How do you define justice? A charge, conviction and jail sentence through an impartial legal system? An eye for an eye? Or do you have faith that forces in the universe will deliver karmic payback? We're at the half-way point of The Shield''s first season and the question of what defines the right way of punishing our fellow man for indiscretions is fast becoming the theme store's top seller. The cops are placed with the burden of sorting out citizen conflict, from the incredibly violent killers to the harmless grifters, having the power to make life-changing decisions on who's guilty and innocent. And when you have a legal system clogged with red tape and political-correctness that impedes real progress, can you really blame people for resorting to tooth-for-tooth time?
Written by series creator Shawn Ryan, “Pay in Pain” features parallel forms of justice. We have the cases of George the Random Latino Killer being handed over to the Toros for retribution and Dutch/Claudette simply warning a psychic to “find new marks”. George went nuts, as explained by his sister, due to the expanding Hispanic population in Los Angeles, but the Toros going after the man's family was going over the line. The story examines the increasing tension between the police and those they protect, with the addition of Jimenez, a vocal politician/straw man who makes some speeches about hate crimes and racial tensions, whose real importance is revealed when Aceveda leaks the IAD case. The psychic storyline seems to exist solely to show the limitations the police have against the mystical who offer a service people are willing to pay for. But of course, the medium is spot on about Dutch's case, though it could just be a very good cold reading. And she looks like Oprah Winfrey, who Vic name drops as the wrong methodology to go about when dealing with the Toros.
Vic is paired up with Carlos, a former Toros member, and both men learn different ways to handle problems on the street. Carlos believes in working with the gang and thinks he can trust Train, whose pregnant girlfriend was killed by George (off topic, but is a loud gun range really safe for a growing fetus?). He nearly loses it when he discovers that the shopowners turned George over to the Toros without telling him, almost putting a fatal bullet in Train's head before being stopped by Vic. In turn, Vic learns a few things from Carlos, namely forgiving Shane for his jokes about autism and more importantly, protecting him, not willing to give Shane up to IAD over the events in “Blowback”. Even if Shane's urine-fueled interrogation antics are immature, Vic needs to protect Shane, the only other Strike Team member who knows the truth about Terry's death.
But while I'd rank this lower on The Shield's scale of intense episodes, there's developments on the sidelines that move along, namely Julien's testimony against Vic for stealing drugs. Gilroy casually mentions that another officer saw the transgression, and Vic puts the dots together, culminating in an awkward scene where Vic arrests Tomas in front of Julien. This isn't a spoiler, but was that the point of the Julien character? To make a closeted religious cop the only witness of a major Strike Team crime, upping the tension and making the audience believe that Vic could go down until Julien's true sexual history is revealed? Judging by his diminished importance over the years (and Michael Jace never feeling comfortable as either a man of God or a cop), I'd say so.
Canvassing Notes
- The opening speech by the scorned citizen, asking what the cops are doing to make people feel safe, was a bit too grand-standing for my taste. If the event of a rapist being released due to a computer malfunction and then raping her niece was a part of the episode, or a result of the flooding of the Barn in “Cherrypoppers”, it could've worked as an ending, but as a “JUST ANOTHER DAY” moment, not so much. But at least they didn't end it with everyone applauding.
- “When you trade in your megaphone for a badge, that's when I'll seek out your opinion.”
- “We're dinosaurs, Vic. And make no mistake, the meteor's coming...”
- “What's fair for them out there has to be fair for us in here.”
- “Just think of the things I could get away with if I was banging a police captain.”
Pre-Cog Report
- Beyond the Julien and Vic development, not too much really comes back in later episodes, not even Carlos or Jimenez, though random members of the Toros will pop up here and there.
Just on a personal note for this episode, back when I was in school, I was trying to come up with a title for a film I made for a production class. I perused the episode titles of my favorite TV shows and felt that "Pay in Pain" summed up the theme of my slip-'n-fall-scheme dark comedy, later renaming it to "Paid in Pain". Enjoy:
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