oveur and out

Tonight's planned television viewing was interrupted by 1967. While "Chuck" and "24" were still recorded by my DVR, I chose to fire up the DVD player and watch a couple of episodes from season 2 of "Mission: Impossible." My daughter gave me the discs for Christmas in 2008.

The inspiration for my retro-viewing party was the death of Peter Graves, the one, true Jim Phelps. I was too young to stay up and watch M:I when it first aired but I got hooked on the show during high school when one of the local New York stations showed reruns of it every night. The episodes from season 2 that I watched tonight are ones I don't recall seeing before.

The teamwork of the IMF and the intricate plots renewed my displeasure with the way the Tom Cruise movies abused the franchise. Martin Landau was quoted in an article about Graves' death. The original stars also smelled a rat and refused to sully their characters by appearing in Cruise's vanity project.

On "World News," Diane Sawyer reported Graves' relation to his brother, James Arness, like it was news. I think her exact words were, "here's something we didn't know..." Huh? I've known that piece of TV trivia for as long as I can remember.

Peter Graves died just outside his home as he was returning from a Sunday brunch to celebrate his upcoming birthday. Is it weird that I am incredibly curious to know which restaurant served his last meal? Get me Dearly Departed Tours on the phone!