My relationship with NCIS is like this: My television has set me up on a blind date saying "He's great guy. You're gonna love him. You have so much in common." I'm reluctant, but I turn up at the restaurant. Then NCIS enters. He's loud. He's stupid. He thinks he's charming and funny but all the while I'm looking at the exit and wondering if I could fake an epileptic seizure.
Gibbs isn't a
Jerk With A Heart Of Gold. He's a Jerk. He's not a
Military Maverick. He's a douche who doesn't listen to anyone in authority out of spite. He doesn't have brilliant deductive skills. He just decides who's guilty and not guilty and it turns out to be right. He doesn't have
Ultimate Job Security so much as
Joker Immunity.
And he's not alone. Tony is a sleaze with who belittles those smarter than him for no other reason than to be in the Guinness World Records book for the longest period of asshat-ery. Ziva isn't an action chick as much as a psychotic Middle Eastern stereotype. The Director is a strawfeminist made to show that all women should always defer male counterparts, no matter what their position of occupation and Mc Gee is wetter than a soggy cornflake.
However the worst is Abby. When will TV executives learn that putting people in unusual clothing does not make them zany or kooky. They need - say it with me folks - an actual real life personality to pull it off. Honestly it's like the writers once heard about this new cool goth thing that all the kids are into nowdays and decided to make a goth character out of elastic bands, glue and annoyingness. And the fact that the actress that plays her is almost forty makes her cutesy act pathetic and disturbing in equal amounts.
These characters seem to amble around fulfilling the same tired running gags in an attempt to be enjoyable. On occasion they go for story arc drama which is strangely disconcerting. Like a zombie trying to breastfeed. You know that act their core these characters are just archatypes with whimsical traits pasted on them. It's the only Live action series where I can reach
Uncanny Valley.
To conclude I have a WMG. An episode of NCIS fell though a timewarp and inspired T.S. Elliot to write
The Hollowmen. Listen to this line:
Shape without form, shade without colour,/Paralysed force, gesture without motion;
Truer words, people, were never spoken.