Leverage – Jim, we have a flashback!

“Do you know why — just as an example — why driving this car is like making love to a beautiful woman?” – Sophie, as car salesperson
“Because I’ve never done either before in my life?” – Customer

Yes, Leverage has been getting into some seriously hokey themes in the last few episodes, some of which work (country music, oddly enough) and others not so much (vigilante militia / fishing). Tonight’s car salesman theme was fine for me, I don’t really have any complaints about the episode. Even if I did … people, we’ve got ourselves a flashback! We’re not talking just any flashback, we’re talking about a 12-year-old Parker driving a getaway car. “The Boost Job” could have been about push-up bras and I would have forgiven it simple because there was an awesome flashback.

I guess I wasn’t particularly truthful when I said I didn’t have any complaints about this episode. I enjoyed it but it wasn’t magic, and the bad guy car salesman with the gold chain was just a little too … caricature for me. I get that part of the charm of Leverage is the hokey bad guys, but this one just rubbed me the wrong way.

I’m also missing a story arc. We haven’t revisited the “big bad” of the season in a long while and I’m anxious to see where its going and what the payoff for the viewer will be. I cannot imagine they can match the awesomeness of Sterling, but I’ll remain hopeful.

Those minor complaints out of the way, I really enjoyed a lot of moments in tonight’s episode:

• Sophie’s new strength this season seems to be neuro-linguistic programming — it works for me.
• Parker stole the car thief’s car … classic.
• Hey, Anna from The Vampire Diaries, nice to see you!
• We got another Parker soft-spot moment when she bonds with Josie. I love it when Parker shows that she’s capable of human interaction.
• Eliot really enjoyed Hardison’s alarm zapper.
• Stealing the cars from the Massachusetts State Police golf tournament was genius.
• The exchange between Nate and Parker at the end was so sweet, about not being so bad if you’re around the right people. Awwwww….

How’d this episode of Leverage sit for you all?

Clacked by Debbie McDuffee
on Aug 01, 2010 @ 22:00 EST5EDT