Damages Watch: Family Affair
SPOILER ALERT: Before you read this post, watch Damages. And check your mail. Carefully.
So of course the week after I decide to do a Watch on Damages, the show serves up an episode that... well, I don't have that much to say about. That's maybe the peril of writing about a series that's more plot- than character-driven; this episode moved the ball down the field a bit and repeated some of what we already knew about Ellen (driven, torn between work and home), Arthur (ruthless and hiding something) and Patty (still scary as hell).
This was a mainly Patty-centric episode, which may have been partly what threw me; we all know Close is great in the role, but I liked the interplay in the first two episodes between Team Hewes and Team Frobisher. (I have the next episode but haven't watched it yet. What am I, a machine?) It was intriguing to see Patty interact more with her family, and to handle her problem son with the same hard-nosed dispatch as her litigation targets. (Maybe my plot-dar was broken last night, but I didn't expect her son to have been the grenade-mailer.) And her reaction to opening her explosive package was priceless: "Oh, God, it's going to be a sh_tty week." But I don't think the storyline about the threats to Patty added much to our understanding of her, because it was simultaneously obvious (of course her enemies hate her) and over-the-top (I'm trying to picture a convicted Enron exec wilding out with a knife after his trial). I still find Patty most interesting, and most menacing, in the subtle hints and glimpses we get of her characters through work, as when--having ordered her staff to work nonstop on a brief--she passive-aggressively tells Ellen, "I like that family's important to you." Patty is scariest when she's being nice.
Meanwhile, the flash-forwards are getting more interesting, although, let's be honest, the only way I could imagine waifish Ellen actually having killed David was if she had been secretly trained as a killing machine by the Alliance. Thoughts? Theories?
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1
I know this is not the right place for this (feel free to move it, James), but upon hearing this exciting gossip on potential casting for Lost next season, I had to put it here, because it arguably is the best news I have ever heard.
Michael Ausiello of TV Guide is reporting that Kristen Bell is being considered for a role as a new character on the show. In related news, if this happens, Lost is the greatest show of all time, bar none.
Here's the link: http://www.tvguide.com/Ask-Ausiello/070815
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Brilliant Firefly reference, and thanks for the link to the Firefly wiki - I didn't know it existed.
I agree that Patty is really creepy when she's being nice. It's kinda like Willem Dafoe in Spiderman being scarier when he's NOT in the Green Goblin suit. But as far as Ellen not being able to kill someone - you never know what someone is capable of doing when they are pushed to the limit. It will be interesting to see how this develops.
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Actually, the character I keep flashing to is not River, but Sydney Bristow: discovering her fiancé dead in a bathtub, screaming, running from the apartment, working for someone who may have killed said fiancé (though I suspect Patty actually orchestrating the murder is a little too obvious-who knows?).
I didn't know the son had sent the grenades until Patty kept making significant eye contact while slowing telling him that his behavior. Must. Stop.
In good news, I'm getting more used to Zeljko Ivanek's accent.
I got a good laugh from the "As you know, six of your colleagues took a personal day, and I fired them."
Meanwhile, I'm getting more and more annoyed by Katie. Plus, why did Tom not investigate Greg's wife beyond "he's wearing a ring"? That was a blatant hole that either is a setup for the wife to have something to do with it or a red herring that makes Tom and Patty look incompetent.
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The producers have said that the hook for this season is what happened to Ellen, how she ended up bloody and fleeing a crime scene. If the show is picked up, what will occur in the second/third seasons? Will it revert to an ordinary law show?
Also I was comparing Michael to AJ from you know where, and I think that Mike clearly wins the future psychopath award, the way things are going. At least that other show had a relatively stable nuclear family.
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Chad,
Oh good God!!! You and your fixation on Bell!
Actually, I'm happy for you. -
6
Sorry to post again, but I was made aware today that AJ tried to kill himself. This is in a season I have not seen yet. Still, I don't think he would send death threats to his family but, of course, I really can't say that definitively.
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I think that Damages is a show that started out being tightly plotted, but is unravelling before our eyes. The show is now nothing but a bunch of loose ends held together by Glenn Close (with some assistance from Zeljko Ivanek -- always been a huge fane of his since he tore up the screen in The Sender--an otherwise forgettable Wes Craven ripoff; and Peter Facinelli, who manages to dominate the screen while having no discernable talent as an actor.)
- poniewozik Loved the season. Mrs Tuned In wd have put u on the main list RT @boredtodeath Thank u for incl us in Time's Top 10. We'll take hon mention. - 7 hours ago
- poniewozik @carr2n Virgin is the best, LAX-JFK - 8 hours ago
- poniewozik Did NPR interview abt multiscreen multitasking. After, automatically reached for iPhone in pocket. Like don draper wd have for cigarettes. - 9 hours ago
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