"Do they have to have their own teeth?"
The meme continues, and I am definitely back to being British, although I don't know about obscure. A current show hardly feels obscure to me... I was wavering as to whether or not to include this character, but now I've seen the pilot and S1, she is totally on this list, as she should have been all along...
Day Nineteen - Det. Supt. Sandra Pullman (Amanda Redman)
Det. Supt. Sandra Pullman: Am I a cynic? I know, it goes with the job and everything, but...
Jack Halford: Do you drink too much?
Sandra: No.
Jack: Do you take backhanders?
Sandra: No!
Jack: Do you beat your wife?
Sandra: Unlikely scenario, but no.
Jack: Then you've nothing to worry about. You're just doing your job.
Sandra: Sometimes I wonder what the job is doing to me.
Sandra's a successful detective and career-woman who gets unexpectedly side-tracked by a kidnap case that goes wrong (she shoots a dog, and the kidnap victim throws himself out of a window), and winds up (as you do in TV-land) being given charge of UCOS - a new department to solve old cases, and needs a team of retired police officers to help her out. (Being: Jack Halford, retired Super, and Sandra's old mentor, now a grieving widower; Brian Lane, ex-Inspector left due to mental health issues, and ex-Sgt Gerry Standing who left under suspicion of corruption, due to being played by Dennis Waterman.) Cue long-running UK drama/comedy detective show.
She's the successful boss of the outfit, good with the sarcasm, and far more likely to do the punching than any of her aging 'boys', but also she recognises her own flaws ("What are you writing?" she asks her counsellor. "Bitch?"), and starts doing something about it quietly from Ep 1 onwards. Plus, she has class, and she and Gerry are a walking two-person battle of the sexes, which never ceases to be entertaining.
And while she may spend seven seasons happily insulting Gerry, she knows when to listen to Jack (she tells him she respects a person's abilities, and not their rank in the pilot, and she's pretty true to that throughout), and when she has to be patient and not throw things at Brian. (Even when he is offering her a lot of self-helps books and a recommended list of medication because he thinks her mental health is deteriorating, when in fact she is starting a relationship.)
Quote-fest:
Jack: Was he armed?
Sandra: Who?
Jack: The dog.
Gerry: (trying on glasses) David Dickinson?
Sandra: Yeah - but without the "David" or the "inson"
Brian: There's a middle-aged bloke in Taunton who was regressed back to his childhood. Years later, he can't step outside his own front door without adult supervision. He still acts and thinks like he's eight years old.
Sandra: [mutters] Him and half the male population
Donald Bevan: You never were very good at the politics, Sandra.
Sandra: With all due respect, sir, that's like criticizing someone for not being a very good arsehole.
Brian: Gerry's been asked out on a date by a forty-five-year-old.
Sandra: Woman?
Gerry: Very funny. She happens to be gorgeous.
Brian: With a thing for older men.
Jack: Much older.
Sandra: Maybe she's just looking for a man with wisdom and experience.
Gerry: Thank you, Sandra.
Sandra: ... And she thinks Gerry might know one.
Ricky Hanson: [spots his nemesis Sandra entering the bar he presides over] That's amazing. And here's me thinking I'm going to have to go to bed on my own tonight.
Sandra: [snappily] Not while there are dogs on the street.
Jack: Grant Milburn. He is the man Leanne claims Fisher murdered. He made his millions in casinos.
Gerry: All right. I remember him.
Sandra: Not surprised. It was probably you who made him rich.
Sandra: It turns out before Milburn and Carole got together, Carole and Patrick Nash were the school's Romeo and Juliet
Gerry: Ah, shagging.
Sandra: I think the preferred term is 'childhood sweethearts'.
Gerry: Hmph. Shagging.
Sandra (to Gerry): Maybe you're finally emerging from puberty?
Sandra: Beware of newspaper editors who buy you lobster. They always want something.
*
A excellent fanvid can be found here (by agapi42. Non-spoilery. (It really isn't the spoilery kind of series, anyway.)
Also an honourable mention for Brian's wife, Esther Lane (Susan Jameson), who is a saint in this, but a very human, weary and likeable saint, with a quiet but dry sense of humour. It is a good thing that Brian does generally know how very lucky he is to be married to her. Well, actually, everyone knows that Brian's lucky to be married to her. In fact, everyone is probably a bit jealous that Brian is married to her and they're not. Except Gerry. Possibly. ;-)
30 days of Awesome TV Female Characters:
Day One: Soolin (B7)
Day Two: Dayna Mellanby (B7)
Day Three: Michelle of the Resistance (Allo Allo)
Day Four: Beatrice Eliott (House of Eliott)
Day Five: Captain Kathryn Janeway (ST:V)
Day Six: Maddy Magellan (Jonathan Creek)
Day Seven: Lady Mary Crawley (Downton Abbey)
Day Eight: Ros Myers (Spooks)
Day Nine: Servalan (B7)
Day Ten: Anna Thornton-Wilson (Hotel Babylon)
Day Eleven: Winifred Burkle (Angel)
Day Twelve: Isobel Crawley (Downton Abbey)
Day Thirteen: Rani Chandra (SJA)
Day Fourteen: Donna Moss (WW)
Day Fifteen: Lynda Day (Press Gang)
Day Sixteen: Cally (B7)
Day Seventeen: Laura Lancing (Brittas Empire)
Day Eighteen: Diana (Dungeons & Dragons)
Day Nineteen - Det. Supt. Sandra Pullman (Amanda Redman)
Det. Supt. Sandra Pullman: Am I a cynic? I know, it goes with the job and everything, but...
Jack Halford: Do you drink too much?
Sandra: No.
Jack: Do you take backhanders?
Sandra: No!
Jack: Do you beat your wife?
Sandra: Unlikely scenario, but no.
Jack: Then you've nothing to worry about. You're just doing your job.
Sandra: Sometimes I wonder what the job is doing to me.
Sandra's a successful detective and career-woman who gets unexpectedly side-tracked by a kidnap case that goes wrong (she shoots a dog, and the kidnap victim throws himself out of a window), and winds up (as you do in TV-land) being given charge of UCOS - a new department to solve old cases, and needs a team of retired police officers to help her out. (Being: Jack Halford, retired Super, and Sandra's old mentor, now a grieving widower; Brian Lane, ex-Inspector left due to mental health issues, and ex-Sgt Gerry Standing who left under suspicion of corruption, due to being played by Dennis Waterman.) Cue long-running UK drama/comedy detective show.
She's the successful boss of the outfit, good with the sarcasm, and far more likely to do the punching than any of her aging 'boys', but also she recognises her own flaws ("What are you writing?" she asks her counsellor. "Bitch?"), and starts doing something about it quietly from Ep 1 onwards. Plus, she has class, and she and Gerry are a walking two-person battle of the sexes, which never ceases to be entertaining.
And while she may spend seven seasons happily insulting Gerry, she knows when to listen to Jack (she tells him she respects a person's abilities, and not their rank in the pilot, and she's pretty true to that throughout), and when she has to be patient and not throw things at Brian. (Even when he is offering her a lot of self-helps books and a recommended list of medication because he thinks her mental health is deteriorating, when in fact she is starting a relationship.)
Quote-fest:
Jack: Was he armed?
Sandra: Who?
Jack: The dog.
Gerry: (trying on glasses) David Dickinson?
Sandra: Yeah - but without the "David" or the "inson"
Brian: There's a middle-aged bloke in Taunton who was regressed back to his childhood. Years later, he can't step outside his own front door without adult supervision. He still acts and thinks like he's eight years old.
Sandra: [mutters] Him and half the male population
Donald Bevan: You never were very good at the politics, Sandra.
Sandra: With all due respect, sir, that's like criticizing someone for not being a very good arsehole.
Brian: Gerry's been asked out on a date by a forty-five-year-old.
Sandra: Woman?
Gerry: Very funny. She happens to be gorgeous.
Brian: With a thing for older men.
Jack: Much older.
Sandra: Maybe she's just looking for a man with wisdom and experience.
Gerry: Thank you, Sandra.
Sandra: ... And she thinks Gerry might know one.
Ricky Hanson: [spots his nemesis Sandra entering the bar he presides over] That's amazing. And here's me thinking I'm going to have to go to bed on my own tonight.
Sandra: [snappily] Not while there are dogs on the street.
Jack: Grant Milburn. He is the man Leanne claims Fisher murdered. He made his millions in casinos.
Gerry: All right. I remember him.
Sandra: Not surprised. It was probably you who made him rich.
Sandra: It turns out before Milburn and Carole got together, Carole and Patrick Nash were the school's Romeo and Juliet
Gerry: Ah, shagging.
Sandra: I think the preferred term is 'childhood sweethearts'.
Gerry: Hmph. Shagging.
Sandra (to Gerry): Maybe you're finally emerging from puberty?
Sandra: Beware of newspaper editors who buy you lobster. They always want something.
*
A excellent fanvid can be found here (by agapi42. Non-spoilery. (It really isn't the spoilery kind of series, anyway.)
Also an honourable mention for Brian's wife, Esther Lane (Susan Jameson), who is a saint in this, but a very human, weary and likeable saint, with a quiet but dry sense of humour. It is a good thing that Brian does generally know how very lucky he is to be married to her. Well, actually, everyone knows that Brian's lucky to be married to her. In fact, everyone is probably a bit jealous that Brian is married to her and they're not. Except Gerry. Possibly. ;-)
30 days of Awesome TV Female Characters:
Day One: Soolin (B7)
Day Two: Dayna Mellanby (B7)
Day Three: Michelle of the Resistance (Allo Allo)
Day Four: Beatrice Eliott (House of Eliott)
Day Five: Captain Kathryn Janeway (ST:V)
Day Six: Maddy Magellan (Jonathan Creek)
Day Seven: Lady Mary Crawley (Downton Abbey)
Day Eight: Ros Myers (Spooks)
Day Nine: Servalan (B7)
Day Ten: Anna Thornton-Wilson (Hotel Babylon)
Day Eleven: Winifred Burkle (Angel)
Day Twelve: Isobel Crawley (Downton Abbey)
Day Thirteen: Rani Chandra (SJA)
Day Fourteen: Donna Moss (WW)
Day Fifteen: Lynda Day (Press Gang)
Day Sixteen: Cally (B7)
Day Seventeen: Laura Lancing (Brittas Empire)
Day Eighteen: Diana (Dungeons & Dragons)