Intelligence 1.10: Lillian's Daughter

A good Intelligence 1.10 this past Monday, with personally motivated terrorism in San Francisco, and Gabriel, Riley, and Lillian heading out there to stop it.  Once again, digital sophistication is not enough to stop an attack - boots on the ground, worn by people with talented as well as cyber-assisted heads on their shoulders, are needed.   As I pointed out at length in my 2003 book, Realspace: The Fate of Physical Presence in the Digital Age, the palpable reality of flesh and blood in the physical world will be an ever necessary accompaniment - sometimes enjoyable, sometimes not - as we increasingly live important parts our lives on the Internet.

But the best part of Intelligence 1.10 was learning more about Lillian and her life, which becomes a center-stage issue because her daughter is living in San Francisco.   Lillian's relationship with her daughter is not the greatest - interesting, because Marg Helgenberger's Catherine Willows also had a difficult relationship with her daughter on CSI.   This is more than coincidence.  It has to be especially difficult for any mother in law-enforcement to have a good relationship with her children, with the life-and-death demands of the job taking precedence over family.   Maybe in Andy Griffith's Mayberry, but not in our real world.

J. J. in Criminal Minds is constantly torn between her family and her work, but Lillian has it even worse on Intelligence, because she doesn't live with her daughter, and indeed they live on opposite sides of the country.  It's easy enough, to get back to the digital world versus the real world, to keep in touch with a child or a loved one via Skype and any number of Internet ways.   But last time I checked, you can't give a reassuring hug through digital means - even three-dimensional holography wouldn't do the trick - and that possibility of a hug makes all the difference.

See also Intelligence Debuts ... Intelligence 1.2: Lightning Changes ...Intelligence 1.3: Edward Snowden and 24 ... Intelligence 1.4: Social Media Weaponry ... Intelligence 1.5: The Watch ... Intelligence 1.6: Helix meets Rectify and Justified ... Intelligence 1.7: Nanites ...Intelligence 1.8: Heart of Darkness, Cyberstyle ... Intelligence 1.9:  EMP Amnesia and Children

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Intelligence Debuts

Intelligence debuted with a strong episode tonight - cerebrally as well action-wise - along with a good starting plot and set-up for the series, and a generally outstanding cast.

Leading that cast is Josh Holloway in his first major television outing since his portrayal of Sawyer in Lost, one of the most memorable characters in that now classic series.  Michael Emerson who played Ben in Lost has done well for himself in Person of Interest, so Holloway had a lot to live up to.  He's doing fine so far with his customary mix of sarcasm and no nonsense, a good persona for the lead character who is a master operative with the added advantage of a brain that's hooked into the Internet.   It's a good premise for a series for our day and age - the digital equivalent of The Six Million Dollar Man - and Gabriel (Holloway's character) even has a lost love he is searching the world to find.

Also excellent is Meghan Ory as Gabriel's secret service agent protector Riley - yeah, he's more important than the President - with a good combination of mental and physical agility.  Gabriel loves his wife, but there's a chemistry between hum and Riley that's bound to lead to interesting complications sooner or later.

Marge Helgenberger as head of the unit Lilian I'm not so sure about.  Her cool, deadpan performance as Katherine on CSI worked great for that almost anime-come-to-life series, but in Intelligence ... I don't know, I'll need to see more before I buy her as someone with sufficient wisdom and vision to be running this whole operation.

Meanwhile, the world depicted in Intelligence is sufficiently different from and similar to ours to host good continuing story.   It's not the Chinese who are our enemies, it's a conservative militant group within China, in the classic James Bondian tradition.   And the set-up recognizes and in fact is predicated upon the increasing interconnection of all forms of communication and information delivery - indeed, this is what makes Gabriel's connection to the Internet so powerful and effective.

The series moves to Monday night next week, replacing Hostages on CBS, which had its moments, but was based on a fundamentally absurd premise through the very end.   In contrast, Intelligence is a realistic as tomorrow's app, which Gabriel is well aware of, and which makes the story, at least in its premiere, refreshing and convincing.





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