Post by icy on Jan 10, 2006 19:27:54 GMT -5
Nice article is well rounded and covers more characters.
From: "The Plain Dealer" out of Cleveland, OHIO
Veteran police drama 'The Shield' is even more brilliant this season
Tuesday, January 10, 2006
Mark Dawidziak
Plain Dealer Television Critic
Look out, ol' Mackey's back. That would be vicious Vic Mackey, the rule-bending Los Angeles police detective played with such ferocious brilliance by Emmy winner Michael Chiklis.
You might expect FX's "The Shield" to be looking a little tarnished after four pulse-pounding seasons. And the dazzling cable series would be excused for having lost a little of its glimmer.
But "The Shield" begins its fifth season at 10 tonight shining brighter than ever. FX provided critics with four of the new episodes, and the evidence is overwhelming: The storytelling is just as arresting as it was in the first season.
Indeed, on almost all fronts, "The Shield" is a better show now than in its first season, when critics lavished superlatives on executive producer Shawn Ryan's morally ambiguous mixture of law and disorder. The cast is stronger. The direction and editing are sharper. The camera work is more intriguing.
What "The Shield" has lost in gut-wrenching novelty, it has gained in consistency. During the first season, for instance, most of the acting firepower was provided by Chiklis and CCH Pounder, whose portrayal of detective Claudette Wyms should have long ago nabbed her the Emmy for best supporting actress in a drama.
Over the next three seasons, however, the writers developed the other characters, and the actors playing those characters raised their games to stay stride for stride with Chiklis and Pounder. The result is that "The Shield" hasn't lost a step as it races down the mean streets of Los Angeles.
The detective played by Jay Karnes, Holland "Dutch" Wagenbach, has grown as if he were injected with the dramatic equivalent of anabolic steroids. The same goes for Benito Martinez's ambitious David Aceveda, former captain of the Barn, now a cagey councilman navigating ever-tricky political waters.
All right, then, how could "The Shield" ever recover from the loss of Glenn Close, who played Capt. Monica Rawling last season? She picked up an Emmy nomination for her work as the captain ultimately brought down by one of those slippery-slope decisions characters routinely face on this show.
But this is a series that knows how to compensate for losses, so, without missing a beat, Ryan and his team have brought in Forest Whitaker to play Jon Kavanaugh, an Internal Affairs Division lieutenant determined to get Vic. Wait until you see how much drama this guy can create with the simple act of offering someone a stick of gum.
The fifth season of "The Shield" opens with the Barn hit by budget cuts. The new captain, Steve Billings (David Marciano), is a mealy-mouthed bureaucrat willing to give Vic and his Strike Team free rein.
That's the good news for Vic. The bad-news items are thicker than the smog over Los Angeles on a muggy day.
The Strike Team is coping with a race war between black and Mexican gang members. A shooting in a high school cafeteria has touched off a riot. Internal Affairs is trying to get detective Curtis Lemansky (Kenneth Johnson) to cooperate with bringing down Vic. And, with the department trying to improve its image in the community, Vic has been slated for early retirement.
"I'll walk out the front door on my own before I let someone push me out the back," a typically defiant Vic tells Strike Team veteran Shane Vendrell (Walton Goggins).
Will Vic survive the many threats aimed at him? Will David continue to help Jon close in on Vic? Will Curtis turn informant and spy on his friends? Will rookie officer Tina Hanlon (Paula Garces) win the respect of her partner, Julien Lowe (Michael Jace)? Will Claudette be able to balance work demands with health problems? Will the pregnant Danny (Catherine Dent) ever reveal the father's identity? And will Jon ultimately bring down Vic?
The questions posed by tonight's fifth-season opener are many, yet the biggest question has been answered. Is "The Shield" still one of the most gripping shows on television? FX marks the spot where you'll find the answer.
From: "The Plain Dealer" out of Cleveland, OHIO
Veteran police drama 'The Shield' is even more brilliant this season
Tuesday, January 10, 2006
Mark Dawidziak
Plain Dealer Television Critic
Look out, ol' Mackey's back. That would be vicious Vic Mackey, the rule-bending Los Angeles police detective played with such ferocious brilliance by Emmy winner Michael Chiklis.
You might expect FX's "The Shield" to be looking a little tarnished after four pulse-pounding seasons. And the dazzling cable series would be excused for having lost a little of its glimmer.
But "The Shield" begins its fifth season at 10 tonight shining brighter than ever. FX provided critics with four of the new episodes, and the evidence is overwhelming: The storytelling is just as arresting as it was in the first season.
Indeed, on almost all fronts, "The Shield" is a better show now than in its first season, when critics lavished superlatives on executive producer Shawn Ryan's morally ambiguous mixture of law and disorder. The cast is stronger. The direction and editing are sharper. The camera work is more intriguing.
What "The Shield" has lost in gut-wrenching novelty, it has gained in consistency. During the first season, for instance, most of the acting firepower was provided by Chiklis and CCH Pounder, whose portrayal of detective Claudette Wyms should have long ago nabbed her the Emmy for best supporting actress in a drama.
Over the next three seasons, however, the writers developed the other characters, and the actors playing those characters raised their games to stay stride for stride with Chiklis and Pounder. The result is that "The Shield" hasn't lost a step as it races down the mean streets of Los Angeles.
The detective played by Jay Karnes, Holland "Dutch" Wagenbach, has grown as if he were injected with the dramatic equivalent of anabolic steroids. The same goes for Benito Martinez's ambitious David Aceveda, former captain of the Barn, now a cagey councilman navigating ever-tricky political waters.
All right, then, how could "The Shield" ever recover from the loss of Glenn Close, who played Capt. Monica Rawling last season? She picked up an Emmy nomination for her work as the captain ultimately brought down by one of those slippery-slope decisions characters routinely face on this show.
But this is a series that knows how to compensate for losses, so, without missing a beat, Ryan and his team have brought in Forest Whitaker to play Jon Kavanaugh, an Internal Affairs Division lieutenant determined to get Vic. Wait until you see how much drama this guy can create with the simple act of offering someone a stick of gum.
The fifth season of "The Shield" opens with the Barn hit by budget cuts. The new captain, Steve Billings (David Marciano), is a mealy-mouthed bureaucrat willing to give Vic and his Strike Team free rein.
That's the good news for Vic. The bad-news items are thicker than the smog over Los Angeles on a muggy day.
The Strike Team is coping with a race war between black and Mexican gang members. A shooting in a high school cafeteria has touched off a riot. Internal Affairs is trying to get detective Curtis Lemansky (Kenneth Johnson) to cooperate with bringing down Vic. And, with the department trying to improve its image in the community, Vic has been slated for early retirement.
"I'll walk out the front door on my own before I let someone push me out the back," a typically defiant Vic tells Strike Team veteran Shane Vendrell (Walton Goggins).
Will Vic survive the many threats aimed at him? Will David continue to help Jon close in on Vic? Will Curtis turn informant and spy on his friends? Will rookie officer Tina Hanlon (Paula Garces) win the respect of her partner, Julien Lowe (Michael Jace)? Will Claudette be able to balance work demands with health problems? Will the pregnant Danny (Catherine Dent) ever reveal the father's identity? And will Jon ultimately bring down Vic?
The questions posed by tonight's fifth-season opener are many, yet the biggest question has been answered. Is "The Shield" still one of the most gripping shows on television? FX marks the spot where you'll find the answer.