The Deeper Underpinnings of Miami Vice

[Robbie C.]

13 minutes ago, vicegirl85 said:

Definitely!  So many opportunities, and sadly there were other episodes I think we could say had the same fate of MV's reach exceeding its grasp.

There are so many it's hard to count them, honestly. Part of it's a product of network television (I don't know how many here appreciate just how locked-down it was at the time), another part is the lack of a steady producer, and other lies in popular expectations for television at the time. I can't stress how important that last piece is: people didn't really expect television to challenge them or put out ideas they normally saw in movies. The expansion of cable changed all that forever (don't forget that while the Sopranos might have been on HBO, The Shield was actually on broadcast FX). The actors have some stake in this as well, although I tend to lay more of the issue at DJ's feet since it became his show and he never owned Crockett in the same way EJO owned Castillo or PMT tried to own Tubbs.

I did really appreciate how Olivia Brown tried to own Trudy in Missing Hours and make the best of the shot she was given, even though they seem to have mashed two concepts together and missed the mark in some ways. Does anyone have any thoughts about the whole peanut butter fixation? But it's easy (as it so often is with Vice) to fixate on the obvious glitz in an episode (the UFO/abduction stuff) and miss what's going on underneath.

[Bren10]

I also mentioned in the MH thread that there are reports of idiosyncrasies like the peanut butter thing in abduction scenarios as well as other situations. One report has a captive ET particularly liking strawberry ice cream. Abductees have claimed to return from an experience with inexplicable cravings for particular things, including things that they have never liked before. Going another direction, without being offensive, there could be a racial implication towards Trudy with the Peanut Butter thing. Or it could just be a McGuffin, though why they chose that particular thing I don't know. Maybe Trudy's going "nutty"?

[Robbie C.]

9 minutes ago, Bren10 said:

I also mentioned in the MH thread that there are reports of idiosyncrasies like the peanut butter thing in abduction scenarios as well as other situations. One report has a captive ET particularly liking strawberry ice cream. Abductees have claimed to return from an experience with inexplicable cravings for particular things, including things that they have never liked before. Going another direction, without being offensive, there could be a racial implication towards Trudy with the Peanut Butter thing. Or it could just be a McGuffin, though why they chose that particular thing I don't know. Maybe Trudy's going "nutty"?

Or one of the writers really liked peanut butter. Who can say with that one? 

[Robbie C.]

Another example of Vice's political bent is The Cows of October. Blatant reference to the Cuban Missile Crisis (the missiles of October) and a clear dig at how obsessed everyone in government in the '80s had become with the Soviets 'stealing our secrets.' They were, of course, but that's not the point. That whole episode was intended to show how exaggerated the threat had become. If you weren't there it doesn't make as much sense, but at the time the irony was pretty obvious. But it wasn't something people expected to see on TV, let alone on Vice.

[mjcmmv]

25 minutes ago, Robbie C. said:

Another example of Vice's political bent is The Cows of October. Blatant reference to the Cuban Missile Crisis (the missiles of October) and a clear dig at how obsessed everyone in government in the '80s had become with the Soviets 'stealing our secrets.' They were, of course, but that's not the point. That whole episode was intended to show how exaggerated the threat had become. If you weren't there it doesn't make as much sense, but at the time the irony was pretty obvious. But it wasn't something people expected to see on TV, let alone on Vice.

Interesting...ashamed to admit I didn't see this! Makes me look at this episode in an entirely different light. 

[Robbie C.]

Just now, mjcmmv said:

Interesting...ashamed to admit I didn't see this! Makes me look at this episode in an entirely different light. 

That's the thing...people didn't really expect to see this on TV, let alone on that "MTV cops" show. There was a movie (with a young Martin Sheen) called "The Missiles of October" that might have provided the title here...I don't know.

[mjcmmv]

3 minutes ago, Robbie C. said:

That's the thing...people didn't really expect to see this on TV, let alone on that "MTV cops" show. There was a movie (with a young Martin Sheen) called "The Missiles of October" that might have provided the title here...I don't know.

I had no idea there were hidden meanings in the title, much less the plot. Lots to learn about the writers and creators of Miami Vice! 

[vicegirl85]

8 hours ago, Robbie C. said:

Another example of Vice's political bent is The Cows of October. Blatant reference to the Cuban Missile Crisis (the missiles of October) and a clear dig at how obsessed everyone in government in the '80s had become with the Soviets 'stealing our secrets.' They were, of course, but that's not the point. That whole episode was intended to show how exaggerated the threat had become. If you weren't there it doesn't make as much sense, but at the time the irony was pretty obvious. But it wasn't something people expected to see on TV, let alone on Vice.

LOL I knew there was some reason I liked Cows of October... it was an ironic comment on a topical issue (OK I don't know that I was that perceptive )

I think there were other episodes of MV that also provided a sometimes ironic view of then-current issues.  People who weren't around or who were young teens at the time probably find some of that incomprehensible and pointless.  Some were better executed than others, of course.   For example, Missing Hours... 

[S.FL84]

Watching a cycling vid today which went down Brickell its easy to see how most people don't know that cocaine built most of skyscrapers in downtown Miami.  I keep referring back to COCAINE COWBOYS as it the premiere source of inside info on cocaine and how it changed Miami from sleepy retirement/tourist town to world class city on par w/ NYC and LA. In the 1970's Miami was nothing compared to 1984+ Miami.  Cocaine pumped literally BILLIONS  of unreported dollars into dirty money washers which were mostly construction companies building a never seen before nor since huge # of 50+ story office/condo buildings.  The famous Miami coroner even commented on it in his CC interview saying he counted the high # of cranes and the dizzying # projects under construction and EVERYONE knew it was all cocaine that was funding it.

[Robbie C.]

Anyhow, past the narcotical entrepenurializations, it does lead nicely into Izzy and Noogie. I've always been fascinated by those two, both as great representations of the kind of informants cops sometimes have to work with and their potential as larger, if stealthy, metaphors.

[Dadrian]

10 hours ago, Robbie C. said:

narcotical entrepenurializations

A fine Izzyizm, sir. 

[pahonu]

On ‎6‎/‎17‎/‎2019 at 8:22 PM, Robbie C. said:

That's the thing...people didn't really expect to see this on TV, let alone on that "MTV cops" show. There was a movie (with a young Martin Sheen) called "The Missiles of October" that might have provided the title here...I don't know.

I suspect that it does reference that title.  Writers reference other writers All the time, particularly with titles.  The Missiles of October was referencing the book The Guns of August about the opening days of World War I.  I'm thinking of a couple of The Rockford Files that were in a similar vein.  "Rosendahl and Gilda Stern Are Dead", "Never Send a Boy King to Do a Man's Job", "Sticks and Stones May Break Your Bones, but Waterbury Will Bury You", "Nice Guys Finish Dead".  Ian Fleming did this with his novel  and chapter titles frequently.

[Robbie C.]

And Vice buried quite a few references like that. It wouldn’t surprise me at all. 

[Robbie C.]

Getting back to Izzy...I always liked the way the character was used to highlight some of the oddities of both the American experience and the attempts of people (both immigrants and natives) to find their place in that narrative. Izzy quotes (or tries to quote) Hemingway and Iacoca, but at the end of the day he's little more than a street hustler with a flair for mangling any language he gets near. He's the whole disconnect between material possessions and the personal sum of an individual. But deep down he gets it. He's the first to figure out just how dangerous the punks in Nobody Lives Forever really are.

Noogie is interesting to me as well. I've put him in every Vice story I've done so far, and there's something about the raw overachieving con-man that's fascinating. He's like Izzy, but he's the home-grown article. He lacks the flair, but makes up for it with his ability to talk his way into just about anything. He's like the brash street-sense and sheer inability to quit even when he knows he's got no chance of getting ahead. I guess you could say Izzy and Noogie are the Stan and Larry of the underworld; odd, out of place in many ways, yet indispensable and dead loyal when the chips are down.

[Bren10]

Continuing on a point from the Out Where The Buses Don't Run thread, I think to say that it was Burnett who killed Hackman and not Crockett is letting Sonny off the hook too easily, as well as removing some of the character's own agency. This would in fact diminish the entire scene and it's significance and meaning to me. And some fans just don't want to accept that their hero would do such a thing. But remember that MV is a noir piece and by nature the protagonists are flawed. Clearly Caitlyn's murder, and by extension the murder of Sonny's unborn child, was the incident that was to send him over the line. The producers/writers intended it to be that until it got muddled by NBC who didn't want Sonny to appear villainous by outright shooting an unarmed Hackman. But this is a point that also needs to be made-just because Sonny crossed the line in the case of Hackman, that does not mean he would go permanently into "Dirty Harry" vigilante mode from now on. In fact, the next time we see him before the explosion he is following procedure and building a case. I would say the Hackman affair was an extreme, one-off situation and actually didn't have much to do with enforcing the law at all as much as personal revenge (when things get personal they get messy..). If justice was Sonny's main concern I think he would've gone after him after he got off death row. But he didn't. It took a personal situation to make Sonny go to such an extreme, but it was an extreme that occurred once and then it was out of his system. It was somewhat akin to the Glantz situation in that once it was done it was done and Sonny Crockett, not Burnett, could live with that even if we the audience can't. I maintain that if there is no explosion and amnesia that Sonny remains a dutiful cop, though an increasingly tired and cynical one.

[Robbie C.]

I don't happen to agree with you in terms of saying it somehow diminishes Sonny by saying it was Burnett who killed Hackman and not Crockett. Of course Noir protagonists are flawed...it just so happens Vice gave Sonny's flaw a name and 'identity.' Burnett was always part of Sonny, his dark side if you will. And it was also buried deep, unlike Tubbs who would flash into instant anger and then subside again. Besides, Sonny let himself off the hook pretty easily for that one as well. The comparison with Harry Callahan is solid but in some ways flawed in that Harry was never a random vigilante in the way some critics would like to contend. There was purpose to his action, and in fact he explicitly rejected the vigilante model as offered in Magnum Force. Would Sonny have remained dutiful? We don't know. I think it's quite possible he would have slipped more frequently, but also understand there's the whole "white hat" mythology around Crockett that makes that view unpopular. Anti-heroes weren't a thing on TV in the '80s, so it's hard to say what the character as we see him there would have done. Slips become more common as people become more tired and worn down, so it's hard to contend he'd somehow be immune from that. To paraphrase the general from the briefing scene in Apocalypse Now: "Every man has his breaking point. You and I have a breaking point. Maybe Sonny Crockett has reached his." (sorry...couldn't resist) And the CIA guy's only line in the same movie might fit for Hackman. "Terminate...with extreme prejudice."

[vicegirl85]

I agree with Bren 10 that it was Crockett, not Burnett, who killed Hackman, and also that it was Caitlin's murder that sent him over the line, not just creating his own justice for Hackman's exit from Death Row.

However, I also believe that his guilt over Caitlin's death (if he hadn't made it possible for Hackman to get off of Death Row and go free, she'd still be alive), along with his head injury and amnesia from the boat explosion, made it possible for the identity of Burnett to take over.  Burnett was a part of him, as Burnett's identity was created by Crockett.  But I think that if it hadn't been for the explosion and its aftermath, he would have been able to keep Burnett separate from Crockett. 

[Robbie C.]

Fair points, but I also think it tends to underestimate the cumulative effects of stress. Crockett was under great deal of stress, and unlike Tubbs he almost never let off steam. Part of what kept Tubbs reasonably grounded (aside from lacking character development by the writers) might have been those outbursts of his. We'll never know for sure, of course. And it's also possible that TV writers from a later generation might have had a different take on Crockett and the effects of his undercover life. I like NCIS LA because of how it deals with some of this.

At least we can all agree there's more to Vice than cars, boats, and wanna-be music videos!

[Bren10]

I think Sonny has a tremendous constitution and endurance level, like a person with a deadly disease who doesn't die but just lives with the pain. This dovetails into why i feel Sonny identifies with Artie Rolins and Vic Romano. I feel Sonny identifies so heavily with them because he's been where they've been and come back, whereas they are in serious danger of turning to the other side. Sonny has been vaccinated in a way against real temptation towards corruption. The Wheeler situation I think only reinforces Sonny's resolve to go the opposite direction. He already knows what a life as someone like a Burnett would entail and I don't think Sonny, or Tubbs for that matter would want that. Their major problem as far as I can see is the "red tape" that gets in the way of them enforcing actual justice and maybe stepping over the line to get it. I do not think C&T are in danger of wanting to live the life of actual high-rolling criminals. 

I think the Apocalypse Now comparison fits here too because Capt Willard goes to the very edge that Kurtz does by the end, but he steps back from the precipice and moves past it. He could easily have given in and replaced Kurtz but thanks in part to his objective detatchment as an assassin and tool of the system, as well as healthy cynicism, he does not give into temptation. There is simply no value to him to take on what Kurtz was doing.

Edited June 23, 2019 by Bren10

[Robbie C.]

I don't honestly think Sonny ever existed continuously undercover as long as Artie did. And the whole idea of him being vaccinated goes against the Noir idea of characters have flaws. I think Sonny may think he's immune, but for tension to actually exist we as the viewers have to understand he really isn't. Tubbs, as I've pointed out before, actually has many undercover personas, so he can jump back and forth without ever really getting too tied to one identity. I also never said I thought they were in danger of wanting to live the "high-rolling criminal life." And if the major barrier is the red tape, then they have more in common with Dirty Harry than many might find comfortable. Red tape was always Harry's main nemesis, at least until the movies almost became parodies of themselves. And that's where the criminal life might have sucked Sonny in: not the high-rolling side but the ability to make his own rules. That's pretty much what he did as Burnett during the whole arc.

Admittedly, my view of Sonny has always been more of him balancing on the edge as opposed to being firmly grounded. He uses booze and the trappings of Burnett's life (the boats, the car) to take the edge off, but it's always there. And if he's just an avatar for the dangers of undercover life in Miami during the '80s none of this is especially relevant in any case.

[vicegirl85]

4 minutes ago, Robbie C. said:

(snipped)Admittedly, my view of Sonny has always been more of him balancing on the edge as opposed to being firmly grounded. He uses booze and the trappings of Burnett's life (the boats, the car) to take the edge off, but it's always there. And if he's just an avatar for the dangers of undercover life in Miami during the '80s none of this is especially relevant in any case.

I agree, he balances on the edge at times, and this becomes more so during the later part of the series, especially after Caitlin's death.  My impression was always that he was grounded in his true persona of Crockett.  The ties with his team (especially Tubbs), and the fact that he does have a family (Caroline and Billy--although from the divorce early in S1 he often seems to go for many months without any sign of thinking about them) help to keep him in his real identity.  Even though he lives on the boat and enjoys the trappings of undercover life, he is in constant touch with agents of the law.  He's not out on his own burrowing his way over months and years to get close to the major players.  Or if he was, it's not evident from the show.  I think the show sometimes tried to give the impression C&T had been working to infiltrate a particular operation for months on end, but it didn't feel that way. 

I've been thinking a lot about the concept of Crockett's character as an avatar for the dangers of undercover life.  However, for me that pulls him outside of the "reality" that exists within the show.  If he's an avatar, I think that makes him less "real" than the others on the squad, and that's not how I perceive him.  For me, the character of Crockett was the linchpin of the series and the one around whom everyone on the team revolved.  So for me, he has to be a real person.

I agree with a lot of what you say but that is a stumbling block for me. 

[Bren10]

Let me take a step back and postulate that maybe we're confusing the dark side of one's nature (which we all have) particularly Sonny's with the Sonny Burnett of Mirror Image. I have always felt that the Burnett of Mirror Image was essentially a different person if only because of how he came into being. There was no moral choice or character degradation to turn into a cold killer. He basically woke up one day like Tarzan or something and was raised by drug dealers instead of wolves. And he continued to live that way because he legitimately thought that's who he was, unlike Artie and Vic who were succumbing to something. He had no frame of reference to decide not to be who he was, at least until way later. And when that choice came up he turned back.

This is why I say it diminishes the moral of the situation to blame the killing of Hackman on Burnett. It smacks way too much of "the Devil made me do it" or "he just wasn't himself that day". I say no because just as it is possible to coexist with the dark side of one's personality and not commit evil acts, it is possible for Sonny Crockett, a basically good person, to consciously decide to end Hackman's life without the excuse of being taken over by a side of his persona.

[Robbie C.]

3 minutes ago, vicegirl85 said:

I*snip*I've been thinking a lot about the concept of Crockett's character as an avatar for the dangers of undercover life.  However, for me that pulls him outside of the "reality" that exists within the show.  If he's an avatar, I think that makes him less "real" than the others on the squad, and that's not how I perceive him.  For me, the character of Crockett was the linchpin of the series and the one around whom everyone on the team revolved.  So for me, he has to be a real person.

I agree with a lot of what you say but that is a stumbling block for me. 

The interesting thing for me has always been Crockett's "real" in some senses, but in others he's not. His grounding is always (at least to me) thin, especially when compared to the other two major characters. We're meant to believe the focus is Crockett in no small part because of how the show's filmed; centering shots on Crockett even when it might be better to focus on another character. Sonny's past reference points are also far weaker, leaving him without grounding when perhaps he should be grounded. Between the filming techniques and how DJ chose to play (or not play) Crockett it makes him less real in some ways than Tubbs or (in my mind especially) Castillo.

[Robbie C.]

3 minutes ago, Bren10 said:

Let me take a step back and postulate that maybe we're confusing the dark side of one's nature (which we all have) particularly Sonny's with the Sonny Burnett of Mirror Image. I have always felt that the Burnett of Mirror Image was essentially a different person if only because of how he came into being. There was no moral choice or character degradation to turn into a cold killer. He basically woke up one day like Tarzan or something and was raised by drug dealers instead of wolves. And he continued to live that way because he legitimately thought that's who he was, unlike Artie and Vic who were succumbing to something. He had no frame of reference to decide not to be who he was, at least until way later. And when that choice came up he turned back.

This is why I say it diminishes the moral of the situation to blame the killing of Hackman on Burnett. It smacks way too much of "the Devil made me do it" or "he just wasn't himself that day". I say no because just as it is possible to coexist with the dark side of one's personality and not commit evil acts, it is possible for Sonny Crockett, a basically good person, to consciously decide to end Hackman's life without the excuse of being taken over by a side of his persona.

This begs the larger question of was killing Hackman necessarily or automatically evil? Hackman was, without question, evil. Much as the killer in Dirty Harry was without a doubt evil. In the Noir framework good and evil often exist side by side in the same person, and redemption from the evil aspect is often part of the Noir subtext. Sanders points out the redemptive qualities of the entire Burnett arc, but we don't see the same thing following Hackman's killing. Ever. Unless, of course, you factor it into the redemptive arc Sanders brings up with Burnett. If you haven't read that book yet I'd strongly suggest it.

[Bren10]

Off the cuff, I'd say killing Hackman was a selfish act that was outside the law, but not altogether evil. I'll try to expand on that, but that's the other problem questlon-does the law determine morality? Just as weed was bad but then the law changed so it isn't bad now, if revenge-killing was actually legal would there be a question of it being evil to engage in it? In regards to Sonny, I don't believe Sonny killing Hackman makes him an evil person. He may be in the wrong lawfully though. If you define evil (as I do) as ultimate selfishness regardless of how it affects others and total lack of empathy, then Sonny Crockett is absolutely not an evil person. He was ready to quit Vice after Hackman' s girlfriend got killed , after all. This may be a contradiction in terms but he is a man who committed a calculated crime of passion. But as you pointed out, he is not in the habit of doing things like that. Or if I want to be jerky and flippant about it, Sonny was just fulfilling the death sentence that should've been carried out by the state anyway.