based on the romance novel. I LOVE HOW RAY'S BRAIN WORKS, okay. I think in the main Fraser would be a lot quicker and more adamant about cautioning Ray off a line of questioning inspired by a work of fiction, but since he -- somewhat rationally, to be fair, because his list of evidence at least has things like spirit gum and pillows and tape decks -- thinks Luanne might be guilty, he's allowing it more than he should. This is probably a great example of how Not Talking About Your Feelings can lead to bad things like Almost Convicting The Wrong Person Of Homicide. Or maybe Fraser is just having an off day and I'm reading it wrong, but seriously, s4 is one big subtext party.
Oh, Fraser saying the right thing. Ray wants to know what it says about him if a beautiful woman is interested and right away he wants to know what's wrong with her; all it really says is that his self-esteem is shot to hell, which is the usual, and not a helpful thing to point out. Nor would saying empty words about it not being Ray's fault be helpful. So Fraser merely tells the story of Louuuu Skagnetti again -- which turns out in the end to be about love, in however deeply weird and Frasery a fashion -- and gets Ray to kind of 'ooo' along, and coaxes out one of those ridiculously brilliant Ray-smiles.
4x04 Odds
This episode is a lot about Fraser being, surprise, human. He throws out his back in the first few minutes, and while Lady Shoes never actually fools him, I think he's more attracted to her than he'll admit. Denny Scarpa is sort of Victoria-lite, actually, by which I don't mean that Fraser does anything stupid, but that I suspect he does still have some measure of feeling for her even after he's figured out what she's up to and has meticulously planned how to take her down. Oh Fraser.
Ahh, Fraser corrects Dewey's misogynist assumptions, gives a history lesson, and does a hilarious French accent, all in the space of a paragraph. Perhaps that is what I should hold up as exhibit A if anyone wants to know why I love him.
I also kind of love Denny Scarpa, absolutely irrationally, entirely on the basis that Lilah Morgan is one of my favourite characters in Angel. And now I move on before I start figuring out how Fraser would attempt to take down Wolfram & Hart. Ohh Stephanie Romanov.
By the way, Ray cleans up nice. I mean, I am all for the jeans and t-shirt, but I think I am also all for the tie and dress shirt. I am not really going anywhere with this, but I think it should be on record that, out of the many reasons I am irrationally sad there is not a whole season of Fraser and both Rays, one particular reason is that I would love to see them all dressed up and solving crime. (Like in Three's a Crowd, which is kind of that and also with bonus Elaine POV. Sorry, my OT3 is showing. Moving on.)
Oh my lord, I did not realize how much time Fraser and Ray spend in s4 bonding over being jaded. "It might be love; then again, it might just be worms," Fraser says of Diefenbaker's infatuation with Ante the poodle; "What's the diff?" Ray replies, to Fraser's brief expression of wry assent. Now where the hell is that Clue Bat I was looking for half a season ago? Interestingly enough, too, when Ray notices Fraser's interest in Denny, he doesn't spend a lot of time acting jealous or trying to convince Fraser she's bad news -- the latter possibly because it's just self-evident. The point is, Ray's actually better at acting like an adult about Fraser's interest in a woman than Fraser was about the same in the previous episode; I mostly get the impression that Ray's just trying to protect Fraser from doing something stupid and getting hurt. I suspect there's probably a little jealousy mixed up in it too, but surprisingly little considering the sort of person Ray is. I don't know if this just means he's better at being an adult than I give him credit for, or if he's just not self-aware about this, but I think part of it is certainly that he's still a hell of a lot better about the emotional stuff than Fraser is.
This is also the episode that Frannie is thinking about going to the Police Academy! I am still wildly sad that they didn't have her do that at the end; she would be a hilarious but surprisingly effective cop, I feel. (For your Frannie-the-cop needs: An Officer and a Gentleman, about Frannie the beat cop and her accidental romance with Welsh. If you know of any others, tell me them!) Anyway, I love her scene asking Welsh to give her advice; Welsh is kind of bewildered but also kind of charmed. Seriously, she leaves and he sits there with this flummoxed almost-smile and it makes my heart glow.
It's possibly worth note that Ray tells Fraser one of the great things about him is his willingness to take people at face value. I don't think Ray Vecchio ever thought that was a particularly admirable trait, and that Ray Kowalski does is ... different. Part of it's probably that he's noticed it works for Fraser, but I think a larger part of it is the fact that Fraser's taken Ray at face value too, and the fact that he's done that and still likes and trusts Ray is really important to Ray, and thus something that he puts it in the 'good things about Fraser' column. Meanwhile in my own 'good things about Fraser' column we have "has most of Paradise Lost memorized". Nngh.
There are so many little random things about this episode that I adore, Frannie's ambitions to become a cop aside: there's Meg drunkenly traipsing around the Consulate, which fills me with warm fuzzies; there's Ray and Welsh hanging out on Welsh's couch, commiserating about Fraser's honesty and what jackasses the Feds are, which makes me kind of want to snuggle them. Lots of s4 makes me happy, but this one particularly is up there.
I really do think Fraser's ability to bluff is new. He's almost always been able to use honesty as a weapon, and he likes to prevaricate and evade and act oblivious and lie by omission, but the ability to pull off what he did with Scarpa -- I think that actually is new. I don't know whether or not I like it, but I do know that I really dig the whole James Bond thing he had going on there.
I am pretty sure that crashing recklessly through glass things is the way Ray declares his love and devotion at this point. I don't think that's good for his physical health but I adore it anyway. And then of course they play poker for air; it's another one of those single favourite scenes I have -- Ray looks so happy, and they're both bantering, and there's some universe in which Fraser did get the IOU on that air. After all, Ray already owes him a bunch from the buddy breathing.