Baywatch - S05E03 - Aftershock

Yeah I'm still writing about Baywatch, for some reason.

Been There, Done That

'B' Story

We start off with this one but it turns out to have very little screen time, it's Matt and Logan not liking each other, partly because they both fancy Caroline. Is this a love triangle? I don't know if it is if none of them are attracted to Matt. Caroline might like him but we haven't had her say anything either way. This is partly because both her and Logan are so new to the show, they've barely had any time to do anything. Not only have they rushed into the Matt vs. Logan scenario but also the Matt fancies Caroline one, too. He only just split up with Summer and we haven't seen him mention her or act sad at all. Now, this is not to say that he is supposed to be a bad person, what I mean is that the writers have decided to pretend Summer never existed, at least, in the stories involving Matt. This isn't a huge deal, it's not like having Matt be all mopey would have been interesting, but it does feel unnatural after two seasons them both being madly in love.

Oh wait, except they weren't, were they, because there was a love triangle involving them and Slade. The Matt and Logan rivalry has been done before - It's a combination of Slade story and the old rivalry between Eddie and... who was it? Oh, I think it was John D. Cort. They weren't in a love triangle but John was introduced to the show after Eddie and Eddie didn't like him. They work out their differences and become great friends. This does all happen very quickly, I admit, but yeah, this new Logan thing is played out just the same. This story doesn't go anywhere so I'll leave it at that.

'A' Story

At least we get to see Caroline in the other story, shes stunning, but the 'A' story is quite unbelievably played out. We spend most of the episode on this one, I don't know what to say, this entire episode isn't exactly bad but... Gayle and Mitch want to get back together again, Hobie is happy about this and then they don't get back together. I can't believe they did this story again, they've done it so many times before.

Since I'm watching this show decades after it aired and I'm watching four or five episodes a week, perhaps it's unfair to criticise it for certain things. Back in the day, viewers would miss episodes and there would be larger gaps between them watching them, so perhaps they'd not notice when stories were re-told. The only tiny differences are that it's Gayle who is really into the idea when it's usually the other way around, and that they decide to re-marry, immediately.

As in, right now in the same episode! Even Stephanie remarks that isn't Mitch rushing, though this is because shes jealous. I knew this episode was coming because I looked at Gayle's baywatch.fandom page months page months ago because I decided I didn't care about spoilers when it comes to this character. Probably because of this exact reason, when she comes back into the show for normally one episode, it's usually the same story. However, I didn't know this one was going to be so soon, I thought I'd read that the wedding episode was way in the future, like, season 10 or something. I kind of do regret reading it now, because I already knew that Mitch runs off to save people literally just before he says "I do" at his wedding. So Gayle decides it still annoys her now he puts his job first. Is this the last time we see her? Maybe. I'll look it up later.

Small note about Hobie which I forgot to say earlier - I was wrong about what I said yesterday, even though he did leave to go live with his mum at the end of the episode, he is back straight away in this one. Over is fear of earthquakes and ready to get back to normal, making the drama from 'Livin' on the Fault Line' pointless. Well, what I mean is it took away the weight of the situation.

Random Thoughts On Baywatch

- Logan looks a bit weird in the intro, I first noticed how he looks before he was added to the show, when I saw promotional photos of him. He looks pretty normal in the show, though.

- Maybe they feel like they can get away with re-using story-lines because they change the cast quite often.

- I might be imagining it or it's creeping in very slowly; The heroics of saving people is getting more extreme, or amplified. I don't mean the action, stunts or size of the situations are getting bigger, I mean they're making out the lifeguards are more like super heroes. Imagine a parody of Baywatch, which I'm sure there were many back in the day, were the gravitas of the situation is turned up. They're still mostly just diving under water to grab someone, but it's made out to be more amazing now.