Idiot Box- Baywatch Nights 1.05- "Just a Gigolo"

Sometimes, bad television makes for great television. Which is why we’ve chosen to allot a certain amount of space within Comics Bulletin’s tv section to the exploration of truly wonderful bad television. Why are we starting this now, you ask? Well, Danny Djeljosevic and Rafael Gaitan have chosen to watch and review every single episode of the detective-themed Baywatch spinoff Baywatch Nights. Nobody asked them to. But they insisted, and here we are…

Rafael: Hey y’all, just as the credits sequence from “Pursuit” is wrapping up, it’s time for another episode of Baywatch Nights! This week, the Misery Gang of Buchanan, Ellerby and McBride have found David Hasselhoff’s true calling — to be “Just a Gigolo.”

Danny: I wasn’t sure what to expect from this episode, except that it might court the hot-button topic of male prostitutes in a way only Baywatch Nights can — with ponderous detective skills.

Rafael: Well, when older rich women’s hot buttons are unpressed and my phone is broken, they turn to gigolos — especially American ones, like Richard Gere. In this episode the gang find themselves investigating a scam run at the local country club where rich women get romanced and financed.

Danny: Yep — some older, wealthier woman’s getting swindled by some hot young buck, and Mitch realizes there’s only one way to catch a gigolo… by becoming one. It’s like Serpico for beach bunnies.

So, to prepare, he does this, making me choke on the bowl of broken cookies I was eating with a spoon:

Rafael: Mitch, the Sherlock Holmes of detecting: “The problem is that he hasn’t broken any laws.” While I ethically feel prostitution shouldn’t be illegal, those fatcats in Washington have spoken otherwise. I guess since Mitch wasn’t reading a detective thriller in this one he didn’t know that. KEEP YOUR HEAD IN THEM BOOKS, BUCHANAN.

Danny: Well, he didn’t charge for sex… he just golddiggered (golddug?) until that lady had no more sweetness to sugar-mommy into homeboy’s bank account.

Rafael: Peace to David Hasselhoff in this sequence for looking hella Cool Dad.

Danny: So, while Mitch is… I’m not sure what Mitch is doing?… Ryan is looking all professional and vulnerable — just perfect for the slimy gigolo to sink his claws in.

Rafael: Mitch on the other hand has evolved into Patrick Bateman, and rather than return those goddamn videotapes, he admires all the “hardbodies” in this town, then speaks the worst French ever to a anthropomorphized poodle, whom he tells he speaks six languages: (Baywatch, Drunk, Ocean, Esperanto probably, GigoHI and NOW, Gigolo).

Danny: It’s a surprising moment, that “hardbodies,” thing because Mitch/Hasselhoff admits what we’ve been all been thinking — for a show about hot people at the beach, The Hoff is kind of old. It’s weird to see a show have that kind of awareness, because I didn’t think we were supposed to think that Mitch is an aging hunk. Even though he totally is.

Rafael: OH MY GOD GARNER ELLERBY. He is blowing up Mitch’s phone because he needs help to capture a bail jumper with the amazing name of “Bobby Bahama.” Mitch is too tied up being white and Ryan is being (se)reduced by her own gigolo, so he suggests Ellerby ask Destiny for help. Ellerby says something mean about her elevators, but we at Idiot Box can forgive it because he is a) wearing the freshest purple Adidas warm-up suit and b) is the only person to ever wear a warm-up suit for actual physical activity outside of the National Basketball Association.

Danny: Ellerby lookin’ like Walk DMC. What follows next is a footchase where someone once again slow-mo dives over a table, and then a footchase where Ellerby jumps on a car. Bobby Bahama (lolololol) finally loses Ellerby by taking him into a car wash.

Rafael: Ellerby hangs on for dear life and I swear in one scene the light of the car wash made it look like he was bleeding — it was a very Night Moves-esque sequence, and wouldn’t be the last… maybe that’s why I enjoyed this episode so much.

Danny: Later, back at Baywatch Nights HQ, Ryan comes back and remarks that she’s taken in too many fluids today (JESUS CHRIST). Then Mitch gets MAD JELLY once Ryan mentions going to first base with the gigolo, and the weird baseball metaphors fly like… baseballs, I guess. Ever notice that Mitch is kind of a sleaze?

Rafael: YUP. The fact that he drills her about being drilled is insane — “in high school first base was kissing… do you know any underage girls who could confirm this?”

Danny: Then the subplot with Ellerby continues as he enters wearing a leather baseball cap and asks Mitch for help and Mitch is just like, “Naw, bro, kind of busy with this gigolo thing.” That… I don’t think I’ve ever seen that before in a detective show. “I REFUSE TO HELP YOU, FRIENDO.”

Rafael: Cut to THE POOL, where Ryan and Mitch are enunciating the “b” in subtlety when Mitch gets confronted by the matron, Margot — Mitch gives her some shit about American being built on the spirit of competition (R.I.P. the Clipse album that never was)

Danny: Let’s take a moment to make fun of Mitch’s suit, which looks like a carpet sample. It’s the color of those Starbucks frappuccinos you can buy from the supermarket.

Rafael: Meanwhile, Ellerby, the Father of Tyler, the Creator, is kicking it in an anti-drug PSA when Destiny comes over to help him — he’s pretty bummed that his prey has given him the slip. He’s tried nothing and he’s all out of ideas when Destiny slaps the file and realizes that Bobby Bottleservice is a Red-Blooded American (likes red-headed call girls) and they set up a Scorpion Death Lock.

Danny: Cut to a slow motion montage of Ryan and the gigolo hanging out in the forest and by the pool and running down the beach in a way people only do in commercials for prescription medication.

Rafael: “We’ve had a moderate amount of plot here on Baywatch Nights, but it’s time to talk about a thing people get: GENITAL HERPES.”

Danny: Before we know it, we’re already back at Some Pool, where everyone’s slow dancing, including Mitch as he tails Ryan and the Gigolo whose name I don’t gigo-know.

Rafael: I think it’s like, Trent, if that matters to you.

Danny: It does not. But Mitch cuts in Ryan’s gigodance and the Gigolo karates him into the pool — we were positive somebody was going to dive into Chekov’s deep end, and Mitch does it in the way that WWE wrestlers do when they’re kicked in the head — LIKE CARTOONS. David Hasselhoff needs glaze to go with all that ham.

Rafael: So we’re back at Nights (at night) and Ellerby pulls two smokin’ hot redheads who have apparently wanted to fuck him for ages. He’s stuck trying to think about baseball and failing when we see Destiny approach Bobby Bahama looking like Katie Pierson and *all of the blood in Raf’s head rushed out and he died with a smile on his dick.*

Danny: That is the end of Ellerby’s plot. We never see him again for the rest of the episode, and it kind of suffers for that. Good thing we only have like 14 minutes left, as Ryan brings Gigolo back to some mansion that clearly isn’t hers (she lives in a trailer, if you’ll remember) and she pretends to be drunk and reveals way too much fake information to further entice the Gigolo to do his erotic crimes. Actually, scratch that, there’s nothing erotic about remembering someone’s safe combination for future pilfering. Unless you’re Shannon Tweed doing it.

Rafael: The most unsexiest dialogue since “died with a smile on his dick” proceeds, with TRENT telling Ryan she’s “like a sexual minefield ready to explode,” except I think it’d be more fun if it was the one where Grey Fox and Solid Snake fought in. Mitch with his perfect timing calls right as Trent leaves, opening the conversation with “Speaking of drooling…”. THIS. FUCKING. GUY

Danny: Then he visits the lady from the beginning who got beat up so bad she’s in the hospital. This part’s kind of uncomfortable (mainly because of the bad bruise makeup) so we’ll skip it and simply note that it features Mitch at his least creepy. I think.

Rafael: What he lacks in creepiness he makes up for in terribleness, as he bullies an injured woman by telling her “Think of what’ll happen to the next woman.” MOTHERFUCKER SHE’S HURT. SHE AIN’T GOT OCEAN POWERS, MITCHELL “KING LEER” BUCHANAN.

Danny: But Mitch has ocean powers, and being kickboxed into a pool made him remember. As Gigolo comes to that big house with half a champagne bottle and a single rose, he finds Ryan sitting poolside while Mitch kisses her from the artificial recreational body of water. Gigolo gets pissed off and storms out and we cut to this:

Rafael: We then find Mitch running on the beach in his Adidas tracksuit, which sounds like a joke but is totally not. He’s totally pushing up on Ryan about “what was that yesterday” like he’s her fucking dad (which probably turns him on) and they decide they’re “professionals” — the first and only time anyone would describe them as such.

Danny: Then the most glorious thing happens — he’s North by Northwested by that hang-glider thing from The Road Warrior. It’s a fun, hilarious thing to watch, because how you gonna kill a guy from a hang-glider with a pistol? By firing wildly at the lumbering blue tracksuit, that’s how.

Rafael: CONFIRM FOR SECOND NIGHT MOVES REFERENCE. It’s a NIGHT MOVES, everybody! But seriously, Mitch manages to dodge a ton of bullets and uses his Ocean Powers to hide behind a pillar and in this entire episode, the thing I believe THE LEAST is that a hang glider can go up and around.

Danny: Cut back to that nice house, where Gigolo breaks in with his outfit that he bought from the burglar store. He breaks into the safe, but then comes Mitch to HIT THAT MOTHERFUCKER WITH A CARPET.

Rafael: Mitch comes out and uses the oldest “caught on tape” joke there is and then “pulls the rug out” (pulls the rug out) from under Trent Hardbody.

Danny: That has got to be the easiest win Mitch has scored in the series thus far. He literally just shows up, quips a bit, and then yanks on the floor.

Rafael: Back at Nights (at night), Mitch and Ryan are sitting uncomfortably when Destiny finds them, still looking like Katie Pierson a — *in lieu of flowers, tit pics can be sent to The Gaitan Family, P.O. Box 6969696969, Miami, FL, Bonerland.*

Danny: Um, yeah, there’s a lot of “sexual” “tension” between Mitch and Ryan now — which is important, because there wasn’t any ever before so now they have to lay it on thicker than Mitch’s baseball metaphors. I can’t tell you what a “grand slam” is, but I have my own ideas as to what a “double header” might be.

Rafael: Re: Grand Slam, I think it’s when you take a gigolo to Denny’s after crying in their lap about your failed marriage.

Danny: So. “Just a Gigolo” was a… pretty decent episode, I guess. It was goofy and had a lot of giffable content, but there’s a lack of Ellerby and it kind of peters out at the end.

Rafael: It washed the taste of “Deadly Vision” out, and featured things I enjoy, like purple tracksuits and Night Moves references (PEOPLE WATCH THIS FUCKING MOVIE).

Danny: You mean that Bob Saget song?

“What do you got for me, Saul? I’m dying for work.. Baywatch NIGHTS? But the beach is CLOSED at night!”

NEXT WEEK: “976 Ways to Say I Love You,” which we guess is a very thorough multilingual episode.

While you wait for your next dose of nocturnal jazz, why don’t you reread past installments?

Danny Djeljosevic is a comic book creator, award-winning filmmaker (assuming you have absolutely no follow-up questions) and Co-Managing Editor of Comics Bulletin. Follow him on Twitter at @djeljosevic or find him somewhere in San Diego, often wearing a hat. Read his comic with Mike Prezzato, “Sgt. Death and his Metachromatic Men,” over at Champion City Comics and check out his Tumblr. His webcomic The Ghost Engine, with artist Eric Zawadzki, updates twice a week.

Rafael Gaitan was born in 1985, but he belongs to the ’70s. He is a big fan of onomatopoeia, being profane and spelling words right on the first try. Rafael has a hilariously infrequent blog and writes love letters to inanimate objects as well as tweets of whiskey and the mysteries of the heart. He ain’t got time to bleed.