The Shield - 1x10 - "Dragonchasers" - Crash and Yearn

The search for perfection is perhaps one of the leading causes for depression and anxiety, yet it's an issue that's seldom addressed when trying to treat those symptoms. Instead we try to put labels on things, take a pill, sign up for a program, see a shrink. But rarely do people talk about what's really bothering them: that there's gotta be something better. A better job, relationship, or course of action. There's a voice in our heads (another cause: over-thinking) that tells us if we just improve this or that, everything will be perfect, everything will fall into place and all will be right in the world. Instead of the pledge of allegiance, schools should've taught that in life, you can't get it right, and you can't fuck it up.

“Dragonchasers” is another rip-roaring adventure and a (near) winner for Dutch, as he finally gets a break in the hooker murder case, not by his smarts, but by random chance of Danny and Julien catching the perp smackin' it in an alleyway. Most of the logistical detective work (interviewing the aunt, getting a warrant to search her house and find the bodies) is left off-screen, instead focusing on the tête à tête between two very intelligent yet emotionally deranged men. There's a lot of similarities between Dutch and Sean, mainly in regards to their low self-esteem and success rate with women. Dutch's obsession with catching a serial killer may even be an extension of controlling something that once resided in him, much like Julien's transference of hate from himself to the tranny hooker. But in the end, Dutch gets his man and gets to experience the high of success, receiving commendations from the rank-and-file (usually Vic, who of course mentions that he promised “we'd get this guy”) who routinely treat him like a joke. By the end of the episode, the high wears off and the crash begins as Dutch breaks down crying in his car, on some level realizing that Sean's right. He's just a lowly civil servant who became a cop to get respect.

Our other literal dragon chaser is Connie, who swears she's gonna get clean after her mother dies and realizes she can't raise Brian on crack. The origin of Vic's relationship with Connie has always been somewhat vague and Corrine brings it up by outright asking if Brian is Vic's son. But the story of how Vic found her trying to abort her child with “some Drano and a plunger handle” is downright chilling. The whole idea of Vic helping Connie get clean is kinda absurd, since she's only useful to him if she's on the street and in the thick of drug/hooker culture. Detox scenes are always hard to watch, bringing the character to her lowest depths, verbally flashing back to the time when she killed the john and Vic helped her cover it up and throwing up, but the hardest scene to watch is when she seems to be doing better, calmly admiring herself in the mirror and asking Ronnie to get her some tea, then tacitly letting the addiction take over by grabbing his cash (though to be fair, Ronnie should've known better to have that on him) and heading for the nearest dealer. When she shows up at the Barn, high as a kite on the moon, Vic asks her how she is. “Perfect”, she replies and confirms her inability to raise her child.

Meanwhile, Julien continues to hate himself for being gay and in order to pay back a tranny hooker who bit Danny, transfers his self-loathing by joining his fellow boys in blue in a very disturbing “blanket party”. And the reporter drops a bombshell about Aceveda allegedly raping a girl in college, but he quickly explains it away to his wife with the whole “she was into kinky sex and litigation” excuse. But all in all, “Dragonchasers” is another great episode dealing with morally-flawed characters making decisions. And Shane totally bangs a stripper dancer in an interrogation room! You don't see that shit on CS-fuckin-I!

Canvassing Notes

• Luckily this grim hour of The Shield is broken up by some comic relief through Shane being manipulated by the stripper dancer running a mugging operation, with classic justifications like “She was rubbing her ass all over my hands. They don't just do that for everyone!”. Though the best part of that story has to be Vic watching Shane and Lem argue over who was the ringleader like a couple of kids, warning them that he shouldn't have to get involved in their easiest case all year.
• Sean Taylor is played by Michael Kelly, one of those “Hey It's That Guys!” whot's appeared in the Dawn of the Dead remake and had recurring roles on The Sopranos and the mini-series Generation Kill. And his character shares the same hometown of Rockford, Illinois with showrunner Shawn Ryan. And speaking of Shawn Ryan, this is probably just a coincidence but the name of the paper that the reporter works for is La Unidad, which translates to The Unit, a show he later wrote and produced with David Mamet.
• Some clever editing/writing: cut from Vic (off-camera) mackin' it with the stripper in one alley to Sean getting his own release in another. See what they did there?

• “Like, what kind of stuff you into?”
  “Oh you know, golf. I'm a four handicap.”
• “God moved out, the cops moved in.”
  “God's still here, we just sublet.”
• “We busted a one arm hooker. Fifty bucks, she'll let you hump her in her socket.”
• “I was laying the groundwork!”
• “Come on, she's an epileptic hottie, not Amy Fisher!”
• “Cop get shot in the line of duty and it's all commendations and 21-gun salutes. Some queer in a dress gives you AIDs, you end up unemployed and the city's dirty little secret.”
• “I didn't know we got the Spice Network.”
• “I got a yammy full of Georgia joy juice, darling. Enough DNA to have you writing parking tickets in Pacoima.”
• “Truth is, Sean, I might not have been the most popular guy in high school, but I got laid. More than a few times. And I'm getting laid now, too, and guess what, she's hot.”

Pre-Cog Report

• The blanket party that Julien and the others give to the tranny hooker is repeated in season two, only Julien's on the receiving end (no pun intended) when the same cops find out he's gay.
• Connie Will Return! Clean! Then Gets Shot!

Arrested Development - 1x02 - "Top Banana" - Platano Fuego

 

In television dramas, the second episode tends to retread the themes of the pilot, reintroduce the characters, and hold your hand through a stand-alone episode until you feel safe and have committed your life (and money to the show's advertisers) to the series. But in sitcoms, they throw in a snappy title sequence that explains the series premise and the character relationships and then just worry about making you laugh. Thankfully this seems to be a trend that's dying off as early episodes of new shows are more easily accessible than the pre-DVR days. But Arrested Development has never played by the rules but it's second episode does a fine job of making their own.

“Top Banana” hits the ground running with an in medias res opening of the Bluth banana stand on fire. Fire's a recurring visual and thematic device, with Tobias' hilarious melodramatic fire sale audition (“Amaaazing Grace...!), T-Bone “the flamer” burning down the storage locker, Lucille's banana flambe and GOB's attempt at shooting a fireball from his sleeves (“my least consistent trick...”). Michael's final decision to burn down the stand, after realizing the true destructive nature is his father, leads to one of the funniest jokes and greatest strengths of the series; wordplay. “There was $250,000 lined in the walls of the banana stand!” only works because Jeffrey Tambor played the quips of “money in the banana stand” to the connotation of insurance, only to be outraged when Michael didn't comprehend the true meaning (see also: flamer/arsonist vs flamer/homosexual).

George Michael and Maebe, Tobias and Lindsay, and GOB (kinda) all play the job market. George Michael's lust for his cousin is put to a test when confronted with her horrible business acumen (“Banana. Buck.”). Add the promotion to Mr. Manager and his belief that adults “can have fun whenever they want, we're kids, we're supposed to be working!” leads him to over-react and grab the gasoline. Tobias loses a job to Lindsay (and proceeds to cry in the shower, introducing us to his never-nude syndrome) and she confirms her incompetency (except when it comes to hair) by oversleeping and missing the commercial. Meanwhile GOB wants more responsibility but doesn't want to be in charge (but he'd like to be asked). His dramatic hurling of the letter into the sea plays off Will Arnett's talent at physical humor, buttoned with the apathetic toss of the dead rabbit into the ocean.

No Buster in this episode and the theme song has this weird electric guitar ditty that they lose henceforth, but “Top Banana” is another very funny outing into the world of the Bluths, strengthening character relationships (Lucille and Lindsay's passive aggressive rivalry, Michael realizing he's putting too much pressure on his son) and memorable moments involving ice cream sandwiches, mis-read magazine titles, and Luz lugging a rack of furs on an Los Angeles city bus.

• “No touching!”
• “I don't know what I expected.”
• “Oh, that's how we joke. She doesn't even have a house!”
• “Furs, or...I don't know, just a heads up.”
• “Don't take that tone. He's my son. I want you to make him stop calling me.”
• “We're like the Lunts!”
• “You might want to let that fire go out before you stick your face in it.”
  “Oh that's funny cause I was gonna say you might want to lean away from that fire since you're soaked in alcohol.”
  “Mine was better.”
• “Michael...having a nice day at the beach, while the rest of us are busting our asses to deliver your mail?”
• “I got a rabbit to buy.”

The Shield - 1x09 - "Throwaway" - Leave the gun, take the churro

 

I was going to start this blog post with a long-winded treatise about the act of discarding people and objects, whether it's justified or based on preconceived notions. Then tie that in to the parallel family strife storylines, both in relation to Claudette and Maynard.

But those get old, convoluted and needlessly personal for a dissection of a Shield episode. Let's talk about the best part of this episode: the Strike Team setting up Hector by impersonating the Los Mags and robbing a police evidence van. That right there is why I love The Shield, the tension created by dirty cops playing cowboys in the wild west of LA. All it took was some bandanas, spray paint, and a fake tattoo. But of course we don't feel bad for Hector, who sealed his fate when he branded Tigre's stomach with his first initial. This is how it works in Vic Mackey's world, bad guys gotta go down by any means necessary.

This is a big episode for Curtis “Lem/Lemonhead” Lemansky, our renegade cop with a conscience. He had a brief spotlight in “Dawg Days”, if you define spotlight as making sarcastic “ain't Vic crazy?” comments. After Lem accidentally shoots Chaco (to be fair, Chaco screamed guilty by running like that), Vic grabs a gun from his trunk o' guns 'n drugs and plants it on Chaco. And the guilt keeps building up once we find out that they shot the wrong guy, who's a former gangbanger with lasered-off tattoos and advises kids on how to escape the hood. So what does Lem do? He first takes a lesson from Vic and beats the fuck outta Hector, burning him with a cigarette and peeling away on his motorcycle all bad-ass. Then he participates in the setup, gets Chaco off, and sleeps with Tigre. Problem solved. And he didn't even need a medicine cabinet full of Maalox.

Meanwhile, Claudette meets the ghost of Christmas future in Maynard, a bastard who treated his family so badly that nobody wants anything to do with him, except a son who ties him up outside. We meet Claudette's father, played by the late Roscoe Lee Browne, who tells Dutch about Peaches' past as a dancer and tries to get her to accept her daughter's new boyfriend. It all pays off when Claudette takes Warner on a tour of the Barn and ends up breaking him down in the interrogation room like a perp. 

 

Canvassing Notes

• Besides wearing the ugliest green shirt ever, Vic's transgressions are getting worse, with his son obviously needing him (note Matthew clinging to Vic's leg when work calls) and Corrine just about reaching her breaking point. It's a shame, but what's Vic going to do? Crime doesn't stop and it's not like Ronnie could impersonate Hector.
• Love the aloof nature of the tattoo artist as his customer's requests get weirder and Vic becomes more exasperated.
• Haven't touched much on the opening credit sequences, which are almost always on point with setting the tone for the episode or having intense sequences introducing a villain, broken up by the shaky credits. The opening truck hijacking with the blaring death metal music and visceral beating of the driver really tells us who the Strike Team is up against.
• “Right. And a man's just as good as a vibrator.”
• “How'd it go with Warner?”
  “I didn't have enough to make an arrest.”
• “Thanks for telling me about Peaches.”
• “I'm only on page 23 and I imagine this is a fascinating place.”
• “Wanting us to be a family doesn't make me a shrew.”
• “I was a bastard.”

Pre-Cog Report

• Vic's increased absence at home and Matthew's condition worsening will lead Corrine to take the kids and leave Vic in the finale of this season and the series.

Arrested Development - 1x01 - "Pilot" - You Can't Handle the Bluth!

 

You can't choose your family.

You're born, you grow up, you learn the way of the world. You look up to your parents and take on their lessons and traits. Then you begin to hate them when their methods and ideologies conflict with what you perceive to be what everyone else is doing and thinking. But there's no such thing as an idyllic childhood. Your parents are just two people who banged and had a kid, mixing and matching the best parental guidance they can gather from books, common sense, and attempts at rectifying their own parent's mistakes. Your extended family is just as full of damaged personalities, hang-ups, annoying quirks, repeated jokes, addictions to drugs, alcohol, and being right all the time. All products of an imperfect environment. But when it comes time for celebrations and heartbreaks, who else are you going to turn to? The perfect family doesn't exist and despite what the media tells us, it's not normal to always get along with people you have frequent contact with. Human beings are hard-wired with a defense mechanism that literally prevents us from being happy. Our brain tells us “this isn't enough” and “what else?” in order to keep us moving and surviving. But what're you going to do? Blood is thicker than water, it's a family affair, you gotta be loyal to somebody! Everyone's got their shit to deal with and it's always something. There'll be fights in public, fun times in private, screaming and crying, laughter and bonding. But if you're lucky, they'll never give up on you.

Arrested Development was a show that thrived on the importance of family. Despite the broad self-interested yet lovable cartoonish characters, it's clear that these people would do anything for each other while engaging in jokes about greedy corporations, actors & magicians, and whacky socialite hijinx. Hell, incest between two cousins is one of the sources of comedy and you can't get any more familial than that. And like any family, it's impossible to choose a favorite member of the Bluth clan.

But we all know the story: the show was killed in it's prime. Despite aggressive fan campaigns, timely DVD releases, and winning an Emmy for Outstanding Comedy Series after it's freshman year, it was canceled after three increasingly-shorter seasons and fifty-three episodes. Can we blame the FOX network? Sure, the show could've benefited from a few more billboards, TV spots and a post-Superbowl airing. To their credit, it was premiered after The Simpsons in it's first season. We also have to remember that 2003 was a time before DVR was a household name and little-to-no online viewing capabilities existed (unlike now, where most networks post episodes the next morning on Hulu). This was a show that practically begged for multiple viewings to absorb every joke in both the fore and background. You couldn't watch this while doing laundry, unlike shows with this-is-the-punchline-music or a three-camera sitcom that says “See? It's funny because this warmed-up-by-a-comedian-audience-being-told-to-laugh is laughing! Why aren't you, America?” It was a show before it's time.

So let's take a look at the extended pilot, first made available on the DVD set, which mainly adds funny characters moments and doesn't bleep out the word “fuck”. The plot is surprisingly simple compared to future episodes: It's George Sr.'s retirement party, we meet all the members of the Bluth family, he passes over Michael, promotes his wife, and gets arrested. Instead of moving to Arizona, Michael decides that instead of just saying that family is important to his son, he needs to act as an example and stick around during his family's time of need. It's a quick half-hour, mainly due to the cinema verite style that employs hand-held cameras and cut-aways to flashbacks, stock footage, newspaper articles and clips. The faux-documentary style, where it's acknowledged that some film crew has been capturing moments of this family since it's beginnings, is a useful narrative device for half-hour comedies, if it's done well, mainly due to the way it handles exposition. In the UK and US versions of The Office and Modern Family, they take it a step backward with frequent talking-head interviews with our characters, who expose their inner thoughts before and after moments we're currently seeing. And it's what sets Arrested Development apart from those shows, there's too much energy and too much going on to stop and have Michael explain his feelings during the retirement party. A mark of a good show is one that trusts it's audience to pay attention. And the Bluths don't do interviews.

Overall, this is one of the better comedy pilots in recent history. The characters are all clearly defined before the first act break, there's real-world conflict that they react to in a comic way, and very solid jokes in the dialogue and visuals. Jason Bateman plays a great straight man, who is perhaps the funniest character on the show with his dead-pan observations on the ridiculous nature of his family. The world of Orange County and the Bluth company's history is immediately expanded upon, from the frozen banana stand to rival housing company Sitwell. The only complaints I have is that some of the jokes' reverse engineering is a bit more blatant the umpteenth time around, such as Maeby's name. Was she named that simply for her response to George Michael's question about them being cousins? But Mitch Hurwitz seems to have an affinity for name puns (see also: George Michael, G.O.B., Tobias Funke and his latest show Running Wilde). The show was reportedly developed as a response to all the corporate accounting scandals like Enron and Worldcom, and while one can only ride the “look how crazy rich people are?” boat for so long, the show deserves credit for expanding on that premise and transcending into comedy brilliance.

This is the first sitcom I've dissected, after diving into the television criticism arena with just my wit and ability to identify variations on a theme. I'll continue to blog about the first season of The Shield, tackle about three Arrested Development episodes a week (in one post), and then possibly move onto Oz. Thanks for reading!