Life 1.1-1.11 (complete season)
Jun. 12th, 2009 10:55 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
meganbmooreLife is a show I’m watching that I think is actually well known and recent enough that I don’t think I have to tell you what it’s about! But just in case it stars Damian Lewis as Charlie Crews, a police officer released from prison after twelve years after being cleared of the murder of his business partner, Tom Seybolt, and all but one member of Tom’s family. Now he lives in a giant, near-furniture-less house that he bought with settlement money, which is managed by Ted Earley, a friend of Charlie’s from prison who was the CEO of a major firm until he was caught embezzling. Ted lives in a room above Charlie’s garage. I figure his room is probably at least as big as my apartment, and that he has more furniture than Charlie. Another part of the settlement is that Charlie is made a detective in the police force. Of course, most people figure he’s either nuts (they’re pretty much right about that) or guilty (not so much that) so no one wants to be his partner, leaving him with Dani Reese, a former undercover narcotics officer who is also a recovering alcoholic and drug addict.
Charlie likes Dani, but Dani wants to shoot his zen and fresh fruit obsession. And duct tape his mouth. Charlie talks a lot. And sometimes, I wonder if their issues duke it out. Charlie’s would probably win, what with his being a cop in prison for almost half her life and all, but Dani’s pretty alpha.
Incidentally, Damian Lewis, who plays Charlie, is a brilliant actor, but Charlie has so many quirks and oddities that, as entertaining and interesting as they are, I think Lewis himself often tends to get lost in them.
Unlike The Inside, where I hated almost all the weekly plots but loved the characters and their relationships with each other (note: the actress who plays Karen in The Inside also has a guest appearance here) I don’t mind the weekly plots in Life. I am also very happy that most do not feature lovingly and often erotically posed bodies of murdered women, though a couple of the episodes have murder victims that might be triggering. Five minutes into the first episode, we have a murdered little boy, with his dog shot trying to protect him, and another episode features a pair of Persian college students who were victims of a hate crime. I tend to assume the corpses of murdered children are universally triggering.
So, I suspect (judging by my f-list) that I’m in the minority here, but I much prefer Charlie and Dani as platonic partners than as potential love interests. I like their dynamic as-is too much to want to see it changed. I’m sure Charlie’s line in the first episode where he asks Dani if anyone ever loved her enough to take a bullet for her is consider prophetic (and is probably meant to be read that way) but who says all love is romantic? Besides certain parts of fandom, I mean.
On a similar vein, I rather like the state of Connie and Charlie’s relationship and the acknowledging feelings, but probably wouldn’t like it as much if anything ever really happened there.
Also, I love Dani’s relationship with her father more than I probably should. And while I’m not sure I agree with her that Charlie’s former partner should have backed Charlie up on the stands even if it was a lie, but I kind of like the sentiment behind it. Like, the whole bit where your partner should have your absolute loyalty, and how she tends to back it up with her own actions, and expect it from others.
I really like how they handled Charlie’s searching for the real killer, too, with it being a quiet, background obsession most of the time, instead of his always obsessing about it, and how finding the killer seemed to be as much-maybe more- about justice as it was about revenge.
Charlie likes Dani, but Dani wants to shoot his zen and fresh fruit obsession. And duct tape his mouth. Charlie talks a lot. And sometimes, I wonder if their issues duke it out. Charlie’s would probably win, what with his being a cop in prison for almost half her life and all, but Dani’s pretty alpha.
Incidentally, Damian Lewis, who plays Charlie, is a brilliant actor, but Charlie has so many quirks and oddities that, as entertaining and interesting as they are, I think Lewis himself often tends to get lost in them.
Unlike The Inside, where I hated almost all the weekly plots but loved the characters and their relationships with each other (note: the actress who plays Karen in The Inside also has a guest appearance here) I don’t mind the weekly plots in Life. I am also very happy that most do not feature lovingly and often erotically posed bodies of murdered women, though a couple of the episodes have murder victims that might be triggering. Five minutes into the first episode, we have a murdered little boy, with his dog shot trying to protect him, and another episode features a pair of Persian college students who were victims of a hate crime. I tend to assume the corpses of murdered children are universally triggering.
So, I suspect (judging by my f-list) that I’m in the minority here, but I much prefer Charlie and Dani as platonic partners than as potential love interests. I like their dynamic as-is too much to want to see it changed. I’m sure Charlie’s line in the first episode where he asks Dani if anyone ever loved her enough to take a bullet for her is consider prophetic (and is probably meant to be read that way) but who says all love is romantic? Besides certain parts of fandom, I mean.
On a similar vein, I rather like the state of Connie and Charlie’s relationship and the acknowledging feelings, but probably wouldn’t like it as much if anything ever really happened there.
Also, I love Dani’s relationship with her father more than I probably should. And while I’m not sure I agree with her that Charlie’s former partner should have backed Charlie up on the stands even if it was a lie, but I kind of like the sentiment behind it. Like, the whole bit where your partner should have your absolute loyalty, and how she tends to back it up with her own actions, and expect it from others.
I really like how they handled Charlie’s searching for the real killer, too, with it being a quiet, background obsession most of the time, instead of his always obsessing about it, and how finding the killer seemed to be as much-maybe more- about justice as it was about revenge.