Did Buck get a Fair Shake?

[Rose]

Some people were hard on Buck's acting while she was on LOCI, but I don't think she had enough to do to let us know how much talent she had.

I grew kinda fond of her character. I wish she could come back for a little while.

[trisha]

I don't think she got a fair shake either. I think that is because we were told months before we saw her that she was very ambitious, saw MCS as a career stepping stone, and that she and Goren would butt heads. That put her in an adversarial role right from the start.

I tried to keep and open mind because I envisioned her start with Goren as sort of a litmus test for what it was like for Eames in the beginning. After all, they had to work together for quite a while to learn to flow so well in an interview that they are like one entity.
So, I did get to like Bishop for what she brought to the table, as well as for the way her character developed. I would like to see her again, too.

[NikkiGreen]

It took a few episodes, but Bishop grew on me. Especially her last three episodes.

But, we were "mislead". The character wasn't really anything like what was mentioned before she came on board.

[Metella]

We were completely mislead & that left me not fully engaged with her character .... I was waiting for the clash. So I was not as tuned in to what was going on as I would have been if left with just a bare bones description of what was going on.

Wonder who's fault that was? Wolf Studios or NBC promo people? I think the latter. Perhaps I am Wolf-struck as I rarely attribute bad decisions to that area. BUT .... I still think the choice of Buck was a poor casting choice, the choice of this type of temporary parter a safe choice and a missed opportunity for showing another area of Goren's character.

I don't think Buck had much range to cover, so perhaps she is a decent actress - she had a very flat affect on CI and that was no doubt what was asked of her, considering their penchant for getting what they want out on screen.

[Rose]

I wonder if we really were mislead or if the powers that be merely changed their minds. I agree it's too bad that they didn't go with the original plans. It would have been cool to see Goren get a run for his money beyond Bishop running ahead of him in one ep and being impatient in a couple of others.

I never saw anything onscreen to indicate that Bishop only saw her job as a stepping stone.

As to the flat affect...I agree she has that. As does the actress who plays the current ADA on L&O, and she didn't have a flat affect when she had a recurring role on "Angel". I reminded myself of that whenever I thought Buck seemed kind of stiff...it might have been what they were telling her to do. The L&O women have a tendency to be stiff. Erbe excepted, thank goodness.

[Lilee]

Yes, I had a hard time knowing, or guessing, how much of the character was written with the sort of ho-hum personality.

[Rose]

Lilee I felt she didn't start out ho-hum, so I figured they decided to downplay the character as much as possible so that she'd be merely a placeholder for Eames. Which is a shame and a waste of a real opportunity to illuminate Bobby's character more by having him interact with a new partner who is an interesting and challenging person.

[pompusone]

To me she looked (and even acted sometimes) too much like Scully from X-files. I found it very disconcerting.

[darmok]

I think they could have done more with her. The only episodes where there really was any friction were "Pravada" and "Stray." I think "Sound Bodies" and "Mad Hops" could have been written for Eames or Bishop.

[trisha]

There was that bit of friction in the beginning of FPS, too, but I think Stray is where she showed most of her frustration with Goren. The parts where he cut her off while talking to the cops and his line about her feet hurting are the most memorable to me. She was not happy with him at all. She got through it, though, and was on the ball and professional throughout. That's what really made me like her.

[Cassie]

Wow!!! I got to say, I am impressed. You’re the first Forum, that really isn’t into “Bishop Bashing” .
I don’t think she was ever given a fair chance from the 1st episode she was in. At first I saw her as nothing more then an Eames clone. They are close in size, frame and hair coloring. There were even times I swore she wore the same clothes as Eames . Even her lines could have been written for Eames. I would have swore at times that was the case.

I do think we were “mislead” as to what kind of character she was going to be. What I saw was a rookie. How she got to MCS so quick, I don’t know. I do feel that there are some situations in life. Where a bright kid out of college, can get a break like that in the business world. In the Police Department MCS, I don’t know, I doubt it.

In the beginning of the episode of “Stray” Bishops starts to question the cops about their dead friends. Goren steps in, takes over, and starts to ask the cops about their dead friends in the car. Gorens asks about their families, how many kids did they have. Then he steps backs and looks at her as to say. “ok, you can question them now” I got the feeling from that scene, that he was trying to teach her a thing or two about being a good, compassionate cop. Also in the episode of “Murderer Among Us” When they are outside questioning the neighbor, she spoke out loud her thoughts on what they were questioning the witness about. Goren looked at her as if to say. “not now, we will talk later” She stepped back. Goren took over the questioning. I saw Goren more as a mentor to her.

I also think that without Bishop, fans would never really come to appreciate the character of Eames.

I think Samantha Buck did a great job. Dare I say it. I don’t think any woman who got the role of Bishop would have been given a fair shake by the female fans of LOCI. No one wants to share Det Bobby Goren with any other woman other then Eames.

[Patcat]

I don't think Ms. Buck get a fair chance from the LOCI writers or from the show's fans. The writers seemed unable to decide if Bishop should be a challenge to Goren, or that Goren should act as a mentor to her. Given half a chance, Bishop showed herself to be an adaptable and intelligent detective.

I suspect the Bishop episodes were not shown in sequence, another element that contributed to the character seeming to change her attitude towards Goren at random.

Patcat

[trisha]

A few of us had a discussion a while back about where Bishop may have come from and how she could have gotten to MCS. Of coarse, it's all up to speculation, but from what she said about a robbery in the beginning of Pravda, I wonder if that's where she earned most of her kudos. She has the ability to think outside the box, as we saw in all of the episodes she was in, but it's not her natural way of looking at things. She uses a more statistical, and formulaic way of solving crimes, and it has obviously
worked well for her, but in MCS she finds herself out of her element.

So, was Goren meant to be more of an adversary or a mentor? I recall hearing from Rene Balcer himself that Bishop would see working with Goren as a stepping stone, and that she would give him a run for his money. I don't think this is quite what we saw, though, and I'm glad. If things had gone the way we were told they would, Bishop would have ended up as a two dimensional character, and that wouldn't have been nearly as interesting as watching the character evolve.

Considering Mr. Balcer's comments, as well as the promo tid bits, I wonder how much of what we saw of Bishop's character development was written, and how much Samantha Buck added with her own wonderful sideways glances, discrete eye rolls, and edgy voice inflections, that faded into fascinated watching, attentive listening, encouraging nods, and smiles of pride. If Mad Hops and FPS were not aired out of order, I think there would more people posting about what a great job Samantha Buck did in portraying Bishop. As it is, the boards where most of the Bishop Bashing went on are not the type of boards I frequent, and I think it is safe to assume that quite a bit of it did come from a desire to deny another woman a special place next to Goren.

[Patcat]

I'm watching HAPPY FAMILY on USA tonight, and I've noted that Bishop works very well with Goren in this episode. It's not the same chemistry with Eames, but the character was adapting.

Patcat

[romulanavatra3]

hey all i would have to agree that samtha buck did a great job portraying bishop( fine i dont think the show is the same without eames and kathryn erbe though).

i did feel though that a couple of things bothered me about bishop particularly in the first few epsisodes, one the fact that she was way to impatient for her own good, i mean the way she ask goren if they could leave a crime scne during a couple of epsdioes was almost rude. two the fact that she wore shoes that were way to out of place(i admit that i was gald by about the fourth bishop episode the one on with connie that she had changed them to more sensilbe footwear).

i do think at times during some of the earlier epsidoes she tried to hard to be eames( i mean sometimes shye tried to sound like eames which did not really work she is after all diifrent person with a difirent voice).

i think that she would make an execlent additon to the cast not so much as gorens ppartner but in some other role( i still feel that at times she was a little bit out of her depth as gorens partner and eames has skills that a suited to dealing wiht goren as a indviudal better).

i would like to see eames together as a team i mean thatey are both intelligent and hard working a think out the box and would play off each other really well.

reagrds all rom.