|
An ominous-sounding episode number, if ever there was one! Interestingly, this episode focussed largely on Blackmoor, which was not only "hell"-like in nature, but was even sub-terranean. All it needed was for Craven to have horns on his head and a trident in one hand. And a few flames of course, but we should just wait and see about those..
We heard that the infamous (and never-quite-visible) Cynthia Leech was on "long service leave - 3 months", which was a bit of a disappointment, because I was dying to see how they managed to film all the Blackmoor scenes while just obscuring her face from the camera each time.
Rita tried to talk to spaced-out Bongo via some disused pipes, out by the "Adolph Ovens", according to what was written on an iron door. The "pipeline" (as opposed to 'grapevine' I guess) appeared to be a mysterious system of old metal pipes running in and out of the whole prison, seeming to serve no purpose other than allow secretive communication between the inmates. I was just starting to wonder why it hadn't been removed, when I noticed Craven listening in to it, and I suppose that was my answer.
Finally we saw the Blackmoor Top Dog, as Roo swaggered into the courtyard. Or rather her enormous hair did, and she followed a minute or so afterwards. "This ain't Wentworth, honey," she said, as if she were Mae West in the Wizard of Oz. This caused much excitement from the assembled background extras, who looked like they needed a bit of action after making jams and cakes for the local Women's Institute. Then there was a big fight between Rita and Roo. I say big because it felt rather long and drawn out, involving a knife, then a baseball bat, then a broom, then lots of cuddles. Despite the way weapons were handed to her in a cartoon-like way - each more bizarre than the last - Roo turned out to be no tougher than Vicki in Wentworth, and I was amazed when Spike said, "No-one's ever beaten Roo before!" and didn't appear to be using sarcasm.
Rita promised the women "a riot - one like [Craven has] never seen before" (if only she'd said that at Wentworth), and preparations got underway. She had another fight with Roo, and again Roo was embarrassingly easy to defeat.
Back in Wentworth, more big hair moments came, with Spider. Sarah said being Aboriginal was "better than being a frizzy-haired slag" like Spider. And in another scene, Spider's departing words were, "gotta go get my hair permed". Not sure whether both of these were references to her legs.
Joycie bounced into the rec room (literally, with a pantomime skip-and-a-jump) and handed over the fashion shoot photos to Lisa and Lorilei. Blimey, Uncle Perc might as well have taken them - most of them were decapitated shots and out of focus.
Alice and Spider decided to get their own back on Kath by stealing merchandise from the shop. ("Like Robin Hood, stealing from the rich..".) So they wandered out of the prison building, across the grounds, into the (unlocked) shop, and filled up pillowcases which surprisingly didn't have SWAG written across them in big letters. Then they carried the bulging blue pillowcases back across the grounds, back into the prison, and all through the corridors to H-block, where they distributed the goods to each cell. I won't mention the obvious question about security, but I can't help being baffled why the stock hadn't been stolen long before now. Later on, Meg said something about shoplifting to Kath. "I hope there'll be none of that!" she chirped. With her customers consisting of thieves, con artists and assorted other criminals, I suppose Kath's got nothing to worry about. Besides, why would they worry about petty shoplifting, when they can walk in and fill their bedlinen?
The stolen goods were distributed to the women, who all seemed delighted with their unexpected gifts. (Obviously no-one got the tinned peaches then.) Nice move by Kath, I thought, to say it was a gesture from her, cleverly turning the situation in her favour.
Sarah had been painting Merle's face with lots of white paint. Kath was later walking along the corridor, following a long line of toilet paper, leading me to expect a cute Andrex doggie wagging its tail at her, at the end of the trail. Turned out it was Merle, enthusing about making a didgeridoo from a cardboard roll. (If she had a tail, I'm sure she would have been wagging it too). Later in her cell, Lorilei was sitting on the bed with a shower cap on her head and a white face. Maybe Sarah had been creative with her too, I wondered. Lorilei told Lisa not to make her laugh, because of her face pack. "About time you did laugh!" said Lisa. "To take your mind off Zoe," she said, instantly reminding her of Zoe again.
At one point, Joan said that "Blackmoor is high security", which was interesting because I distinctly remember it being stated that Wentworth was a "high security" prison, more than once in the series. Blimey, bit of a difference between the two.
Towards the end of the episode, Pamela Madigan (earlier described by Sarah as a "Coconut - black on the outside, white on the inside") told the women a "dreamtime" story, about black swans. I think this was probably nicely told, but I have to admit I was far too distracted, thinking about all the drag queens I've seen in brightly-coloured outfits, waving their hands around theatrically as they recounted a story. It was also an interesting idea to intercut this calm story-telling with the tension and drama of Blackmoor, and I liked the idea (in theory) quite a lot. Sadly, it didn't seem to work as well as it ought to have, though not sure exactly why.
|
