A Theory For What We Saw Happen In The Waning Days Of Dallas

Jimmy Todd

Telly Talk Star
LV
4
 
Messages
2,916
Reaction score
5,801
Awards
8
Location
United States
Member Since
2019
i really liked Steve Forrest on the show, just not as Jock. If they had made him an antagonist fkr rhe Ewings in another way that would have been wonderful.
 

Snarky Oracle!

Telly Talk Supreme
LV
4
 
Messages
15,097
Reaction score
1,256
Awards
13
Location
USA

pete lashmar

Telly Talk Addict
LV
4
 
Messages
1,095
Reaction score
2,463
Awards
6
Location
Portugal
But that would have made him just another adversary. The Wes Parmalee plotline, though inevitably controversial, was at its heart what DALLAS was all about.

We even have a thread about it, one started by pete lashmar:

http://soapchat.net/threads/wes-parmalee-story-with-hindsight.3172/
Indeed....oddly, as I type this I'm watching Ellie discovering the buckle, knife & letters - how bizarre is that!

I loathed the story on broadcast but on every re-watch it gets better and better - just a shame it ended so abruptly.
 

Seaviewer

Telly Talk Champion
LV
7
 
Messages
4,862
Reaction score
8,447
Awards
16
Location
Australia
Member Since
14 September 2001
It was dropped? Bobby had come back from South America having learned that Parmalee was Wyatt Hanes, she had said goodbye to Ellie and left town.....so other than seeing him tried in court and sent to prison there wasn't much more they could have done with the storyline at the time they ended it.
All he really learned was that there had been another man on the helicopter. In no way was it proven which was which.
 

Luke_Krebbs_Ewing

Telly Talk Champion
LV
7
 
Messages
4,648
Reaction score
9,674
Awards
15
Location
Northern Ireland
Favourite Movie
The Lord of the Rings Trilogy
All he really learned was that there had been another man on the helicopter. In no way was it proven which was which.

All of what Bobby found out was hearsay. Nothing could be proved & even if there was another man on the helicopter what are the chances of this guy having Jock's belt buckle, his knife & those letters?

Wes took a lie detector test. Yes, I know they're not admissable in court but he passed it. He also submitted to a full medical scan & X-ray's showed he had the same bone breakages as Jock as well as others. What are the odds of two different men having the same bone breakages? All the medical facts pointed to him actually being Jock. :)
 

Kenny Coyote

Telly Talk Star
LV
0
 
Messages
2,672
Reaction score
1,576
Awards
2
Location
Maryland
All he really learned was that there had been another man on the helicopter. In no way was it proven which was which.

I think Bobby believed he'd found out plenty. Parmalee confessed he was a fraud anyway, so what difference does it make? Did you ever think, even for a second, that Jock survived an accident of that type, and came back with a completely different build, different to where his entire skeleton would have had to have shrunk? Yet looking younger than we'd ever seen him look? With no visible scars after a fire burned most of his body and burned his whole face off?

That was a stupid story. I'm not surprised they got so many angry letters basically saying WTF are you doing??? They say on the DVD special features they never intended to have him turn out to be Jock. The plan was always to have him be a fraud but the audience didn't know that did they? One thing you never want to do is insult the intelligence of your audience.
 

tommie

Telly Talk Hero
LV
3
 
Messages
6,120
Reaction score
8,650
Awards
9
Location
Sweden
Member Since
I dunno
They had finished filming the story before the plotline had a chance to air, so they couldn't have been responding to the audience's reaction. And besides, not everyone hated it.


It was mostly wrapped up but, yes, it seemed to end in a rather sudden way -- but Steve Forrest had to go film a GUNSMOKE reunion movie, and the Wes Parmalee plotline was an intentionally ambivalent one that was meant to leave us hanging and not have anything completely explained away, so the viewer could believe he was or wasn't Jock depending on what we wanted.

Forrest likely signed on to do 13 episodes for season 10, which is a pretty standard contract, and either him or the producers decided not to extend it. But as you say, they didn't end it because of the audience reaction; it's the same thing with Karen Cellini on Dynasty. Her episodes had also barely started airing as she was written out, but in her case they of course put all the blame on her. It might've been a decision by the producers or Forrest himself to leave at that point - him signing up to do the Gunsmoke movie possibly actually points to it being his decision and the sudden wrap of the storyline indicates this.
 

Snarky Oracle!

Telly Talk Supreme
LV
4
 
Messages
15,097
Reaction score
1,256
Awards
13
Location
USA
Parmalee confessed he was a fraud anyway, so what difference does it make?
Because it may have been a false confession. The show tossed out a lot of red herring to allow viewers to choose whatever they wanted to believe. That's what made the Wes Parmalee plot almost Shakespearean. It wasn't a "stupid plot", it was almost brilliant if bizarre.
One thing you never want to do is insult the intelligence of your audience.
Or, it would seem, overrate it.
 

pete lashmar

Telly Talk Addict
LV
4
 
Messages
1,095
Reaction score
2,463
Awards
6
Location
Portugal
Watching it all over again in my re-watch and boy Jock must have rambled on and on and on - Wes has just told Sue Ellen about Cliff being the possible father of John Ross, Punk said only 2 people know what was said in the helicopter - him and Jock Ewing - but it's still the fact that he recognises people on sight. The execs may not have plotted for him to be Jock but sorry, all the evidence points to the fact he was - they overcooked the pudding on this one IMO and ran away very quickly.

But in the age of DVDs and repeats, Wes most definitely comes across as being the genuine Jock Ewing IMO.
 

Barbara Fan

Admin
LV
12
 
Messages
10,199
Reaction score
23,149
Awards
28
Location
Scotland
Member Since
2000
Favourite Movie
Witness, Vertigo, Spellbound
Pity they just didnt do a DNA sample on Wes and match it with the boys! Simple! end of speculation!!

I always found it amusing that for "jock" to crash in a helicopter and be badly burned and disfigured by the flames, he ended up less craggy, better looking, and not a scar or burn mark in site - I want the name of that plastic surgeon!! because he did a fab job!
 

tommie

Telly Talk Hero
LV
3
 
Messages
6,120
Reaction score
8,650
Awards
9
Location
Sweden
Member Since
I dunno
Pity they just didnt do a DNA sample on Wes and match it with the boys! Simple! end of speculation!!

The first DNA test in a criminal case was in 1986, so it was in its infancy at that point and still raised eyebrows. I don't think it's that odd that no one thought of it.
 

Kenny Coyote

Telly Talk Star
LV
0
 
Messages
2,672
Reaction score
1,576
Awards
2
Location
Maryland
Some won't … appreciate it.

Does that concern you?

When they want the audience to believe this man could be Jock despite having a completely different build than Jock did, how do they expect the audience to ignore that? Are we supposed to believe his entire skeleton shrank? The man looked younger than Jock did in 1978. He had no visible burn scars despite supposedly having been terribly over most of his body. That tells the audience they didn't try.

They should have gotten Parmalee's surgeon for Pam. Then she wouldn't have had to run away and abandon her family because she had so many burn scars. Apparently, according to the people responsible for that time period in Dallas, they have better plastic surgeons in the jungles of Colombia than in Texas.
 

Taylor Bennett Jr.

Telly Talk Mega Star
LV
4
 
Messages
3,457
Reaction score
8,162
Awards
10
Location
one of them high rises down in Venezuela
Watching it all over again in my re-watch and boy Jock must have rambled on and on and on - Wes has just told Sue Ellen about Cliff being the possible father of John Ross, Punk said only 2 people know what was said in the helicopter - him and Jock Ewing - but it's still the fact that he recognises people on sight. The execs may not have plotted for him to be Jock but sorry, all the evidence points to the fact he was - they overcooked the pudding on this one IMO and ran away very quickly.

But in the age of DVDs and repeats, Wes most definitely comes across as being the genuine Jock Ewing IMO.

I’d pay good money to see footage of Jim Davis as a fever-stricken Jock rambling for hours upon hours, telling the Ewing backstory and random details from all the previous seasons!
 

Lastkidpicked

Telly Talk Dream Maker
LV
4
 
Messages
1,931
Reaction score
5,170
Awards
9
Location
United States
Member Since
2008
I’d pay good money to see footage of Jim Davis as a fever-stricken Jock rambling for hours upon hours, telling the Ewing backstory and random details from all the previous seasons!

Especially if because of the fever, he told the backstory including secrets that he normally wouldn't tell. Secrets that J.R. and Bobby wouldn't even know.

It would put a whole new perspective on a re-watching of the series.
 
Last edited:

Snarky Oracle!

Telly Talk Supreme
LV
4
 
Messages
15,097
Reaction score
1,256
Awards
13
Location
USA
Does that concern you?
Seems to concern you.

Kenny Coyote said:
When they want the audience to believe this man could be Jock despite having a completely different build than Jock did, how do they expect the audience to ignore that? Are we supposed to believe his entire skeleton shrank? The man looked younger than Jock did in 1978. He had no visible burn scars despite supposedly having been terribly over most of his body. That tells the audience they didn't try.

They should have gotten Parmalee's surgeon for Pam. Then she wouldn't have had to run away and abandon her family because she had so many burn scars. Apparently, according to the people responsible for that time period in Dallas, they have better plastic surgeons in the jungles of Colombia than in Texas.
They may very well have used the same surgeon for Pam.
 

Taylor Bennett Jr.

Telly Talk Mega Star
LV
4
 
Messages
3,457
Reaction score
8,162
Awards
10
Location
one of them high rises down in Venezuela
Especially if because of the fever, he told the backstory including secrets that he normally wouldn't tell. Secrets that J.R. and Bobby wouldn't even know.

It would put a whole new perspective on a re-watching of the series.

it definitely could add story intrigue, but I was just trying to picture Davis playing that sort of scene, which is way outside the zone of anything he’d done on Dallas. I think the potential for spectacular unintentional comedy would be high!
 

Seaviewer

Telly Talk Champion
LV
7
 
Messages
4,862
Reaction score
8,447
Awards
16
Location
Australia
Member Since
14 September 2001
They say on the DVD special features they never intended to have him turn out to be Jock.
I don't really care what they intended. On screen it's ambiguous at best.
despite having a completely different build than Jock did,
That's irrelevant to me. Call it poor casting if you want but the differences between the two actors have no bearing on the story.
 
Top