The Bridge 2.9-10: Deaths and Close To

A scalding, concrete stripping last two episodes of The Bridge - 2.9 and 2.10 - featuring the deaths and brushes with death of the following major characters -

• Charlotte - dead - shot by Fausto's men in the house last week.  She was a strong character in the first season, but was a shadow of herself in season two.   Waste of a good actress, Annabeth Gish, who was standout in Brotherhood.
• DEA agent McKenzie - shot by Fausto's men in the same house last week.  Not a particularly likable but a strong character.   And another waste of acting talent - Abraham Benrubi, memorable in ER.
• Hank - close to death, but hanging on, after being shot in that same house last week.   Hank is arguably the third most important character on the show - after Marco and Sonya - or maybe tied for third with Fausto.   He now looks likely survive, in the hands of Sonya and Marco after a dramatic car interception, but you never know.   I'd hate to see him go, if the show's renewed.
• Eleanor - shot, again, in the house - not that to close to death, but you have to admire her recovery after she lost a lot of blood from a wound.   The woman even manages to walk away after her car is rammed, and only collapses when Sonya tells her to get down on the ground. Her survival is testament to the sheer survival power of deep, inchoate evil.

Sonya was rescued last week from what could have been death, but, again, her death would leave a season three bereft of one of the central characters on the show, and a compelling one at that. Probably the nicest moment in the tonight's episode is when she thanks Marco for saving her.   Just two weeks ago, she was disgusted with both Hank and Marco.  Now she's drawing close again to both of them.  Credit regarding Hank goes to Fausto's bullets.

Missing in action - once again - are Eva and Linder.   But the reporters are playing a bigger role, which is good to see.   Just two more episodes left this season - I'd definitely be up for watching a third.

See also The Bridge 2.1: What Motivates Sonya? ... The Bridge 2.2: First-Class Serial Killer ... The Bridge 2.3: Marco's Dilemma ... The Bridge 2.4: Marco Redeemed and Mr. Writ Large ... The Bridge 2.5: The Soul of the Not-Killer ... The Bridge 2.7: Major Business ... The Bridge 2.8: Parallel Stories

And see also The Bridge Opens Brooding and Valent ... The Bridge 1.2: A Tale of Two Beds ... The Bridge 1.6: Revelations ... The Bridge 1.7: A Killer and a Reluctant Professor ... The Bridge 1.8: Some Dark Poetic Justice ... The Bridge 1.9: Trade-Off ... The Bridge 1.10: Charlotte's Evolution ... The Bridge 1.11: Put to the Test ... The Bridge Season 1 Finale: Marco Joins Mackey and Agnew

 
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The Bridge Opens Brooding and Valent

A good opening of The Bridge on FX tonight, with its story of a body stretched out dead across the Juarez - El Paso border on the bridge between Mexico and the US, making it a case in the jurisdiction of both countries and their police, except it turns out to be two bodies - the upper torso of one woman and the lower torso of another - which makes the murder case even more interesting.

Demian Bichir - of Esteban fame on Weeds - plays the Mexican detective Marco Ruiz, and he does it with customary style.  When an El Paso detective wishes him "buenos dias," he responds with "howdy partner" in a perfect Texan accent.   He has hands full not only with his lethargic boss in Juarez but his Amercian counterpart Sonya North, played by Diane Kruger.

Sonya's a strange piece of work for a detective - by the book, wound tight, but with the same kind of irrepressible energy as Barbara Havers on the British Inspector Linley Mysteries (how's that for a stretch).   I'm not sure if I like her, but based on the first episode she may be the most memorably peculiar female detective to come along on television since Sarah Linden in The Killing.

Speaking of which, The Bridge feels to some extent like a southern version of The Killing, which takes place in Seattle.   But what The Bridge also has going for it is its Mexican component, and the obvious relevance of this series to the immigration issues that currently beset our country (because of Republican intransigence, but I'll try to keep politics out of this).

Ted Levine of the late great Monk is back as police lieutenant (ok, he was a captain on Monk), and Annabeth Gish from Brotherhood lends her appeal and intensity as someone whose husband drops dead after he tells her he wants out of their marriage and who must have something to do with the murders.

Brooding, smoky, philosophic, politically valent - The Bridge may be just the thing for a hot summer's evening.

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Person of Interest 1.5: Potentials

Person of Interest is really beginning to come into its own, and I'm beginning to really enjoy it.  In tonight's episode 1. 5 we find that -

• Once again, Reese is fallible - that is, he's not a superhero who can always get the better of any number of bad guys whatever the fight.  A few episodes ago, he got knocked through a window or a door (he did pretty quickly recover).  Tonight he arrives just as a judge's son is being kidnapped, does his best to stop a team of cold killers, but gets stopped by a shot of something in the shoulder.  This makes him more appealing as a character - he's only human, albeit one knows how to shoot, punch, etc. with usually devastating impact.
• Reese is grateful for the job Finch has given him.  He was none too happy about it at first, and he's gradually warmed up to it over the past few episodes.  I like evolutions of characters in a given season.
• Reese and Finch may have an ally they can call upon in some future episode - Judge Samuel Gates (played by David Costabile, who had very memorable runs in both Breaking Bad and Damages).   Makes me hope that we indeed see more of the judge in Person of Interest.

About the only thread that I don't like much in this series is the local cop story.   Detective Fusco (played by Kevin Chapman, who was outstanding in Brotherhood) is a bore.   And Detective Carter (played by Taraji Henson) is alright.  But their stories don't really add much to the central Reese and Finch story, other than the constant danger that Reese and Finch, especially Reese, will be discovered and arrested.   But until this becomes a serious factor in the series, Carter's role is little more than a distraction from the main plot line.  I'd say the writers need to correct this, sooner not later.

But the overall theme of trying to stop murders before they happen remains compelling, and with Reese and Finch continuing to develop in unexpected ways, Person of Interest has a lot of potential.

See also Person of Interest of Interest  ... Person of Interest 1.2:  Reese and Finch

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The Plot to Save Socrates


"challenging fun" - Entertainment Weekly

"a Da Vinci-esque thriller" - New York Daily News

"Sierra Waters is sexy as hell" - curled up with a good book

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Prime Suspect

Prime Suspect on NBC has been getting some excellent press - as has its star, Maria Bello as NYPD Det. Jane Timoney - and it's all deserved.   Timoney is a sassy, take-no-guff, courageous, bright, fearless police woman who may be the best police woman on television since ... well, Angie Dickinson as Police Woman.

And the supporting cast is stellar, too.  Kirk Acevedo (from Fringe) as Det. Calderon, Brian F. O'Byrne (from Brotherhood and Flashforward), Kenny Johnson (Lem from The Shield!) as Jane's love, and Aidan Quinn (Legends of the Fall) as Jane's boss all make memorable contributions to the series and every scene they're in.

Prime Suspect was a long running show over in England - the NBC series is a new adaptation - and said to have influenced The Closer, which also features a high-powered woman steering a course in a police department dominated by men.   But Brenda Leigh Johnson on The Closer, though tough enough, is no match for Jane Timoney, who mixes it up with the best of them, and gives chase to bad guys twice her size.  (We're going to Netflix the British series.)

It's also good to see Peter Berg involved in the production of another show after Friday Night Lights, and set so palpably in the streets of New York.   With Law and Order down to one series, and Blue Bloods a little too formulaic for my tastes, New York's primed for a new, hard-hitting cop show.

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The Plot to Save Socrates

"challenging fun" - Entertainment Weekly

"a Da Vinci-esque thriller" - New York Daily News

"Sierra Waters is sexy as hell" - curled up with a good book

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House 6.10 Back in Business with Good Humor and Guest Stars

Good to see House back in play in episode 6.10 on Fox on Monday.  It was a light House, at least as far as major characters are concerned.   Wilson's trying to hook-up with attractive neighbor Nora, who demurs because she thinks he and House, living together as they do, are gay.  House exploits this to try to nail Nora on his own, but Wilson's poignant proposal to House when House and Nora are on a date blows this for House.  Meanwhile, Taub, Thirteen, and Chase make Foreman think he's earning less than they are; he turns this into a double fake-out of guilting them to each contribute a little to his salary, as the price for his not leaving for another job, which he didn't intend to do in the first place.

There was good guest star power in this episode.   It was good to see Sasha Alexander as Nora - I liked her even better in this exuberant role than the too-serious Kate in NCIS.   And Ethan Emby - who played Declan, the troubled detective, in the late, lamented Brotherhood - was good to see as a cop undercover with a drug ring and a disease that even House can't cure.

House continues to be one of the most original, riveting shows on television.


5-min podcast review of House

See also House Reborn in Season Six? ... 6.2: The Gang is Back and Fractured ... 6.3: The Saving Hitler Quandary ... 6.4: Diagnosis vs. Karma ... 6.5 Getting Better ... 6.6 House Around the Bases ... Four's a Crowd on House 6.7 ... House 6.8 and the Reverse of Flowers for Algernon ... House 6.9: Wilson

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The Plot to Save Socrates




"challenging fun" - Entertainment Weekly

"a Da Vinci-esque thriller" - New York Daily News

"Sierra Waters is sexy as hell" - curled up with a good book 

The New Golden Age of Television Roars Back

Have you seen Heather Havrilesky's dyspeptic The year the small screen fell flat in Salon, subtitled "Lackluster pilots, slumping sophomore shows and the devolution of the serial drama. The golden age of TV suddenly looked tarnished in 2008."

Here's the picture she paints ...

2008 not only marked one of the worst years of TV in the last decade, but all of the momentum and promise of the past few years seemed to vanish in a haze of crappy, unoriginal new programming, lackluster sophomore shows, flaccid sitcoms and pointless cable comedies.

Some bloggers agree with this, at least in part. The Flaming Nose, for example, cites Dexter, Mad Men, and True Blood as exceptions to Havrilesky's screed, but calls it nonetheless "well reasoned".

But I don't know what picture, or screen, Havrilesky or the Flaming Nose have been looking at.

The past year - 2008 - brought us one of the best seasons of Lost, a cut-throat knock-down legal thriller in Damages, the best episodes ever shown of Law and Order: Criminal Intent, outstanding seasons indeed of Dexter and Brotherhood on Showtime, and The Wire, In Treatment, John Adams, and, yes, True Blood on HBO and Mad Men on AMC, to name just a few.

And here's what we have in store this and next month of 2009: the debuts of new seasons of 24 (January 10-11) and Lost (January 21) - among the top shows ever to have been on television - as well as Battlestar Galactica (January 16), Big Love (January 18), and Damages (January 7), plus the resumption of Fringe (January 20), Life on Mars (January 28), Heroes (February 2), and The Sarah Connor Chronicles (February 13). And, come to think of it, of The Unit (January 4), The Closer (January 26), and Bones (January 15) - none of which I've yet reviewed here on Infinite Regress (as I have all the others), because I've not yet thoroughly caught up with the earlier parts of the current season, because they're not yet on DVD, and I prefer watching these great shows on my television not computer screen.

And, while we're at it, there's also The L Word, which is coming back for its final season on January 18, and I reviewed the first four episodes of here last week. Another fine show.

So, is the new golden age of television - as I called it in an op-ed in Newsday in July 2006 - "tarnished"? Only if you're wearing some kind of rust-colored glasses...

Politics in Brotherhood Season 3 Finale Even More Intense than in Illinois

I don't know whether Brotherhood will be coming back for another season - I surely hope that it does - but tonight's finale tied up a lot of loose ends, even as it left a lot more to be told.

Tommy is now Speaker of the House. His first shrewd gambit to get there was turning in and on Kilpatrick and Donatello, certainly not the most immoral thing to do, given that the bribe money that passed between the two, and Tommy delivered, was not Tommy's idea. But Declan got in the way of Tommy's plan, and talked Kilpatrick into turning on Tommy.... Fortunately for Tommy, Freddie was already willing to do what was necessary, and kill Kilpatrick before any further damage was done. Donatello, in the hospital with a heart attack and stroke, may not survive too much longer in any event.

So Tommy becomes Speaker, and he's beholden to Freddie for killing Kirkpatrick, and in fact giving Freddie the go ahead to that. Freddie made it look like a suicide, so the Feds are not likely to suspect, though Declan might, and Tommy knows.

And where do we stand with all of this? Well, I think Freddie (well played by Kevin Chapman) was a much more interesting character this year than in the first two seasons, and he was something close to, if not heroic tonight, at least stepping up and doing what he needed to do. It was Declan's fault, after all, that Tommy's first plan fell through, which would have had Kilpatrick going to prison not being killed. As I said last week, I don't like Declan one bit, and I'm glad his plan to ruin Tommy was foiled. And Tommy ... well, his hands were always a little dirty, and now they are even more so, but he, too, did what was necessary to survive.

Michael, who was out of control most of the episode, did an even more noble thing in the end, enabling not only himself but Tommy and his whole family to survive. The scene when Tommy tells Michael he has to go, and Michael understands, was one of the best in the series.

Colin and Kath didn't work out - no real surprise - but Michael's gone when they both get back to Providence, separately. Michael puts in a call to Rose, from a public phone from somewhere out of town, to tell her he's ok. So, he leaves town, just as the series began with his coming back to Providence after so many years.

A fitting ending for this season, but I hope not for this powerhouse series, which as I've said in previous reviews this year has become more relevant than ever, especially given the unfolding events in Illinois.

See also: The Caffees and Blago in Brotherhood ... Brotherhood Is Back for a Third Season, and Better Than Ever

And from Season 2: Checking in Brotherhood Season 2 Episode 6: The Simmering Stu and Episode 9: The Anti-Thanksgiving Gem ... Season 2 Finale

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The Plot to Save Socrates

"challenging fun" - Entertainment Weekly

"a Da Vinci-esque thriller" - New York Daily News

"Sierra Waters is sexy as hell" - curled up with a good book

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The Caffees and Blago in Brotherhood

Michael Caffee continues to be admirably reliable in blasting away those who push him too far in his business. He started this season of Brotherhood killing US Attorney Ellis Franklin when Franklin squeezed him just a little too much, and in Episode 3.7 he let Nozzoli have it.

But it wasn't a clean kill - a picnicking family saw the shooting - and it looked in the coming attractions as if Nozzoli wasn't killed, even though Michael shot him three times.

And there remains the harrowing question of what Michael is going to do about Kath and Colin, now that the helpful FBI has shown him the picture of the two of them kissing. My prediction: I can't quite see Michael killing a member of his family, or Kath, as furious as Michael is. Michael has always been protective of his family, even when he has reason not to. Of course, he did beat Colin, so anything is possible ...

The other big question is what's going to happen with Tommy. There are two parts to this -

1. What will Tommy do? With the Speaker in the hospital with a serious heart attack, and Tommy a very possible replacement - will he resist stepping up? Eileen certainly doesn't want that. But I think Tommy has politics inescapably in his blood.

2. Will Declan bring Tommy down? I'll tell you: I really don't like Declan. Fine acting by Ethan Embry, but the character really bothers me. He's a loser with his wife, I don't know what he really wants as far as being a good detective. If anyone goes down, I would rather it be Declan. Maybe Michael will put Declan out of his misery.

This season of the Brotherhood has really been a fine chess match, and, as fate would have it, ever closer to politics in our real world. Gov. Blagojevich of Illinois would fit perfectly in the Rhode Island of Brotherhood.

Hey, bring Blago on for a cameo next season, if he's not locked away. He wouldn't hold a candle to Jason Clarke as Tommy Caffee, and Jason Isaacs as Michael is in an Emmy-deserving class of his own, but Blago in black would work just fine in some political wheeling and dealing scene, and, hey, it's cable, so they wouldn't have to bleep his language.

See also: Politics in Brotherhood Season 3 Finale Even More Intense than in Illinois ... Brotherhood Is Back for a Third Season, and Better Than Ever

And from Season 2: Checking in Brotherhood Season 2 Episode 6: The Simmering Stu and Episode 9: The Anti-Thanksgiving Gem ... Season 2 Finale

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The Plot to Save Socrates

"challenging fun" - Entertainment Weekly

"a Da Vinci-esque thriller" - New York Daily News

"Sierra Waters is sexy as hell" - curled up with a good book

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Brotherhood is Back for Third Season - Better than Ever

Brotherhood is back for its third season on Showtime, and if the first two episodes are any indication, this will be a faster, sharper, more powerful Brotherhood than what we saw in the first two seasons - less talk, more conflict and payoff, which could make this the best season of Brotherhood so far.

My favorite character has always been "bad" brother Michael Caffee, harrowingly and reassuringly played by Jason Isaacs, probably best as known in his performance Lucius Malfoy in the Harry Potter movies. Taking nothing away from Lucius, I find Michael Caffee even more memorable. You can count on him to only be pushed so far, and, then, whatever the consequences, lash out without warning and kill the person who was doing the pushing. Last year it was that horrible hit man. This year, it's the Federal prosecutor. The killings are, as I say, harrowing yet satisfying, because they give just deserts in a world in which people usually get away with all kinds of things.

Michael was nearly beaten to death at the end of the first season, and this figured in the second and now the third season. The second season was weakened, in my view, but making Michael too much the possible basket case from the beating. But it ended with "good" brother Tommy, well played by Jason Clarke, surprisingly revealing to Michael that Tommy knew Michael was about to be attacked, but did nothing to warn him. This year, Michael's not talking to Tommy because of that - refuses to be in the same room with him - but the other reliable thing about Michael is the love he has for his family, so I'm thinking it's just a matter of time until most or all is forgiven.

Tommy has some neat political dealings in the first two episodes of Season 3. One of the real joys of Brotherhood is the backroom political wheelings and dealings we see - in one sense, like The West Wing, but much more gritty and closer to crime because it's taking place on a state and local level.

And, beginning in Season 2, Tommy wasn't the only family Michael needed to live and work with. His cousin Colin - well-played by Brian F. O'Byrne - has become Michael's right-hand man. But it's only a matter of time until Michael finds out that Colin and Kath are falling in love, and the big question about that land mine is whether Michael will view that as an attack on him or a blessing...

Declan (Ethan Embry), Freddie (Kevin Chapman), Eileen (Annabeth Gish), and Mary Rose (Fionnula Flanagan - now of Lost fame) are all back in fine form, and it was good seeing Freddie sell some cars.

The timing is perfect for a show about backroom politics, and I'm thinking this season will be the breakout for Brotherhood.

See also Checking in Brotherhood Season 2 Episode 6: The Simmering Stu and Episode 9: The Anti-Thanksgiving Gem ... Season 2 Finale

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The Plot to Save Socrates

"challenging fun" - Entertainment Weekly

"a Da Vinci-esque thriller" - New York Daily News

"Sierra Waters is sexy as hell" - curled up with a good book

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Lost 4.5: Desmond 1 and Desmond 2: The Exquisite Loops of Time Travel

Time travel is a wonderful, exquisite, exasperating, paradoxical thing. It tugs at the very edges of our understanding. It is shimmering and fragile, and yet somehow embodies the most profoundly imaginable possibilities in the cosmos. It is exceedingly hard to do well - to tell a time travel story that doesn't flinch from the paradoxes, that embraces them, yet still tells us a story we can (mostly) understand.

Journeyman on NBC last year rose to the occasion once, in its splendid episode before the finale. Journeyman was a time travel series.

Lost was never really about time travel. But its Desmond story - a man who sees the future - certainly could have been a time travel story. I wrote in my reviews here last year that time travel might well explain what was going on with Desmond, and those he touched.

Tonight, in Episode 5, Lost took that path - or, actually, made good that path which it had already been on its way to building, from the time Desmond unaccountably ran into Jack on the steps of the stadium well before the flight of Oceanic 815, to the little experiment with time pieces we saw Faraday doing on the island a few weeks ago. Actually, Lost did better than make good - it made great, genius, golden television tonight. Great for the episode, great for the series.

Here, for what it's worth, is my take on what we learned in tonight's show. I'm sure there will be other explanations.

Let's think of the Desmond we saw before tonight's episode as Desmond 1 - with one exception which I'll get to, shortly. Desmond 1 breaks up with Penny. He travels around the world, sees Jack on the steps of the stadium (this is the exception to Desmond 1, as I'll explain below), winds up in the hatch on the island. He loves Penny now, and wants to get back to her. The hatch blows, exposing Desmond to intense radiation. He's still Desmond 1, but he begins to have visions of the future.

In one of the flashbacks last year, in Episode 3.8, Desmond has a conversation with Ms. Hawking (played by the always-memorable Fionnula Flanagan, also seen on Brotherhood). She apparently has knowledge of Desmond and his future which he and we did not yet have at the time of that episode. This was likely the second reference to Desmond 2 (and I'll get to the first in a few paragraphs).

Desmond 1 continues on the island, plays the crucial role in getting Charlie to the Looking Glass, etc. The last we see of Desmond 1 is when he is on board the helicopter with Sayid before it goes off course.

We learn tonight that electromagnetic fields do strange things to people's perception of time. The hatch explosion radiation gave Desmond visions of the future. The strange properties of space/time around the island - in part natural, in part the result of some technology - boost Desmond's temporal powers, to the point that his consciousness is able to instantly, uncontrollably travel through time.

This turns him into Desmond 2. This Desmond first emerges and travels from the helicopter off the island to Desmond 1 back in an army camp. But once the temporal connection is made between future Desmond 2 and past Desmond 1, the original Desmond - Desmond 1 - in that training camp becomes Desmond 2.

Desmond 2 in the past, informed by Desmond 2 in his future (our present - what we're seeing on our television screen) goes to see Faraday in Oxford, and Penny in London. The instant he sees them, and gives them any information from the future, they, too, are turned into Faraday 2 and Penny 2.

The heart-warming part of this story is that Penny 2 comes to serve as Desmond 2's "constant," and Desmond 2 comes to serve as Faraday's. This saves their lives. (As we learn from the unfortunate Minkowski, having your mind moving around in time can otherwise be fatal.)

And here's something else: I've long been citing Desmond's running into Jack on the steps, in the first episode of Season 2, as one of the inexplicable coincidences which may hold the keys to what is really going on in Lost. What are the odds of Desmond having run into Jack, before Desmond wound up in the hatch on an island on which Jack crashed?

All but nil.

But now we have a rational explanation. It was not coincidence. Desmond spoke to Jack the way he did on those steps, and went to meet him there in first place, because Desmond 2 needed to talk to Jack - Desmond 2, who of course already knew everything about Jack and the island, because Desmond 2 had lived through it. Just as Desmond 2 was in touch with his earlier self in the army camp, in Oxford, in London, tonight, so Desmond 2 was in touch with his earlier self before that meeting with Jack at the stadium.

And why did Desmond need to meet and speak to Jack?

Because Desmond 2 knew how crucial Jack would be in helping Desmond get off the island, and back in touch with Penny...

See also...

Further Questions about Lost 4.4: Jack and Aaron, Kate and Sawyer

1. Lost's Back Full Paradoxical Blast 4.1 ... 4.2: Five Flashbacks and Three Rational Explanations ... 4.3: Thirty Minutes and Big Ben ... 4.4 Kate and ... ... 4.6 The True Nature of Ben ... 4.7 Flash Both Ways ... 4.8 Michael and Alex ... 4.9 Daughters, Rules, and Some Truth about Ben ... 4.10: Almost a Dream Come True ... 4.11 Unlocking Locke


and

2. More Thoughts On Lost 4.1: Those Who Went with Hurley and Those Who Stayed with Jack and Two More Points about Lost 4.1


special 10-minute podcast of this Lost review and analysis

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The Plot to Save Socrates

"challenging fun" - Entertainment Weekly

"a Da Vinci-esque thriller" - New York Daily News

"Sierra Waters is sexy as hell" - curled up with a good book

more about The Plot to Save Socrates and its time travel ...





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Brotherhood Season 2 Finale

Well, Brotherhood's Season 2 finale was a lot like the entire Season 2: satisfying, very satisfying, but not great. And not as strong, overall or finale-wise, as Season 1.

Still, it was satisfying, as I've said, and that's something, more than something. Brotherhood is unique in its treatment of politics, and its mix of political with family and crime, on television, and certainly deserves to be renewed.

Lots of situations were resolved in this finale. Judd Fitzgerald (so well played by Len Cariou) is put to rest. So is Tommy's relationship with his girlfriend - by Eileen. Declan and his wife may finally be edging back together, and Rose and Colin are establishing a good relationship.

And one relationship is finally being rent asunder. Tommy is understandably furious about Michael - whose public gun play, even though not his fault, cost Tommy a chance to become Speaker. In a telling last scene, Tommy's tells Michael that Tommy knew that Freddie had ordered a hit on Tommy last year - the hit that didn't take place, because Declan intervened with his own cowardly assault.

Michael is shaken - as we've never seen him before, with Tommy.

I'd like to see how that is resolved. Let's hope Showtime gives Brotherhood another season.

And here's an interesting thing: now that I've written this review, I think I like the finale even more. It may not be great, but in its own way is close to it. And the Thanksgiving episode, and the election episode, were flat-out great.

And that's something, too.

See also Checking in Brotherhood Season 2 Episode 6: The Simmering Stu and Episode 9: The Anti-Thanksgiving Gem

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The Plot to Save Socrates

"challenging fun" - Entertainment Weekly

"a Da Vinci-esque thriller" - New York Daily News

"Sierra Waters is sexy as hell" - curled up with a good book

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Brotherhood Season 2 Episode 9: The Anti-Thanksgiving Gem

I was thinking that this second season of Brotherhood has been a little more lumpy than the first - still very enjoyable but not as powerful, well-plotted, and original as last year - until tonight.

In many ways, tonight's Episode 9 om Showtime was a perfect standalone, anti-Thanksgiving story. Nobody gets what he or she wants, but some got it worse than others. The turkey never makes to the table at the Caffee house. I wasn't sure which one, because Rose wasn't there - she was going for a tryst with an old flame in the Biltmore. That doesn't quite work the way she wanted, at first - the gent isn't senile, but ...

Meanwhile, Tommy and Michael of course argue about MaryRose's smoking weed (the coming attractions made too big a deal of this), and Eileen's none too happy about this either. But she and Tommy (and Michael and Tommy) do draw closer at the end. Poor Colin gets just about nothing - no American Thanksgiving, which he's seen from afar and wanted to be part of for years - because Michael sends Colin out to do some very important business....

Which brings us to the way the plot was moved surprisingly forward, tonight - but, first, I don't think I've seen as good an anti-holiday show as this in years, if ever. Mary Kate (Tommy and Michael's sister) has a great monologue in which she details the universal aggravations of Thanksgiving and what it's supposed to do but often does not.

Colin doesn't hear it, because he's out on Michael's business, as I've said. Which is ...

Well, Freddie Cork and Marty Trio do have a fine Thanksgiving, at least for the most part. They're in a cottage on the bay, Freddie with his wife and Marty with his lover. The Fed agent is doing this for them because they will spill their guts tomorrow about Michael and Tommy and the Mayor, and the idea is that all three will be sent off packing to prison and disgrace.

Except, Colin has some business to conduct this Thanksgiving, which not only gets in the way of his enjoying a proper family Thanksgiving, but will put a crimp in at least part of the Fed plan to snare the Caffees.

Brotherhood tonight was about as well-crafted as it gets. A brooding, profound masterpiece of an episode which I predict will become a television classic.

And next week's the finale.

See also Checking in Brotherhood Season 2 Episode 6: The Simmering Stu and Episode 10: Finale

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The Plot to Save Socrates

"challenging fun" - Entertainment Weekly

"a Da Vinci-esque thriller" - New York Daily News

"Sierra Waters is sexy as hell" - curled up with a good book


Read the first chapter of The Plot to Save Socrates .... FREE!

Checking In On Brotherhood: Season 2, Episode 6: The Simmering Stew

The second season of Brotherhood on Showtime has been progressing well. Perhaps a little quieter than the first season, but building and percolating as the fine Irish stew of politics and crime in Rhode Island that it is.

Tommy's mistress Dana - well played by Janel Moloney - is an interesting, complex character. Tommy enjoys her well enough, but her off-the-cuff, cutting comments about the nature of their relationship keep Tommy from getting too close. And when she at last ventures a little real affection for Tommy, he pulls back ... and back to Eileen.

I think Tommy (Jason Clarke is excellent) and Eileen (so is Annabeth Gish) belong together, so I'm glad to see this. But I have feeling we may find before too long that Dana is pregnant. (No spoiler here, just a hunch - on the other hand, maybe that's too obvious.)

But it's good that Tommy and Eileen are pulling closer, with the election right around the corner, and the Mayor showing his true, backstabbing colors.

Tommy and brother Michael (can't ask for anything more in an actor than the quiet, explosive power of Jason Isaacs) are getting along better than ever, also. I'm delighted to see Michael depose his insufferable gangster boss Freddie (Kevin Chapman). But playing ball with the police like this is playing with fire, especially when Declan (Ethan Embry) is in the picture. If Michael ever finds what Declan did to him last year...

The cousin Colin (Brian F. O'Byrne) is definitely an asset to the show as well to Michael (and my guess would be Tommy, too, if need be). And Michael will no doubt soon need all the help he can get ... attracting lightning is his place in this universe.

Fionnula Flanagan, as feisty as last year as Rose, will be there to help, as well. But she won't be able to call upon Judd (Len Cariou) any more...

And the stew slowly simmers ... stirred, heated, bubbling on Brotherhood.

See also Brotherhood, Season 2 Episode 9: The Anti-Thanksgiving Gem and Episode 10: Finale

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The Plot to Save Socrates

"challenging fun" - Entertainment Weekly

"a Da Vinci-esque thriller" - New York Daily News

"Sierra Waters is sexy as hell" - curled up with a good book

more about The Plot to Save Socrates...





Read the first chapter of The Plot to Save Socrates .... FREE!

Brotherhood's Back! Sneak Preview

Brotherhood returns for its second season on Showtime Sunday night - right after Dexter. From Miami to Providence - a great sweep of the eastern seaboard, and a great sweep for Showtime.

I've seen an advance copy of the first four episodes. No spoilers below, except for what you have to know already: Brotherhood could never let Michael Caffee die.

So Michael's back. But he's not 100%, and the shake-up that his brain received makes for an important element in this year's story. Jason Isaacs gives a great performance - just as he did last year - of a slightly muted Michael. (Isaacs plays Lucius Malfoy in the Harry Potter movies, in case he looks familiar. Talk about an actor with range.)

Jason Clarke gives a fine performance as brother Tommy Kaffee, too. Brotherhood has good echoes of The Sopranos. But the great strength of the series for me has always been the Providence politics. It's not only Rich Man/Poor Man, brother who made good and brother who didn't. It's a show about getting things done - the hard mobster way as does Michael, and the hard political way, as does Tommy. The first ends in blood more than the second, but otherwise they're no less painful, no less easy as paths to success.

The women are also strong and appealing on Brotherhood. Tommy's wife Eileen played by Annabeth Gish is complex, intense, and, whatever her flaws, you'd want her brown eyes on your side. (Her relationship with Tommy is especially difficult now, because of what she told him at the wedding last year). Fionnula Flanagan as mother Rose Kaffee is a classic (if she looks familiar, you saw her in Desmond's UK flashback on Lost). Michael's girlfriend Kath (played by Tina Benko) has a much larger role, and that's welcome. And The West Wing's Janel Moloney is now on the show, as - well, I promised only one spoiler, above.

But I can say that I think the show is more thoughtful, even deeper than it was last year. Ethan Embry's giving a sterling performance as officer Giggs, and the complexity of his personal and professional life could support a series in itself. Brian F. O’Byrne joins Brotherhood as Caffee cousin Colin - from the other side of the Atlantic - and this adds an additional dimension to the family.

Brotherhood's on its way to making memorable television - among the best of the decade.

See also Episode 10: Finale

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The Plot to Save Socrates

"challenging fun" - Entertainment Weekly

"a Da Vinci-esque thriller" - New York Daily News

"Sierra Waters is sexy as hell" - curled up with a good book

Dexter's Back! A Preview...

Dexter returns to Showtime for a second season this Sunday. I just saw the first four episodes, and I gotta say ... Dexter is considerably better than it was last year, which is saying a lot, because Dexter was easily the best show on television in its first season.

But this year has even more brilliant plotting, and the kind of unexpected twists you find only in a fine movie. Twists that are jolting and satisfying, make great sense in retrospect, and (of course) move Dexter one step forward to a better life, success, or safety, on the one hand, and one step back - being discovered - on the other hand.

I will reveal just one spoiler, which serves as the writhing backdrop of the first four episodes, and I'd bet of the entire second season. The burial ground of Dexter's victims, the place he has dumped their body parts in bags out in the sea, is discovered....

Other than that, I can tell you Sgt. Doakes (Erik King), Debra (Jennifer Carpenter), Rita (Julie Benz), Angel (David Zayas), Maria (Lauren Vélez), and Vincent Masuka (C. S. Lee) are sharp and more vivid than ever. Plus, Keith Carradine's in as a master Federal agent investigating the bodies that turn up in the bay, and dark-haired beauty Jaime Murray plays Lila who ... well, let's just say, she understands Dexter better than does Rita (not too difficult) and may understand him better than anyone.

Michael C. Hall is deft, just the thing as Dexter, as he was last year. His voice-over narration is sardonic and just the thing, as it was last year. The new season starts this Sunday.

But, if you'd like to see the complete first episode now, just click here for the VIP webite - and your password is Killer Shows.

I'll be seeing the first four episodes of Brotherhood tomorrow, which will debut its second season right after Dexter on Sunday.

But on just the irresistible strength of Dexter, I'd say Showtime can now lay claim to being the undisputed best network on television.


5-minute podcast of this review




See also my reviews of other Season Two episodes ... 5. Dexter Meets Heroes and 6. Dexter and De-Lila-h7. Best Line About Dexter - from Lila and 8. How Will Dexter Get Out Of This? and 10. Dex, Doakes, Harry and Deb's Belief Saves Dex and Season 2 Finale: All's ... Well

And see also my review of Dexter, Season One: First Place to Dexter

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The Plot to Save Socrates

"challenging fun" - Entertainment Weekly

"a Da Vinci-esque thriller" - New York Daily News

"Sierra Waters is sexy as hell" - curled up with a good book

Emmy Oversights!

The Emmy Nominations were announced today - I'm delighted that The Sopranos did so well, and Weeds and Jack Bauer got some due, and Heroes, too ...

But here, in classic television-watcher tradition, are some howls of protest from me about egregious oversights:

1. Nothing major for HBO's Rome - including nothing for one of the best performances on television, ever - better, even, than most of what you see on stage and screen - by James Purefoy as Marc Antony. And nothing at all for HBO's The Wire, easily one of the best shows now and in the history of television.

2. Nothing major for Showtime's superb Brotherhood, and nothing major for Showtime's Dexter, including nothing for Michael C. Hall, who gave a great performance. And nothing major, either, for Showtime's The Tudors.

3. Nothing major for Battlestar Galactica or Lost - but not surprising - for some reason, award-givers have glass eyes and tin ears when it comes to most things science fiction.

4. Nothing for NBC's Kidnapped. It was cancelled by NBC, finished its run online, and I predict it will come to be recognized in the future as the great show that it was.

By "nothing major," I mean no best series, no best actress or actor, etc. An "Outstanding Single-Camera Picture Editing For A Drama Series" nomination, as Dexter and Lost received, is excellent for the editor but all but meaningless in the general popular culture.

Network for network, Showtime took the worst oversights. But, awards are like sugar-fixes, anyway. In the long run, what counts are the engagement of the viewers, which Showtime is doing a fine job in building....

And here are AP writer Frazier Moore's views on the matter, with some nice clips ...

review of John Kenneth Muir's TV Year: Volume 1

Last July 23, I wrote in an op-ed in Newsday that television was clearly enjoying a "new golden age". My evidence ranged from 24 and Battlestar Galactica to Rome and Weeds. Jon Cassar, accepting the much-deserved Emmy for Director of the Best TV Drama - 24 - a few months later, told the world how happy he was to be part of this new golden age. I'm sure many others recognized its onset as well, both before and after my and Cassar's observations.

If there is any flaw in John Kenneth Muir's TV Year: Volume 1: The Prime-Time 2005-2006 Season, it is that he and tv producer Larry Brody (Hawaii Five-O -aloha!), in their introductions to the volume, present the "new golden age" recognition as if it is some sense debatable.

It is not. It is apparent to anyone with eyes and taste.

This inaugural volume of what will be a yearly series published by Applause Theatre & Cinema Books out of New York City makes this case beautifully. Detailed information on cast and credits, sage and humorous commentary, interview excerpts and even bits of gossip all conspire to make this book both necessary for anyone seriously interested in television - as I obviously am here on InfiniteRegress.tv - and enjoyable to anyone who watches any of it.

And I even agree with most of Muir's commentary . . . Showtime's Brotherhood is "sexy, gritty, and never less than compelling" and "thrives as a terrific summer series . . ." Absolutely! Weeds is a "brilliantly written and performed highlight" of the television season . . . One-hundred percent! - see the rave review I posted here just a few minutes ago. HBO's Rome was "splendid . . ." Yes, indeed! (Here I am raving about Rome, too.)

The volume inevitably suffers from the passage of time which is the burden of any printed volume versus what you can get online. It's not very interesting to read about Lost Season 2, or the next-to-last series of episodes of The Sopranos, now in July 2007 when the Season 3 finale of Lost and the series finale of The Sopranos were so magnificently (in different ways) and masterfully mindblowing.

But that's a small quibble. A book is a book, and has its own advantage over electrons on screens. A book comes with batteries always included - that is, the light of day or any light bulb - and it has what I call "reliable locatability," meaning, what's on page 24 today will be on page 24 forever. That beats even the reliability of the IMDB.

I'm looking forward to Volume 2 next year.

Defending Television - This Time Against Critiques That It's Too Good!

I wrote a piece "On the Benefits of Watching Television" way back in 1980, well before I even had a computer. In those days, I needed to defend TV against claims that watching it made us stupid, or worse. I pointed out that we all needed a little down time, when we weren't intellectually or emotionally engaged at our highest level, and TV provided this. And, even back then, some of it - such as Star Trek - was indeed a feast for the mind.

As recently as last year, I published an op-ed about Television's New Golden Age in Newsday, arguing against the same near-sighted, mostly academic, attacks on TV.

But lately I've noticed a different kind of criticism of television, with just the opposite grievance: television may be too sophisticated nowadays, too complex in some of its storylines for its own good - in other words, too good! (See, for example, this Too sophisticated for most discussion of NBC's Studio 60, shortly before it was cancelled.)

I've also seen grumblings that television deliberately gives us overly complex storylines as a bait for DVD sales. Mourned are the good old days, of simpler, unconnected episodes on television, when buying a DVD of a series, if it existed, would be laughable.

Television, it seems, can never win. There's something about that screen that always seems to attract ire from somewhere, about something it does or doesn't do.

But this critique of TV, though it seems to be media savvy, is even less astute than the older attack on TV as an idiot box. Sure, someone might want to get a DVD of Battlestar Galactica, The Sopranos, or Lost - but those shows could just as easily be TiVo'ed, seen in one way or another on the Web, etc. and of course have been. The world of narrative delivery has changed. Whether book or movie or TV series, buying a copy of it on a discrete piece of material is yesterday's news.

And it seems that those who are critical of television's new storytelling sophistication may not have much to worry about anyway. Rome and The Sopranos have ended on HBO. Season 4 of Battlestar Galactica will be its last, and so may be the next season of The Wire. 24, Lost, Heroes, and Big Love are continuing, and Showtime has been taking up some of this slack with The Tudors, Meadowlands, Brotherhood, and Dexter. But new golden ages don't last forever, and we may be seeing the beginning of the end of this one.

I hope not. But I'm sure whatever television next becomes, it will have no shortage of sage, caustic, savvy critics.

And maybe that's good for television. The worst thing that can happen to any medium is to be taken for granted.

Only Idiots Don't Watch Television...

"Only Idiots Don't Watch Television" was my original title for the following op-ed that I wrote for Newsday this past July, 2006. They changed it to the more dignified title you see below - taken from the next-to-last line of my op-ed - but that's ok, because I do indeed believe that we're seeing a new golden age of television (I say so in the op-ed) - indeed, I've taken to calling our era television's platinum age.

Because, if anything, television has gotten even better since the summer. The first half of the third season of Battlestar Galactica, just concluded last week, was the best science-fiction I've ever seen on television (or at least, the first part of it was - as good as the best Star Trek episodes, and better than most). The Wire concluded a low-key but outstanding season. Kidnapped, foolishly cancelled by NBC, just concluded last night on nbc.com, and it was a superb series - intelligent, stylish, suspenseful. NBC does, at least, deserve credit for fielding it in the first place. Dexter, which I wrote about in a blog post here last week, is a marvelously unusual cop show. Brotherhood is an excellent new political drama. Sleeper Cell, which I also wrote about last week, offered an excellent second season. All three were on Showtime.

And in January, new seasons of Rome (on HBO) and 24 (on Fox) begin. I can hardly wait. In the meantime, as the cold winds of late December blow, here's another look at the view from this past summer...

Newsday
Editorials
IDEAS
TV's new golden age
BY PAUL LEVINSON

Paul Levinson is professor and chairman of communication and media studies at Fordham University. His latest novel is "The Plot to Save Socrates."

July 23, 2006

It used to be called the "idiot box." Critics have been muttering for years that we're a nation of "videots," that television's been rotting our brains. But who are the idiots now?

People who saw "Rome" on HBO this fall? The opening credits alone were a masterpiece of music and animation. Or perhaps the video dopes are those who just finished watching the next-to-concluding season of "The Sopranos" or watched the past three seasons of "The Wire," or I forget how many seasons of "Da Ali G Show," all also on HBO, or the new "Battlestar Galactica" on the Sci-Fi Channel.

All of these shows have been lionized by critics. Tim Goodman of The San Francisco Chronicle called the acting in "The Wire" both "virtuoso" and "phenomenal." David Zurawik of The Baltimore Sun said of "The Sopranos": "If this isn't art, then neither is Mozart." The series won four Emmys in 2004 and has been nominated for many more. "Ali G" has been nominated dozens of times. "Rome" boasts Jonathan Stamp, former BBC executive producer for history and archaeology, as its history consultant. "Battlestar Galactica" has lifted science-fiction on television to a new level of political sophistiction, sensuality and style.

Awards in themselves are certainly no sure indication of quality. But, combined with the raves of critics and cinema-level writing, acting, and production, the achievements of this new age of television are unmistakable.

Who are the nitwits, now? People who saw or missed those shows?

It's not all cable - the networks have been enjoying a golden age, too. "Lost" on ABC and "24" on Fox are two prime examples - "24" led the pack in Emmy nominations announced earlier this month. And in all cases, the availability of these series on DVD, which allows the viewer to see multiple episodes of a series without commercial interruption, is fueling the new excellence of television.

But it's not entirely new, either. There have been great programs throughout TV's history, ranging from "Have Gun, Will Travel" to "Star Trek" to "All in the Family" to "Hill Street Blues" to "ER," to name just a representative sampling over the decades.

What's different now, though, are the wings of new media that, rather than flying away from television, are lifting it to new heights. Not only cable and DVDs, but iPODs, which offer downloadable episodes, are making television easier to watch - and better. Why better? Because when people were obligated to watch television on inflexible schedules dictated by the networks, many shows were pitched to the lowest common denominator. The cardinal rule of that first, now bygone, age of television was "thou shalt not offend or confuse." But when people can see television on their own schedules - whether via on-demand cable, DVD, TiVo or iPODs - television can take chances. It can hire topnotch character actors like Ciaran Hinds, who last year played a supporting role in Steven Spielberg's Oscar-nominated "Munich" and starred splendidly as Caesar in "Rome."

TV can now cater to more individual tastes. Its programs must still live or die based on their rating shares, but the pie is now split so many ways that a smaller piece can go a lot further than in decades past.

Like books and movies, TV can now take real risks to achieve excellence. It can try a prime-time show on polygamy, such as HBO's "Big Love," or a sitcom about a suburban school mom who sells marijuana, like Showtime's "Weeds."

Back in the 1960s, Marshall McLuhan applied the term "rear-view mirror" to help explain our perception of new media. He meant that we see new technology through lenses ground in the past. The automobile was first called "the horseless carriage" and radio "the wireless" before they broke free of their pasts, attained names in their own right and claimed their destiny.

How many people who still think TV is only for dullards and laggards are seeing it through a rear-view mirror, looking at it backward, focused on network domination and stick-figure characterization? Was that what Harper's editor Thomas de Zengotita had in mind when he called cable TV - along with the Internet and DVDs - a "vast goo of meaningless stimulation"? Maybe TV needs a new name.

But, by television or any other name, the much-maligned tube is finally achieving its potential not only to entertain but inspire.

It used to be thought that watching television distracted us from more noble intellectual pursuits like reading. But, to the contrary, it seems that an intellect charged by any medium is all the more hungry for new adventures of the mind. Literacy is on the rise. The National Assessment of Adult Literacy found an 8 percent increase in reading abilities in the past decade. "Harry Potter" and "The Da Vinci Code" are happening in this new golden age of television. Its rising tide will likely be lifting many more boats to come.

Relevant links:

• Defending TV, Again - This Time, Because It's Too Good! 31 March 2007
  
• The Goldplated Globes: What They Missed On TV 18-minute podcast
  
• TV Roundup: The Field in Mid-November 21-minute podcast
  
• first place for Dexter 3-minute podcast
  
• Weep Not for Kidnapped 3-minute podcast
  
• Digital McLuhan: A Guide to the Information Millennium by Paul Levinson

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The Plot to Save Socrates "challenging fun" - Entertainment Weekly "a Da Vinci-esque thriller" - New York Daily News "Sierra Waters is sexy as hell" - curled up with a good book