One of my guilty pleasures as a kid was murder-mystery games. I played a lot of Clue and was also partial to the How To Host A Mystery series (in fact, the Star Trek: The Next Generation one is still in my closet). So this week’s Leverage, an affectionate nod to classic whodunits, was a home run in my book.
From the opening scene (“it was a dark and stormy night,” indeed), “The Ten Li’l Grifters Job” was peppered with fun for the mystery buffs among us. The title was an Agatha Christie reference. The main characters dressed up as notable literary detectives. (Did you catch that Nate was Ellery Queen, the character that Timothy Hutton’s father, Jim Hutton, played in the 1970’s TV series?) And I couldn’t help but giggle at one character’s reference to hiding a pipe wrench a la Clue. The Leverage writers and cast clearly had a great time with their choice of setup, because they went for broke with it. And when the people making an episode are having that much fun, trust me, it definitely translates on screen.
What I appreciated as a writer was that the episode didn’t then become a cutesy theme installment. Rather than put the characters into amusing situations because of the premise, the writers let the humor come out of the characters themselves, whether it was Hardison complaining how much he hated the victim’s (that was William Russ of Boy Meets World fame) house, or Eliot remaining disgruntled about…well, many things. We weren’t subjected to forced jokes wrung out of an interesting premise. And although the ultimate reveal was fairly obvious, I honestly didn’t care, because I was having way too much fun.
“The Ten Li’l Grifters Job” is an example of why Leverage works so well to me. My friend Blake Masters once posed the theory that there are two types of television – the kind you get sucked into and the kind that you casually watch – and both have merit. For me, Leverage is the latter, a kind of comfort food. It doesn’t leave my jaw hanging open or give me heart palpitations, but it doesn’t need to. Instead, it has me saying things like, “Well, that was clever,” or “That was funny,” or “Hey, that’s what happened to that actor I haven’t seen in forever!” On a summer evening, it’s the perfect show to relax with. Especially when it brings back fond memories of me having my nose buried in a copy of Great Detective Stories.
Between this week’s fun romp and last week’s strong character development, it looks like Leverage is still going strong at a time when many shows begin to flag. I personally am happy to have this team of cons around for as long as they’d like to be.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I suddenly feel like a game of Clue. …
Clacked by Brittany Frederick 
on Jul 03, 2011 @ 23:56 EST5EDT
Loved this episode and absolutely loved the homage to Tim’s Dad’s Ellery Queen. He had it right down to the mannerisms, hat, coat and sweater. His Dad would have been proud!