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Finalewatch: Lipstick Jungle
We had a bit of a downbeat end to Lipstick Jungle's abbreviated season of career drama, marital woes, hot boytoys, and the enduring question: Can a woman have it all? Answer? Probably not, but if you're Brooke Shields and you can alternately cajole and bully the scriptwriter, you might just be able to pull it off.
You always hog the spoilers!
Nico is still having fun with Kirby the hot boytoy, and while I can maybe -- maybe -- buy that she'd have time to slip away at lunch for a quickie, no way do I buy that she'd ruin her blowout with a hot (in all senses of the word) post-coital shower. The woman has to have priorities, right?
Right now, those priorities include looking uncomfortable whenever she and Wendy are stuck in the same elevator and enlisting Victory to take Wendy's place at social events. The party of the week is a basketball viewing shindig thrown by Kelly and Chris Parker, hot couple, reputed hockey star, and the next cover subject of Bonfire magazine. Nico also brings Charles, who apparently can't or won't talk to other adults in a social setting and despairs at being able to actually watch the game, so he heads out early. Nico takes the opportunity to nip out Kirby's for more naughty bouncy funtime, which is punctuated by several phone calls. When Nico finally answers, she finds out that Charles had a heart attack and is in the hospital. Oh, the guilt!
Nico spends a lot of time being tortured in Charles' hospital room, and spends much of the time there in the rather fetching cocktail dress she wore to the party and Kirby's. She also finds out that the one thing nearly guaranteed to fix a friendship is a near-death experience, as Wendy is there to support her (fortunately, Victory called Wendy in, because Nico wasn't going to.) Nico decides to rededicate herself to her husband, despite the fact that (1) Kirby is much hooter, adores her, and gives her passion, and (2) there's some evidence that Charles was bonking one of his students. Nevertheless, Nico tells Kirby she wants her marriage back, and resigns herself to standing by her man.
Nico's episode scorecard: Marriage, 1; Sex 0; Friendship, 1.
Victory spars with Joe, who refuses to sell her company and continues to try to woo her, calling business meetings where he plies her with Swiss truffles and attempts to fly her to Milan. No dice, billionaire boy. It helps that Victory bonds with cover-couple Chris and Kelly at the soiree, and they ask Victory to be her stylist. How nice to be appreciated for her talent, right?
Not so much -- Both Chris and Kelly put the moves on her, and Victory ends up in an awkward threesome with the couple. When Chris keeps pushing his wife away while making out with Victory -- and I'm sure that's a violation of threesome etiquette -- Kelly gets pissed -- "You always hog the girl!" Seems Victory is the latest of many women brought in to help their marriage, and it's just not working. The next morning, Victory calls Joe and says she wants him back in her life. Spiffy! Replies sleepy billionaire boy. Who's that? Asks the woman billionaire boy slept with the night before. Dammit! Fortunately, she has the very best assistant in the world who makes her smiley-face pancakes to help her get over the pain. Awww!
Victory's episode scorecard: Sex, 0; relationship, 0; Friendship, 1; Kick-ass assistant, 1.
Wendy is in a quandary: Lorraine, an award-winning screenwriter who happens to be a woman of a certain age is very, very late in delivering the script. Wendy stalks her, gets disarmed by the offer of dinner, and ends up leaving with plenty of stories about Lorraine's life but no pages. You'll have it tomorrow, promise! Lorraine says. Lies!
Wendy reappears at the apartment and Lorraine tells her she can't finish this script because she fears it's her last. Movies are a young person's game! No one will hire me! The only folks who get jobs, even writing jobs, are 20-year-old hotties! If that's the case, I'm screwed. Please don't replace your recapper with a younger, hotter model! Wendy gets over these fears by offering Lorraine a no-questions-asked deal on her next script. (Hmmm. Does that ploy work with recappers?) With no more excuses, Lorraine finishes the job and heaps praise upon Wendy, because she's awesome and wonderful and the best wife and mother and must be paying the scriptwriters for this show, too.
Wendy's episode scorecard: Job, 1; Marriage, 1; Sex, 1 (because even though Paul Blackthorne isn't in this episode, the mere fact he plays Wendy's husband means she wins at sex); Friendship, 1.
What did you think of the finale? Do you love Wendy, or find her kind of superior and grating, like I do? Is Nico making a mistake dumping Hot Kirby for Possibly Cheating Charles? What was the deal with that the random security van when Victory and Wendy were talking? How much does Joe suck? Will you tune in when/if this show comes back?
I know I'm in a minority that just gets smaller with each episode, but I don't think Joe sucks at all.
Victory dumped him. She has pushed off his many attempts to get her back. So what if he slept with a woman? She was going to sleep with a man and a woman--at the same time! I would say that while I understand Victory's hurt feelings, she really has no right to be upset with him.
As for Wendy, I think both she and Shane can be grating. How much perfectness and whine can be in one relationship?
And Nico--I applaud her for trying to make it right with her husband. But she's stupid if she doesn't fix what was wrong with her marriage *before* he had the heart attack.
June | Mar 21, 2008 7:06:05 AM | #Nico continues to irritate me more every week. She's operating out of guilt, not love for her husband. AND when she said she wants her marriage back, you just have to wonder how much the idea of him having an affair plays into that. Didn't bother her BEFORE.
I will watch when it comes back - as long as nothing better is on opposite.
Jan | Mar 21, 2008 8:34:03 AM | #A MISTAKE for dumping "hot" Kirby for her POSSIBLY cheating husband? You've got to be kidding me. All cheating does is make you just as bad a the other person even if they are doing it or did it first. I can't imagien a single male who watches this show likes that character. It's a shame too cause she' a damn good actress.
I really like Wendy who realizes that marriage is actual work and was glad she blasted into Nico in past episodes. I also liked that she was there for her friend when the chips were down and Nico's husband had the heart attack.
And, as a guy, I'll actually diagree with June in this repect regarding Victory. If you want to win a woman back and you REALLY care you just DON'T sleep with another woman while trying to get said woman back. While you are most certainly right in the sense that they aren't together so she can't get too mad it doesn't say much for him that he went elsewhere so quickly. One of those grey areas. How long did Ross say "We were on a break!!" lol
TE | Mar 21, 2008 11:44:49 AM | #As far as Wendy goes, is it really worth spending your life working so hard to be perfect? Nico is in a passionless partnership, not a marriage, so is it really cheating? Victory is with a man who is used to getting everything he wants and plies her with stuff, not love, so why wouldn't she walk away... then she experiences something shocking and realizes presents are better than nothing. Really, Wendy doesn't exist in the real world, but Victory and Nico are real people.
Michelle | Mar 21, 2008 2:14:32 PM | #The only thing worth watching this show for is Kirby. I don't care for Nico, but I'm willing to watch her so she can justify his screen time.
In general I don't find the characters on this show to be particularly likeable. I had started liking Victory, but then she just got too pouty for me once she got into the relationship with billionnaire-guy.
It's fun to watch the upscale world of NYC if there's nothing better on and I feel like watching TV, but I could do without this show just fine.
Darlene | Mar 21, 2008 6:01:42 PM | #TE, I would normally agree with what you've said.
But for this particular instance, I found it hard to be behind a woman who, hurt after breaking up with a guy that showered her with attention, felt the need to be with a COUPLE that showered her with attention.
I usually like Victory, but she was the one that broke up with Joe. She was just as quickly ready to sleep with other people--again I say multiple people at the same time. She wasn't the one that stopped the threesome. She seemed perfectly ready to do it, albeit nervous.
It was only after she felt ill-used and lonely that she wanted Joe back. I'm sorry, but I thought that was shabby of her to do to him. How often is she going to toss him aside and then cling to him at her will?
So, for that, I give Joe a pass.
June | Mar 21, 2008 9:36:57 PM | #keep kirby on the show. a lot of women watch for him, period :) his relationship with niko is hot. everything else is zzzz. wendy is waaay too perfect. when marsha mason's character told her she was amazing, it was barf inducing. they need to make her character more human = flawed.
lea | Mar 21, 2008 9:49:35 PM | #This show has grown on me and I'd like to see it come back.
I think our blogger said this before, but Kim Raver gives a very sypathetic performance as Nico that I can't hate her - even though I watch some of her behavior like a train wreck.
Though Kirby is really hot (some guys watch for him too!), there's no suggestion that they have anything other than sex; though he'd like to make it more. She at one time loved Charles and must have had a happy marriage, so I think at least tryihg to get that back is a good thing. When/if that fails, she should feel free to run to Kirby's bed, if he'll have her.
I'm sticking to my theory that the writers write Victory like she's a teenager, because here again, she's as fickle as the wind and easily led astray. If they didn't make her so pouty and sad-sackish, she'd provide some fun (almost adventuresome) comic relief... as it is, she's just annoying. But Joe's also a jerk, in multiple and sort of indefineable ways. I see Victory hooking up with her assistant, who's pretty cute himself.
Wendy is too perfect at this point, but I don't have a problem with her having it all - I think some women do manage to have it all, but it's a struggle to do so and it doesn't always last. I'd like to see that struggle - juggling work with the daily business of keeping her marriage healthy; actually show her damned phantom kids and the difficulty inherent in being stretched thin.
Finally, I think there should only be one married women of the three and the other two shouldn't necessarily have long term stable relationships either; it's kind of boring. I see Nico becoming the divorcee kinda back on the scene (when Kirby has a new girlfriend, likely his own age) and Victory as ever-dating not-quite-right guys.
Varris | Mar 22, 2008 5:29:40 AM | #I fear Joe and Victory's situation is going to turn into the Rachel/Ross "We were on a break!" episodes. So long as Andrew McCarthy comes back with his own voice and stops pretending to be Carey Grant I'm happy.
I don't think Wendy's being superior at all. If you're married you're not going to condone your friend having an affair as it makes a mockery of all your marriages. If we're still comparing this show to Sex and the City, I remember Charlotte being really disappointed in Carrie when she and Big were having an affair and she didn't even like Big or his wife.
And what's Nico doing now? Hurting poor Kirby again and stopping the affair because she thinks her husband's having an affair - where's the logic? Is she going to get Kirby fired again?
Victory's assistant is gorgeous, wish he was mine!
Ok first ok all I cant believe I am blogging about a tv show. However after a Lipstick Jungle all-nighter to catch up ... Each episode got better. I am completely hooked. The Joe/Nico interplay didn't do anything for me until the last two episodes. And Andrew McCarthy is the PERFECT fit for that roll. I have been a big fan since the 80s. My favorite roll though is Nico's assistant and the interplay between Joe and he is simply hysterical and most likely foreshadowing of tension to come. To be honest I think we are going to see a gay back story between Joe and that other rich billionaire from the art auction. Old prep school boyfriends or something? As usual what makes this show work is the supporting actors. All the assistants and even the screenwriter from the last episode. Not a big tv nut anymore but I kinda like this one.
wickie | Apr 13, 2008 11:00:12 AM | #
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