Ruminations From a Cluttered Mind

It seems a thankless business to be a Canadian television actor. They get practically no promotion. Check them out on Wikipedia or whatever, and you come up practically empty-handed. This is as opposed to Americans on fairly obscure shows like "Young Indiana Jones Chronicles" (1992-1993), or Japanese actors who have photos and height and weight stats available. And fanfic...There are Canadian-produced shows I enjoyed in years past, and you think I can find fanfic on any of these? No wonder so many Canadian actors head south to find work. Anyway, in support of my poor, unsung Adderly, I will write a fitting synopsis...

Imagine a Canadian version of James Bond. He's intellectually brilliant, physically gorgeous. He's fearless, athletic, has a killer sense of humor and an exemplary character as a human being. This is V.H. Adderly. He was top dog in the intelligence community, specializing in European covert operations during the deadly cold war era of the 1980's. One fateful night in East Berlin, he was captured by enemy agents who, in an attempt to extract intelligence secrets from him, smashed his left hand with a mace. He escaped, he survived, but his hand is useless and his career ruined. He was sent home to (presumably) Toronto and reassigned to Miscellaneous Affairs, the bottom rung of the entire agency. His boss is a snivelling, hen-pecked, petty beaurocrat named Greenspan and his only other office-mate is the over-qualified secretary, a Miss Moneypenny wannabe named Mona. It is utter humiliation. The only thing keeping him going is the dauntless hope that if he can only prove himself still useful to I.S.I. (International Sercurity and Intelligence), he'll be reassigned to Covert Operations. In the meantime, he keeps finding massive trouble buried in his trivial assignments (e.g. courier, movie theater usher, bodysitter), which endlessly aggravates his immediate supervisor as well as the director-general of I.S.I., Major Clack.

What keeps me watching Adderly, though, more than the context is the character of Adderly himself. He's so unabashedly hopeful he'll return to the place he was, even though it really does look unlikely. His basically good-humored, easy-going nature collides with his frustrations and regrets over his current situation with some really heart-rending results. There's subtle indications of his woundedness woven into the stories--the way he hides his non-functioning left hand in his jacket pocket, his flashbacks to the night he was tortured, the way he kicks his company-requisitioned car every time it dies out on him, his expression every time someone calls him "one-armed" or otherwise questions his competence. The only person who seems to understand him is Mona, who entertains romantic notions of Adderly, but really is like a sister, a best buddy, and sometimes a protege. She runs great interference with Mr. Greenspan, and she's not intimidated by Adderly's occasional moodiness.

There are so many fanfiction avenues that could be taken with this show. Did Adderly ever get back into covert operations? Did his relationship with Mona remain platonic, and was she okay with that? Did he ever really come to terms with his injury, and redirect his life in response to that? Did he get back together with his old flame, Jennifer, once she retired from covert operations after being held prisoner in Eastern Europe for 3 1/2 years? Did Mona ever get accepted into operative training school? So many ideas, so little time...