Pros Novelisation Weekly Read 4 - Where the Jungle Ends - p123 to p159 - Killer with a Long Arm

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

(I have got to make these posts less detailled - it took me forever this time, because I watched the ep at the same time as reading, to find the differences better... and took screencaps... I swear, the next one will be bare bones!)

The novelisation of KWaLA starts with the Dover car ferry scene, and Costa and Georgi meeting up - pretty much as the ep does, although the ep features a car hovercraft, which I always think is pretty cool. I miss them...

We get an extra scene straight away in the novel though:
This time, at Cowley's call, it was Doyle's turn to be aroused by Bodie. [And it really does say "aroused" rather than "roused" - *vbg*] Remembering Doyle's diabolical mischief when he'd dropped Bodie in it with Claire Donnelly, Bodie licked his lips in relish at the thought of the mayhem he'd cause his partner if - as was very, very likely - he was shacked up with a toothsome morsel. Doyle attracted women like honey attracted wasps - stings and all. That Bodie also attracted women had nothing to do with it. So said Bodie as he rang the bell on Doyle's apartment door.
He wondered why Doyle had chosen to taunt him by calling the girl Betty. Betty remained aloof - and yet Bodie had finally made up his mind to chance his arm. The old saying about not doing it on your own doorstep hardly applied here, did it? He waited and the door opened a crack and Doyle looked out.
"Mornin' Doyle - let me in. Big news - "
"You, Bodie," said Doyle, keeping the chain firmly on the door, "Can wait three minutes. Then I'll be out - "
"Is this the way to treat a pal?"
"It is when there's a Betty involved."
Bodie's face underwent a miraculous change. He tried to peer one-eyed past the door edge. "You don't have - in there - ?"
"You wouldn't know, would you Bodie? Or are they all Bettys to you?"
"They had a way of treating people like you in the jungle. Stake 'em out with a trickle of honey up their legs, and - "
"Yeah. I've heard all about those ants in your pants. Now let me say a sweet goodbye and I'll be with you."
The door slammed.
Bodie fumed.
When Ray Doyle came out he wiped his mouth very ostentatiously and smirked. That convinced Bodie he was wasting his time. Doyle had been alone in the apartment - hadn't he?"
Now, how much would you pay to see Bodie stake Doyle out in the jungle, trickle honey up his legs, and... well, the whole "arousal" scene, really? *vbg*

They go on to meet Cowley, driving together in his car, although their conversation takes place when they get to the forensic garage rather than in the car, and for some reason Doyle shook his head. "Why us?" he asked. is cut from the episode and just inferred - for timing, maybe?

Once they get to the garage there's some extras in the episode - the forensics chap (according to the novel "Mervin, a chunky-looking man..." - the didn't quite manage that casting though!) explains that they tracked the murder via the blood type of the policeman who was shot, which isn't in the novelisation.(Not at all gratuitous inclusion of pic for the sake of the lads leaning on things... *g*)

Then the scene with Costa, Georgi and Hilda in the novel and ep both, but then an extra scene in the ep, where they test the rifle and the poacher is shot at, which is just given as backstory in the book. In the novel we then go straight to the lads arriving at the scene with Cowley (who arrives on his own in the ep, with the lads already there). The novel does give us the rather lovely description: Flashing his I.D. at the guard, Cowley, already limping, set off up the slope. Bodie and Doyle followed, limber, lithe, breathing easily. That's our lads - limber and lithe!

Everything's pretty similar next, although to get to the scarecrow field: They tramped the intervening distance, with Cowley limping along gamely. When they reached the scarecrow Cowley and Doyle looked at the straw stuffed body and the sacking head. There were two holes in the head. Bodie, at the back, let out an exclamation and twisted the scarecrow around. All three men stared numbly at the cavernous holes blasted out the back of the scarecrow's head. The damage was enormous.
After a time Doyle's policeman instincts sent him sniffing around the area. He bent, straightened and came back to Cowley holding a cigarette butt.
"Athens," he said. "The Jaguar was stolen in Athens. And this is a Greek cigarette. Greek."
Cowley nodded decisively. "Then it's down to you, Doyle. You have Greek contacts, I feel sure, from your time in the Met."
"Tarkos," said Doyle. "An interesting character."
"So what are you waiting for?"

We don't get that last little bit in the ep either, instead Bodie asks Doyle where they're going once they're en route. And the novel has a few other extra lines when they're in their "mobile ghetto":
"Is that the end of the lecture on anti-racialism, Doyle? Because I have to tell you this - everyone's my friend. Jew or Gentile. Black, white, brown, yellow. Everyone's my friend."
Bodie slid a sharp sideways look at his partner, who was lapping this up.
"Just so long," added Bodie, "as they are friendly."
The car pulled into the kerb where a brightly painted taverna splashed a spot of Mediterranean brilliance into the London sunshine.
"Look," said Bodie, as though resolving a difficult conundram. "Have I ever shown any prejudice towards you? Don't I always treat you as an equal?" He was having difficulty keeping a straight face; he hadn't forgotten his partner's shut apartment door. "Almost?"
Doyle hauled on the handbrake and cut the motor. He was openly smiling now.
"Where's this then?" said Bodie, looking at the taverna.
"We're going to see a Greek who isn't so friendly."
These ribbing sessions between the partners made a tough life more livable. Mind you, if they got half a chance they'd pull the most diabolical stunts against each other. That added the spice to life that had sorted out the Bettys from the Claires.

There's a bit more in the novel when they've left Tarkos to his Limoge plate again:
On the way to the address, with Doyle driving, a tacit silence lay between them. They were both hard, tough, experienced young men; but they remained human, capable of being hurt, enduring all the pangs of what Doyle would call the human condition, and Bodie the jungle of life. They did not believe in flannelling each other.
So when Bodie started ribbing, Doyle prepared to go along.
Bodie said, "He didn't ask you to dance. I've a terrible suspicion you offended him in some way."
And then, to Doyle's surprise, Bodie added "You were good back there."
Doyle said sharply "Should have seen me in my prime."
"I mean it. You were cool, in command of yourself. Me, I'm too hot-headed."|
"Where I was brought up," said Doyle, "you had to keep your nose clean - if you didn't - "
"Don't tell me you lost your hooter?"
Doyle grimaced. That was too close to the bone. He contented himself with saying: "You're okay, Bodie." And that, as they both knew, was as near as either would get to praise. They didn't believe in the maudlin stakes, and Father Christmas had been long gone."
Not sure about Bodie being the hot-headed one and Doyle cool-tempered, usually - I'd say it was more normally the other way around, though I guess they both have their moments in the other direction... It's not played at all seriously in the ep either - Bodie's definitely teasing Doyle when he says "You were great in there... Good trick that", and Doyle follows up with "That's not a trick, that's just... being offensive." I think I like the novelisation version better this time - a slightly deeper glimpse of our lads, and Doyle's background too.

The lads' chase after Tommy is a bit different in the novel:
The partners cornered Tommy up a long blind alley. He turned like a weasel at the far back wall and blasted a barrel back at them, the sawn-off booming with shocking clamour in the cover of rusted, overflowing, odiferous dustbins.
"We want him alive," Doyle said grimly. "A double-barrelled - and he's had one."
Bodie nodded. "I'll dive - you get 'im."
Bodie rose from the cover of the dustbins, hurled himself in a sprawling hurling smother of arms and legs across to the other side of the alley. The buckshot sprayed dustbins and wall and a few pellets flicked through Bodie's expensive jacket. He yelped with anger. Doyle was up and running, sprinting, his face mean. This was what teamwork was all about. They'd acted sharp and quick, and even Bodie's few words had been needless.
Tommy fumbled out two fresh shells from the valise, started to ram them into the breeches - and Doyle hit him in a jarring body-contact that ended up with Tommy flat against the wall, the barrel of the sawn-off pinning his throat, and Doyle with cocked fist quivering in front of Tommy's terrified face.
There are a couple of dustbins, and Bodie does leap over them, but it's a sun-filled grass-overgrown patch of land rather than a dark and stinky alley!

The ep has an extra scene next - Cowley giving a briefing to various agents - one of them called John, because Doyle greets him as he and Bodie come in! - before sending them off.


Then in the ep we see Cowley interrogating Tommy, which is given just a couple of words in the movel, as just one of the many things CI5 are doing to piece together the puzzle of what's happened.

The lads, in the ep, go around to Tommy's flat and find gun oil on newspaper wrapping - and lean in close together to try and read the imprint of some writing...All rather glossed over, in the novelisation.

Back, in the ep, to Cowley interrogating Tommy, and then the lads coming in - and then cutting to the scene of Cowley, Bodie and Doyle looking at the information from the imprint, and Betty coming in with still more information identifying Georgi.

In the discovery of the dead golfer the book is again pretty similar to what's in the ep, but again there's a wee bit more for us about the relationship between our lads in the book:
Doyle flared up. "Nobody's nobody!"
A little scared by Doyle's attitude, recognising that this creeping menace was getting to them, Mervin said quickly "I didn't mean that. I mean he's unconnected with the case. A small time insurance broker."
"Well let's hope he was covered - for his wife and kids' sake. He did have a wife and kids?"
Quietly, well-understanding, Bodie said "Knock it off, Doyle. Any venom, direct it at him." The empty horizon leered down on them, hollow, green, mocking. "The long shot merchant who uses human beings for target practice."
Quietly, well-understanding... I like that. *g*

The book moves to the lads trying to work out Georgi's target - but instead of Cowley saying it, when Doyle suggests that it could be a night shot, it's Bodie who says "No" with such certainty that Doyle knew at once his partner would be correct in what he said. "If it was night this bastard Scraffoss - or whatever he's calling himself now - would have made his two dummy runs at night. He's that good."
"Yes," said Cowley, turning back to the map and seeing in his mind's eye the sprawled glittering lights of London. "He's that good. And he's out there somewhere..." Bodie's not in the scene at all, in the ep.

Back to Georgi and co., and the scene where Hilda comes on to Georgi, and Georgi explains that his one exception to his rule of no sex before a kill was... a boy. This made both the book and the ep, which I'm quite impressed by for the times...The book misses out the scene where the neighbour calls though.

Hilde is sent out for food and runs in front of a car - then in the ep, Betty brings more information about Greek connections for Cowley, the lads go to the hospital and are given information by - another agent? Not in the book...

Then they're off to the scene of the accident to see what's nearby. It's longer in the episode, and includes Doyle asking Bodie to measure him out a couple of miles - not in the book.

There's a favourite scene next in the ep:

Bodie claiming to be having an affair with Betty which isn't in the novel at all - and in fact is contradictory to the first scene in the book where it's Doyle pretending to be having an affair with her!

It's morning, and Georgi puts together his rifle in the ep. Betty wakes Doyle, who's fallen asleep at the desk, but it's rather different in the book:
Doyle stretched and yawned. His face was stubbled with beard, his tie had been dragged down from his throat, his eyes felt gummed to this eyelids. Bodie was asleep across a pile of reports. The tawdry rest room - the rest room! That was a laugh! - lay stale and flat in the harsh electric lights.
Doyle made a cup of tea and Bodie awoke instantly at the tiny clink of metal, the splash of water.
"You sleep easy, Bodie. Quick."
"Habit. Belgian Congo. Grab it when you can - anywhere."
No Betty at all, and it's Doyle waking Bodie (which of course he does in the ep, but rather less gently...)

Book and ep have Cowley talking about the one thing that he and Bodie share - although the book doesn't have Doyle suggesting, sotto voce, same secretary, which makes the lads smirk. *g*

Bodie realises that the target is at Wimbledon, and the lads go off to search. In the novel, another agent is slipped in:
Doyle ran swiftly down the street from one tower block heading across concrete to the next. Parked cars lined the kerb. He ran past a beat-up Cortina which he recognised as Shotgun-Tommy's car, and then a couple of Minis...
Shotgun Tommy has appeared by name in every episode so far in the novels - but not one episode on screen yet!

The lads find the Range Rover, and Bodie is sceptical about it in the book as well as the ep - but in the book it's Bodie who breaks the window, whereas in the book it's most definitely not!

And then it's all much the same right through until the final scene, which in the book plays out like this...
Bodie and Doyle looked at the corpse of Georgi sprawled bloodily in its corner, and at Costa who gripped his shoulder as he struggled to rise. The silence stretched.
Cowley's voice raised in decibels and pitch.
Will somebody say something!"
At last Doyle said into his handset: "One dead. One wounded." He let it lie for a space, and then added just in time to beat Cowley's expected outburst: "Neither of them us." He glanced at Bodie, whose set face and down-drawn eyebrows boded trouble. "We did okay."
Bodie stabbed out a hand at Costa. "Okay? One wounded and you think that's okay? A bust in like that, you're supposed to shoot to kill! You were supposed to be minding my back!"
"Bodie..."
"Well, next time you can play the monkey on a string and I'll do the back-minding."
"Bodie..."
"If you think hanging over nothing - and then your partner shoots - "
"BODIE!"
Doyle pointed his S&W from the doorway directly across to the window. "And if I'd missed, what would I have got? WHO?"
Bodie, flushed, offensive, furious, hands on hips, turned about and followed the trajectory. He regarded the window, and where Costa had been, and realised what Doyle was so patiently trying to point out to an intemperate, hot-headed, ex-para mercenary.
No one could hold Bodie when he got on his bike like this - no one except Doyle.
Now, defensively, Bodie said: "Since when do you miss?"
And that made it all right. Bodie and Doyle - they smiled one at the other, and then as the faint bangings became louder, went to let loose the bound Priors.
Ahhh... *g* (They're much grumpier about it in the ep!)

We don't get the sleazy ending with the lads spying on a girl getting dressed in her own flat in the book either, but one that I like much better.
[Cowley] stood holding the radio handset as Bodie and Doyle walked over in the sunshine. - and then the joke about winning the Men's Singles. I'll take the lads in the sunshine any day, though. *g*

So - did anyone else read? Or watch? *g*

Comments

[shooting2kill.livejournal.com]

Thanks *very* much for this post and for all your time in getting it to us. I've not had a chance to read through it yet but couldn't help noticing this at the beginning:

... it was Doyle's turn to be aroused by Bodie. [And it really does say "aroused" rather than "roused"

Unbelievable! Needless to say I'm looking forward to reading the rest...

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

Here's hoping it turns out to be readable!

And isn't it amazing the difference adding an "a" makes... *g*

[unbelievable2.livejournal.com]

Excellent post.
We talked about this ep the other day, didn't we? As another example of the creepiness/sleaziness of the writing where the women are involved. I still find the writing overall rather objectionable, even allowing for the 70s, but I have always liked how the aftermath of the shooting in the flat is described.

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

Thank you! (And rats - I remember replying to you last night, and then not hitting "post" before I shut down my laptop. Let's try this again....!)

We did talk about this ep the other day! I was thinking as we did that it was going to come up in the next novelisation... *g* To be fair though, I remember finding Pros ahead of its time as far as treating women in the episodes, and it was a difference I noticed even when I was originally watching at 16/17. Bodie and Doyle were talked about as "new men" at the time. Okay so there's the occasional sleazy moment like this, but relatively few compared to shows like The Sweeney. And women were given roles as agents too, and allowed to do more than just scream when the villains came along. By our standards now it's not great (although there are some more current shows that it knocks the socks off - but that's the badness of those particular shows), but I guess it was part of growing up. I just wish we'd kept growing - we seem to have got stuck at a certain point, and it's only just lately that people have noticed... Bad us...

[heliophile-oxon.livejournal.com]

Oh, brilliant write-up! :-) Thank you!!

Interesting that the novelisation omits that stomach-turning ending when we're all apparently supposed to find it hilarious and great fun that our main characters are suddenly a bunch of peeping toms; unsurprisingly out of the entire series this is one of the scenes that comes closest to pulling me right out of the story. It feels very tacked-on and out of character to me (Bodie's racism and abrupt turnaround in Klansmen is another thing that just doesn't feel it fits, even within the confines of the show) - I mean of course it could be argued that it's actually in character, considering the attitudes of the time, and yet ... it comes across as far too cheap and tacky. Their attitudes we seen them show to the women they actually interact with seem much more true to their characters and to the times!
The only way that scene could "work" would be if they were all rather desperately playing it up, trying to show each other how one-of-the-lads they were *g*

I have to admit, the novelisations tend to disappoint compared to fanfic - there are some great bits in there, like that whole scene you cited, ending with
Quietly, well-understanding, Bodie said "Knock it off, Doyle. Any venom, direct it at him." The empty horizon leered down on them, hollow, green, mocking. "The long shot merchant who uses human beings for target practice." - now that really does sound spot on to me,
but overall ... there's fanfic which is so much better written!

Always interesting to see what stays in and what gets changed *g* Thanks for putting it all together for us!

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

Well thank you... *vbg*

Trouble is, I remember that lots of people did find it hilarious and great fun that the lads would use the rifle scope to spy on women in their own homes... I guess we were still growing up back then. Seems to take a lot longer than I was expecting when I was younger!

I do agree that it feels tacked on though - actually most of the "jokey" endings feel really tacked on to me, like the one where Cowley brings in the tea trolley and talks about having his cake and eating it too, and the one where Bodie eats the Swiss roll and Doyle asks about their expenses - suspect that's bad writing as much as the innate sleaziness of the time...

And I completely agree about Pros fanfic too - so much better than the novelisations! *g*

[macklingirl.livejournal.com]

Sorry, I couldn't finish it because RL was a hindrance. I'll step in as fast as I can, I promise.

[byslantedlight.livejournal.com]

I hope RL gets better soon, so that you can spend lush time reading Pros with us! *g*

[cyanne]

This is a fabulous writeup, and I love your screencaps. Completely agree that ending of the ep always makes me cringe, the book sounds much better. But there are lots of great scenes in this ep, as you've pointed out. Along with the way Doyle's voice breaks when he's telling Bodie he was afraid he would hit him, I love the scene in the restaurant and the way the Bodie just stands back with a look of, yep, that's my Ray, says "I'm with him" and then kicks the trolley (I hope I have the word right) at just the right time. I love it when theyr'e in sync like that.