Been watching Graceland since the jump, and while I do like the show, I thought the most recent episode was a step backwards. They called the episode Heat Run, which was sloppy because the actual Heat Run was in the previous episode as well as mentioned in the opening segment of this episode. After 5 minutes it was done, never to be mentioned again.
Last week, when Paul and Mike sold the cop-killer bullets to Bello’s man Eddie, Paul introduced Mike as “This is my guy from Pendleton.” Okay. As we’ve been told, you don’t give out more info than you need to because it just might come back at you in the form of questions.
So that brings up a question – If Paul didn’t introduce Mike as Mike to Eddie – how does Bello come to call Mike by his name? Second point is that – by having Paul pull his gun on Mike, and then, Bello and his men come in with their guns drawn – all in the first five minutes – we all knew no one was going to get hurt.
Bello returns Mike’s weapon to him
This week there were a preponderance of meaningless events that seemed to go off into tangents that went nowhere. Like why did Bello ask one of his men to fire up the stove and then absolutely nothing came of it. Like at the first bar scene – DJ says the he’s “… like a chocolate Jesus – watch and learn my young friend“, as if he was going to teach Mike something, but all he does he exit the scene.
Later, Mike meets with his ‘shrink/controller’ Juan. Basically they rehashed stuff that we already knew (Mike’s interactions with Paul), then Juan suggests that Mike’s reports are a bit thin. Juan says, I need more detail. Okay fine – but Mike says, You know I’m IN THE HOUSE, and it’s not all that easy to type up detailed reports when I’m IN THE HOUSE. That makes sense – so why does Mike, after discovering something interesting when he runs the number of the credit card that Paul used at the bar, get up from his desk to go and check it out, then he leaves his computer on?
When Lauren said she saw the cars in the garage, not ony did Paul not believe her. but neither did we. Could they have made it any more obvious in their instructions to the actress to look like she was lying? Her eyes gave away everything.
And that whole business with Charlie’s less than dependable CI. What a waste of time. Did we really need Whistler to go look around that house, and tell in detail all the stuff he would do and repairs he’d make. You know what happened. So wasn’t that a waste?
And really, did we really need a whole episode to write Lauren’s character off the show. Seemed like Donnie got let go much quicker.
Okay, I could find plenty more to gripe about but to what point? I mean there are positives. Meaning there are lots to like. I do get that Daniel Sunjata is hitting his role as Paul Briggs out of the park at every turn. His character is possibly dark and brooding internally – but I love Sunjata’s portrayal because of the energy he brings to the screen. He’s not only a good-looking guy, but Briggs has also got plenty of smarts – both street sense, as well as for planning and being on top of things as well as his innate abilities in deception. He is an exciting character.
Aaron Tveit has the role of the FBI mole within the undercover group. His role is a lot trickier. His ability to think on his feet, especially while under-duress, is remarkable. He, very much like Briggs, has the innate ability to suss out everything that’s going on around him.
Lauren (Scotty Thompson) is now officially out – but let’s not say she won’t ever re-appear. The Russians are still of a mind to take the other off-screen agent (Donny) out. So we will have to wait and see.
As for the other characters Brandon Jay McLaren’s DJ Jakes – like him as well. So far, he’s not done much beyond looking and sounding like a Rastafarian. I think he’s been underused. Ditto for Johnny. I hear your question about the women, Charlie and Paige – so far they’ve not been pivotal in any of the major cases. But the next episode (1-04) called Pizza Box apparently has more active roles for the supporting characters.
Paige (Serinda Swan) bags a perp
Following that episode – I’ll be back with new Graceland commentary.
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