Review: Damages (Season One)
As promised, I’m writing the review as soon as I finished watching the emmy award-winning first season of this high-stake litigation thriller. Going for quality rather than quantity, the show is easily summer’s most brilliantly written show. Makes you think, and even though we’re used to spotting most of the twists that these tv shows throw at us, I didnt see the last one of this series coming.
The pilot opens up the show by introducing two parallel time periods. We follow this format throughout the series. The earlier timeline has a recent graduate, Ellen Parsons (Rose Byrne) on the top of her life. She’s happily engaged, fresh out of law school and just got an offer from one of the most exclusive law practices of the city, ruled over by Patty Smith (Glenn Close)’s iron fist. She’s warned by another interested party that Patty’s offer wont come without a ton of very dangerous baggage. She decides to accept anyway. The second timeline opens six months later and has Ellen running, semi-naked and injured around NY, where she’s soon picked up and charged with the murder of her ex-soon-to-be-doctor-husband. If that wasn’t enough, she seems to be alone with the rest of the cast mysteriously absent. The show mostly runs on the “past” timeline and only flashes to the future to tease us with new twists and clues.
As soon as Ellen joins the firm, she’s thrust into the middle of one of the firm’s biggest cases, a class action law-suit filed by grieving employee against the rich CEO of the company (an irritating performance by Ted Danson). This extremely high-profile case has Patty Smith on edge as well as her second in command Tom (Tate Donovan). Ellen soon discovers her soon to be sister-in-law has a strong connection to the case and realizes her invitation to join the firm might not be as random as she had thought. Everything unravels from there on. Betrayal, illegal shortcuts and murders become a frequent theme of the show until the season finale where more than half the regular cast is deceased. Concerning the plot, I have to point out it’s flaws. It might be brilliant and very well written but it seems to be custom-made for a movie or a mini-series. It didn’t fit very well into a 13-hour format and seemed forced at times, filled with useless episode-long storylines. The season finale was (as expected) excellent and sets up very well for season 2 (I though like Prison Break, this was a one-season plot and would not fit very well into further seasons as writers come up with horribly cliched storylines to keep the series going), however the second season seems not only planned out but damn well more interesting than season 1.
The casting was pretty good. Glenn Close was fantastic as the most cold-hearted boss out there and for her character there is absolutely no redemption after what she had and tried to do this season. I want to see her go down. The true gem of the show, however was Rose Byrne. I love her choice of projects, she can be found in both of last year’s edgy brit flicks (the fantastic Sunshine and the horribly dull 28 Weeks Later). She was fantastic in the series and her performance in the last episode as the helpless but not-beaten grieving almost-widow was fantastic. The last five minutes of the show were incredible. Sadly, filming for season 2 hasn’t even begun yet. Aside from the two main players, Ted Danson irritated me, Tate Donovan surprised me with an entertaining cowardly act that was so much more fun to watch than his two-season stint in The O.C and Zeljko Ivanek gave the performance of his life which would have been more appreciated if it had played out in a less-crowded field.
It was a great filler for the episode-less months. And now, I cant wait for the shows to begin again.
Tags: Damages, Glenn Close, Rose Byrne, Season One
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