House Reborn in Season Six?

A quieter, change of pace, nonetheless satisfying two-hour premiere of House, Season 6, on Fox tonight. House may be the most brilliant show on television - in fact, I think it is - with the astonishing logic of misanthropic Gregory House, MD, often playing a central role, and the occasional glints of almost genius of the doctors on his team also in the mix. It's medical mystery, angst in the extreme, and jab in the gut humor, like no other show on television.

Tonight's start of the sixth season had almost none of this - none of the regulars except a brief phone conversation with Wilson, no strange medical conditions all but inexplicable to everyone except eventually House. What it did have was Andre Braugher (of Homicide fame) as the head shrink Dr. Darryl Nolan in the mental institution House voluntarily committed himself to at the end of last season. Nolan moves from arch antagonist who won't give House the letter he needs to practice medicine again (it was great to see Braugher vs. Hugh Laurie as House), to a friend and supporter. House gets his letter, and in the process has a semi-normal start of a relationship with Lydia (played by Franka Potente, who was perfect in The Bourne Identity, as she was in this episode of House), who unfortunately is married. But this was probably the most normal we've ever seen House, certainly for most of two hours.

How did House get there? The suicide of Kutner was a little more than his tenuous grip on reality could take last season. Just for the record, I won't be surprised if somewhere along the future line it turns out that House's initial insistence was right that Kutner was murdered, after all. It's also worth noting, as everyone in our world outside of television knows, that Kutner had to leave the show because Kal Penn accepted a post in the Obama administration as Associate Director of the White House Office of Public Engagement. This was consistent - if contributing a lot more to the public good - with a connection between House and our real world that runs through all of the show like a live wire, with House revealing to the real world of viewers the identity of Keyser Sose in the The Usual Suspects (don't worry, I won't), cracking wise about Heroes (which runs opposite House on NBC), and more in just Season Five.

But what will happen now in Season Six? Is House truly cured of his vicodin dependency, has he really found a way to handle his daily pain and deal with unexpected pain without resort to that little bottle? In the past, such liberations have always been temporary. Because, if permanent, we would have had a significantly different character from the flawed, troubled genius who has been such a commanding, exhilirating presence over the past five years.

The series has been so superb, so far, that I'm betting whatever way House goes, we'll find him no less provocative and riveting. And I'll be reviewing every episode right here.


8-min podcast review of House

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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!

Damages 1-10

I have but three episodes left to watch of the first season of Damages - nominated for an Emmy* - and while I'm waiting for the last disk for Netflix, I thought I'd say a few words about what I've seen...

Grim, powerful punches to the solar plexus. Glenn Close in the lead role of Patty Hewes is an actress as a lawyer to be reckoned with (and thoroughly deserving of her Emmy nomination). At this point, about all I'm not willing to put past her is murder. Ted Danson as the CEO Arthur Frobisher of the Enron-like company Patty is suing is the least funny - and best - of his career (though his hilarious spots on Curb Your Enthusiasm are a close second). Zeljko Ivanek has been superb on everything from Homicide to 24 in the past, but never better than Frobisher's brilliant, tough, but almost endearingly vulnerable lead attorney - and a good match for Patty. Tate Donovan as Patty's second-in-command is outstanding, too.

But Rose Byrne as Ellen Parsons - hey, she was in Attack of the Clones - as the new addition to Patty's office is the gem of gems on this show, and the centerpiece of the story...

Which is ... she finds her former fiance murdered, after having been almost murdered herself, and the police (of course) suspect her. The story is told via a series of harrowing slivers of the present, with much longer flashbacks to months ago, which close in on the present as the series progresses.

Damages is really much more than a lawyer show. It's more of a blend of The Fugitive and Lost. I'll be back with more after I see the ending, and with reviews of the Season Two on weekly basis when it's aired in early 2009 on the FX Network.

*Damages and Mad Men are the first basic cable series to get Emmy nominations. Details in the video that follows. My generally rave reviews of the first two seasons of Mad Men start here.



See also Season 2 reviews: Lying with Damages

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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!

Edward R. Murrow to Tim Russert

The outpouring of grief over Tim Russert's untimely death today, at age 58, shows both the high esteem and affection that Americans hold for television journalists who protect our interests as untiring champions of the First Amendment.

When Thomas Jefferson and our Founding Fathers made the press the crucial guardians of our government - the watchdogs whose job it was to report to the American people what their government was really up to - Jefferson must have the likes of Tim Russert, and his unceasing speaking of truth to power, in mind.

He was not only the moderator of Meet the Press since 1991 - by far the most memorable - but he was NBC News' Washington Bureau Chief. He was one of the few who spanned traditional network and cable news, with his CNBC/MSNBC interview show. And he made a great guest appearance on Homicide: Life On Street, playing himself as character Lt. Megan Russert's cousin.

There are less than a handful of television reporters and anchors who in their different ways defined their genre and their age. Edward R. Murrow, Walter Cronkite (who is still with us), and Tim Russert.

The Wire Bows Out Gracefully; Kudos to Cast and David Simon, the Charles Dickens of Television

I sometimes, often, in fact, think The Wire is the best show ever to have been on television. It's hard to compare to The Sopranos, which was just about one person, really, Tony. The Wire was an ensemble show par excellence, with at least 15 to 20 centrally important players over the past five seasons. You can't compare it at all to Lost, which is in another - fantastic - universe, entirely.

The Wire is certainly the best cop show, ever. My previously favorite was Homicide: Life on the Street. David Simon was the brains behind that Baltimore masterpiece, too. And there were lots of other connections - including Clark Johnson, Meldrick in Homicide, Gus in this last season of The Wire.

But The Wire was much more than a cop show - in fact, the cops were less than half the story. There was the dock, in Season 2; politics in Season 3 and after; the school in Season 4; and the paper, the media, in this final Season 5. All of these were done superbly - though perhaps the cynical ending to the paper story this season, with fraud rewarded with the highest honor, was a little too much, though I suppose not unrealistic.

But the real star of The Wire, season after season, in addition to cops, was the street. I can't recall ever getting such a clear picture of life in the street - or, the corner, real and metaphoric, on which drugs are sold and life is lived - as we got, season after season, in The Wire. Not in any movie, or book. First the Barksdale crew, then Marlo's, were as vivid a tableau of intelligent, brutal, sensitive, savvy, focused characters as ever presented. One of the shows this season was called "The Dickensian Aspect" - and, the truth is, that could easily apply to the whole series. David Simon, just by virtue of The Wire, could be called the Charles Dickens of television.

If you'd like a look at the characters and cast of The Wire in all five seasons, HBO has put up a fine page of photos. My favorite is still the extraordinary Stringer Bell, second-in-command in the Barksdale crew, The Wealth of Nations on his bookshelf, played to perfection by Idris Elba, but that takes nothing away from the dozens of other razor-sharp performances in The Wire.

And how did it all end?

The Wire did something exceptional and original here, too. Totally unlike the brilliantly ambiguous ending of The Sopranos, the ending of The Wire had complete closure, and was brilliant, too. And against all expectations, it was happy. McNulty is stretched out on a table for his wake - but it's only a mock wake - he's leaving the police, not life at all. Carcetti is elected governor; Rawls gets an appointment as a high state cop; Daniels looks happy as a lawyer; Rhonda Pearlman is a judge ... well, you get the picture.

The street does as well as can be expected, too. Marlo's free, rich, and likely out of the game (though you never know). Bubbles is eating upstairs with his sister. Michael may be a stick-up man, not good, but maybe he's just doing this once. Dukie is, sadly, in the worst shape ... going doing the road to addiction that Bubbles just left.

My guess is we won't see a series like this again for a very long time. Even the music was perfect, from the different versions of Tom Waits' "Way Down in the Hole" that opened shows for each of the five seasons (Steve Earle did the honors for Season 5, as well a good performance as Bubbles' sponsor at Narcotics Anonymous), to the great music that ended every episode, to the special version of "Way Down in the Hole" that accompanied the montage near the end of tonight show.

~When you walk through the garden ...~

That's a walk I bet viewers will relish for decades to come.

See also The Wire's Back! Review of Season 5 Episode 1 and Episode 2: The Great, Dangling Conversation ... 3. McNulty and Marlo ... 4. One Down ... 5. Media Chasing Their Own Tales and Tails ... 6. Superman Omar and Tall Stories ... 7. King of Diamonds ... 8. Two Down ... 9. Cold, Killer Sweetheart

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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!

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The Wire's Back! Sneak Preview Review of Season 5, Episode 1 (no real spoilers)

Whoah! What a New Year's treat. I just saw the first episode of the new, final Season 5 of The Wire on HBO's On Demand!

And I loved it!

Here are some of the reasons why ...

It's great to hear Steve Earle's rendition of "Down in the Hole". Clear and smooth as a whistle. You can hear it here, if you don't believe me ... And here are more of my thoughts about the now-five versions of this great title song...

And the storyline this season looks fine, too. This television season - 2007-2008 - may be remembered as one of the great years for newspapers on television. Journeyman featured a time traveler working out of a newspaper in San Francisco (and I sure hope it continues), and The Wire's finale season will look at the workings of a newspaper in Baltimore.

Meldrick from Homicide: Life on the Street - aka Clark Johnson - looks to be playing the main newspaper part, and that's good news. Johnson's a fine actor. And I'm in favor of all possible, deepening connections between Homicide and The Wire, two now-classic Baltimore cop and crime shows. (My favorite, until now, was Callie Thorne (Laura Ballard on Homicide -> Elena McNulty on The Wire). Hey, McNulty, you were crazy to let that fall apart, and I still hope the two of you get together somehow at the end of this season...

And speaking of McNulty - Dominic West is better than ever in that role, and gives The Wire something else in common with Journeyman: both have Brits playing Americans. West is incredible in his American accent - you can't hear a trace of his UK. (Kevin McKidd as Dan Vassar on Journeyman is almost as good...)

Lots of other good stuff in the season premier. Michael (Tristan Wilds) has really grown into his role. He's on his way to becoming a leader - with all the good and bad that that entails - including looking out for Dukie (Jermain Crawford). Herc (Domenick Lombardozzi) is working for the drug-lawyer Levy (Michael Kostroff). And Marlo's power - starting with the ice-cool Marlo (Jamie Hector) himself, and his deadly-duo muscle Snoop (Felicia Pearson) and Chris (Gbenga Akinnagbe) - is looking more chilling than ever...

But, hey, I promised not to give too much away ...

So, suffice to say, don't miss this premier next week. Or, if you have HBO On-Demand, don't miss it right now ...

"When you walk through the garden...."



4-minute podcast of this Wire review

See also Looking Back At The Wire and Episode 3: McNulty and Marlo ... 4. One Down ... 5. Media Chasing Their Own Tales and Tails ... 6. Superman Omar and Tall Stories ... 7. King of Diamonds ... 8. Two Down ... 9. Cold, Killer Sweetheart ... 10. The Wire Bows out Gracefully

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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!

Continuing Journeyman: 2

The second episode of Journeyman crystallized what I was thinking (and wrote) about the premier of Journeyman last week: the new NBC time travel series is really about the intricate, time-entwined personal lives of the central characters, unlike Quantum Leap, in which Sam's personal life only rose into story prominence on very special occasions.

Journeyman is clearly - and, so far, tantalizingly - the cat's-cradle story of four people. Dan (Kevin McKidd) and Livia (Moon Bloodgood) are time travelers, erstwhile lovers, and maybe more. Livia's further along in this time travel business than is Dan, but Dan is the focus of the story.

Meanwhile, Dan's slowly managing to convince his wife Katie (Gretchen Egolf) that he's time traveling. This week, Dan time-vaults to the past from a plane, in which he is seated next to Katie - a nice touch, for this leaves no way she can think he just tripped out on the street somewhere, and that's why he's not home.

And Katie and Dan's brother, Jack, were once a couple. While Jack - a cop (great to see Reed Diamond from Homicide back in the mix) - intersects with Dan in his time traveling, as well as in the present.

This nearly menage-a-quatre is much more than just emotional backdrop for the story. It is emerging as the story, though we haven't seen all that much of it yet.

As for Dan's "missions" - which he is yanked into without warning - we have now seen two. They bear an interesting similarity: the real purpose of the mission isn't revealed until the end, and it's not what we think it to be. Also, at this point, the missions have all been about non-famous individuals - no attempt to save JFK from assassination (which I and I bet half the science fiction writers in the world did in at least one story we wrote)*.

In its individual rather public-event focus, Journeyman is also like Quantum Leap, which only only once or twice a season had Sam figure in attempting to avert a public tragedy of the past.

But next week, Journeyman will take a shot at this, too. The coming attractions show Dan at the 1989 San Francisco earthquake, where he will have to choose which of three people to save.

I'm betting that there will also be an important element of his personal life at stake in this, too. I'm looking forward.

*That would be the "Loose Ends" saga for me - which I actually started writing in 1974, but I didn't get around to publishing until 1997.


8-minute podcast analysis of Journeyman


Reviews of other Journeyman episodes: 1 ... 3 ... 4 ... 5 ... 6 ... 7 ... 8 ... 9. Dan Unravels His Present ... 10. Jack's In! ... 11. Livia's Beau//Save the Newspaper, Save the World ... 12. The Perfect Time Travel Story ... Lucky 13

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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