1-14 Fish Scaler

Airdate: Feb. 3, 2017
Writer: John Turman (Story) , Craig O’Neill and David Slack (Teleplay)
Director: Eagle Egilsson
Guest Cast: Siobhan Fallon Hogan (Ilene Preskin) , Frank Whaley (Douglas Bishop) , Gary Weeks (Agent Tanner)
Michael Tow (Agent Cho) , Pat Dortch (FBI Director Ted Dryer) , Danielle Deadwyler (Brunette Agent)
Aina Dumlao (Andie Lee)


MacGyver and Jack must track down a corrupt FBI agent who has framed a man for murder while trying to cope
with the anxiety of getting their first performance review from Matty, their tough new boss.

Hm. Hm.

Not a bad episode, but it didn't really leave a lasting impression (yet). Might have to watch it again and think about it some more.

In the last scene, there is NO BACKGROUND MUSIC/NOISE for at least 30 seconds and it's amazing! (No, really!)

No offense to Keith Powers and the sound editors who sure work a lot to get the episodes ready within a few days; but it really changes the tone of the scene if there is just the actors and their voices for once.

What? I'm the SECOND post? I didn't even watch it live! I watched it at 5:00 AM MST on CBS.com.

Ok, the first scene horrified me until I saw that it was MacGyver messing with Bozer.

I'm liking Mattie Weber, but I'm thinking two things:

1. The last name of Weber is a nod to RDA's General Hospital character with former wife Heather Weber.
2. The idea for Mattie Weber is ripped off from NCIS Los Angeles with Linda Hunt's character.

But I'm still liking it. The Patricia Thornton thing just wasn't working. Mattie Weber will be a great addition.

Ok, the scene in Bishop's apartment where the FBI broke in, it became a contest of "who can yell the loudest and intimidate the other." The FBI won.

NITPICK! Kicking the gear shift on the steering wheel? What year was that car? In older models (at least 2005 and back, 2005 was the last time I had a car before I got my new car in 2016), you CANNOT kick the gear shift when the car is OFF. Well, maybe you could if you kicked hard enough, but it didn't look like MacGyver kicked it that hard. In newer models with the push button start, you CAN move the gear shift when car is off.

I really liked the plot of Bishop actually didn't kill that agent, the tape was messed with to look like he did. Wow, what a plot twist.

I'm still liking Classic MacGyver better, but I'm hanging with this show to see how long it lasts.....

Ok, anyone else?

I just watched it an hour ago and was wondering if it's so bad that no one has dared to comment on it yet

Also, was something else going on last night? Didn't see as many Twitter comments as during earlier episodes... will be interesting to see the ratings. I guess they won't be as high as for Episode 13.

I'm pretty sure the name Mattie Weber was a nod to Matt Weber from the original series (the guy who briefly replaced Pete Thornton when Pete got ousted from the Phoenix Foundation in "Early Retirement.") Aside from the name being extremely similar, both characters replaced a Thornton at Phoenix.

I really couldn't get into last night's episode. I'm not really sure why. There were decent scenes, but about halfway through it, I found my attention was gone, and I was focused more on playing games on my cell phone... never a good sign.

Just finished watching the episode and I liked it. I liked the fan alarm macgyverism, simple, neat and perfectly doable IRL.

Last nights episode had the highest total viewership for the hour.



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Who thinks Matty Webber's personality should have been Thornton's? In a lot of ways she reminded me of the original Pete, especially because she really seemed to care for MacGyver, whereas Patricia Thornton didn't really show that much emotion and care for the group. Sure, I can count some times wherein she seemed to care but Matty just seemed to work better for me.

But if they really go down with Matty being the real villain, just like the original Matt Webber from Early Retirement, then maybe they really WANT us to like her first so that not only the characters are played with, but even the viewers.

The evalution/kindergarten treatment was a bit over the top and with seasoned field professionals. Especially her lecture to Mac about Macgyverisms which was a bit tongue in cheek ( I know) but I found it a waste of breath/script. Other than that not a bad episode and the best, most creative set/lighting/filming to date. I think that Google Map Macgyverism was inspired by our own member "Miracle Mac"'s ongoing contributions to the location finding thread .... arguable, I know but you never know who's sponging off this forum and it would be hard to convince me otherwise!

I watched this episode again today because for some reason, I just couldn't pay attention the first time I watched it.

Overall, not bad.
I think the showrunners are learning from their mistakes. For example:

- Including this episode, we've now had a few episodes in which only Mac & Jack are out in the field, while Riley and Bozer stay behind at Phoenix. It definitely works better this way (I'd still love to see an episode with only Mac in the field, but I'm having some doubts that will ever happen.)

- In the past several episodes (including this one), Jack never really used his gun (he points it at people occasionally, but that's about it.) This is definitely than the early episodes when there were gunfights all the time.

- Although I'm still not crazy about Mattie Webber, she does have more personality than Pat Thornton did, and it was nice to see her being concerned about Mac's safety. The only thing that seemed a bit silly about that is when she told Mac that if he wants to keep relying on improvisation, he's going to have to prove to her that it work. Um, isn't the fact that he's been able to succeed in every mission by relying on improvisation proof that it works?

One thing that I think helped this episode a bit is the fact that it took place in Georgia, which is where the show is actually filmed, so they weren't as restricted as they are when they're trying to pretend that they're in a completely different place.

She said she thought he had been lucky up until now.

My question was how can he prove it works? She's just going to keep saying he got lucky.


They're back to the formula again. Opening, team briefing, mission, closure.

Hopefully they're going to mix it up more though? *fingers crossed*

I was laughing out loud about her statement; him having to prove that his way won't get him killed; and him messing up once means the word "improvise" will be deleted from his vocabulary.

If he messes up, he's dead anyway

I guess she gets her proof in the next episode anyway. According to the Press Release (if I remember correctly), they'll help solve her niece's murder?

Yeah, I wasn't thrilled about that. And it's actually worse, in a way, because the opening wasn't even an adventure, it was just a silly comedy bit with Bozer.
At least they skipped the obligatory "quirky" scene at Mac's house.

Not a bad episode!

My only real complaint, which I mentioned already was the scene were Matty talks down to Mac and his lame attempts of trying to avoid his evaluation, which I felt was stupid on Matty's part. Now I know original Mac kinda picked his battles, but he had some backbone and didn't have a problem butting heads with those in authority.

A good example was in Fraternity of Thieves were he basically was willing to walk out because he didn't like what was going on and wasn't afraid to tell off the Colonel (I forget his name). He also told off Cindy Finnigan in Obsessed because she was trying to give him sass. Pete had almost no control over Mac, despite being his "boss".

I could see original Mac having a field day with Matty Webber.

Other than that, I thought it was a good, fun episode. I give it a 3 out of 5.

Bonus: If Matty isn't a bad guy, I'm going to be sorely disappointed.

Overall, Mac in this shows seems a bit less able to take care of himself than the original did, and this is just one more example of it. Likewise, it always irks me a bit how we hardly ever see Mac driving himself anywhere. Instead, Jack is always driving him. It makes Mac look like a kid, and Jack seems like his chaperone.

At first, I thought that would be the direction they'd go, but now, I'm really not so sure. It seems like they're trying to make us like Mattie. We've seen more warmth from her than we did from Thornton. Or maybe that's just misdirection so they can catch us by surprise?

Reminder: There's a rerun of this Episode tonight!

Final ratings via Showbuzz

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Seriously? Are, or should I say: were you guys hoping that Matty was a bad guy? They just played that card with Patricia, two episodes ago. Why doing it again? Because Matt was a bad guy in Early Retirement? Then they would miss their mark.

Before I get into the episode, I'll take on Matty first. My first brief impression in the last episode wasn't great. The way she talked to Mac for starters was like: what is he? A toddler? Yet my impression totally changed with this episode. She showed almost immediately warmth by saying to call her simply Matty. She sets out her boundaries and has the kind of dry sarcastisc humor I like. And she seems willling to give Mac a fair chance. Yet her idea about Mac's improvisations seems a little odd and what is she going to do if it doesn't work out? Fire him if he's not dead? Despite that, she seems more likeable than Patricia.

The episode itself was better then the last one but not much. It was a nice touch Bishop was innocent of that murder after all but further, I don't really know what else to say about this episode. I was kinda hoping the Asian FBI-agent was Tzi Ma from Children of Light.

Not a bad episode but not great. The opening gambit was lamer then the last one though.

Here's the blog post by Rhett Allain - Technical Consultant for the Reboot - about the "MacHacks" used in this episode:
https://rhettallain.com/2019/02/02/macgyver...es-fish-scaler/

If you had like 10k worth of fish you were trying to send, I would go through the hassle of it, but for anything less not a chance. And even then I would drive them across that is still a procedure and a half then ship from there.