Loveday Writing

When Dale returns home, he finds a voicemail left by his mother, who has informed him that he and Helen have made the social pages in the newspaper. Before he has a chance to call back, the story of Azaria Chamberlain’s matinee jacket being found breaks, and he rushes into the office.

Meanwhile Helen’s sister, Cathy, shows up unannounced at her house to tell her that their father is sick. Helen shuts the door in her face and plays loud music to drive her away.

On Thursday (6 February), Dale and Helen have a lunch meeting with Lindsay where he tells them that management believe that Lindy Chamberlain’s release from prison will be the story of the decade, and that while it’s traditionally been Geoff’s story, management want Helen to report on it. Lindsay also tells them that management is prepared to offer the Chamberlains up to $100,000 for an interview, and that if Helen gets the interview, it will make her the face of “news at six”. Later, Geoff tells Dale at the office that he’s also trying to secure the Chamberlain interview.

On Friday (7 February), Dale, Helen, Tim and Gary are in Darwin, waiting to get a shot of Lindy being released from prison. When the car comes out, Helen wants to go after it, but Dale tells her she needs to do her piece to camera, which leads to the car getting away. Later at the motel, Helen concludes that Lindy hasn’t left Darwin as the car was going in the opposite direction to the airport. Dale remembers that Geoff told him that Lindy’s faith was important to her, and ends up deducing that she would be staying with a local couple she met through church, the Parry’s.

They go to the Parry home and Helen knocks on the door to leave them her business card, which they take but they also slam the door in her face. Helen, Dale, Tim and Gary leave after Dale insists that they need food and rest, much to Helen’s chagrin. Later that night, Dale goes to the pool to cool down as he’s having trouble sleeping, and finds Tim sitting on the edge with his feet in the water. When Tim asks Dale about his relationship with Helen again, Dale points out to Tim that he seems obsessed with his personal life, and Tim tells him that he is gay, but doesn’t tell many people. Dale accepts him.

On Saturday (8 February), Helen, Dale, Tim and Gary return to the Parry’s house to find that their competitors are there too. When Dale visits one of the neighbours and asks to borrow their phone to call the office, he overhears a conversation Lindy is having in the Parry’s backyard with her solicitor, Stuart Tipple. He leaves and comes back with Helen in tow. Dale and Helen then come up with the idea of reaching out to Lindy by making the story about her as a loving mother rather than about the murder charges and imprisonment.

Later, while Helen is writing a draft letter to fax to Stuart, Dale surprises her with champagne, two mugs from his motel room, and fake flowers he stole from reception, to make up for forgetting about their scheduled date the night before.

The next day, Helen and Dale come back, and Helen finds a fax waiting for her – Lindsay wants them in the office first thing tomorrow as he’s heard from Stuart and they want to have a phone conference to negotiate on doing an interview.  When they go into the office the next morning, Lindsay informs them that the conference call has been cancelled as the Chamberlains accepted Ray Martin’s offer for an interview on 60 Minutes.

Overall I enjoyed seeing Dale and Helen working as part of a team and Dale standing up to her. They clearly work together like a well-oiled machine, and I’m looking forward to seeing more of this as the season progresses. I’m also looking forward to the episode where they find out that Geoff sabotaged their chance at the Chamberlain interview.

Geoff – This episode essentially had Geoff pitted against Helen and Dale. The Chamberlain story was Geoff’s signature story, as Lindsay told Helen and Dale. When the story of Lindy’s imminent release from prison broke, Geoff desperately tried to get a hold of Stuart Tipple, but couldn’t get through.

Later in the episode, Evelyn tells Geoff about another job at The Weekly, but he refuses to consider it. When Stuart eventually returns Geoff’s call, he informs Geoff of Helen’s letter and offer, asking him if his own offer is separate or in conjunction with Helen’s. Geoff tells him he got his wires crossed and will look into it. Geoff ends up calling and secretly meeting with Clive from 60 Minutes. He tells them about Helen’s proposal and suggests that Channel 9 exceed it. When Clive asks why Geoff is telling him this, he doesn’t answer and leaves.

Geoff comes into work the next day and finds out from Helen that they didn’t get the interview. Geoff plays it cool and allows Helen to read the lead story in the upcoming broadcast. Helen thanks Geoff, remarking that it was kind of him to do so.

In all honesty, Geoff’s sabotage really didn’t surprise me, that being said, I’m looking forward to seeing whether he ends up taking his efforts to sabotage Helen further as the season progresses.

Rob and Noelene – Rob and Noelene had more screen time this week as Lindsay has Rob read the Weekend Bulletin. When the weekend comes, Rob is nervous about interviewing the coroner on the Chamberlain case and ends up calling Noelene. He asks her to come in on Saturday to help him. To get his head around the case, Noelene explains it using a VFL analogy, as he’s a former VFL player.

Even though he’s confident, his interview with the coroner goes awry. Afterwards, Noelene encourages him by telling him that the rest of broadcast was fine. The next day, Rob’s second broadcast goes off without a hitch.

I honestly enjoyed their subplot and I hope to see their relationship develop as the season progresses. I’d actually like a bit more of a back story on both of them – both as individuals and colleagues, as I haven’t seen Noelene as close to any of the other employees.

Overall this was a solid episode with plenty of character development with almost every character, and it was good to see most of the characters outside the confines of the office and the studio.