I knew it was coming back, but missed the return. Hopefully they'll rerun the episodes I've missed, as this is one of my favorite shows, doing a creditable adaptation of the novels by Rex Stout. Maury Chaykin is excellent as Nero Wolfe, and Timothy Hutton is fine as Archie Goodwin.
My friend Burr was just saying today that this show had a single flaw, which was that they often tried to compress a story into a single episode, when in many cases two were required. So I was quite amused to see that the episode I watched tonight was part one of a two part story. Unfortunately, The Mother Hunt had one strike against it from the beginning: it was directed by Alan Smithee...
Smithee, after all, never existed. As all true film buffs now know, Alan Smithee (aka Allen Smithee and Allan Smithee) is a pseudonym for any director who disowned his or her movie, usually for reasons of artistic control. Instead of taking credit, the director would petition the Directors Guild of America for an Alan Smithee credit in exchange for a pledge not to disparage the film publicly.
Still, with a few flaws, this episode held out all the formulaic charm of the previous entries I've seen, and I intend to catch the second part once it airs. And I won't miss any more episodes, either!
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