Nip/Tuck/Thoughts: Mommie (Not-so) Dearest

I don’t know about you, but I kina LOVE it when Shakespearean-trained British actors take on material that some might consider beneath them and class the joint up.

For example, I love that Ian McKellen walks around the X-Men movies wearing a cape and performs the role as if he were doing King Lear. It’s not so much that they elevate the material, it’s more that they bring the same fervor to junk that that they do to the stage, and I love them for that. (Also, see: the adult cast of the “Harry Potter” movies.)

“Nip/Tuck” got its own touch of class last Wednesday (sorry for the late recap) when Vanessa Redgrave reprised her role as Dr. Erica Naughton, Julia’s controlling mom and Sean’s erstwhile nemesis. I didn’t even realize that the show had really been missing a delicious villain until Redgrave/Erica showed up.

We caught up with her as she consulted Sean following his sorta-suicide attempt by long distance swim. I thought Sean had been pulling a Don Draper in the season 2 episode right before Don came home from California, but Erica got him to admit that he had initially tried to kill himself.

It didn’t take long for Erica to leave Sean stuck in a psychiatric hospital (where he had to be bailed out by Christian) and plotting on taking custody of Annie and Connor from Sean and Julia. In the space of the hour, she had convinced Matt to serve as a witness on her behalf and had fooled Sean into taking a swing at her new boy toy (played by Gilles Marini) to give her leverage.

I suppose the writers want us to think that Erica is trying to steal Julia’s life, but to be perfectly honest, I didn’t really need a reason. Redgrave was so commanding and delightfully devious that I would’ve been perfectly happy if it turned out that she wanted Annie and Connor just because she was bored.

The only downside is the fact that Redgrave’s awesomeness only enhances what an absolute snoozer Julia (played by Redgrave’s real-life daughter Joely Richardson) is. Having your mom come on your show and absolutely school you can’t be that fun. Then again, I’m sure the tables will soon be turned on Erica, especially given the fact that we still don’t know what her young hubby’s motivations are.

The other two subplots belonged to Christian and were sort of a mixed bag.

I know a lot of people were are probably rolling their eyes now that it looks like Kimber is going to come back to Christian after being engaged to Mike for a very brief (sickeningly sweet?) period of time. However, I agree with what Sean said a few episodes ago – Christian and Kimber are mirror images of each other. They’ll always be drawn to one another no matter what. Whether this is a good thing or a bad thing for the characters remains to be seen (hint: it’s bad), but it feels genuine because that’s simply the way it is – these two will never get over each other.

Finally, I’m not saying that actor/actress Candis Cayne doesn’t make for a convincing woman. Hell, my “Crying Game” alarms didn’t start going off until barmaid Alexis Stone insisted Christian have anal sex with her. (If this were real life, then it could have just been that she enjoys anal sex, but since this is a TV show there HAD to be a reason and that was a clue.)

It’s just that hasn’t this show done the transsexual thing before (and better)? Did we really need what appears to be a one-off storyline where a character debates what gender identity really means? Mostly this storyline just made me miss Famke Janssen’s Ava Moore. Also, Alexis looks 1,000% more attractive as a woman.

So what’d you think of this episode? What’s Erica’s husband up to? How will Sean and Julia strike back? Finally, could this show possibly end with Christian and Kimber together?