In Plain Sight: High Price Spread
By fred | July 7, 2008
(S01E06) Five episodes in, In Plain Sight hasn’t developed into a great show so far. It’s not completely bad either and I do like it so far, but it’s heavily flawed and clichéd all along the way, with a clear habit for a lack on consistency or follow-up on previous events/episodes. I’ll be honest, if there was any competition worth-watching, I might have dropped this show.
But there isn’t really any competition, and it’s not completely terrible, so I keep watching week after week. It hasn’t always turned out for the best, but at least this week I’m happy I kept tuning in, because while still not the best this show could be, I feel this might have been the best episode of the show so far. One thing for sure, it’s the one I enjoyed the most.
This episode started right away with being different : we weren’t 6 months ago, but 10 years. All the way back that long, to see who the first witnesses Mary ever had responsibility for are. But this episode wasn’t about witnesses being in danger, it wasn’t about their past coming back to haunt them, it wasn’t about anyone trying to kill anyone, there was almost no investigation, and as a matter of fact it wasn’t even about the WITSEC at all in any way.
What we had this week was a very common story seen so many times before : the poor black guys witnessing a murder, saved by basketball, the very promising basketball player falling into deep troubles, here gambling, right when Mary shows up, and ending up to the point where he’s forced into ensuring his team will loose a game to pay back his debt. At first he goes with it, but of course in the very last seconds of the game he has the ball, whether he scores or not will make all the difference, and in the end all is well, he scores, his team wins, no one’s hurt and the bad guy s get arrested.
We’ve all seen this many times before, and it really didn’t had anything new or different to offer. The main story of this week’s “case” wasn’t all that exciting, and I wish this would get better, but the interest of this episode was somewhere else.
This episode had other things to offer, starting with a little more characterization than we’ve been used to, a much welcome addition if you ask me — though I still feel all the scenes with Mary’s family were quite useless and I wish they’d all go away, and they really went heavy on the crying over her father for Mary. What we also had was a much welcome humor, and a little more for Marshall to do, a Marshall who finally started to look more like a real person and not just a puppet that sometimes walks by Mary’s side. Their boss, however, is still as useless as one can possibly be.
Many discussions between Mary and Marshall were funny, and whether it was Mary making fun of Marshall, the neat little reference to Back To The Future, or Marshall ending all of Mary’s sentences, those were great and funny bits I wish to find a lot more often in this show.
Now, if only we could have such moments put in an episode dealing with a story that actually relates to WITSEC, that isn’t silly or cliché, and if possible not involve Mary’s mom or sister, in any way, then we could have a good show there somewhere.
It still wasn’t great, but at least it’s getting a little better !
Posted in Reviews
Shows: In Plain Sight
