With TNT’s renewal of “Dallas” for a third season in 2014, it’s time once again for my Top 10 Wish List for the new season. I’m elated that the series has been renewed. “Dallas” continues to be the best reboot of an iconic original television series to date. It remains thoroughly contemporary while generally respectful to the spirit of the original. Given Larry Hagman’s death, and the long 9-month hiatus before it returns, the wish list is a little more complicated this year.
Season three will be the year that determines if the new “Dallas” can become its own success entirely without Larry Hagman. As a result, I suspect the emphasis may shift more aggressively to new characters and story arcs. With that in mind, I look back at some of what’s worked best and worst in both the original series, and in season two of the current series, as guideposts for new wishes for season three. I’ve tried to balance the old with the new, but you can’t completely take the original “Dallas” out of the boy. Here’s my unsolicited two cents for the series’ creative team as they map out the pivotal season ahead. Take a look, and tell me what’s on your season three wish list in the comments section below.
#10. Let the Divas In On It
The Ewings, including the new Pam Ewing, convene to launch J.R.’s Masterpiece
(image: TNT)
Season 2 closed with the Ewings, aided heavily by John Ross’s new wife Pamela Barnes Ewing, framing Cliff Barnes for J.R.’s death, as J.R. suggested in his letter to Bobby. It was quite the sinister turn for Bobby in particular, since he enjoined the family’s help under false pretenses, and never fully disclosed the truth to J.R.’s ex-wife or new daughter-in-law.
From a dramatic point of view, I’m guessing the decision to leave Pam out of the loop was because writers want to potentially mine more conflict from Pamela and John Ross when and if she ever finds out the truth about J.R.’s death. That’s fair, and I hope we do get to see that drama between the newlyweds in season three.
What’s odd though, was the decision to keep the truth from Sue Ellen. This part of J.R.’s Masterpiece came off feeling a bit dated and sexist. Once again, Sue Ellen got “played” by the men in her life. If Sue Ellen is supposed to be such a “Bitch on Wheels” as they keep telling us, why couldn’t she be trusted to be as ruthless as her son and ex-brother-in-law? Bobby’s choice to leave her out in the cold undermines the perception of her as a strong lead character.
And unlike Pamela, I’m not clear what drama there is to mine if Sue Ellen finds out later that she helped frame an innocent man. There’s no one for her to play off; both her son and Bobby lied to her. If she chooses to walk away from them over this, she has virtually no one else to turn to. It better not lead to some bizarre reunion with Cliff, or a further fall into alcoholism. Both of those plot lines are long played out. We need to see Sue Ellen learn the truth, give the boys some serious grief about it, and move on. Fast.
#9. Out of the Sets, and Into the Streets
(…or at least back to the ranch)
Elena confronts Christopher at Jedi headquarters
In season two, TNT’s “Dallas” struggled with some of the same challenges the original series faced in the twilight years of its original run, one of which was an increased dependence on soundstage sets over location shooting. The shift was more noticeable this year though, in part because Director of Photography Rodney Charters’ camera work in season one set our expectations so high.
Charters took us back to Southfork, and to the city of Dallas, in glorious golden-hued widescreen HD last year, giving “Dallas” an epic feel that even the original series lacked. It was expansive and captured the scope of both the ranch and the city. The new angles and locations all over Southfork breathed new life into fans’ love of the ranch, and the Ewing mythology.
While Charters is still onboard, and even wore the Directorial hat for this season’s NASCAR driven “The Furious and The Fast,” the overall look and feel of the series shifted to the artificial light and green-screen skylines of interior sets that were recycled multiple times over. The predominant feel this year was sadly more low-budget basic cable claustrophobia than cinematic Texas epic.
In terms of the sets, the Ewing Energies offices are a satisfying contemporary start-up spin on corporate office interiors, but the green-screened skylines feel jarringly “Star Wars”-esque. When John Ross stares out the window, I half expect to see Queen Amidala’s ship fly by. The light isn’t right, and it’s noticeable when compared to scenes shot in real offices like the one used for the Barnes Global boardroom.
Can someone buy John Ross a chair?
(image: TNT)
Which leads to another point. Every single real home used as a character’s home in the series outshines the still Costco-decorated Southfork set. Sue Ellen, Harris Ryland, and even Dr. David Gordon’s home are all noticeably more posh than the dime store Southfork interiors. I’m glad they’re using those locations (Harris’s in particular feels grand), but come on, spend some bucks on “Southfork” already. Those empty buttery-bland walls and throw pillows as furniture are ludicrous. Call Victoria Grayson’s decorator from “Revenge” and get some help.
And when fans can instantly spot the sets serving multiple roles, Bobby’s den as the governor’s office, the hospital and police station using the same set, and the banker’s office being the Ewing Energies office, something is amiss on the production design side. I understand budgets are tight, and repurposing is efficient, but then maybe make a little extra effort on the set dressing, lighting and camera angles to sell it a bit more convincingly. Audiences are pretty sophisticated these days. “Dallas” needs to posh it up a bit, and get back to the real Southfork Ranch exteriors more in season three.
#8. Share and Share Alike
So 33.3% of 25% is what?
Can you imagine sitting through this PowerPoint every week?
One of the other pitfalls the original “Dallas” fell into in its later years was tossing around Ewing Oil shares like hot potatoes. I think at one point even Raoul owned a stake in the company in the late 80’s. It became ridiculous how often ownership changed hands. It felt like a device writers became addicted to in a desperate attempt to rekindle the drama (and ratings) of the first year after Jock’s death, when Bobby and J.R. battled it out for ownership of Ewing Oil. But that magic, like much of the original cast, was long gone by then, and tossing shares of Ewing Oil around week-to-week couldn’t save the show.
I was surprised by how fast the new series turned to the shares game this season, not only with Ewing Energies, but with Barnes Global too. Ewing Energies had only been in existence a few months before ownership started changing hands almost weekly again. I’m glad Sue Ellen was brought into the fray of Ewing Energies, but now that the dust is settled, writers need to back off the rather boring battle for shares of both companies. It’s just not interesting. Does anyone care if Elena gets back into Ewing Energies? She was super boring when she was there in the first place. She’s much more compelling out on her own with Drew.
So just to review: over at Ewing Energies, Bobby owns 25%, Chris 15%, John Ross, 25%, Sue Ellen 25%, and Pamela 10%. At Barnes Global (barring a much needed return of Katherine), Christopher has 33.3%, Pamela has 33.3% and Cliff has 33.3%. So 33.3% of 25% is what? You don’t care? Neither do I. It’s basically all Mutually Assured Destruction at this point anyway. J.R. was always the driving force behind the battle for shares of the company, and he’s gone. It’s best to leave the shares alone in season three, and develop some new original stories around the characters.
#7. Who’s the Boss? Judith Ryland, That’s Who.
Don’t mess with Mama.
(image: TNT)
With the death of Larry Hagman, confirmation that Victoria Principal will not join the series, and a nine month hiatus before season three’s premiere, “Dallas” could use a healthy jolt of positive stunt casing. And Judith Light is currently the series’ best shot at that.
Tony and Emmy winner Light provided a much-needed infusion of sudsy theatrics to season 2 as Harris Ryland’s borderline incestuous mother, Judith Ryland. Conscious or not, the similarities to Tennessee Williams’ colorful Violet Venable from “Suddenly Last Summer” were hard to miss, and fantastic.
Writers and Light effectively introduced more questions than answers with mama Ryland’s character in season two, leaving viewers wanting more. When the spurned matriarch threatened to remove her son from control of the family business, he pushed her down the stairs. Thankfully, she survived, only to be banished to a nursing home, heavily sedated.
But Hell hath no fury like Judith Ryland scorned! An entire season’s worth of scenery chewing could easily be gleaned from the story of Judith’s escape from the home, and methodical retribution on her formerly golden boy son. Let her seize the company. Heck, maybe even have John Ross and Emma help her in order to neutralize Harris.
The possibilities are endless, and the pop culture cache that an announcement of Light joining the series fulltime could bring is not to be underestimated. I always thought bringing Light on board was sort of genius. While the actress’s huge television fame was contemporary to the original “Dallas” series, it’s also separate from it, so you potentially draw some of Light’s longtime fans into the “Dallas” fold.
Casting Lee Majors has similar potential. A great example of a series currently doing this “affinity stunt casting” successfully is TV Land’s “Hot in Cleveland.” The fledgling basic cable sitcom has staged numerous mini-reunions with its cast members’ peers and former costars from iconic TV heavyweights “The Mary Tyler Moore Show,” “Frasier,” and “One Day at a Time” among others.
Judith Light is good for “Dallas’s” drama, and for its ability to elbow its way back into the pop culture zeitgeist, post Hagman.
#6. Call Off the Caskets
As I pointed out in our “Season 2 Fun Facts” over the last couple weeks, season two of the new “Dallas” was a particularly lethal one for its cast. With the deaths of 9 characters over 15 episodes, it was the series’ deadliest ever.
When a character dies every 1.7 episodes in a 15 episode season, it’s hard to give those characters enough screen time for the audience to even start to care about them. In season two more time was spent on the action-style set pieces – such as the Southfork hostage crisis and the rig bombing – leading up to the murders, than on developing the murder victims (at least the new ones) in the first place. The deaths started to lose dramatic punch, and the bodies piled up faster than you could count. The over use of murder-as-plot-device and Larry Hagman’s real life death worked against each other this season. The fictional deaths lost much of their impact in comparison.
For a soap that set the low point on devaluing character death via the infamously disasterous “Dream Season,” the rule should be to tread lightly on character deaths. Half your audience won’t believe them anyway. Once the threat of death has lost its weight in the narrative, there’s little else to replace it with.
My wish for season three is fewer “24” style action/murder sequences, and more screen time focused on the living breathing characters we love.
#5. Mind the Gaps!
One of “Dallas’s” protracted showy action sequences from “Blame Game.”
(image: TNT)
“Dallas” struggled in season two with the burden of having almost too much to accomplish in each episode, given the 15-episode season. In an ensemble serial that’s trying to introduce entire families of new characters, that’s not much time.
Oddly, rather than choosing to invest the time on character development, writers instead often chose to invest more screen time in those action-film set pieces I talked about above. That decision helped create some huge narrative gaps in the storytelling, and it’s something that needs to be corrected in season three.
The jarringly absent Gary and Val “closure” scene, Lucy’s inexplicable comings & goings, a complete a lack of any emotion from Sue Ellen when it’s suggested Pam may still be alive, the abrupt intensity of the Drew and Emma romance, and the complete non sequitur of John Ross bedding Emma in the season finale aren’t simply more “twists,” they’re really uneven creative choices that actually kneecap the gravitas of the characters. Sue Ellen really doesn’t care that Pam may still be alive? What? Valene declares she won’t leave Southfork until she confronts Gary about Sue Ellen… and then she leaves without confronting him? What?
For season three, less time on slow motion “Matrix”-style fight scenes, “CSI” montages, and shoot-outs, and more time letting this talented cast tell riveting character-driven stories with clear continuity.
#4. Bring on the Barnes/Wentworth/Cooper Divas!
Cliff needs his Divas!
(Afton image: TNT)
Season two was not good to the Barnes clan. The iconic family is on life support at this point and needs a major infusion of new life to save it from a final death spiral.
The problem with the Barnes family was that it was always a much smaller and more fractured family than the Ewings. For a brief season in the original series, when Rebecca, Cliff, Pam, and Katherine were reunited, and Cliff was solidly with Afton, the Barnes family had some meat on its bones. But soon after, Rebecca died, Afton and Katherine left, and ultimately so did Pam. The show was forced to create new villains to try and fill the void, but they never worked as well. Dallas was about the Barnes and Ewing families.
This year the writers seemed to go out of their way to repeat several of the same devastating Barnes clan losses, and take the carnage even further. The search for Pam was a dead end from the start, and everyone knew it. It didn’t yield a single new viewer, nor any compelling new information about the character. What it mostly did was raise the ire of the longtime fans hoping for Victoria’s return. It just picked at a decades old scab, and made the Barnes family feel smaller in the end.
On top of that, the killing of Katherine Wentworth, consistently the most popular “Dallas” villainess among fans, yielded another fatal blow to the Barnes family. If Pam is dead, fine. But that makes Katherine all the more valuable to the Ewing/Barnes battle. She had serious unfinished battles with J.R., Cliff, and Bobby, and always wanted what Pam had.
Let’s face it, without Katherine and Afton, there aren’t any other potential Barneses left. It’s just Pamela and Cliff, and Cliff’s in a Mexican prison. Yawn. More importantly, after killing his grandchildren, Cliff is feeling played out. Having him re-start the same old battle for shares of Ewing Energies with Elena is just tiresome. The Barneses need an infusion, stat, and that infusion should be Afton and Katherine.
It was fantastic to have Audrey Landers back as Pamela’s mom, but Afton is sort of an isolated character. That’s been the struggle for her all along. Her personal and professional life rarely intersected with the main storyline. She has no stake in either the Barnes or Ewing fortunes.
Some of Afton’s best writing happened around seasons six and seven of the original series, when she was paired with Cliff, and sparring with Katherine. She served as Cliff’s conscious, and as his protector. She protected him from his own excesses, and from the external threats he couldn’t see for himself, like Katherine.
If Katherine returned, furious at her brother’s bungling of the Wentworth fortune, and out for revenge, and Afton returned believing that Cliff was indeed framed for J.R.’s murder, it’d be a win-win. The chemistry between Landers and Morgan Brittany is gold. Katherine is centrally invested both emotionally and financially in the Barnes/Ewing fight, and Afton knows how to read her, so she becomes vital as well.
With Afton at his side, and Katherine gunning for him, Cliff (and Pamela by extension) could have a delicious renewal in season three. Katherine was juxtaposed against Cliff in the original series as the crazier, more evil sibling. Given Cliff’s new extreme, imagine how bad Katherine could be now! Morgan Brittany looks great, and is ready, willing and more than able to slip back into Katherine’s famous chapeaus.
(If you support the return of Katherine Wentworth, tweet #BringBackKatherine to @AaronAllen227, @Dallas_TNT, and @TNTPR today!)
#3. Calling All Ewings…Again!
Joan Van Ark roared in and stole her scene in “Ewings Unite!”
(image: TNT)
In my season two wish list last year, I made a plea for the end of using the original series leads in drive-by style micro cameos. While the cameos in “J.R.’s Masterpiece” and Afton’s return in “Guilt & Innocence” were more substantial, sadly Joan Van Ark and Charlene Tilton were severely wasted in “Ewings Unite!”
Joan’s scene with Linda this year was one of the best scenes of the season. In under a minute, Joan brought Valene and Gary’s tortured past back to life. It was as if no time had passed. Hearing Valene confront Sue Ellen about trying to steal her husband was riveting. Joan accomplished more in that minute than many actresses half her age could do in an entire season. And she made it looks effortless.
That single appearance made the case for a return for both Gary and Valene as series regulars in season three. Joan and Ted both proved they can own the screen, and their characters have countless professional and familial ties to the central stories of the series. And though I don’t like to admit this, “Knots Landing” isn’t coming back, probably ever. So this may be the only way to get a last dose of Gary and Valene.
Similar to bringing back Judith Light, casting Joan and Ted as regulars would give the series both greater dramatic heft, and fresh pop-culture momentum going into season three. If series execs could buy the rights to Bobby and Betsy, and also sign-up Charlene for some recurring appearances, there’d be a huge potential canvas of new stories and characters in the Ewing family, anchored solidly in the canon.
I’m still a huge fan of bringing Ray and Lucas Krebbs back too, even if Susan Howard and Priscilla Presley aren’t interested in returning. Lucas could be a spark of dynamite in the Ewing family. As Bobby’s only biological (and unrecognized) child, he is the true outsider.
The point is, though Cynthia Cidre seems focused on bringing in more of her new characters (Elena’s friend Joaquin, and Ann’s unnamed brother) in season three, there remains a slew of established but unwritten young adult characters that could be drawn from the canon, while retaining both creative freedom and historical accuracy. It’s a win-win. Here’s wishing for a better use of characters from the original series in season three.
#2. Fewer Mix & Match Pairings
The Southfork “Love Tree” is filling up fast.
Call me old fashioned, but a little less bed hopping between the new leads in season three would be much appreciated. Ending season two with another out-of-left-field hook-up between Emma and John Ross after he married Pam felt redundant. Yeah, yeah I know. John Ross is his father’s son, ahem, “tip to tail.” I love watching Josh Henderson play the scoundrel. He has a delightful smirk that feels worthy of J.R.’s son.
But one of my wishes for John Ross last year was that we’d get to see him have more of a heart. I don’t need him to turn all soft and gooey, but come on. Over the long haul of J.R.’s lying and cheating, it was his real weakness for Sue Ellen that made him still seem human. John Ross needs to land in one bed, at least long enough for us to know where his heart lies. That way, when he cheats, we know what he’s actually cheating on. I’m still not clear on whether he cares more for Elena or Pam at this point, and he’s already on to Emma.
Overall, the current pairings: Christopher and Elena, John Ross and Pamela, and Drew and Emma, feel the most promising. We need to see more of them together though, particularly of John Ross and Pam, and Drew and Emma, before more fractures are introduced. Let them smile and have a little fun together, before they get all freaky and snarly again. It’s getting hard to know who to care about, and it only works if we do care.
#1. A Brave New Sue Ellen
Sue Ellen tells John Ross, “It’s not easy being a Ewing bride in this family”
(Image: TNT)
Finally, I can’t close without throwing out some wishes for my very favorite Dallas Diva of all time, Sue Ellen. After a rough start in season one, and some ups and downs in season two, Sue Ellen started to find solid ground in the new series in the wake of J.R.’s death. Linda Gray did superb work in the episodes around J.R’s death, as Sue Ellen stepped into a more fully fleshed out relationship with her son, and in the Ewing family overall.
A riveting new Sue Ellen indeed started to take shape thanks to writers and Gray. That Gray did some of her best work in the immediate wake of her real life best friend’s death is remarkable. Notably, and deservedly, fans have launched a grass-roots campaign to get Gray nominated for an Emmy Award for her work this year.
Aside from her scenes in the funeral episode, one of my favorite scenes of the year was actually between Sue Ellen and Bum in the episode “A Call to Arms.” It was a small, incidental scene, but it’s the kind of scene that fleshed out Sue Ellen, and connected the new series to the original. In the charming scene, there was mention of J.R. having Sue Ellen followed (as usual), and of Sue Ellen’s move to England, which had never before been mentioned in the new series.
Over twenty years passed between when we left Sue Ellen in England married to Don Lockwood (Ian McShane), and when we first saw her return to dinner at Southfork last summer. Almost nothing has been said or done with those decades of Sue Ellen’s life in the new series. Now that J.R.’s dead, it’s time we learn a little about her life during those years. What happened to Don Lockwood? Does she still have lingering feelings towards him or Ken Richards? How long did she stay in England? Were there other men in her life over those years?
Sue Ellen is too good to leave hanging out there all alone, dependent on John Ross for connection to the Ewings. I’d love to see her with a man, or two, of her own, and her own mysterious history. While I liked the device of her using her drinking to gain the courage to become “Lady J.R.” in the latter half of the season, now that the masterpiece is over, she should put the booze away. No one wants another Sue Ellen-goes-to-rehab storyline. No one.
Linda has more than earned her stripes playing the tortured drunk over the years. She’s mastered it. Now it’s her time to take on new challenges and shine. Sue Ellen deserves a story arc as rich and compelling as Ann’s was this season. She’s one of the biggest reasons diehard fans will hang on for season three.
Long live Sue Ellen Ewing.
