“Rescue Me”

I just watched “Rescue Me” – my favorite tv show. I taped it last week so I could watch it twice. Doesn’t everyone do that? The next episode will be the season finale. I’ll be very sad when it’s gone – why couldn’t it be there all year for people who need it . . . people like me. “Rescue Me” is a very well-written show by Denis Leary and Peter Tolan. Denis stars in it. It’s outrageous, humorous, crazy, dramatic and everything else. It’s about a group of firefighers in one station house, examining their characters and also their private lives.

In this episode, Tommy(Denis Leary) gives the chief some Viagra because he’s going to be having sex with a woman he met who is taking care of his Alzheimer’s wife who lives in a nursing home. This woman is an illegal – maybe from Jamaica. So right in the middle of sex, the chief falls off the woman and yells for her to call 911. She yells back that she can’t do that since she’s an illegal, so she puts on her clothes and away she goes. Meanwhile, the chief is by this time lying on the floor and looking quite dead. However, some firefighters break into his house the next day and find him and he ends up in the hospital, hoping to recover from a heart attack.

Sheila, Tommy’s “sort of” girlfriend, who is the widow of Tommy’s cousin – also a firefighter – wants to use her 3 million dollars from the widows’ fund of 9/11 to buy a house for the two of them in the Hamptons, I believe. Tommy is not really sold on that idea at this time. He’s just found out he may be the father of his pregnant, ex-wife’s baby . . . or the father could be Tommy’s brother, Johnny, who is now living with Janet, the ex-wife. But Johnny, a cop, is shot on a stake-out, so a funeral has to be planned.

Some of the guys are thinking of leaving the business. The Probie, Mike, wants to transfer as he’s the newest member and is always being kidded about things . . . lately about whether or not he’s gay. No one really cares, they just kid him. Lou wants to go to Florida and live on a fishing boat and wants Tommy to go with him. Sean, who is a tiny bit slow, is going to marry Tommy’s sister, Maggie, who’s been married many times already. She is wild and really, really crazy . . . and very scary. She’s portrayed by Tatum O’Neal who does a great job of playing crazy and scary . . . or maybe she’s not playing at all.

So at Johnny’s funeral, Tommy sees dead people . . . firefighters, his dead son, cousin and so on. He doesn’t actually see them even though we see them walking around during the ceremony. This is all just in his mind, I hope. After it’s over, Maggie offers the priest $500 to marry Sean and her right then and there. During the ceremony, a man comes up and tells them they’re standing on his mother, so they move 10 feet away and continue the service. When Maggie throws the bouquet, it lands in front of a woman bending over a grave, arranging flowers. Sheila races up and grabs the bouquet away from her.

At the party and dance after the funeral/wedding, Sheila tells Tommy she bought the house for them and he tells her he’s quitting the FDNY. I’ll see what happens in the finale tonight which I, of course, will tape.