It's 7 PM on Monday night, and you know what that means. Aired February 17th, 1997, this is the weak point of my "best seven-episode run in the series". It's the only one that's a bit of an odd man out, as a comedy episode, and a lot of folks don't like it. Well I do. I like it a lot! It's great to get a Richie-focused episode for a change. It feels like he hasn't had enough episodes since he returned in "End of Innocence" with that rad new sword.
We begin with Richie speeding around in an expensive red car, nearly causing several accidents.
Why is he in such a hurry? Is there an unclaimed open window somewhere?
Behold! Richie, rocking the debonair suave of a leading man. This episode is an opportunity to see what a Richie spinoff might have looked like, actually. Why isn't he on the DVD title screen up top? He is unquestionably the star and focal point of the episode. It's Caspian all over again.
Stuff Happens with some towing company trying to tow Duncan's car. Apparently Richie bought it and never made the payments on it, using his Richard Redstone alias.
While we're at it, there should be an episode about our heroes dealing with Richie's unpaid excise taxes, or something. You know, real-world tedious bullshit that we have to deal with in the modern age.
Back at the casino, Richie is rolling deep at the roulette table, somehow winning at everything. Not sure if he's swindling people or just having wildly good luck. Apparently he's been doing a lot of swindling lately.
Richie wins a million dollars! That should be enough to get these lovely ladies back to the hotel suite for some drinks and conversation.
Woman A: "I'm so sorry. Do you know what women call a man under six feet?
Richie: "What?"
Woman A: "...a friend!"
Woman B: "lol"
Richie: "Well, you could stand to lose a little weight!"
::the entire room stops what they're doing and gasps, with one guy's face melting like Raiders of the Lost Ark::
Richie then meets this cute Frenchwoman, Marina. She is just adorable! She's nice to him, so she probably wants to kill him or something.
Nothing good can ever happen to Richie, we've established this.
This random guy serves champagne to the newly-acquainted couple, only he spikes Richie's drink. He then leans over and furiously makes out with the top of Marina's hand, before slapping Richie in the face with a velvet glove.
The level of disrespect for our boy in this season is OFF THE CHARTS.
As the duo of Marina and Richie go out to take a drive, drugged Richie slurs his words and wobbles about before collapsing facefirst.
Marina is concerned about how much Waiter Guy gave him. She seems nice, for a kidnapper who is drugging a guy.
Even though there's a backseat, Marina decides to park her backseat right in Richie's lap. She's fun. The actress looks Russian, but she clearly speaks French, so...IDK. The funny thing about Russia is that most of the women look like models while most of the men look like someone hit them in the face with a shovel.
Richie caresses a boob while dozing off.
Waiter Guy, disgustedly: "He's American. They have this ridiculous obsession with breasts."
Richie wakes up handcuffed to a bed. An extra-springy one! Damn it, what does that devil-woman Marina have planned for him?!
Marina explains that her grandpa, who owned the family chateau, took out a loan. Now, the loan is due, and a loan shark is going to take the chateau unless they come up with 200,000 Francs (about $50,000 USD).
Marina can't let them take the family chateau, so she either has to marry the loan shark, or come up with the money. ...why not just marry the loan shark, get the loan nullified, and then divorce him and take half his money? If he won't nullify the loan, then divorce him anyway and use his money to pay him for the loan. It isn't like men have very many rights in these situations, ZAPOW. Unless he made her sign a pre-nup, on the legal advice of his lawyers Jamie Foxx and Kanye West.
Richie would like to help her with this problem and give her the money she needs to not be homeless, but he doesn't actually have any. That's right...the whole "Richard Redstone, billionaire corporation owner" was just a facade.
Flashback time! A more recent one than most, and it's at the same casino Richie went to earlier. This is why a Richie spinoff wouldn't have worked that well: No flashbacks. Anything in that vein would have needed to be someone else's flashbacks.
Duncan is hanging out with this absolutely scrumptious woman. They seem pretty serious; she knows he's immortal.
He loses a card game and buries himself in her neck to feel better.
Then she plays and proceeds to win a million dollars. It's pretty easy to win a million dollars here.
GET A ROOM!
The casino owner is the guy on the right. He's ADORABLE.
"Zat eez a lucky man!" he says.
The guy on the left is Carlo, who proceeds to buy out the casino soon after when the other guy goes kind of senile.
In the present, Duncan goes to the same casino and talks to the same proprietor. Amazing how they made this guy have a 20 year age difference in back to back scenes.
Duncan has to walk with a cane now and put grey streaks in his hair to present the illusion that he's aged at all. He also stuffed wads of cotton around his gums to make his cheeks puff out so he'd have jowls and Old Guy Wide Face.
He's trying to track down Richie to talk to him about the car situation, and the casino proprietor tells him that Richie left with Marina. Duncan actually knows her family, and the chateau in question, so he's off to investigate.
.......just realized. Now it is Duncan who will be peering into windows. This episode is a complete inversion of the rest of the series.
Back at the chateau, Marina feeds Richie. He's getting some serious Stockholm Syndrome over this woman. Also she's exquisitely gorgeous so that probably helps.
Eventually she agrees to un-do one of his cuffs so that he can at least...you know, have an arm free. For whatever it is that Richie needs to do. He proceeds to plant one on her, and she's into it.
OOOOH, RICHIE HAS A GIRLFRIEND
He then senses an immortal. And he's still chained to the bed with his other arm.
Uh oh.
"You gotta let me go! We could all die!" he says while Marina gets mad at him for trying to manipulate her and leaves. Wait, SHE is mad at HIM for manipulating?
He breaks himself loose, which causes the entire bed to cave in.
"OH YEAH. NICCCCE." says Duncan in the window.
Richie (w/ shard of the bed that he's still handcuffed to) escapes out the side of the chateau, expecting another immortal to strike at any time.
Duncan is happy to see him, and can't wait to hear THIS story.
Eventually they hatch a plan. Pay this woman's tab (it's about $50,000 US) and save the chateau. Richie goes back to the chateau to turn himself back in and tell them they're covered, when...
...this one asshole guy breaks a pot over his head and "re-captures" him. If Marina had answered the door instead, they could have worked everything out.
Instead, he gets chained back up, and Marina is DISPLEASED at his escape. If he really wanted to escape, why would he come back in? USE LOGIC, MARINA
Duncan, with cane and limp, shows up. He's really hamming it up in this episode, playing this slightly-seedy old accountant.
Marina re-gags Richie. This is starting to become really not-hot and more annoying than anything else. Let Richie help you, dammit!
Marina bounds down some steps in the episode's loveliest scene. We have some great shots of the chateau, but it turns out that the greatest photo subject is Marina LeMartin herself.
Duncan proceeds to give her a check for all the money she needs, courtesy of Richard Redstone. No word on how Richie communicated with him on the situation, or arranged this, when he's been tied up this entire time outside of the few minutes where he went outside the building and then returned. Marina never asks. LOGIC, MARINA, DO YOU SPEAK IT?
She's now feeling very lovey-dovey towards Richie for saving her from losing the family chateau and having to marry that casino proprietor. And now she's the one planting a kiss on him:
::Duncan slowly rises in the window::
"Oh Yeahhhhhh."
Richie and Marina bring the money to Carlo. The chateau is paid off, and everyone is happy.
...except that the deadline for paying off the last of the chateau's bill was yesterday. Carlo could just wave that away...but he doesn't. He now owns the chateau. He could maybe be convinced to sell it back to them... for ten meelion francs.
Duncan: "That's over 2 million dollars!"
Even Duncan can't just come up with that in a few days. It looks like the jig is up.
Our heroes finally explain the truth to Marina and her grandpa. Richard Redstone is a fraud, the money was Duncan's, and well, they tried.
The grandpa is this nice old guy who is a bit senile but means well, and he's shattered that the family home is going to be lost.
Wait a minute...is this the guy that owned the casino before Carlo took over?
Hard to tell, I think it's supposed to be the same guy.
Yeah, pretty sure it's the same guy. So the LeMartins owned the casino originally, and not only did Carlo acquire it from them, now he's taking their house? My God.
A brief moment of hope follows as our heroes realize that a bunch of famous artists once stayed at the chateau. One original Picasso and they could make a fortune and solve all their problems.
Duncan finds... a painting of himself, giving the most "Oh Yeah, Niccce" window look ever. Creepy Richie has been completely upstaged by Creepy Duncan. Man can't even be creepy without Duncan upstaging him!
With no valuable paintings to sell, Marina has little choice left: She haz to marry Carlo, or her grandpa will be home-lees.
Duncan makes a personal plea for Carlo not to do this to the young lady.
He refuses, of course. He's THIS close to being with a hot 19 year old for the first time in decades. But wait! That watch triggers a flashback.
"Duncan, is zis how vich people live all ze time?"
"Not if they want to stay rich."
Our heroes are rolling about in all their money, when...
...a mystery man appears and robs them! Duncan would probably try to stop him, but he was mostly concerned about his lady getting shot, so he couldn't really do anything.
Wait, were they actually having sex on the pile of money? Cashiers and whatnot have to handle that money!
Well, the guy took all the money...AND took Duncan's watch. The same one Carlo is now wearing.
Turns out Carlo suddenly had a huge amount of money, which is how he was able to acquire the casino.
Which means...Carlo was the guy that robbed them twenty years ago. DUN DUN DUNNNNN.
Our heroes race to the casino.
Richie: "She drugged me, kidnapped me, and tied me to a bed. I don't know Mac, I think this could be a solid foundation for a relationship."
Duncan draws a very nice gun on Carlo after accusing him of being the one who robbed them 20 years ago. Carlo of course plays dumb.
Duncan then intentionally gets close and a struggle ensues, during which Duncan makes sure he gets shot.
Richie: "THAT LOOKED LIKE MURDER TO ME! Unless of course you sign over the chateau to Marina, in which case I might be willing to cover up what happened here."
Not only does he sign it over, he even gives up the watch. Then he flees the scene and lets Richie deal with the body.
Duncan starts grousing about what a great actor he is and how he's done Shakespeare, while Richie stands there trying not to crack up. It's one of those "they let the camera keep running" moments like the end of "Prodigal Son".
All is well that ends well, with our heroes hanging out at the chateau. Richie is going to stay here for a bit and help turn it into a hotel that will set the family up for generations into the future.
He and Marina can't exactly have kids, though. They'll need to find a sperm donor or something.
::Carlo reappears suddenly:: "I'm available!"
Richie is looking as youthful as he ever has. New sword, new girlfriend, things are really looking up for young Richie. Looking forward to seeing what new hijinx he gets into as his life really comes together finally! What wonders await in Season 6?
Duncan makes a discovery: The wine cellar has a fake wall.
Indeed, they had a secret, better wine cellar where they kept all the good wine, and walled it off to keep Ze Germans from finding it during Ze Vor.
Duncan notes that they're set on money for the foreseeable future no matter what, now. All of these are worth well into the hundreds, and one bottle is worth as much as $4000. It's like finding a perfectly-preserved sports card collection.
Grandpa decides that they're drinking the $4000 bottle with dinner. He really IS senile! But also adorable. His kidnapping granddaughter is also adorable. What a feel-good episode...if you don't think about the kidnapping and drugging too much. That painter guy accomplice can go too.
I like that we end with a daytime shot of the place, after mostly seeing it at night during the episode.
Here's our immortal of the week. Always good to see an immortal of the week not die by the end of the episode.
Wait, the Watcher Chronicles have been episode-specific about the main characters this entire time?
Well goddamn, another thing I've been missing...took me a while to realize they'd added a page 2 to the bad guy chronicles, now I find out the good guy chronicles are actually different from episode to episode.
In any case, looks like Richie has found some real purpose. Which means, unfortunately, that it's time for him to sod off again for a bit. Weep not for Richie, for he will be with his new lover Marina.
Next Monday at 7 PM: Duncan faces his toughest challenge of the season besides Kronos in "Duende" - with the result being debatably the best fight scene in the whole series.
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