Melrose Place (1.02) "Nightingale" - Meet Caleb

Caleb Brewster is moving into the office, but not the building.

Last week, The CW debuted their reboot of the 90's camp fest Melrose Place. Being of a certain age, the thought makes me somewhat dizzy, because MP was a 90210 spinoff, which has also been rebooted, but in this new universe, may or may not be connected to the new Melrose.

Still, MP gave me my first regular gay in my life, Matt, played by Doug Savant. Back then, he had no love life, and his one on-screen kiss made such creative use of angles you didn’t actually see it.

This new version promises us a new kind of gay in Caleb Brewer, played by hottie Victor Webster. Last night we met Caleb. He’s definitely a new type of character: cocky, successful, assured, and somewhat amused by the people around him. But did the show treat him like they treated Matt?

From neutered on Melrose Place to emasculated on Desperate Housewives.

There’s a monstrously complex murder plot going on involving Sydney (Laura Leighton), who really should be glad they killed her, because HDTV is not for her. But fortunately that plot doesn’t matter to us at this point. Which is good, because it’s really, really dull and complicated.

Our entry point is Ella Simms, who’s a junior publicist. She enters her firm on a Friday morning to find the merger is more of a bloodbath, and everyone is packing their desks. Evidently the new owners sent an executive from New York, and he’s caused utter chaos in thirty minutes or less – better than Dominos.

If everybody at work has a box when you walk in, there might be trouble.

She marches up the stairs to the office, straightening her inappropriately snug dress and introduces herself to the new hotshot. He responds by handing her a box with bubble wrap and telling her to pack up her office. Ella tells him that though she never says this to a man, letting her go would be the biggest mistake of his life. Caleb, and his delivery said more than the words, responds “Oooh, I seriously doubt that.”

Caleb opens with subtle clues about himself.