I’m appointed acting director and take over assignment duties for a week, and this is what I come up with?  To be fair, the Netflix randomizer, or Stream Crosser can be blamed for this debacle.  If 1 trillionth of 1 trillionth of 1% of the total mass of the Internet is occupied by episodes and/or discussions revolving around Prison Break, it’s too much.  So let’s add a little to it, shall we!

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Rob: Another “Crossing Streams” assignment, another TV show that I avoided watching as it aired. Prison Break began airing in the fall of 2005 and I had two reasons that I refused to watch it. First, I still believe to this day that Prison Break was responsible for the early cancellation of Arrested Development. They aired on the same night and an Arrested Development/Kitchen Confidential/Prison Break block just begs the viewer to either watch the first hour or the second hour. Most people may not remember but the ratings for Arrested Development tanked so hard that fall that Fox stopped airing the show right after the new year and dumped the last four episodes back-to-back on a Friday night in February. This probably had nothing to do with Prison Break but I just remember thinking that Fox devoted a lot of ad time and general promotion to that show while unceremoniously dumping one of the best sitcoms of all-time.

The other reason I refused to watch Prison Break is that I had already seen the definitive prison genre show, HBO’s “Oz”. I am already predisposed to disregard most network dramas as they are somewhat subdued due to the censorship. Everything that your mind could possibly imagine happening in prison, happened on Oz (plus some things that your mind couldn’t imagine!). Why would I want to watch a network show that I presumed would be a mainstream, accessible version of a show I had already devoured? Plus with a name like Prison Break, it begged the questions “what happens when they break out of prison?” “Do they break out of different prisons each week?” “Do they keep getting sent back to prison?” “where’s the goddamn remote?”

(I guess reason three for not watching this show is because my brother loves it)

So once again, I load up Netflix and pull my assigned episode “Tweener”, episode nine from season 1. The first thing I immediately notice is how attractive everyone on the show is. Goddamn network TV. They even have to make the appearance of the actors more accessible to the mainstream viewer. There is a creepy character named T-Bag who apparently rapes the weaker prisoners on the show…he would be the most handsome guy on Oz.

This is definitely not a show that you could just jump into the middle of and peep. I’m not really sure what is going on. There is a group of guys working on remodeling a room in the prison, but they are actually digging a hole in the center of the room to escape. In order to disguise the mess they’re making, they take the debris out into the yard and slowly toss it onto the ground. To anyone who hasn’t seen Shawshank Redemption, this is likely fucking mindblowing. Never mind that they don’t seem to be making actual headway on the remodel or that there are no guards in the room overseeing their work.

This show features two actors who portrayed two of the worst characters I have seen on TV in recent memory. There is Sarah Wayne Callies, who plays Dr. Sara on this show, but I know her more for her horrible portrayal of Lori on The Walking Dead. It’s probably not her fault as that character was terribly written, but based on the limited scenes of hers in this episode, she isn’t exactly Emmy material. Then there is Marshall Allman, who is playing the wrongly-accused brother of meathead Lincoln (who himself is wrongly accused, I think (?), and is on death row). Marshall played Sam Merlotte’s idiot brother on True Blood, and if you can stand out as a terrible character on that shitshow, you have really made a name for yourself in my book.

So the gist of this episode is that there are dudes trying to escape from prison (just like the title of the show!), then there is some anal rape stuff (one of the victims ends up hanging himself), and then there is a wrongly-accused character on the run from the law. I will give this show credit, the acting is ok, the writing is ok, the set design and cinematography does not look cheap. I do like Peter Stormare, so it was cool to see him have a part on the show. Just based on this one episode, my interest my piqued enough that if I were laid up and there was a Prison Break marathon on FX, I would consider not changing the channel. That’s about as ringing of an endorsement that I will give to a show that gave the world an 8-year Bluth hiatus.

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Joe: Okay, honestly?  I watched 10 full minutes of season 2 episode 4 and regretted it.  I’m trying to catch up with House of Cards, and this is how I’m spending the little time I have in between GoT, Mad Men, The Americans, and the 24 season debut?

So yes, I quit watching, I couldn’t stomach it.  Hamfisted acting, stock direction, unbearable dialogue, a completely unreasonable high concept, basically no redeeming qualities.  But it did get me thinking, which is probably the point of the exercise.  Do those of us who enjoy medium to high quality television somehow need the buffer of awfulness provided by shows like Prison Break?  Yes, I feel like one of those assholes that turns down a Miller Lite and will only drink Stella poured in an approved regulation glass, but I don’t want the unwashed masses infecting my enjoyment of Mad Men.  I don’t need to hear “DUDE WASN’T THAT AWESOME WHEN DON FUCKED THAT ONE BITCH AND THEN GOT ALL FUCKED UP?!?” when I come in to work on Mondays.  At this point, it’s a proven fact with five decades of evidence that some people are inevitably going to watch shit movies (when is Deuce Bigalow 3 coming out?) listen to shit music (people 30 and older know the dangers of boy bands, but there’s no way we’re passing that lesson on to future generations) and watch shit TV (do we need to review the network lineup success rate of shows that launched the last few autumns?).  So no, I’m not going to watch Prison Break.  But on some level, I’m grateful that garbage like this exists, so that I can enjoy my 1917 Chateau Blanche Madmoiselle Blahblahblah without the Keystone Light riffraff pissing on my shoes.  Viva la 4+ seasons of Prison Break!  When they gonna break out dis damn prison?!?!?

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Phil: Dramas frequently require the suspension of disbelief by their viewers, but Prison Break requires the expulsion of disbelief. This show is alarmingly complex, yet somehow vapid.

As a virgin viewer, here is what I could ascertain:

-An evil organization called “The Company” and led by “The General” is pulling all of the strings
-The prison break has successfully occurred, because there are no scenes shot in a penitentiary
-A musclebound fellow did sneak into a prison to break his brother out. One of the brothers now works for “The Company”
-You can track the location of somebody on a flip phone using a stock Windows laptop
-Everyone is after something called “Scylla”, some form of uber-weapon (which I would guess has little to do the monster from the Odyssey)
-Even bound and at gunpoint, your mother will still criticize you, offer unsolicited advice and try to resolve twenty-year-old parenting issues
-Really attractive and high-functioning pregnant women can be smackheads
-The barrier for entry for television actors is much, much lower than I would have guessed
-Apparently there are people who will watch anything which airs at 9PM on a network

In fairness, I dropped into the series at the nineteenth episode of the fourth season with no knowledge of the (wooden) characters or the (convoluted) plot lines. That said, I am pretty happy not to have invested the 70+ hours of time I would need for this piece of shit to make sense to me. If you are going to just drop in on a network drama, stick to the single-serving fare offered by procedurals.

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So, as per the norm, Screensnark recommends you avoid the show that we sampled at all costs.  Unless you need a hangover marathon show.

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Joe - So, Dawson, Joey, Pacey, etc. etc. I’ve made it to almost age 34, without seeing a single solitary second of this show, and unfortunately that streak has come to and end courtesy of Crossing Streams.

Quick synopsis, Season 6 Ep 2, Dawson FINALLY fucked Joey last episode, and now they’re dealing with some morning after shit. Not Morning After pill shit, but just with the shit that young, affluent white people deal with the morning after they fuck. Pacey (seriously, Rust Cohle should have been named Pacey Witter on True Detective. It’s only marginally more ridiculous.) is gonna be a cutthroat stockbroker, and he has a goatee. And the other people are doing other things. Oh, and it’s Joey’s 19th birthday. She gets pissed that Dawson fucked her even though he had a GF, which ruins her surprise birthday party, and then they break up again. Probably would have been a fairly realistic way to end the series.

What’s more fun is to imagine this episode fitting in to other versions of the actors and their characters.

1. Dawson is devastated by Joey’s attitude, and it affects his entire outlook toward women. After all, he was a Texas state champion QB who doesn’t want your life. This leads him directly into The Rules of Attraction, and OHHHHHHHHH NO FUCKING WONDER HE’S SO FUCKED UP.

2. Joey realizes that she totally blew it. Dawson was hopelessly in love with her, and she just showed him the door. How to fill the colossal void in her life that he left behind? Oh hai Tom Cruise, wait you want to marry me, but you’re 5’1″, what do you mean 5’1.5″, wait Scientology what’s that, you want me to what for four hours in front of paparazzi cameras, well okay we should probably get divorced. Small wonder she ends up married to Adam Sandler in one of the worst films ever made a few years later.

3. Wait, Pacey’s going to be a stockbroker? Pacey, I’d like you to meet someone, his name is Jordan Belfort. By the way, have you ever tried qualuudes? Don’t worry, everything will be fine. Yes, that’s Jonah Hill’s penis.

Fantastic. Love it, much more than the show. I guess it’s really not THAT bad. But a few other things. It’s funny to watch shows from the early 2000s now, they were just so cavalier about what would now be considered blatantly offensive gay jokes. There were at least four of them in this episode! Maybe one doesn’t catch my attention, but four, holy fuck! And also, the trope about leaving a note on a pillow the morning after you’ve fucked a girl. THAT CANNOT EVER WORK. WOMEN INSTINCTIVELY WAKE UP AND SMELL BLOOD THE MOMENT YOU MOVE IN THE MORNING. This is fact. It was nice that they ran it all the way back to reveal that Dawson was actually breaking up with the “girl he’d been seeing” (only white people refer to it as that) when the note said he “went to get breakfast”.

Look, it wasn’t horrible. Maybe not even as bad as I expected it to be. But I just couldn’t see devoting years of my life to something like this. I guess I’ll never be a teenage girl, FFUUUUUUUUUUUUUU

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Rob - I have never willingly watched a teen drama. From an early age, I was mainly a comedy nerd or a cartoon nut. When I got to college in 1994, most of my television viewing consisted of MTV or Sportscenter. I began to watch more dramatic TV as I left college, so perhaps I just missed out on the genre of teen drama. It never interested me in high school. Some of my fellow students were watching 90210 at the time. I remember My So-Called Life made a huge splash on MTV. None of those shows interested me for whatever reason. I seem to remember thinking that those shows weren’t “cool” (as though I even knew what that meant, I was and still am pretty uncool).

When “Dawson’s Creek” began, I was 21 years old and about to finish college. It definitely was not on my radar at the time. The only real exposure I had to the show was when James Van Der Beek was in “Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back” and claimed that Jason Biggs “wouldn’t last a day on the Creek”. I was pretty sure that this show was not my cup of tea. So when Crossing Streams told me I had to watch an episode of “Dawson’s Creek”, I once again begrudingly accepted. Episode 12 of season 1 was my assignment. “Beauty Contest”. The short description on Netflix says “Joey and Pacey enter a beauty pageant”. Hoo boy, what am I about to get myself into? Isn’t Pacey Joshua Jackson? How do I words?

So it appears that this show revolves around four kids in this small coastal town. There’s Dawson, Joey (short for Josephine, played by Katie Holmes), Pacey (Joshua Jackson) and Jen (Michelle Williams). Jen and Dawson used to have a relationship but now they are just friends, and Dawson is just friends with tomboy Joey, but this episode is going to change all that after Joey decides to enter this dehumanizing beauty pageant in order to try to win $5000. This episode basically stole the plot from “She’s All That” (or maybe vice versa since that movie came out shortly afterwards), where a previously unnoticed nerd (because Katie Holmes is obviously very plain and unnoticeable) gets glammed up and all of a sudden pants are tight.

All of the characters seem to come from humble lower-class backgrounds. Pacey and Joey enter this contest because they need money to extract themselves from their current situations. Joey wants to go to a college that is on par with her feminist intellect, so she ends up prostituting herself in order to win that cheddar. Pacey has a rough homelife and he wants to emancipate himself…the $5000 would be enough money to move out and rent a sweet place on the water. He pushes for equal gender rights and is allowed to enter the competition. Dawson turned both of them on to this contest as he is a volunteer for whatever reason. Jen decides to help Joey in her quest to win the prize and attempts to become better friends with her rival for Dawson’s affection.

The dialogue and plot of this show are just ridiculous. I don’t think I can enjoy teen dramas anymore because the storylines have absolutely no gravitas to an adult. Watching this episode, all I could think was “It Gets Better” or “I get why the writers are trying to influence kids’ perceptions of things, but c’mon”. And I’m sorry, I just don’t buy that people would think Joey was ugly because she is “tall” (didn’t know 5’9″ meant you were a Shrek-esque ogre in 1998).

Joey ends up singing (more like caterwauling) a song from Les Miserables. Pacey decides to perform a magic act as his talent (I thought it was a huge copout to not have him dress in drag), but he is told that he has no chance of winning the competition. He ends up changing his act to a dramatic performance of the “FREEDOM” speech from Braveheart. Uber-cringeworthy. Joey ends up winning runner-up as she sacrificed her dignity for a coupon to the spa. She would’ve given up less dignity by blowing a sailor in a back alley.

It was cool to see this foursome at such young ages. They are all right around my age (James is 38, Joshua and Katie are 35, Michelle is the youngest at 33) which means they were in their early 20s at the start of the show. It was great to see the styles that “kids” wore in the late 90s, as Michelle Williams often dressed like a mom. And it was cool to see Dawson’s mom played by Miriam the Vestal Virgin from “History of the World Part I” (see, I’m a comedy nerd, that would be where I’d recognize that actress).

I don’t think I’ll be watching another episode of “Dawson’s Creek” (on purpose). If you like teen dramas, have at it.(ed. note You bet I will!)

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Obligatory outro pic

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Never heard of it, looks goofy.  Anyhow Shelly will be watching episode 7 and Nuclear Rob will be watching episode 4.  Let’s get harpin’.

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Shelly - Okay This week the Crossing Streams , crossed over to a little ditty known as “Harpers Island”. I was soooooo excited at first because I love me some Harpers Ferry, West Virginia. I’ve been a bunch of times and literally am obsessed with the quaint historical town. I have rafted, toured, drank and hiked all through it! I’ve even invented a screenplay in my head where zombies arise from the dead and John Brown himself I have to defeat (yeah I’m “special” like that) But…… This isn’t HARPERS FERRY, its HARPERS ISLAND Shelly. (dumbass).

I believe it takes place off the Coast of Washington State (which may as well be Africa to me) and it gives you a “previously on” segment so I’m a little caught up with the history of the show. My episode was the seventh in the series and titled ” Thrack, Splat, Sizzle” . With a title like that I’m hoping for a Pizza Delivery man dick in a pizza box type of scenario, but that’s not what happens.

The main character is Abby Mills (the actress doesn’t look familiar) who lived on this island and her mom was killed on this island back in 2001-ish? There was a serial killer type running around back then and Abby’s mom was one of his victims. She is coming back from where she lives now for her best friend (a BOY! now you know you can’t be havin’ no platonic relationship with a BOY!) for his wedding. I have to say if my mom was killed on some island I’d probably never go back, or maybe I would? It just seemed weird. Anyway her dad is the Sheriff or chief Deputy Doofy in charge played by Jim Beaver!!! OMG Bobby Singer from Supernatural, I may just pee yet!

Who wants to put their face in that right about now?

It unfolds that the bride to be (played by hot little number Katie Cassidy) is grieving from the fresh murder of her father (I assume he died the episode before). The killer seems to be back or a copycat of sorts is back. She obviously doesn’t want to go on with the wedding at the moment, and guests are starting to pack up their things. Of course the plot device of the broken down ferry comes into play. Apparently no ferry can come pick anyone up until dawn? I live on an Island (GASP) we have bridges and such. I’d never rely on a ferry… I’ve seen April Fools Day (1986)… No Ferry= Certain Death.

There is a side story of a guest that looks like Chumlee from Pawn Stars and he found some drug money covered in blood with a friend of his on a boat? The friend accidentally shot himself in the woods and Chumlee left him there for dead. I swear people I’m not making this shit up, this is what really went down. He apparently never saw No Country For Old Men… you don’t take drug money covered in blood.

The acting is semi decent and the look and feel of the show is actually okay. the scenery of Washington is beautiful. Now I have no idea what it looks like other than The Killing (it rains all the god damn time) or the 4400 (Aliens come get your ass) but its pretty all the same.

Nothing is really resolved in this episode, and I suspect the whole show is very episodic and you need to watch it in its entirety to even come close to knowing who the killer is. I can tell you I’d be hailing the Coast Guard to pick my ass off from Wedding Death Island and then the show would be over.

It does seem like the killer might even be multiple people because he/she seems to be everywhere all the time. I’m not going to add this to my Netflix Tupperware because my instant streaming refrigerator is too full right now (I’m looking at you, House of Cards, for taking over my life). But If you like Gossip Girl meets Supernatural meets Revenge, this may be for you.

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Rob - For this installment of Crossing Streams I was assigned the episode “Bang” from the CBS miniseries “Harper’s Island”. I don’t really remember this show when it aired, but that is because it is on CBS and I don’t regularly watch any shows on that channel. I did a little research before watching this episode and saw that this was a single-season miniseries, which is pretty cool. It doesn’t seem like networks air shows anymore with the intention of making them a closed-loop single season.

At the opening of this episode, Netflix luckily included the “Previously on Harper’s Island” introduction, which gave me the opportunity to see Harry Hamlin cut in half, which really gave me a “wtf did I just get myself into” feel upon beginning the episode.

This show is a murder mystery that features a lot of deaths. This episode opened with a man escaping on a boat with a bag of money, but somehow the boat was booby-trapped with a shotgun that ends up blowing the guy’s head off (we both didn’t see that one coming). The show then opens with the plot of two of the presumably main characters shortly before their wedding, about to embark on their bachelor/bachelorette party for the day. The men decide to take the groom out on a fishing trip and they end up finding the dead man and his money. One of the groomsmen, who is broke after sinking all of his money into a beer start-up company, desperately takes the dead man’s money and ends up shooting a hole in that boat, thereby sinking the dead man and his boat and all the evidence that a crime had been committed. The rest of the episode for the men consists of them trying to figure out what to do with the $250,000 they found.

On the other end of things, the bachelorettes decide to hire a psychic to do tarot readings for their party, because when you are wanting to get drunk and festive, you definitely want to see an upside-down Death card staring you in the face. One of the other main characters, who I gather is returning from Los Angeles to the small town for the wedding, gives her necklace to the psychic who then sees some sort of horrible vision upon touching the jewelry.

This show wasn’t bad. The only actor I had recognized was the main guy Henry, who was on Ugly Betty (also playing a guy named Henry, oddly enough). This show definitely is not my bag, but if you like murder mysteries with a hint of horror and supernatural aspects, I would recommend it. This show definitely needs to be watched from the beginning as I didn’t really know how all of the characters tied together. If I were bored and wanted to turn my mind off for a while, I can think of far worse shows to watch than “Harper’s Island”.

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So when the randomizer landed on The Adventures of Young Indiana Jones I was pretty psyched at first.  I had nothing but fond memories of watching the series as a kid.  Just to start off I’d like to say that I was…..disappointed.  That’s the nicest way of putting it.  The most realistic description is that I was bored out of my mind.  Since I can remember as a child I’ve been an Inidana Jones enthusiast.  Growing up we didn’t have MANY movies, but I always had my brother’s old ass VHS Star Wars and Indiana Jones tapes.  Just around the time that I was very much getting into these amazing films, a television show came on that chronicled the adventures of a Young Indiana Jones.  It was so exciting.  Every episode felt like the length of a movie, too!  Though I was very young so I don’t recall specifics, I specifically remember loving the program.

So now I went into this experience with a very open heart, ready to reconnect with a childhood favorite.  Unfortunately that’s just not what happened.  To start off with the show felt like a full movie as a kid because it IS a full movie, at least lengthwise.  90+ minute episodes, something I don’t generally have time for.  Or maybe I do have the time, I just never really feel like committing so much time to watching something.  It’s totally a hypocritical mindset because I’ll sit down and watch 3 hour long episodes of something on Netflix.  Maybe it’s because I like the freedom of being able to jump out whenever, as opposed to a movie where you’re committed to watching the fucking thing.  Anyhow 90 minutes I sigh, but still I sit down expecting to see some top notch action, maybe even enough to keep my two year old son somewhat entranced.  What I got instead was 90 minutes of some of the most boring, mundane pseudo-espionage crap I’ve ever seen.  Indiana Jones is all about action, they’re action movies through and through.  Moving from one big action set piece to the next, exhaustively until the movie is over, never wasting a second.  This show featured almost no action whatsoever.  It was 99% very unriveting dialog about spies and Indiana Jones being in love with a girl.  Blergh.

To be PERFECTLY honest I didn’t really follow along very well.  Indiana Jones is trying to get close to a Turkish general or something to get him to side with the Allies and……it’s a total snoozefest.  Before long I found myself on the ground playing with my toddler’s toys rather than pay attention to Indiana Jones promising to marry some Turkish gal or other.  Checking my phone, almost nodding off.  I did not enjoy this nearly as much as I thought I would, as much as it greatly saddens me to say.  A few things wrong with the series, Sean Patrick Flanery as Indiana Jones.  Don’t get me wrong, he’s a capable actor and I enjoyed him in The Boondock Saints as much as the next pinhead, but he just never feels like Indiana Jones to me.  He’s a handsome young dude, but just doesn’t pull of a cocky young Indiana like River Phoenix did in The Last Crusade.  Maybe it’s because I already associate River with the role, but I still feel like he did it better.  So the main actor is off, that’s bad news, and maybe even worse is the writing.  There’s no excuse to make Indiana Jones boring.  Maybe they couldn’t afford big action sequences on a tv show back then, but they should have found some way to make things exciting.  It was an exciting era with an exciting character.  Maybe I just watched the wrong episode, but there was not an exciting thing going down in the ep I just watched.  Maybe if they couldn’t make Indiana Jones exciting, they shouldn’t have been making an Indiana Jones show at all.  Except they had stupid kids like me watching so….whatever.  Final verdict is a don’t waste your time.  Even if you’re like me and adore the fuck out of the films.

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Rob – I must preface this review with some blasphemy: I do not like Indiana Jones. I have watched the films a few times and something about them just does not interest me. Perhaps it is the time period: I do not have a lot of interest in the early 20th century. Or perhaps it’s the action sequences? I can appreciate some of the famous scenes and dialogue from the series, but overall, I would not choose to watch an Indiana Jones movie and do not enjoy them when I catch them on TV.

With that said, I was not eager to perform this Crossing Streams assignment. I vaguely remember when this show aired at the time in 1992 and I had no interest in it then. Much to my shock and dismay, I loaded the episode up on Netflix and discovered that it was 95 minutes long! This show was a two-hour program on ABC? WTF. But Joel is a cruel mistress, so I had to proceed.

I will admit that I did not pay full attention during this viewing, but I could not help it. It was boring. Clearly the show was aimed at a younger crowd; after all, it is “The Adventures of Young Indiana Jones” (or “The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles”…I’m not sure what the true title of it is supposed ot be). Sean Patrick Flannery plays young Indiana, and has an early 90s surfer haircut that somehow still seems realistic for the time period of the show (the 1910s). This particular episode took place during the Bolshevik Revolution in Austria. The show does a solid job of physically portraying the time period, as the costumes and set design were fantastic. The show appears to borrow the John Williams score throughout the episode. If only the show had the budget to borrow better actors and screenwriters. The dialogue was incredibly dry and uninteresting, and it was delivered by mediocre actors.

It seems to me that the show producers were trying to capture young and old viewers by using the nostalgia of the time period as well as the feel of the movies, but by using younger actors, it feels like we’re watching a fantastical young people adventure but without any true gravitas. The storyline places Indy in a real-life historical event, but the whole episode comes out like a boring ham-fisted history lesson for children. The whole time I was half-watching this show, all I could think was “this actually entertained people?”.

Sean Patrick Flannery’s Indiana Jones has no charisma and just can’t carry the role and Harrison Ford is so iconic that this is a near-impossible task. This show also lacked some of the elements that make the Indiana Jones movies so much fun. There was no recovery of ancient artifacts. No face melting. None of the spirituality and mysticism. It was like a boring re-telling of a historical event. I suppose that if you really really enjoy Indiana Jones, this show would be a good fix for you.

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For our inaugural Crossing Streams article the show that was landed on is…..Breakout Kings.  A quick google search tells me that this show was an A&E original drama series that revolved around U.S Marshals tracking down escaped convicts and employing the help of currently imprisoned convicts in return for a reduction on their sentence.  I won’t actually be writing about the show, I’m more of the overlord of the process.  I’m Dr. Faulkner trying to keep Squirrel and Stubs within the bounds of the dome.  The two subjects this week will be Rob who will write about episode 4 of season 1, and Shelly who will be writing about episode 5 of season 2. A fun premise and the show sounds like a fun enough premise, if a little unbelievable.  I don’t recognize anybody in the cast except Jimmi Simpson who’s a McPoyle on Always Sunny in Philidelphia.  It says here that he plays a convicted pedophile.  Damn McPoyles.  Anyways, here’s Crossing Streams ladies and gentlemen.

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Rob – For the premiere assignment of “Crossing Streams” I drew episode 4 of season 1 of the show “Breakout Kings”. I couldn’t tell you what channel this show airs on if you held a gun to my head; my guess would be TNT? (note: it is on A&E) I wanted to see this show without any biases, so I did not look up any show descriptions or episode synopses until after I watched the episode. I decided to write my review as a stream-of-consciousness.

- The episode begins with a camera crew filming a documentary at a prison. They point to a cordoned-off section of inmates and make a point to let the viewer know that those prisoners are BAD NEWS BEARS. Cut to a scene with one of those inmates fashioning some sort of escape device. Is this guy one of the breakout kings? The guy bent a wire hanger and put a pencil eraser on the end of it and painted it black with a pen.

- The next scene, this guy takes his wire hanger and puts it over his ear. OHHHH, he made a makeshift earpiece and somehow manages to steal a uniform and escapes from the prison in the guise of a camera crew member. Genius! This must be the worst guarded prison in the US.

- Cut to a female in a prison waiting for a visitation that never comes. This is Serinda Swan, according to IMDB. Wow, she is purdy. She looks like a mix between a young Elizabeth Hurley and Debi Mazar. She steals every scene she’s in.

- Cut to a scene with the main cast. Ok, apparently THEY’RE the breakout kings. So what is the point of this show? It seems that these characters are a group of inmates who help out the US Marshals office when it comes to people breaking out of jail. I guess these people are experts at breaking out of prison?

- Jimmi Simpson gets the “…and Jimmi Simpson” credit in the opening credits and he deserves it. He knows exactly the kind of crappy procedural he has signed up for and he takes it to the limit.

- We find out that the guy who escaped from prison is a convicted pedophile. I call bullshit immediately as the guy is way too normal-looking and handsome to be a pedo. /Rob-logic

- The team heads to the school that this guy used to work for as a counselor and lo-and-behold, they find him there as he tries to make contact with one of his victims. What are the chances? He manages to constantly evade the crack team of breakout kings up to the prescribed amount of time per the procedural formula.

- Jimmi Simpson’s character was a psychologist. I would like to know what crime he committed. I will have to google this. But he’s a darn good psychologist, so good that he figured out that this escaped convict does not exhibit the classic signs of a convicted pedophile!

- Cut to a side-story involving the team leader, a US Marshal that just can’t take a vacation because he’s tied to his job. I wonder if he’ll be divorced by the end of the season.

- What do you know, Jimmi Simpson was right. He and an agoraphobic member of the team re-interview the victim that the pedo tried to get in contact with. Turns out she was actually molested by her own father but ended up pinning it on the school counselor. How she managed to divulge this secret to Jimmi Simpson, I have no idea, dude looks creepier than most TV pedophiles.

All in all, I ended up enjoying this show by the end of the episode. It is a classic procedural-type show. This episode felt like a Law & Order: SVU storyline. The premise has a twist with the criminals-catching-criminals angle and feels forced and mostly unrealistic. Perhaps it gets better in season 2? As I don’t watch procedurals, I don’t see myself watching any more of these episodes, but I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend it to anyone who likes these types of shows. The cast is pretty solid and the storylines are catnip if you like criminal mysteries.

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Shelly – Our new feature here at screen Snark is called “Crossing Streams” which was for me, very much like solving a mystery in and of itself. usually SLIW and Switch Hitter assignments I’ve seen a clip of the show in question here or there. Not so with the first Crossing Streams. Breakout Kings was all new to me, I think I saw a commercial on A & E? I’m not even sure what network it was originally on. But it has now found its home on Netflix which I love. Netflix for TV watching folks, is where its at. You can watch at 3 am if you can’t sleep, in your jammies, when you’re sick, wherever you want. And you can binge watch and its safer than binge eater (trust me).

I was given Breakout Kings season 2, episode five; Self Help. The mystery unfolds at the beginning in a “minimum security” prison which reminds me of Orange is the new Black (please season 2 premiere soon!!) We see an inmate get into a scuffle with another inmate but its just a grand ruse for his real purpose. There is a planned false anthrax attack on the prison, and the original inmate has a racial suit delivered and he changes into it in a side utility room. (seems unbelievable but I’m not a stickler for reality in most shows anymore).

Flash to Brooklyn (Brrrrrrroklyn– I can’t say Brooklyn without screaming Brooooooooklyn in my “authentic” Brooklyn accent) We see a team of sorts and I assume these guys and two girls are indeed “The Breakout Kings”. They evidently get tips from all over the country when prisoners breakout and again I’m assuming here, they have skill sets that help figure out how the prisoner broke out and how to retrieve them. I’m not real clear on why the cops aren’t used or FBI or a plethora of of other agencies, but again I’m going with it.

I recognize two from the team but really only one. I thought Brooke Nevin was AJ Langer.. Rayanne Graff from “My So Called Life” , no such luck, although she’s due for a comeback any day. And then there is Jimmi Simpson. You know him, you’ve seen him in a million things, he looks like young less drunk and bloaty James Spader. I first saw him in the Emmy Deserving (lol) mini Series Rose Red. (Side note I don’t really care how bad a Stephen King television movie is, it deserves an Emmy, its Stephen King).

Turns out the prisoner is some huge self Help guru Ronnie Marcum (he’s not Tony Robbins) and likes to brainwash people along the way. He’s a really bad dude and turns to murder during his breakout. Again with some believability  issues, but I accept because most shows are written like this now. I will say the acting is pretty solid and Jimmi Simpson is pretty strong if not teetering on overacting. The writing doesn’t bother me, hell its not a bad show. There are a few things at the end of the episode which make it clear it would be helpful to watch the show in its entirety. I’m confused and lost but that’s the point of Crossing Streams, i can fill in the spaces like mad libs.

Then the show gets wacky because after murdering a few people and kidnapping Ronnie breaks back into jail…. Apparently Ronnie is one step ahead of me and planned this all. No fingerprints anywhere on his excursions and he was furiously looking for “something” which turns out to be a tape of him confessing killing a kid when he was 17. Maybe I didn’t watch close enough but I’m a little confused (as per usual). The Breakout Kings themselves are ex cons trying to shave off time from their sentences. I’m getting it now, its been a slow hour but I’m getting it.

I may have to go back to the beginning and watch this, I’m intrigued but truly don’t have any more love on my TV plate. Maybe I can save Breakout Kings for a rainy Netflix day, which is what Netflix and this show are perfect for.

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So there it is, not hated but not loved.  A decent show that you might want to check out if you’re bored one day and can’t seem to find anything else on Netflix.  Until next time, be excellent to each other, and party on dudes. – Cameron

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