The Closer: Season 1: eps 1-3

[meganbmoore]

Basic premise: Brenda Lee Johnson is a CIA-trained interrogator from Atlanta who is brought to L.A. to head up a unit of the police force specializing in high profile cases. The rest of the L.A.P.D. hates her because her department automatically has priority in all cases. Her department hates her because she has very very bad social skills when it comes to work. She doesn’t care about either.

I’m a bit iffy. Or at least, I’d be a bit iffy if I hadn’t already seen parts of some later episodes. While I like Brenda and her sidekick, Gabriel, most of the rest of her department are glorified extras so far, except for the one who’s aggressively politically incorrect so he can be put in his place. Her boss is a so unlikable that I’m appalled Brenda had a personal relationship with him a few years pre-series. I’m doing my best to write it off as a youthful indiscretion. The captain of regular homicide would be ok, except they tried to make sure we sided against him in the pilot by hinting that he was unethical so we’d root for Brenda in their conflict, and I don’t always respond well to such blatant narrative instructions.

Then there’re the crimes. So far, all three victims have been women, all murdered specifically because of sex, though for different sex-motivated reasons. Two were murdered by women who had been romantically betrayed. If I didn’t remember the resolutions of a few cases we watched at work (and that some of the rest of the cast seemed to have some development) and know that it wasn’t always like that, I might throw in the towel. Also, I’m not sure if it’s the narrative, or because we see it through Brenda’s eyes, but the two female killers have been portrayed very sympathetically (both were betrayed-one intentionally, one not) while the male murderer was portrayed as deserving what he got. I’m still somewhat undecided about that aspect, so far.

All that probably makes my opinion seem more negative than positive, but it really isn’t. Though the cases have been painfully predictable, including motivation, they have been interesting. While Brenda is abrasive on the job, it’s also made clear that she’s mostly amazingly blunt, and the worst only comes out when people are in her way, or not doing their jobs right, or she’s (always rightly, so far) designated them as being scum. Though cliché, they also take the edge off by having her be a slob, get lost easily, and apparently be fighting off an addiction to junk food. They also tend to portray her as cute and charming in spite of the abrasiveness, not because of it. Granted, it probably wouldn’t work with a different actress, but Kyra Sedgewick does it well.

Under the cut are the brief bits I typed up after I finished each ep. There’s some repetition, as I didn’t bother to change anything.

1.1: Pilot: A woman’s mutilated body is found in the house of a man who has disappeared.

I like Brenda and her sidekick, not so big on the others. Aggravated that they went the “loudmouthed sexist pig is amusing as long as he’s called on it” route with the older guy. Wish they weren’t being so blatant about the guy who runs regular homicide (I think) not being all he’s cracked up to be. The indication that he might manipulate investigations to suit his needs and put them off was a serious facepalming moment for me. I…I’m not sure what I think of the resolution. Who the victim was in relation to the missing person was pretty obvious from the start, I think, but I’m not sure I like Brenda so eagerly using faith and sexuality against a person as a weapon. Actually, I know I don’t like that.

1.2: About Face: A woman dies in the shower, and during the investigation, Brenda learns that almost every woman in the victim’s life had had an affair with her husband at some point.

The case was also easy to figure out (I haven’t watched crime solving shows in a while, so I’m having to remind myself that that’s normal) but didn’t hit any of my hot buttons like the last one. (Well, the girl killed the wrong person, IMO, but…) Brenda’s relationships with Gabriel (aka, Sidekick) and the FBI guy who’s clearly carrying a torch for her are cute, as are her phone conversations with her parents. And I did like her reaction to her makeover.

1.3: The Big Picture: A teenaged Russian prostitute is murdered, and her client list has a lot of high profile names on it.

I believe I now officially hate Brenda’s boss. Before, I was just mildly annoyed by his general attitude and two-facedness. I now reassign him to creep for the crime of assuming a person is innocent of a crime because that person is his friend, and using his position of authority to prevent Brenda from doing her job. Not that he was successful in keeping her from doing her job, but still. This is the third episode with a female murder victim, and the first where the murderer wasn’t female. In all three, the woman was murdered because of sex. I know it’s almost a necessity for some of these to be to be that kind of crime, but I need a little variety.