Leverage’s Tara is a perfect fit

“Cleavers. Haven’t done that in a while.” – Eliot

Yep, there’s a little bit of a pun in the title … it was a fashion episode, after all….

I’ve got to hand it to Leverage: even though they may not be firing on all eight cylinders like they were in their near-perfect debut season, they really are making the most of Gina Bellman‘s maternity leave. The writers have masterfully woven Jeri Ryan‘s Tara right into the story lines and have easily created a new dynamic within the team that really, really works for me.

I like Tara a lot, and I especially like how she just fell into step with Nate and the rest of the team and was able to pull off the con with a last-minute save. She really fits in and adds a new dynamic that the show needed. They wrote this in well, too, with Tara complaining throughout the episode about Nate’s codes, cyrptic clues and slogans but she finally gets it when it counts, and she counters with her own “5-0″ code and Nate knows exactly what to do.

I don’t miss Sophie at all, actually, but I do think there’s something more in store for us than just some strange shots of her in foreign countries. I get that they have to write in Gina Bellman’s maternity leave, but Ivey and Keith mentioned just how absurd the costumes and backgrounds are of the webcam shots of Sophie. I have a feeling she’s pulling something on Nate, and by default, the rest of the team.

My guess is that she’s not traveling the globe and happy, but actually somewhere very nearby and faking the backdrops. The last episode before the hiatus made it seem like the team was dependent on Sophie (she did mentor some of them to great guffaws last season), but I actually think it’s the other way around. I don’t think Sophie can tear herself away, and maybe she and Tara even have the whole thing planned from the start. It will be interesting to see how it all plays out, and if the writers are thinking along the same warped (but fun!) lines as I am.

Other things worth mentioning:

• “Pilgrim chic”
• The Chinese triad cleaver fight was so much fun, and Tara certainly holds her own, a fact that earns her some respect with Eliot.
• Gotta love the look on Eliot’s face when he knows he’s going to dress Parker as a model…
• almost as much as taking us back to an old favorite reference of Leverage‘s heyday: Eliot’s vast range of knowledge begotten from the women he’s dated. This time, fashion models.
• Another throwback: making us think that Tara was ratting out Nate to the bad guy.
• And yet one more: Nate posing as Interpol was a nice twist to tie up the loose ends so Russell got his due, and sending the “Pilgrim chic” designs to the knock-off sweatshop too.
• You just had to know that Parker as a fashion model was not going to go well.

Clacked by Debbie McDuffee
on Jan 13, 2010 @ 23:00 EST5EDT