thread: 2011-06-01 : TV Roundup
On 2011-06-14, Daniel Klein wrote:
I must plug The Mentalist. Elevator pitch: TV "psychic" calls out serial killer on his show. Serial killer murders psychic's family to teach him a lesson in humility. Psychic joins the police as a consultant on a mission for vengeance.
It's often very procedural, very case-of-the-week plus character-development-bit-of-the-week, but it has a few points that make me recommend it unconditionally:
* Simon Baker is an amazing lead and fills the character like I believe no one else could. Patrick Jane is one of the most fascinating, consistent, complex characters I've ever seen on TV.
* It gets religion right. Most of the cops on the show have some level of religiosity to them (from the very overt, Jesus-will-save-you-ness of Grace to the very subdued catholicism of Lisbon which only shows itself in life and death situations). The hero is an atheist, and in any other show on the planet he would be a Hollywood Atheist: WHY HAVE YOU FORSAKEN ME! MY FAMILY WAS KILLED, THERE IS NO GOD! Patrick Jane is a rational, reasonable Atheist who calmly points out that atheism is the more reasonable, plausible approach and who separates what he wished were true from what is more likely to be true.
* When it decides to be smart, it is oh so very very smart. The whole "main character is so smart others think he's psychic" bit could have been played as a gimmick in any other show or been simply implausible. Here, though, he always shows his work and makes his wild leaps of logic seem perfectly obvious in hindsight. More Sherlock than Sherlock, really. And the show plays oh so very fair. I've often paused before a reveal, reviewing what we've seen and learned so far and have been able, after some thinking, to arrive at the correct conclusion. That balance of "the audience can figure it out too, if they want" and "not too obvious" is SO hard to get right, and yet they do it episode after episode.
* Holy fuck, some of the endings of the most recent episodes! Here I ramble on about and spoil 3x18, one of the most amazing episodes recently. The third season has come to a close, and I cannot say word one about the season final without spoiling a more than magical moment of TV.
In short, watch The Mentalist. It has its weaker moments (especially when too much time is spent with the cops), but it reaches moments of narrative sublimity like few other shows.
