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Aurelian Since: Dec, 2013
May 4th 2014 at 2:52:31 PM •••

It's unlikely that Ronnie would face execution for Terry Crowley's murder. Vic had already confessed to it, and it had already been established that Ronnie was not present when the murder took place. He'd face charges as an accessory after (and possibly before) the fact.

Irrelevant402 Since: Sep, 2013
Jul 20th 2010 at 9:14:09 AM •••

Wow I so am talkative this week. Probably since I've been doing "Shield" marathon.

Why exactly do we fans consider "Co-Pilot" to be generally discontinuity while sifting through stuff like Dutch and Claudette's meet and other things.

Is it that it seems too contrived that so many people met like that just perfectly? It does seem a little funny with that being the first time Lem and Ronnie meet Vic and something odd about Terry coming in at that time.

Still I like to pretend it's an abridged version, roughly. Over several weeks Claudette and Dutch meet, Julien signed up and got Danny for his training officer, The Strike Team is pressured into making busts too quickly without a chance, and when they do Acevada has Terry ready.

Just an adaptation distillation episode rather than having two or three of them properly.

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MirrorNoir Since: Jun, 2011
Aug 18th 2011 at 11:58:52 PM •••

Besides the junk with Julian being there (if he was to have been featured in Co-Pilot, they should have used him in a civilian role and maybe have him point out that he was just accepted into the Academy), the episode undercut Acaveda's character and his relationship with Vic as established in season one and the pilot in particular.

S1 established that the Barn had been around for a while and that Acaveda was a rookie Captain who had just been assigned to the station for a couple of months. This in turn ties into why Vic was so blatantly a dick towards his boss in the pilot and why Acaveda couldn't fire Vic: Vic and the Strike Team had been around for a while and Acaveda was some new guy who had just been made Captain/had just become Vic's boss; and since Acaveda was still new in his role as boss, he was pretty much at the mercy of Gilroy overruling him every time he tried to reign Vic in.

Irrelevant402 Since: Sep, 2013
Jul 19th 2010 at 12:36:55 PM •••

All right I got season 6 in the mail, and got 7 for my b-day. Don't give me any spoilers but I'd like to hear: how is season 6?

It doesn't sound like it's as bad as 3 but it doesn't sound like 4 or 5's quality. I mean it sounds like the show was extended haphazardly.

Geez, figures Shawn Ryan gets threatened with cancellation then they make him extend the show another season. or so I hear.

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MirrorNoir Since: Jun, 2011
Aug 18th 2011 at 11:48:41 PM •••

Decent; but the the short nature of it and Kevin Hiatt's presence simply sets up Claudette having a character derailment moment (basically defending Vic's dirty cop antics while cursing out Kevin for being the white knight/squeaky clean cop who won't break the rules, when it benefits Claudette).

As for the seasonal format/cancelation issues, it was more just FX screwing with Shawn Ryan over how they were going to split season S5 up; S5 was supposed to be 20 episodes long (and Lem's death at the very end of those episodes) but they decided to split it up into two seasons; by the time season five was planned out with the intent on resolving the Kavanaugh storyline in the first couple of episodes of S6, the decision to give him a seventh season came down, meaning Ryan had to pad out his storyline for the back end of season six (hence why we had Kevin Hiatt introduced and promptly written out and the resurrection of the Money Train Heist as far as the Armenians coming after Vic).

IIRC, had season six been the last, we would have probably seen an ultra-rushed version of what we got with the end of season seven. Vic and Ronnie discover that Shane killed Lem and Shane's family go into hiding; they blackmail Vic/Ronnie/Corrine into providing them cash to leave town with and something happens with Corrine that causes Vic to turn states evidence to save her, at the expense of having to confess to all of his crimes/selling Ronnie down the river along with Shane and end the series alone and unemployed and basically a pariah.

Irrelevant402 Since: Sep, 2013
Jul 18th 2010 at 3:39:39 PM •••

Lemmie take a break from my season 3 topic for a moment. Can we get a character sheet started here? I'm doing my damnest trying to figure out how to get it started.

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FastEddie MOD Since: Apr, 2004
Jul 18th 2010 at 3:43:29 PM •••

Click this: Characters.The Sheild and go to town.

Goal: Clear, Concise and Witty
Irrelevant402 Since: Sep, 2013
fantasticpants Since: Apr, 2010
Jun 1st 2010 at 9:22:01 AM •••

I don't see how Shane belongs in the Complete Monster category. 'The most depraved of all characters, a villain utterly lacking in redeeming features' — seriously? I think it's pretty clear that's not the case, nor is he in the same league as Armadillo or Antwon Mitchell.

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JamieGumb Since: Dec, 1969
Jun 20th 2010 at 3:43:21 AM •••

Dude murdered his pregnant wife AND son, simply because he was unable to accept the notion of them knowing what he had done (on top of that, his nonchalant attitude towards killing Lem after the fact; Shane may have had more self-awareness of his actions than Vic ever did, but in the end he still rationalized everything to make himself not feel guilty about his actions); arguably the work of a complete monster.

Freezer Since: Jan, 2001
Jun 20th 2010 at 7:16:55 AM •••

Didn't Mara already know the whole story? Either way, Shane wasn't evil (Not like Vic, Amadillo or Antwon), a Knight Templar or even a Well-Intentioned Extremist. He was a panicky idiot who found himself in WAAAAY over his head and couldn't face the consequences. He mad bad choices and his attempts to fix them or avoid the consequences brought worse choices. I just don't think he fits the trope.

My name is Freezer and my anti-drug is porn.
JamieGumb Since: Dec, 1969
Jun 20th 2010 at 11:00:13 AM •••

To be fair, if a man who murders his pregnant wife and two year old child isn't a Complete Monster, what is?

And hell, there is even a NAME for the type of Complete Monster Shane is in that regard: family annihilators. People who kill their entire families out of self-absorbed, narcissistic belief that their families would be better off dead than to know that dad was a failure/not perfect.

fantasticpants Since: Apr, 2010
Jun 29th 2010 at 9:59:01 AM •••

It is possible to commit monstrous acts, pass the Moral Event Horizon and not be a Complete Monster (no redeeming characteristics, no remorse whatsoever — for instance, the serial child killer from M doesn't qualify), and that's pretty much the case with Shane. His attitude towards killing Lem wasn't nonchalant — he nearly attempted suicide upon discovering Lem hadn't sold the Strike Team out. He quite clealy feels guilt and remorse. As for the murder-suicide, it was shown as a crazy, despair-driven last resort; he honestly seemed to believe he was saving his family from a fate worse than death by sending them to Heaven. Obviously it doesn't excuse it in any way, but it goes to show how divorced from sanity he'd become by then. Shane is presented as an ambiguous, YMMV sort of character, which is why he doesn't fit the trope.

Edited by fantasticpants
Irrelevant402 Since: Sep, 2013
Jul 17th 2010 at 11:50:52 PM •••

Removed as reply, made own topic, my bad.

Edited by Irrelevant402
71.229.141.253 Since: Dec, 1969
Jul 18th 2010 at 3:46:46 PM •••

I'd agree that Shane is a total bastard, but doesn't go all the way overboard into Complete Monster territory. To elaborate on the Fate Worse than Death his family faced, Shane was undoubtedly headed to the gas chamber and Mara would spend the rest of her life as a prison bitch for being a cop's wife. As for his son, Vic taunted Shane by suggesting that he would become the boy's surrogate father figure and Shane knows firsthand how that turns out.

Irrelevant402 Since: Sep, 2013
Jul 18th 2010 at 12:44:16 AM •••

Why is Season 3 considered Season Rot/ so bad its horrible?

  • spoilers, and mind you I have yet to watch season six and seven but they're at the top of the to-do list* Now I admit it's not quite up to stuff as season 1 and 2 were but I really enjoy that season, re-watching it now, is it the weakest season? Possibly, but is it entertaining? Hell yeah. I loved the rivalry between the Strike Team and the Decoy Squad, wish they got to reappear, Julien becoming a bit more like Mackey but stopping himself before it got too late, the fight between Mackey and Mara with Shane in the middle, Lem ascending further up the character ladder by really being turn up about the money train and eventually burning it, one of the final scenes where he calls the team his family and eventually the band being dissolved. Vic Mackey's crimes eventually biting Acevada in the ass on a very personal level where he got raped was and his struggle over that was very harrowing and he didn't fully recover during the season. Then we got the villains, the damn Cuddler Rapist who thwarted poor Dutch by not having much of a history and appearing very normal, maybe the scariest kind of murderer right there, the one that blends in perfectly. And there's Micos who did not have Gilroy's connections and history with Mackey, Armidillo's massive intelligence, Antwon's two-face charisma and viciousness, nor Kavvenaugh's resources, smarts, and determination, but god damn there was something freaky about the guy. Very much something like a force of nature that was hard to track and struck very hard and fast. He was a nice chance of pace from the previous two big bads.

Anyone I admitted that season 3 isn't the best but nor is it on the level of current Family Guy in terms of decay or The Roepers (spin-off from Three's Company, huge first season, crappy second one).

Argh where's the 'bugs me' page for this? I'd have put this there. Anyway I really want some insight on this, love to hear other troper's opinion.

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JamieGumb Since: Dec, 1969
Jul 18th 2010 at 12:54:52 PM •••

Fans consider season three to be the weakest for a lot of reasons:

1. The Shane/Vic/Mara triangle, which goes on and on and on with no end in sight at the expense of giving Lem and Ronnie any screentime until the second half of the season.

2. Similarly, the BS that was subplots about Vic's own love life (IE the arc with him dating a woman who still had a thing for her clingy boyfriend and his crap with his ex, Corrine, dating someone else)

3. The whole "Dutch killing a kitten" thing, which pissed off A LOT OF fans

4. The way they got rid of Tavon; many fans liked the character and hated how the writers dropped the proverbial bus on him

5. The seperation of Dutch/Claudette and Danny/Julian as well as the way that Claudette went from voice of reason to power-mad, raging bitch without her partner around to keep her in check

6. the fact that despite having 15 episodes, the only character that benefits from the extra episode time is Julian (who becomes pretty much a non-entity from season four onward). it would have been nice if they had used the extra time they had to give Lem or Ronnie more screentime than they ultimately did receive, or even using the extra episodes to further play around with the whole Decoy Squad/Strike Team rivalry.

7. and finally, there was the fact that the writers seemed to have no clue as to where the story was going in season three with regards to the Strike Team, save for the idea of having Vic prance around like a jilted lover, pissed off that Shane no longer paying attention to him. By the time Micos DOES show up in the final couple of episodes, it seems like they are rushing him on stage to provide a villain for the season finale than actually having a bad guy be built up for the bulk of the season.

That's not to say that the season is all bad; the rape storyline and it's resolution is the high point of the season IMHO and Michael Jace manages to pull off his storyline rather well as far as showing Julian being drawn to the dark side and his ex-partner Danny fighting against Vic and Julian's other partner to save his soul. Plus Walt Goggins and Michelle Hicks do their best to make the pairing of Shane and Mara work, in spite of the crappy material they had to work with. But it's a major step down from seasons 1 and 2 and doesn't come close to the the glory that was seasons 4-7.

Irrelevant402 Since: Sep, 2013
Jul 18th 2010 at 1:37:11 PM •••

I'll reply, I don't see the harm in giving my insights.

1) Maybe watching it this time I'll see the Shane and Mara going on and on. Still I was delighted in seeing someone stick up to Mackey who wasn't his wife/a co-worker with power/ a crook. I thought we saw a nice different side to Shane. But I admit maybe this re-watch will have me more against season 3.

2) Well Vic gets around, I remember wish Vic would do something to that jerk-ass cling boyfriend, the writer do have a habit of that. Then again if I don't remember much then that's probably not a good sign.

3) Hey hey! No making stuff up! That' didn't happen! (Besides if it did happen I think it looked more like an adult cat...IF it had happened but it didn't).

4)Yeah that was a drag I admit but it was established that Shane was a jerk-ass racist, and I hear they kind of justified the good old fashioned 'tv amnesia'. It was kind of annoying see Vic and co. dropping whenever they were talking about the money train whenever Tavon entered and I doubt he would have put up with the secrecy much longer if Vic hadn't assured him...or if the writers hadn't gotten rid of him. Yeah okay he was put on a us what a drag.

5) Claudete did kind of become a bitch but c'mon I'd crank up the bitch factor too if I had been pretty much guaranteed the captain position to try to stop Vic Mackey only for them to go 'nope!' I figured Claudette didn't want to be captain since she knew herself well enough that she had the chance of going a little power-mad but eventually decided Mackey was too dangerous. I figure she wanted to prove herself and came up too strong at points. Didn't bother me that much but maybe this re-watch will affect that call.

6) Damn 15 episodes? Yeah more Decoy Squad would have been hella great.

7) It seemed like they nicely built up Micos, I mean he popped up in the first episode and comes up again through out the season. Yeah the show wasn't as focused as the previous 2 seasons.

I admit maybe I'm too gentle on season 3, it is a weaker season and I guess I can see why fans are/were so pissed about the decreased on quality. Maybe I was riding off the fumes of season 2 and going 'hey this season ain't so bad!'

Eh, re-watching it as I type. Glad I'm hearing some replies now.

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