Maryland J. Koba emerges from his diabetic coma to give the prerequisite spoiler warning... If you haven't seen this, and care, STOP READING NOW!!!
Hello. This is Maryland Just-shoot-me-now Koba, here, with the late review of Touched By an Angelwith the lovely and talented Jessica Steen. Once again, our Jess shows that she is one of the best actresses in the business, and blows away any other actor on the set.
Before I begin, let me make something perfectly clear. Kobas have no religion, other than to worship those that feed us. (Like little girls with spirulina bars.) We don't want to disparage anyone's religion, we just calls 'em like we sees 'em. Get it? Got it. Good!
To begin with, Touched By an Angel does NOT refer to Jess's kissing scenes with Antonio! The premise is that three angels are sent by God to intervene in the lives of humans when they really screw things up royally. Hmmm... I seem to recall an old Christmas movie of the same ilk with a less-attractive angel. Only these folks aren't earning their wings. Well, at least, I don't think so. One hopeful sign is that I spotted a familiar name in the producers credits - Marilyn Osborn from the first season of X-Files (she wrote Shapes). I figured that it couldn't be too bad.
Jessica plays a wife of a fireman and mother of a little girl. She's got the perfect family life, the perfect garden, and a heroic husband. But, naturally, there's a worm in this garden, and we soon find out what it is. Jess's character was raped by a burglar six years before, and the scumbag is up for parole. She doesn't tell her husband about the notification. But, she goes to a crisis center, where she encounters two of the angels who are "in disguise" as counselors. They tell her all kinds of platitudes, she gets upset, and runs out. Then, she goes with the Irish angel, Monica, to the parole hearing. Turns out that the rapist has "found God" and spouts Bible verses like a phony TV preacher. Naturally, the parole board lets him out over Jess's objections. And his parole officer is... yep, you guess it, the third angel! The rapist gradually falls back into his evil ways, while Jess and her husband try to deal with their demons from the past. So far, so good. It's a gripping story with a very intense subject. It really made me want to see how this thing was going to resolve. Jessica's range of emotions was just amazing. She sparkled every moment she was on camera. SOMEONE GET THIS WOMAN A SERIES!!!
Then, in the fourth act, it all fell apart. We here at KOBA-TV usually don't watch this show, so we had no idea what to expect. I was kinda hoping that the humans would resolve this somehow with a little nudging from the angelic messengers. What happened was total Deus ex machina. Literally. At the critical moments - the husband was about to send the rapist to meet God personally, and Jess was packing to leave her husband - the angels reveal themselves as such. Now, Kobas can only take so much sugar before our little pancreases go into overload. When the angels "decloaked", it was enough to send me into a sugar shock. The answers were nothing more than platitudes, and that "we all need to go back to the time when we were innocent children." Yeechhhh! Personally, I was kinda hoping the husband would blow the rapist's brains out, and then Detective Cameron Quinn from EZ Streets would show up. Er.. CBS cancelled that show. Needless to say, he didn't, the rapist got a "stern warning" from the head angel, and Jess's marraige was saved. All's well that ends well, and the rapist goes back to jail. Now I know why this show is a hit, and EZ Streets was cancelled. EZ Streets was too morally ambiguous, whereas Angel is an old-fashioned morality play.
Obviously, TBAA appeals to a lot of people - it's one of the highest rated shows on the air. But, for this particular Koba, it's just a little too schmaltzy for my tastes. Not to say that I don't like a good family drama now and then (give me Doctor Quinn's hunky husband any day!), but this was a little too much to take. Jessica was outstanding, and so were the other guest stars. But, I guess life on G889 has made me a little too cynical for angelic visions. You humans are gonna have to work out your own problems. In the meantime, I give Touched By an Angel three tomatoes out of five - and an extra pair of garden trimmers for Jessica, for being sharp and on the mark.
Tune in tomorrow, when MJK says "Invasion... this time, WE are the aliens. Er... that doesn't sound quite right..."
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