Burn Notice 3x13 to 4x04
Jun. 28th, 2011 11:52 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
icepixieI have FINALLY figured out who Jeffrey Donovan (Michael) reminds me of! Well, besides Rob Schneider. But no, really, he looks somewhat like Vincent Ventresca without the crazy hair, and the voiceovers are very reminiscent of Darien Fawkes's on Invisible Man. Plus there's the whole involuntary job-change, fighting crime in novel ways with a team, shared criminal backgrounds... No wonder this show dove straight into my heart!
I'll start with some things I didn't like. Gabriel's insistence on seeing Fi's passport with a Madrid stamp was kind of dumb. Girl's been red-flagged by Interpol; no way can she fly under her own name. She's probably on her third or fourth fake ID. And even if she did have her own passport, it's not like they don't expire; she could just say that it expired sometime between 2006 and 2010, and she dumped the old one.
Logic holes were kind of a theme for these eight episodes. In 4x01, what's going to happen to Winston if the feds ever do prosecute the Breakers for any of their illegal activities? His financial records are all mixed up with theirs. If Barry works his magic and extricates his info from theirs, then they have no reason not to kill him. Though I guess maybe we're just supposed to infer that El Prez liked him, or at least considered him not worth killing anymore.
Another hole: Vaughn & co. can't figure out the same things Michael figured out from the file? Really? How do they run a super-secret spy organization if one guy, albeit a very bright guy, can think rings around them? Though I suppose it was their way of getting Michael to trust them and get invested in the mission. (Presumably Michael figured this out and just didn't tell us in voiceover.)
...Right. Drink more, think less. Especially when it comes to the conspiracy, because I'm starting to get the same feeling about it that I had about the X-Files mytharc: i.e., nobody behind the scenes really has a plan for it. This is not good, not good at all. At least the majority of the episodes are still devoted to the entertaining jobs of the week, and the mytharc only takes over once per season. It also doesn't seem to be as pointlessly byzantine as XF's was, which is a relief. It's still internally consistent so far, and I don't think anyone will be turning into beams of starlight any time soon.
Just for kicks, the plot, as I understand it so far: Management heads some kind of covert organization, unconnected to governments, with questionable recruitment practices and employees who have a habit of going off the rails. They are not a group you voluntarily hang around with, but if you've been burned by them, you might not have much of a choice. On the other hand, there is another bigger, badder secret organization out there that's doing unspecified evil acts, against which Management is working. Said organization used Strickler to try and seduce Michael over to their side, and also hired Gilroy to break Simon (one of Management's mistakes) out of prison for unspecified purposes.
From what I can tell, various national intelligence organizations have no clue that this entire turf war is going on. Or maybe they're involved in a plausible deniability sort of way, in much the same way that Michael was a "freelancer" for the CIA, because they don't want to get their hands dirty. Thus, Michael, Fi, Sam, and now apparently Jesse are OUR ONLY HOPE for stopping the unspecified evils these organizations are perpetrating, which makes me question the efficacy of organizations like the CIA.
Speaking of Jesse...I remain undecided on him. I generally resent cast members added partway through a show's run, so I think it'll take me a while to warm up to him. One thing in his favor is that a four-person team makes two two-person teams possible, which was helpful and even a little fun in 4x04. And I like that Fi has found a buddy in the "blow stuff up first, ask questions later" department. Beyond that, though...he's okay, I guess? I can understand the skills he adds to the team, and I see that he shakes up the dynamic, but I'm seeing this on a very superficial level at the moment. Jesse feels more like a collection of skills and character traits than an actual character, if that makes any sense. (And oddly enough, very few of those skills and traits say "spy." "Detective" or "military" I'd buy, perhaps because he looks like a taller Poor Man's Jon Huertas, aka Esposito on Castle, but spy...not really.) The characterlessness is probably because he's only been around for three episodes, though. So we'll see. The missing $2 million does add a layer of ambiguity to his character that I like.
I think part of my problem is that I can see the writers going, "Oooh, having Michael be the cause of Jesse's burn [even though it was less a "burn" than "Jesse was trusted with this information and charged with keeping it out of outsiders' hands, and if Michael managed to get it, Jesse wasn't doing his job" - Ed.] and keeping it secret creates Dramatic Tension Type 152A! We'll just let it play out with Jesse integrating iwnto group, everyone coming to love everyone else, and then, in a season finale, The Truth Gets Out! Jesse does something stupid because he's hurt and angry. Michael will help him out, both will learn lessons about Telling The Truth and Who Your Friends Are, and will spend the next season warily putting their friendship back together, stronger than ever!" We've all seen this storyline before; we all know how it goes. Not that the show is a shining bastion of originality--honestly, I'm not sure I'd want it to be one--but this feels especially paint by numbers. That said, they may well surprise me, and that would be fantastic.
(Madeline, I'll note, agrees with me. Loved, loved, loved her putting two and two together and figuring out Michael was the one who caused Jesse to lose his job, and then telling Michael to just tell him the truth already before any of this mess happens.)
Anyway, I do still actually like the show, especially in all its little details. To wit:
- I've really grown to like Maddy over the third season. Her steadfast refusal to believe the FBI agent's selected tales from Michael's burn notice file was as heartening as her answer to Agent Boring's "Do you really want to pay for his mistakes?" ("He paid for mine.") was heartbreaking. And since my main issue with her in S1 and S2 was her refusal to admit she had ever been wrong, that did sort of make me pleased at the same time as I felt really bad for her.
- Plus, I rather enjoyed how she said, "If Michael wanted you dead, you'd be dead," about two seconds after I said the same thing. She does know her son. :D
- The scene between them at the end of 4x01 was an excellent follow-up. Michael actually tells her everything he knows, and says he's scared that he'll turn into Simon. She's quite sure he won't. Lovely.
- Also on that theme, I liked Michael's statement to Fi (and Sam, but mostly Fi) in 3x13 that being around her made the part of him that was like Larry smaller every day.
- Apparently I am psychic where Fiona is concerned. Of course an English soldier killing her sister was what jump-started her involvement in the IRA. Well, assuming she wasn't just spinning a tale for Gabriel to get him not to shoot her, anyway. (Should I be worried that a generous helping of characters I like are lying liars who lie?)
- Sam as Chuck Findley, CSI, doing a Horatio Caine impression with the sunglasses--AWESOME. SO VERY AWESOME. Hell, I've never even seen CSI Miami, and I found it hilarious.
- I actually like Vaughn, although I imagine he's probably up to no good.
- The biker case in 4x01 wasn't one of their greatest hits, but I really enjoyed the way poor Michael was just dropped into the middle of it. He goes to see Fi, who had only recently heard he wasn't actually dead, and gets one kiss before she's getting him to load a weapon and come with her on a job. Sam just tells him they'll have to get a beer soon. And Michael's sitting in front of the client's house with a small automatic weapon in his hand before he even asks for or gets all the details. Heh.
- And then a few scenes later, he's understandably a little underwhelmed by his welcome home. Fi, ever-perceptive, asks, "Are you pouting?" Aw. I'd pout too, Michael. At least they get to share a better welcome-home moment after that, even if he does have to go and ruin it by mentioning he's kind of enlisted to fight an international war of evil he doesn't yet understand, to which her fairly understandable reaction is, "ARGH."
- One benefit of Jesse's newbishness is the scene in 4x02 where Mike and Fi are completely in sync, building a plan with each other that involves increasingly higher-caliber artillery, and Jesse's like, "Haha guys, now let's--wait, you're serious?"
"You're just gonna walk up to him and get him to buy these weapons?"
"I'm a spy, Jesse, that's what we do. [To Fi] Have things changed since I've been out?"
You have much to learn, young padawan.
- Chuck Findley the Mob Enforcer, with his friend Mr. Slicey, might have been the best Sam cover ID yet. (I know it's basically just a running joke at this point, but surely someone in Miami is getting suspicious about this Findley guy by now, with all the jobs and personalities he's supposedly had!)
- It was interesting to see Sam do more than just be a sidekick in 4x04. He kind of took over the steering wheel there for a while--albeit not to the greatest end.
I'll start with some things I didn't like. Gabriel's insistence on seeing Fi's passport with a Madrid stamp was kind of dumb. Girl's been red-flagged by Interpol; no way can she fly under her own name. She's probably on her third or fourth fake ID. And even if she did have her own passport, it's not like they don't expire; she could just say that it expired sometime between 2006 and 2010, and she dumped the old one.
Logic holes were kind of a theme for these eight episodes. In 4x01, what's going to happen to Winston if the feds ever do prosecute the Breakers for any of their illegal activities? His financial records are all mixed up with theirs. If Barry works his magic and extricates his info from theirs, then they have no reason not to kill him. Though I guess maybe we're just supposed to infer that El Prez liked him, or at least considered him not worth killing anymore.
Another hole: Vaughn & co. can't figure out the same things Michael figured out from the file? Really? How do they run a super-secret spy organization if one guy, albeit a very bright guy, can think rings around them? Though I suppose it was their way of getting Michael to trust them and get invested in the mission. (Presumably Michael figured this out and just didn't tell us in voiceover.)
...Right. Drink more, think less. Especially when it comes to the conspiracy, because I'm starting to get the same feeling about it that I had about the X-Files mytharc: i.e., nobody behind the scenes really has a plan for it. This is not good, not good at all. At least the majority of the episodes are still devoted to the entertaining jobs of the week, and the mytharc only takes over once per season. It also doesn't seem to be as pointlessly byzantine as XF's was, which is a relief. It's still internally consistent so far, and I don't think anyone will be turning into beams of starlight any time soon.
Just for kicks, the plot, as I understand it so far: Management heads some kind of covert organization, unconnected to governments, with questionable recruitment practices and employees who have a habit of going off the rails. They are not a group you voluntarily hang around with, but if you've been burned by them, you might not have much of a choice. On the other hand, there is another bigger, badder secret organization out there that's doing unspecified evil acts, against which Management is working. Said organization used Strickler to try and seduce Michael over to their side, and also hired Gilroy to break Simon (one of Management's mistakes) out of prison for unspecified purposes.
From what I can tell, various national intelligence organizations have no clue that this entire turf war is going on. Or maybe they're involved in a plausible deniability sort of way, in much the same way that Michael was a "freelancer" for the CIA, because they don't want to get their hands dirty. Thus, Michael, Fi, Sam, and now apparently Jesse are OUR ONLY HOPE for stopping the unspecified evils these organizations are perpetrating, which makes me question the efficacy of organizations like the CIA.
Speaking of Jesse...I remain undecided on him. I generally resent cast members added partway through a show's run, so I think it'll take me a while to warm up to him. One thing in his favor is that a four-person team makes two two-person teams possible, which was helpful and even a little fun in 4x04. And I like that Fi has found a buddy in the "blow stuff up first, ask questions later" department. Beyond that, though...he's okay, I guess? I can understand the skills he adds to the team, and I see that he shakes up the dynamic, but I'm seeing this on a very superficial level at the moment. Jesse feels more like a collection of skills and character traits than an actual character, if that makes any sense. (And oddly enough, very few of those skills and traits say "spy." "Detective" or "military" I'd buy, perhaps because he looks like a taller Poor Man's Jon Huertas, aka Esposito on Castle, but spy...not really.) The characterlessness is probably because he's only been around for three episodes, though. So we'll see. The missing $2 million does add a layer of ambiguity to his character that I like.
I think part of my problem is that I can see the writers going, "Oooh, having Michael be the cause of Jesse's burn [even though it was less a "burn" than "Jesse was trusted with this information and charged with keeping it out of outsiders' hands, and if Michael managed to get it, Jesse wasn't doing his job" - Ed.] and keeping it secret creates Dramatic Tension Type 152A! We'll just let it play out with Jesse integrating iwnto group, everyone coming to love everyone else, and then, in a season finale, The Truth Gets Out! Jesse does something stupid because he's hurt and angry. Michael will help him out, both will learn lessons about Telling The Truth and Who Your Friends Are, and will spend the next season warily putting their friendship back together, stronger than ever!" We've all seen this storyline before; we all know how it goes. Not that the show is a shining bastion of originality--honestly, I'm not sure I'd want it to be one--but this feels especially paint by numbers. That said, they may well surprise me, and that would be fantastic.
(Madeline, I'll note, agrees with me. Loved, loved, loved her putting two and two together and figuring out Michael was the one who caused Jesse to lose his job, and then telling Michael to just tell him the truth already before any of this mess happens.)
Anyway, I do still actually like the show, especially in all its little details. To wit:
- I've really grown to like Maddy over the third season. Her steadfast refusal to believe the FBI agent's selected tales from Michael's burn notice file was as heartening as her answer to Agent Boring's "Do you really want to pay for his mistakes?" ("He paid for mine.") was heartbreaking. And since my main issue with her in S1 and S2 was her refusal to admit she had ever been wrong, that did sort of make me pleased at the same time as I felt really bad for her.
- Plus, I rather enjoyed how she said, "If Michael wanted you dead, you'd be dead," about two seconds after I said the same thing. She does know her son. :D
- The scene between them at the end of 4x01 was an excellent follow-up. Michael actually tells her everything he knows, and says he's scared that he'll turn into Simon. She's quite sure he won't. Lovely.
- Also on that theme, I liked Michael's statement to Fi (and Sam, but mostly Fi) in 3x13 that being around her made the part of him that was like Larry smaller every day.
- Apparently I am psychic where Fiona is concerned. Of course an English soldier killing her sister was what jump-started her involvement in the IRA. Well, assuming she wasn't just spinning a tale for Gabriel to get him not to shoot her, anyway. (Should I be worried that a generous helping of characters I like are lying liars who lie?)
- Sam as Chuck Findley, CSI, doing a Horatio Caine impression with the sunglasses--AWESOME. SO VERY AWESOME. Hell, I've never even seen CSI Miami, and I found it hilarious.
- I actually like Vaughn, although I imagine he's probably up to no good.
- The biker case in 4x01 wasn't one of their greatest hits, but I really enjoyed the way poor Michael was just dropped into the middle of it. He goes to see Fi, who had only recently heard he wasn't actually dead, and gets one kiss before she's getting him to load a weapon and come with her on a job. Sam just tells him they'll have to get a beer soon. And Michael's sitting in front of the client's house with a small automatic weapon in his hand before he even asks for or gets all the details. Heh.
- And then a few scenes later, he's understandably a little underwhelmed by his welcome home. Fi, ever-perceptive, asks, "Are you pouting?" Aw. I'd pout too, Michael. At least they get to share a better welcome-home moment after that, even if he does have to go and ruin it by mentioning he's kind of enlisted to fight an international war of evil he doesn't yet understand, to which her fairly understandable reaction is, "ARGH."
- One benefit of Jesse's newbishness is the scene in 4x02 where Mike and Fi are completely in sync, building a plan with each other that involves increasingly higher-caliber artillery, and Jesse's like, "Haha guys, now let's--wait, you're serious?"
"You're just gonna walk up to him and get him to buy these weapons?"
"I'm a spy, Jesse, that's what we do. [To Fi] Have things changed since I've been out?"
You have much to learn, young padawan.
- Chuck Findley the Mob Enforcer, with his friend Mr. Slicey, might have been the best Sam cover ID yet. (I know it's basically just a running joke at this point, but surely someone in Miami is getting suspicious about this Findley guy by now, with all the jobs and personalities he's supposedly had!)
- It was interesting to see Sam do more than just be a sidekick in 4x04. He kind of took over the steering wheel there for a while--albeit not to the greatest end.