I’m not gonna lie to you — it’s the former. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, so long as the buddy cops are enjoyable … that’s kind of where things get dicey for me.
They just lost me last night. I don’t know — something about the show just refuses to engage me. Which is too bad, because as its individual parts, the show has a ton of merit. It’s the sum of those parts that left me wanting for more.
The focus of the week was Special Agent Sam Hanna (LL Cool J) … really? He’s great, and all, but is that what they wanted to tell us about him? That as a former Navy S.E.A.L. he’s a closed book? I thought it could have been an interesting opportunity for Hanna to discover something about the new him who’s now an NCIS agent, but his self-exploration never got off the ground.
And since the show’s a partner thing right now, the focus on Sam forced Callen (Chris O’Donnell) to be his sidekick, which was a total 180 from where the show means to be. An ensemble cast would allow one person to shine while the others still retained their strengths, but a cast with a leading man like O’Donnell forces him to take a back seat when someone else steps up, which just makes everything seem silly.
The coupling, as it were, leaves Kensi “is he looking at my butt?” Blye (Daniela Ruah), and Dominic “Sam doesn’t like me!” Vail (Adam Jamal Craig) to fend for themselves. Don’t get me wrong — both characters are good, and both can (and likely will) be tremendous assets to the show. But they’re being utilized as levity right now, taking care of the sideshow while Hanna and Callen focus on the important stuff, and that sucks. Kensi is a bit crazy, though. Did she seriously key that random car?
Meanwhile, Hetty (Linda Hunt) was suddenly looming and in charge. Yes, she supposedly was last week too, but no one remembered to actually write her that way until now. I don’t know — maybe disjointed is the right word for how all of this comes across? At least to me.
I applaud NCIS: LA for its efforts at distancing itself from the original. A cold re-dux of its forbearer, ala CSI, would not have resulted in anything worth writing home about. However, there’s originality, and then there’s just taking things too far. Undercover unit instead of murder investigators? Good. Losing the team feel? Bad. Buddy cop versus ensemble? Okay. Weak characters instead of rich ones? I don’t think so. There’s nothing wrong with taking some of the winning formula and re-applying it!
I predict this show will be successful. The weight of its star-power alone (both the cast’s and the crew’s pedigree) will probably see it through for a few seasons. But I just don’t think it’s for me. If a show doesn’t engage me, it’s not worth sticking around just to see what might be. If they pick things up? Let me know.
For now, I think I’ll stick with the East Coast crew.
Clacked by Aryeh S.
on Sep 30, 2009 @ 12:44 EST5EDT
Kensi keyed the car (a lot) to really sell that scorned woman angle, and the suspects bought it. She even tells someone on her cell to run the plate, because they’ll have to pay for the body work. It’s good to see that the Marine brat retains a personality.
I’m undecided about the buddy cop premise, but as long as they keep joking about Callen/Hanna being a gay couple I can’t help but enjoy it.
I am troubled by the guest actors we’ve seen so far. On NCIS, it was remarkable how they got their one-offs to portray sailors and marines so believably so much of the time: always professional but usually ordinary and unremarkable like real soldiers. Maybe it was the fact that it started as a Bellisario show that enabled them to get the nuances right. This week, I was laughing at the thought that these morons were SEALs, just as I did last week at the supposedly elite PMC contractors that got wiped out. They felt more like actors playing military badasses in an action movie than what we’ve previously seen on the parent show, which made it much harder for me to take the drama seriously.
*POST AUTHOR*
Oh, I know why she did, it was just insane. :) I didn’t expect it to look like it did when they panned to it.
Interesting point; I generally gloss over the case of the week, and thus the guests, but with your call to consider it, I do see a difference in casting quality between the shows. Either way, I think O’Donnell and LL Cool J are a poor fit….
I don’t know, the whole Hetty thing also throws me for a loop. I think the writers think she is a funny distraction, but for me, it completely misses the boat. Aside from the fact that she is annoying (to me, at least)– what’s the point? As discussed in a previous post, she seems not to be the boss, but then, instead of recasting the boss from the pilot (and I’m glad they got rid of her), they decided to let the team go leaderless except for the occasional Director Vance? I don’t know…
*POST AUTHOR*
I wonder if the complaint that people had was with Macy, Louise Lombard (the actress), or with her role on the team; since Callen is somewhat of a “team leader” she was redundant, especially if Vance was going to play a role as well – as he should.
But then the question becomes, what’s Hetty’s role. I think she is the new boss, meaning the loudest complaints were about Macy and Louise Lombard, but she’s supposed to be non-traditional, and also responsible for a whole host of other things, like wardrobe, thereby addressing the redundancy issue.
She doesn’t seem to work, so clearly they missed the mark, but maybe they’d have done better to simply address one problem at a time.