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Cult TV: The Master Episode 8 – ‘The Good, the Bad, and the Priceless’

February 19, 2022 | Posted by Bryan Kristopowitz

Image Credit: Kino Lorber

Cult TV Issue #13: The Master Episode 8

Hello, everyone, and welcome to the latest issue of Cult TV. I’m Bryan Kristopowitz.

Image Credit: Kino Lorber

I don’t really have a “proper” intro for this edition of Cult TV, so I’m just going to tell everyone that likes/loves ninja entertainment that they absolutely need to see New York Ninja. I’ve seen it, I reviewed it (check out my review of the movie here), and I can’t wait to watch it again. It really is one of those kinds of movies.

So go over to Vinegar Syndrome’s website and buy a copy of New York Ninja. You should also check out the other stuff that VS has on sale because they have tons of cool stuff.

Man, does anyone else out there think or feel that we need more of this kind of thing in our lives?

Here are the links to reviews for the first seven episodes of The Master, just in case you missed them for some reason (or want to read them again):

And now, onto the eighth episode of The Master.

Episode 8: “The Good, the Bad, and the Priceless”

Image Credit: Kino Lorber

Director: Michael Caffey
Writers: Tom Sawyer, Michael Sloan, and Susan Woolen, based on a story by Allison Hock

“The Good, the Bad, and the Priceless” is yet another “Sho Kosugi” less episode of The Master, which is, again, just mind boggling in retrospect. I know that I keep talking about this but it just makes no sense to me that the show had Sho Kosugi as part of its cast but didn’t have him in every episode doing something. He’s the goddamn ninja, man. The real deal. The show should be about him and not Lee Van Cleef. Sorry for the repetition of this point but it’s important. I bet the show would have lasted longer than thirteen episodes if it had focused on Sho Kosugi.

“The Good, the Bad, and the Priceless” is also the closest thing The Master has to a two-part episode story, as it features a prominent part for Tara Buckman’s Cat Sinclair, who left with Lee Van Cleef’s John Peter McCallister and Timothy Van Patten’s Max Keller at the end of episode seven. And Sinclair actually works with McCallister and Keller to take on the bad guy of the episode, which is something I didn’t expect to see happen. As far as I can tell, based on Buckman’s imdb page, she doesn’t appear as Sinclair again in the next episode or any later episode. So what’s the deal here? Why does she appear in this episode as a part of the team but then doesn’t appear again? Sinclair isn’t killed in the episode, she isn’t run off for some reason. Sinclair doesn’t get suddenly homesick and bolt it back to her mother. So what the heck is going on here? Did the producers make Sinclair a part of the team for this episode, just to see what it’s like to have three adventurers instead of two? Would Sinclair have become a cast regular if the show had received a second season? Anyone out there have any insight into this? We really need the fine folks at Kino Lorber to do a full on, extras filled home video release of The Master so we can find out this stuff.

So “The Good, the Bad, and the Priceless” has McCallister, Keller, and Sinclair arriving in New York City, hot on the trail of McCallister’s daughter Terri as it’s believed that Terri works at a big hooha fashion advertising agency there (Terri is considered one of the top models at the agency but she’s also a bit of a recluse so no one at the agency seems to know all that much about her beyond she’s famous and works there). In fact, the Terri that McCallister, Keller, and Sinclair eventually meet is actually Gina (Janine Turner), an undercover investigator that wants to take down the super corrupt criminal that runs the advertising agency, Simon Garrett (George Maharis). I’m not entirely sure of Gina is a cop, a federal agent of some sort, or a journalist. All we really know is that Gina is an investigator and she wants to take down Garrett.

Image Credit: Kino Lorber

So Gina poses as Terri and meets with McCallister and they connect, with McCallister acting as though Gina’s Terri is the real Terri. These scenes are weirdly upsetting because we know that McCallister isn’t connecting with his real daughter and McCallister really seems like a different person in her presence. It almost seems like he’s at peace, a kind of peace we haven’t seen him experience since the show began. McCallister thinks he’s achieved what he set out to do. But then we know that he hasn’t done that at all. That isn’t the real Terri. That’s just messed up. Now, McCallister eventually finds out that Gina isn’t the real Terri and admits that he suspected that Gina wasn’t the real Terri early on, but that admission just makes the whole situation even more messed up. If he knew or suspected as much, why did he go through the motions of acting like he finally met his long lost daughter? And then there’s the whole thing where Gina wants to use McCallister to help her take down Garrett and that’s why she’s trying to get close to McCallister in the first place. I don’t care if she is trying to take down Garrett, what she’s doing is super manipulative. Again, the whole thing is just messed up.

As for Garrett, he wants to steal the British Crown Jewels, which are on display at a museum in the city. He’s not entirely sure how he’s going to do it, but he knows that he wants to. When he first meets with McCallister he suspects that he knows him but he can’t quite figure out from where. Garrett eventually figures out that he knows McCallister because he took a sort of “ninja class” many years ago while doing business in Japan and McCallister was the ninja instructor (I don’t know what else you call it). So Garrett kidnaps Gina’s Terri and uses her as leverage to get McCallister to steal the jewels for him.

Image Credit: Kino Lorber

“The Good, the Bad, and the Priceless” is chock full of plot. In fact, it’s probably the most complicated plot in the show so far. It’s also the most emotional episode so far in the series, with the way McCallister interacts with Gina’s Terri and, to a lesser extent, the few moments we see Keller and Sinclair interact. There’s a moment in the middle of the episode where it seems like McCallister and Keller are on the verge of ending their relationship because McCallister has finally found his daughter (Keller also seems to want to go back out onto the road by himself). Is this meant to be the last episode of the series? We know that it isn’t, we know that there are many more episodes to go, but there’s a fleeting moment where you’re meant to think that “Holy crap, is this thing ending?” Both Lee Van Cleef and Timothy Van Patten do phenomenal work here as they pile on the feels. And Janine Turner is excellent here, too, being manipulative and making McCallister believe that she is Terri.

George Maharis also does a great job as Simon Garrett. He’s a sleazebag of the highest order but he’s also charismatic enough to where you kind of like him. You don’t want him to complete his criminal scheme because he is a bad guy, but you want to see him try to complete it. Garrett is also a bit of a martial artist himself as we see him owning all sorts of martial arts/ninja equipment (he also has a pretty decent fight with McCallister at the end of the episode).

Image Credit: Kino Lorber

The only character that really gets the short straw is Tara Buckman’s Cat Sinclair. Despite being a part of the McCallister/Keller adventure team she doesn’t actually get to do much. She doesn’t get to participate in any team strategy meetings, she doesn’t get to fight anyone. She doesn’t even get to drive the van. She’s just sort of in the episode. So, I ask again, why? Why is Cat Sinclair in this episode? Why is she a part of the team if she doesn’t get to do anything?

Image Credit: Kino Lorber

The episode’s action beats are pretty weird. Some of it looks fantastic, like the final fight between McCallister and Garrett. There’s also the sequence where McCallister and Keller enter the museum and figure out how to beat the laser alarm system that’s guarding the British Crown Jewels. I don’t get why, in this instance, that Keller doesn’t wear black or dark clothing (he’s just wearing his regular street clothes while McCallister wears his ninja outfit), but the ins and outs of beating the laser system is great fun (and this laser system features lasers that are lasers that cut you for real if they get you. They’re not just beams of light you can’t break and it sets off an alarm). But then there are fight moments where the stunt double work is ridiculous because you can tell that both McCallister and Keller are super obvious stunt doubles. By this point in the series the obvious McCallister stunt double is an expectation, but the Keller one is off putting. They couldn’t find a way to make Keller’s stunt double look less obvious?

Image Credit: Kino Lorber

Oliver Clark, who people will recognize as Joe Carruthers, the guy that Santa Claus wants to hire as Santa Claus in Ernest Saves Christmas, shows up as Garrett’s first criminal mastermind planner Kendal. Kathleen Kinmont also pops in as one of the models. And George P. Wilbur is also apparently in the episode according to imdb, although I don’t remember actually seeing him. He’s listed as “Thug” on imdb, so who knows?

So is “The Good, the Bad, and the Priceless” a good episode of The Master? In general, I would say yes it is. I’m not sure anyone would like it if they hadn’t watched the previous seven episodes first, but even then the episode has several good moments that make it watchable (I can’t stress enough how great the “fooling the laser alarm” sequence). And the plotting is shockingly intricate. The good stuff outweighs the episode’s issues, and that’s always a plus. So, again, I would say that “The Good, the Bad, and the Priceless” is a good episode of The Master. Not the best, but still pretty good.

Oh, there’s also a very funny recurring bit where a guy at the ad agency wants to hire McCallister to be the spokesmodel for a deodorant brand. I mean, would you buy a deodorant hocked by Lee Van Cleef? Of course you would. Everyone in the world would. Because who wouldn’t want to smell like Lee Van Cleef?

I’m really hoping that the next episode rocks hard. It’s the last episode that has a full on Sho Kosugi performance in it.