Hotel Babylon
Season 4, episode 1
Aired: June 19, 2009 on BBC1
SYNOPSIS
Hotel Babylon is being shut down. To that end, baliff Juliet has taken over the hotel to oversee the closing.
Tony is working closely with the Chadhuri family for their “meeting party” (daughter Aishia is the victim of an arranged marriage to Omar, a “down on his luck” Bollywood star. Aishia’s father, Pramit, is throwing the party for the couple who are meeting for the first time). It will be the Babylon’s last big event.
Or will it? Since the the Chadhuri family are insanely wealthy, Tony decides to see if he can convince Pramit to buy the hotel. Unfortunately, the deal falls through when Tony spies a call girl leaving Omar’s suite. In a fit of conscience, Tony tells Aishia about the hooker, which wrecks the party (and the upcoming wedding, obviously).
Meanwhile, a terrorist bomb goes off in central London, leading to a total lockdown of the area. Babylon is then overrun with people needing food and shelter, and the staff rise to the challenge.
One of the people trapped at Babylon is Sam, Juliet’s ex-husband. He has become quite wealthy due to some good investments. When Tony’s offer to the Chadhuri family falls through, Sam buys the hotel just to save the staff’s jobs. However, the hotel becomes very important to Sam when his other wealth – mostly vested in stocks – disappears in the global downturn. Hotel Babylon is all that he has left.
Lastly, Tony’s meddling with the affairs of the the Chadhuri family is rewarded by the end of the episode. Tony had given Omar a liquid laxative in his sleep, causing him to miss an important audition. Omar storms up to Tony and makes a huge ass out of himself, allowing Pramit to see what a jerk his daughter almost married.
OTHER STUFF
– In the US, a bailiff is usually an armed police officer who maintains order in a court room. In the UK, there are six types of bailiff, one type of which is an employee of a private company that oversees enforcement for Magistrates’ Courts. These are basically “repo men” hired by the courts, although in a case like Hotel Babylon, a well-educated specialist would probably be used instead of a “meathead”.
MY THOUGHTS
Meh. While I get that this episode sets up everything for the upcoming season, I feel the series is sliding ever closer towards mediocrity. More and more often we’re seeing time-killing musical numbers and montages instead of the witty writing this show used to have. This is especially sad to me, because this is only the 25th episode of the series, and with such a rich setting – a luxury hotel in the heart of London – you’d think they wouldn’t need to rely on those crutches just yet.
I like how Sam was able to buy the hotel with a single phone call, and 5 hours later the deal was done. I know that writers often compress things for time (how much fun would it be for us to watch Sam’s lawyers doing paperwork for three episodes?) but… come on. It takes at least three weeks to close on a house… how long does it take to buy a five-star boutique hotel in London? More than 5 hours, I’m guessing.
Tony’s hallucinations were stupid.
As much as I enjoy everything there is to do with Emma Pierson (sigh!), she really doesn’t look very pregnant, does she? Her boobs are the same perky size they always were, and she still has the perfect hair and nails. She looks like she’s ready for a date, not bloated and eight months pregnant.