Dallas: J.R. Returns

Dallas: J.R. Returns
Directed by	Leonard Katzman
Produced by	Patrick Duffy (co-executive producer) Wayne A. Farlow (line producer) Larry Hagman (co-executive producer) Rich Heller (executive producer) Leonard Katzman (executive producer) Mitchell Wayne Katzman (associate producer) Lee Rich (executive producer)
Written by	Arthur Bernard Lewis (story) Leonard Katzman (teleplay)
Starring	Rosalind Allen Christopher Demetral Patrick Duffy Linda Gray Larry Hagman Omri Katz Deborah Kellner George Kennedy Ken Kercheval Audrey Landers Tracy Scoggins
Music by	Jerrold Immel
Cinematography	Don Reddy
Release date(s)	November 15, 1996
Running time	120 min
Country	United States
Language	English

Dallas: J.R. Returns is the first of the two Dallas reunion movies to air after the series went off the air.^[1] It originally aired on CBS on November 15, 1996, and recently was rerun as part of TV Land's salute to 50 years of Warner Bros. Television.

Plot

The cliffhanger ending of the series finale is resolved in the opening minutes of the movie. It turns out that the gunshot J.R. Ewing fired was at the mirror, not himself (although no glass was heard smashing). It is also revealed that J.R. has quit drinking, and would usually be seen sipping coffee or iced tea instead.

Several years later, J.R. is in Europe, while Bobby Ewing lives at Southfork alone with his son Christopher, happily out of the oil business, and Cliff Barnes is still the president of Ewing Oil, relishing the fact that he finally beat J.R.

However, things aren't as cheery as they may seem. Bobby, conscious of the fact that Southfork, once full of family, is now all but empty, considers selling it. Meanwhile Cliff, weary of the oil business, decides that after all the trouble he and J.R. went through during their rivalry, he wants to try to regain whatever he lost in it. Cliff comes to the conclusion that the best way to do so is to sell Ewing Oil to Weststar Oil, a giant Oil conglomerate headed by J.R.'s other nemesis, Carter McKay. McKay promises that upon completion of the deal, Weststar will completely incorporate Ewing Oil's assets into his company, and Ewing Oil will permanently cease to exist. J.R. hears this and decides that he will try to regain his position. He tries to appeal to Bobby to get back in business together and buy Ewing Oil back, but is rebuffed. J.R. arranges for Afton to be put in a sanitarium so Cliff can't find her.

After a surprise trip to Ewing Oil where he taunts a rattled Cliff with his plan, J.R. learns of a provision in Jock Ewing's will where Jock left J.R.'s son, John Ross, stock in computer company Cyberbyte, which has a total value of $200,000,000. The provision states that John Ross is only to receive this stock upon the death of his father. However, since John Ross is living with Sue Ellen (his mother) in Europe and is unaware of his inheritance from his grandfather, J.R. decides that he's going to sell some of this stock and buy up shares to take over Weststar, which is about to absorb "his" company. He sells the entire stock portfolio, which he put up as collateral for a loan in the same amount, and buys a controlling stake in Weststar Oil. To cover his tracks, J.R. rebuys the stock and reinstates the provision, saying that if anyone found out about the incident he would just claim that they were released to John Ross Ewing, Jr. (J.R.) instead of his son (full name John Ross Ewing III) in a clerical error.

To set this in motion, he fakes his own death in a car accident with help from several people, and has his attorney "accidentally" put the shares in his name instead of his son's. Thinking that J.R. really has died, Bobby holds a memorial service at Southfork, with John Ross and Sue Ellen attending and Cliff in quiet celebration, where he believes he's won the ultimate victory over J.R....until J.R. surprisingly returns to Southfork. He falsely claims to have been kidnapped and managed an escape. Sly is disgusted by all this and resigns as J.R's assistant.

In the final moments of the show, J.R. is now the majority shareholder in Weststar, and uses that clout to force McKay to back out of buying Ewing Oil. McKay says that Cliff sold Ewing oil to someone else already. After being sent a letter notifying him of his daughter's whereabouts, Cliff finally decided finding his family was more important than beating J.R., but Bobby figured out a plan so that Cliff could have both, and agreed to buy Ewing Oil. Bobby later realized that he was tricked back into the oil business by J.R. who knew getting Bobby off Southfork would force him not to sell. J.R., on a roll, maneuvered the board to remove McKay as Chairman of Weststar and for himself to take his place.

Upon revealing this Bobby is not happy so he sells half of the company to his new partner, Sue Ellen Ewing. JR appears shocked and crushed. Bobby, Sue Ellen, and Cliff, all believe they pulled one more over on old JR. A drunken and bitter Sly had tipped off Sue Ellen that J.R. faked his own death. Sue Ellen suspected this all along and was neither surprised or even that angry about it, but still felt that J.R needed to be taught a lesson. Cliff meanwhile greets Afton and Pamela outside the sanitarium after Afton was released and they leave to finally be a family.

In the last scene, John Ross asks JR why he is smiling even though he lost Ewing Oil to Bobby and Sue Ellen. So JR points a few things out. Bobby is back in the oil business and is no longer going to sell Southfork. Ewing Oil is back in Ewing hands. JR is Chairman of the Board of Weststar Oil. Sue Ellen is back at Southfork to stay, and John Ross will remain in Dallas to learn the oil business from JR. At this point, John Ross turns to JR, and realizes his father may have actually planned everything to work out this way from the start. JR's last words were (along with his trademark grin) "You see John Ross? You're learning already."

Cast of characters

Main cast

(in alphabetical order)

Rosalind Allen as Julia Cunningham

Christopher Demetral as Christopher Ewing

Patrick Duffy as Bobby Ewing

Linda Gray as Sue Ellen Ewing

Larry Hagman as J.R. Ewing

Omri Katz as John Ross Ewing III

Deborah Kellner as Pamela Rebecca Cooper

George Kennedy as Carter McKay

Ken Kercheval as Cliff Barnes

Audrey Landers as Afton Cooper

Tracy Scoggins as Anita Smithfield

Additional cast

Deborah Rennard as Sylvia "Sly" Lovegren

George O. Petrie as Harv Smithfield

DVD Release

Warner Home Video is releasing Dallas: J.R. Returns on DVD April 12, 2011 on Dallas: The Movie Collection 2-disc set.^[2]

References

1. ^ "J.R. REPRISES THAT OL' 'DALLAS' MALICE". The New York Daily News. November 14, 1996. http://www.nydailynews.com/archives/entertainment/1996/11/14/1996-11-14_j_r__reprises_that_ol___dall.html. Retrieved 2010-08-31. 
2. ^ [1]

External links

• Dallas: J.R. Returns at the Internet Movie Database