Leverage: Season 1
Apr. 22nd, 2010 12:39 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
meganbmooreThis is a caper-of-the-week show about a drunk former insurance investigator who teams up with a bunch of criminals he used to hunt all over the world to help people by committing crime. No, really. But it’s the good kind of “No, really.”
Nate Ford used tofight crime be an insurance fraud investigator until the insurance company he worked for refused to cover his son’s treatment, and the kid died. He drunk himself into unemployment, divorce, and homelessness and now plays modern-day Robin Hood with four of the criminals he used to hunt. Sophie is a grifter who wants to act on stage, but despite being an amaszing actress while breaking the law, she can’t act to save her life otherwise. Parker is a borderline-sociopathic thief in love with money and allergic to feelings and people. Hardison is an uber geek (if geekitude exists for it, he geeks over it) and computer genius. Eliot is a “retrieval expert” who thinks they’re all insane (Ok, mostly Parker. I think she scares him.) and likes to beat people up.
The characters are universally awesome, though I’m not thrilled with all aspects of how Nate’s alcoholism is handled and how his angst revolves around the dead kid being brought up every chance the show gets (ok, I’m just not big on dead kids in fiction) or how Nate and Sophie’s not-exactly-romance goes from “you should ship them because they shot each other when they met and he’s in love with her bad acting” to “Sophie wants Nate to face his problems and he just drinks more” throughout the season, though the final arc got that back on the right fitting somewhat, and hopefully resolved a lot of Nate’s problems.
While I love Sophie and Nate (actually, Sophie is probably my favorite, if I must choose) I do agree with what seems to be the general fandom consensus that the sub-team of Parker, Hardison and Eliot is more fun, and probably fit the often-light-hearted tone of the show better than the Nate and Sophie angst, though everyone seems to have their fare share of angst. In fact, much of Parker and Hardison’s slow-moving-but-adorable-probable-future-romance is rooted in that time they bonded about being children in foster care. (Incidentally, while Parker has the requisite Terribly Terrible Foster Care Experience, it’s balanced by Hardison being raised by an apparently awesome foster mother, making this one of the few times I’ve seen the foster system acknowledged as not being inherently evil on US TV.)
The show also plays with some standards role assignations in capers, too. The two characters who would normally be the fandom heartthrobs-the smooth operator and “pointman” who the con revolves around and who must have something up a sleave, and the near-sociopathic, amoral thief with an angsty past who can barely interact with people in social situations (and doesn’t care to anyway)-are women, something I suspect is very much deliberate on the part of the writers (they also frequently pass the Bechdel Test, and if they fail due to talking about a guy, it’s not in the context of having to talk about romantic relationships or how amazing/awesome he is) and the cute geeky guy who would usually be assigned the entry/POV role (I’d say this designation fluctuates on a near-episodic basis, though it does still default back to Nate) is black.
While Hardison is the only on-screen POC, gueststars of both the good guy and bad guy variety are frequently POC. Christian Kane (Eliot) is of mixed Anglo/Cherokee descent and I believe he identifies as Cherokee, but I have no idea what Eliot’s intended ethnicity is. Based on what I’ve seen, I suspect it will either never be addressed at all, or he’ll be biracial. Gina Bellman, I believe, is also Jewish, though I doubt that will ever be a part of the show. I feel I should warn, though, about one episode where Sophie impersonates an Indian woman.
Also, the showe needs more Kari Matchett. But I’m biased that way.
Spoilers for season 2 will result in Hardison deleting entire harddrives.
Nate Ford used to
The characters are universally awesome, though I’m not thrilled with all aspects of how Nate’s alcoholism is handled and how his angst revolves around the dead kid being brought up every chance the show gets (ok, I’m just not big on dead kids in fiction) or how Nate and Sophie’s not-exactly-romance goes from “you should ship them because they shot each other when they met and he’s in love with her bad acting” to “Sophie wants Nate to face his problems and he just drinks more” throughout the season, though the final arc got that back on the right fitting somewhat, and hopefully resolved a lot of Nate’s problems.
While I love Sophie and Nate (actually, Sophie is probably my favorite, if I must choose) I do agree with what seems to be the general fandom consensus that the sub-team of Parker, Hardison and Eliot is more fun, and probably fit the often-light-hearted tone of the show better than the Nate and Sophie angst, though everyone seems to have their fare share of angst. In fact, much of Parker and Hardison’s slow-moving-but-adorable-probable-future-romance is rooted in that time they bonded about being children in foster care. (Incidentally, while Parker has the requisite Terribly Terrible Foster Care Experience, it’s balanced by Hardison being raised by an apparently awesome foster mother, making this one of the few times I’ve seen the foster system acknowledged as not being inherently evil on US TV.)
The show also plays with some standards role assignations in capers, too. The two characters who would normally be the fandom heartthrobs-the smooth operator and “pointman” who the con revolves around and who must have something up a sleave, and the near-sociopathic, amoral thief with an angsty past who can barely interact with people in social situations (and doesn’t care to anyway)-are women, something I suspect is very much deliberate on the part of the writers (they also frequently pass the Bechdel Test, and if they fail due to talking about a guy, it’s not in the context of having to talk about romantic relationships or how amazing/awesome he is) and the cute geeky guy who would usually be assigned the entry/POV role (I’d say this designation fluctuates on a near-episodic basis, though it does still default back to Nate) is black.
While Hardison is the only on-screen POC, gueststars of both the good guy and bad guy variety are frequently POC. Christian Kane (Eliot) is of mixed Anglo/Cherokee descent and I believe he identifies as Cherokee, but I have no idea what Eliot’s intended ethnicity is. Based on what I’ve seen, I suspect it will either never be addressed at all, or he’ll be biracial. Gina Bellman, I believe, is also Jewish, though I doubt that will ever be a part of the show. I feel I should warn, though, about one episode where Sophie impersonates an Indian woman.
Also, the showe needs more Kari Matchett. But I’m biased that way.
Spoilers for season 2 will result in Hardison deleting entire harddrives.
no subject
Date: 2010-04-22 01:31 pm (UTC)