Category: The Equalizer
-
“The Equalizer” wraps up season two with a cliffhanger; it’s been renewed for two more seasons, which means it’s safe for a good while, so it’s a playing renewal chicken cliffhanger. Though it is kind of perpendicular to one. No spoilers. The cliffhanger’s manipulative but also not. It’s predictable (the scene leading up to it…
-
I’m sure it’s happened before, but this episode has a guest star who appeared on the eighties “Equalizer,” too. In the first scene of this episode, Queen Latifah meets with spy guy Neal Benari to check up on her nemesis, who’s overseas after killing Chris Noth (offscreen). Presumably, we’ll get some sort of return visit…
-
Right up until the ending, which resolves Tory Kittles’s recent professional turmoil story arc–two racist white cops kidnapped him and tortured him because they thought he was just a mouthy Black guy, not a Black cop—this episode’s one of the best “Equalizer” episodes. It’s also something of a “gimme” episode, just because of the structure.…
-
With Chris Noth now dead and presumably buried, “The Equalizer” can move on to whatever’s next, which apparently involves introducing Queen Latifah’s ex-husband, Stephen Bishop. Latifah has to take a gunshot victim to Bishop for help—he’s one of the best surgeons in the city, and Latifah’s client can’t go to the hospital because the bad…
-
The opening recap features Chris Noth, which had me hoping they’d finally resolve his character on the show. They do. In some ways, it’s the biggest episode of “Equalizer” so far; Queen Latifah takes on a Bond villain, Chris Vance, who’s got a Bond weapon of mass destruction to unleash on unsuspecting New York City.…
-
Tory Kittles gets his most significant episode of the season (if not the show), but with several caveats. First, it’s a Black trauma episode. Kittles—with his two sons—is somewhere in not-New York City New York, and a couple sheriffs’ deputies assume he’s a suspect. When he asserts his rights, the senior officer (Lee Tergesen, leaning…
-
So, Rob Hanning gets the script credit this episode; his name stood out but not because of his “Equalizer” work. He used to write on “Frasier.” He did another “Equalizer” too, the relatively good episode with Chris Noth saving his son; an inglorious distinction, to be sure. But Hanning’s name stood out. And his episode…
-
The Leonard Matlin capsule review of 1987’s other Mannequin movie, Lady Beware, describes Diane Lane’s lead performance in the film as “uneven, but her rage is convincing.” That phrase has stuck with me for decades now. This episode of “The Equalizer” feels similar. It’s about general hate crimes against Asian-Americans escalating to murder, though the…
-
Based on the Legacy title, I thought we might be getting Chris Noth’s character dying offscreen. Sadly no. They also mention him a few times, which is kind of weird. It implies the viewer’s supposed to remember the character, though—presumably—Noth won’t be back. The episode opens with a flashback to the Tulsa massacre in 1921…
-
How does “The Equalizer” deal with Chris Noth’s permanent absence? It’s like he was never there. He’s heavily featured in the recap because he got Adam Goldberg out of federal prison, then nothing. He was also supposed to be mentoring teenage Laya DeLeon Hayes, who was conspicuously absent from Noth’s last episode. I kind of…
-
So when they said Chris Noth would not be appearing on future episodes of “The Equalizer,” I guess they meant after this episode. Though the entire time it seems like they’re setting Noth up for a farewell hero arc and it as a surprise when he didn’t ride off into the sunset. What’s stranger is…
-
I’m trying to remember the last Chris Noth-centric episode of “The Equalizer;” it must’ve been last season. This episode has him running around with a machine gun and fist-fighting like they promised him he could do American James Bond or something. Instead, however, it’s old man James Bond with Noth teaming up with previously unrevealed…
-
It’s a city-in-crisis episode, with a sniper terrorizing New York. Only the show skips the first two attacks, and it doesn’t appear there’s a lot of crisis going on. Even though the expository dialogue makes it sound like everyone’s staying inside when Queen Latifah and Liza Lapira go to the crime scene, there’s a bunch…
-
Oh, come on, "Equalizer," stop getting my hopes up. Thanks to this episode—directed by movie "star" Mark Polish (quotations because I knew he existed but have never seen him in anything, and I also thought he co-directed all those) and with a script credited to Zoe Robyn—I am once again approaching bullish on "The Equalizer."…
-
I’m not getting roped into the “maybe ‘The Equalizer’ will actually be good” game again, but this episode’s solid. It improves some things, it maintains some things, it fails at some things. The fail is Tory Kittles teaming up with Dominic Fumusa for a bit. Kittles has all these buddy cop one-liners he dismissively spouts…
-
Every time I think “The Equalizer” is getting better, it stalls out, though at least some of this episode is fine, and the worst stuff (Liza Lapira acting tough) is predictable. This episode, writing credits to Keith Eisner and Erica Shelton, is a combination of “The Wire”-lite and “The Shield”-lite. And it’s directed by Eric…
-
So, this “Equalizer” is in many ways the best episode ever. There are still many problems—starting with the A-plot being about Queen Latifah taking on the Saudis and continuing with some bad acting from one of the principal guest stars—but it’s pretty darn good. Especially for “The Equalizer.” Randy Zisk’s direction is strong, Latifah’s performance…
-
“The Equalizer” returns with a whole bunch of problems but still has a reasonable amount of charm to it, just because of Queen Latifah. She gets a really good “mom” monologue when Laya DeLeon Hayes is yelling at her about being a former super-spy now using her very particular set of skills to help those…
-
Yeah, I knew Joseph C. Wilson credited scripts weren’t good, which is a real bummer because this episode deserves better. Queen Latifah gets a case close to home when daughter Laya DeLeon Hayes and her friends become collateral damage in a drive-by shooting. The episode becomes a race: will Latifah get justice for the victims…
-
This episode has a lot of stones. It’s very modern—a group of disaffected white guys become an alt-right terror cell because one of them’s a cop and really wants to use all his access to explosives for evil (it could potentially age very poorly)—and they all got together on a Parler knockoff. And it tries…
-
I watched this episode like it was the season finale, so I was more bullish on the epilogue than I would’ve been if I’d known there were two episodes after this one. This episode’s got Queen Latifah doing a CIA one-shot amid her regular plot lines, like daughter Laya DeLeon Hayes and aunt Lorraine Toussaint…
-
The episode opens with district attorney Jennifer Ferrin deciding she’s going to go after vigilante Queen Latifah because it’ll make a good “law and order” story for the media. Yep, Karen Ferrin (it even rhymes) will be going after Black woman Latifah who helps the BIPOC people the NYPD at best ignores, at worst murders.…
-
It’s a perfectly solid episode of The Equalizer. It might be the best? It’s certainly a lot more comfortable with itself—minus Chris Noth, who apparently won’t be on the episodes where Tory Kittles shows up and vice versa (based on last episode)—and it handles the “equalizing” a lot better. Instead of doing the story like…
-
It took until after we’d finished watching the episode for me to realize there’s no Tory Kittles in it. He’s got a credit. He’s not in the show. Instead of the NYPD being the wrench in Queen Latifah’s plans, it’s Laila Robins and the CIA. Robins is playing a variation on her part in “The…
-
Did they save up their Chris Noth for this episode? He actually does something with the plot. Nothing with the non-Queen Latifah cast, but they get him in a lengthy action set piece involving the episode villain (Scott Cohen). Noth and Latifah crashing actually evil philanthropist Cohen’s formal ball isn’t as good as it could…
-
Well, this episode establishes a couple things “The Equalizer” certainly didn’t need established. First, Chris Noth is not a regular cast member no matter what the titles say; he’s nowhere to be seen this episode. Second, turns out Andrew W. Marlowe’s not going to be the worst writer on it. I was upbeat when I…
-
Despite being a general improvement over the pilot and seeming to trend up in general (Adam Goldberg’s not obnoxiously bland this episode and Liza Lapira’s improving a little so maybe she’ll hit that level by the next one), this episode of “The Equalizer” has a lackluster, pseudo-cloying finish. The show tries to do a bunch…
-
They don’t use the song. The movies didn’t use the song either, did they? I love that old “Equalizer” theme song. Stewart Copeland. Anyway. “The Equalizer: 2021” is Taken with Queen Latifah only she’s an altruist and not only using her very particular set of skills to help family members in danger. She’s got a…
The Stop Button 