4-08. I Never Wanted the Job.

Lonely's latest misadventure puts Callan in an awkward position.

Air Date: Apr. 19, 1972. Written by: John Kershaw. Directed by: Jim Goddard. Produced by: Reginald Collin.


THE PLOT:

Lonely is making extra money on the side using The Section's cab. Not a serious problem in itself... until Lonely's latest fare, vicious underworld figure Ted Dollar (Val Musetti), is gunned down right in front of him!

Callan orders Lonely to tell nobody about what he saw, which pretty much lines up with Lonely's own instincts. Unfortunately, the assassins find Lonely anyway - and when they threaten him and take a hammer to his cab, Lonely lets slip that he has a tough friend. The men report to their employer, shady club owner and would-be crime boss Abbot (William Marlowe), who decides the smelly little cabbie is an unnecessary risk.

Leaving Callan yet again having to save Lonely - something that Hunter is losing patience with...

Shady club owner Abbot (William Marlowe)
with his girlfriend, Tina (Cleo Sylvestre). 

CHARACTERS:

Callan: Spends the episode suffering from a particularly nasty head cold. When events require him to focus, he is mostly able to forget about his discomfort to deal with the crisis at hand. The second he's by himself, however, he collapses into misery... and with Lonely interrupting him every time he's about to get some rest, he's in a bad state by the end. The cold gives Edward Woodward something slightly different to play, and it also likely contributes to Callan's being even more snappish toward Lonely than usual.

Hunter: He's already annoyed with Callan over the agent's open scorn toward his current assignment - a minor bit of business that barely impacts the main plot. Once he learns that Lonely is again potentially interfering with Callan's focus, he loses all patience, coldly threatening Callan and even telling Meres that he's growing tired of "our friend Lonely" - though he isn't quite ready to have Meres dispose of him (yet).

Lonely: This entire episode is a strong look at the peculiar Callan/Lonely friendship. The dynamic is familiar: Lonely gets into trouble; Callan shouts at him and threatens him; then Callan saves him. Lonely knows the pattern too, which makes him apprehensive about going to him for help to start with. When he tells Callan about his latest predicament, there is a moment in which he visibly shrinks, bracing himself for what will come next. When Callan pushes a little too hard, Lonely finally hits his limit: "Don't you start threatening me again. You're always doing that, and I'm fed up with it!"  Russell Hunter is splendid throughout, and I particularly enjoyed seeing him getting that one moment of strength to balance out his usual weakness.

Meres: The ending confrontation, as Abbot and his thugs try to ambush Callan, shows Meres's Achilles heel: overconfidence. None of these minor gangland thugs is remotely in the same league as him or Callan, so he never takes the fight completely seriously. He turns and starts to walk away, certain the crisis has past... leaving it to Callan to save him from being shot in the back. The final scene, in which Callan and Meres first improvise an unconvincing explanation to Hunter, then laugh to each other about how they are "civil servants," harkens back to their late Series Two dynamic: these two aren't quite friends, but they also aren't quite not friends.

One of Abbot's thugs threatens Lonely.

THOUGHTS:

On a story level, I Never Wanted the Job is a minor episode. The stakes are small. From the get-go, we know that these small-scale hoodlums aren't remotely on Callan's level, even with a cold. A scene in which Callan easily swats away the thugs, then drags them back to Abbot for a confrontation, confirms just how outmatched these criminals are.

It is far more significant, however, as an examination of the relationship between Callan and Lonely. By this point, we know the rules as well as they do. Lonely expects Callan to be surly toward him, even to threaten him... but even Lonely has a breaking point, and it's almost surprising just how satisfying it is to see him finally stand up for himself (even if, being Lonely, he picks a bad moment for it).

The episode makes explicit that Callan's fate is now tied to Lonely's. During his brief time as Hunter, Callan put himself far out on a limb to protect his friend. The only time he played politics effectively was when he convinced Bishop of the need for a "Mobile Communications Facility," thus allowing him to nix Lonely's Red File by bringing him into The Section. Now Lonely's personal problems show the potential to interfere with Section business - and both Hunter and Meres warn Callan that if the little thief creates big enough problems, then Callan will be held responsible.

Series Four has seen very few sluggish episodes, and I Never Wanted the Job is another briskly paced offering. It hits the ground running with the murder, and every scene that follows develops and complicates the plot. The story may be minor, but it's never dull, and the final confrontation scene is particularly well-staged.

I might wish for a little bit more of a sense of jeopardy. That aside, this is another very entertaining episode. With about two-thirds of the final season now reviewed, I think there's an excellent chance that Callan's last season may also turn out to be its best one.


Overall Rating: 8/10.

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