I think the TNT folks are really starting to get the formula for their dramas. They made a business plan to be the best at it and they are coming up with some great stories while they center a star and some kind of familiar thespians in support.
I have watched a season of Southland so far and I have allowed it to grow on me. I haven’t cared for too many actors that are on that show or for many of the others actually but last night I saw a performance that impressed me to tears as many others have from the TNT dramas.
Of the TNT shows, I used to like The Closer but have gotten away from it since the writers strike. The show has never been the same to me since then. Dark Blue? At first, I didn’t care for it but after a season, I can’t wait to see the new one. Then there’s Leverage. Love that show. It has a great lead actor in Timothy Hutton and a great supporting cast. It provides the right level of comedy that isn’t cheesy but the right blend of twists and drama to make it a great show.
Southland is pretty gritty and dark yet realistic. Almost too realistic in that it makes you feel a little filthy after watching it: All the sins and darkness that happens along with the people who are protecting us committing the same moral mistakes and miscues providing mixed anti-hero mentality that colors the show enough to give it edge. I hadn’t had any characters on there that I could identify with or feel for until last nights episode I watched on demand.
But first, on Leverage, a scene from the first season just floored me so much emotionally that after I watched it I had to go upstairs and hug my wife and daughter. I was so moved by Timothy Hutton’s portrayal of a father watching his son die right before his eyes on the operating table. His anguish was so visible and real. It just dug inside me and ripped my heart. I truly know what he was feeling when he cried out “No!” and ran through the ER to be with him and hold him. The pain that is released when that happens to a mother or father just radiates through the world and anyone coming in contact with it has to absorb some of the pain and suffering because what is portrayed and just imagined to be felt is too grievous for anyone to bear. Being a father makes it worse for me obviously and then being a sap doesn’t help either. This still stings me in the chest when I think about it.
So on Southland, for this season they have been introducing a young Latino boy about 11 or so: Not really gang age yet. He has been mentored by one of the homicide detectives and the detective has been getting too close, basically trying to keep him out of trouble, keep him in school and such. It’s a way that makes the detective feel he is doing something right with his position. So I see the story right? He’s gonna get killed at some point regardless of what the detective does.
So I watch and I think I see the story coming. All the way to the end of the show. The detective finally gets to meet the mother and father. Neither are good enough to have such a bright kid. He loves to read and had just read Where the Wild Things Are AFTER he saw the movie because he wanted to see how close it was to the movie. But he didn’t want that to get out so he would lose his street credit.
So towards the end of the show, the boy is riding his bike after getting in trouble with the police twice already and sprung by the detective both times. While riding his bike some kids confront him and begin to beat him. You can’t see it all unfold but a shot rings out and one of the kids falls to the ground. They cut to another scene while you hear the detectives car get called to respond to a homicide.
So there it is right? He will drive up on scene and that poor boy will be laying there dead from a gun shot before he ever got to live his life. Nope. Not the boy! A guy standing over on the corner calls out to the detective and he strolls over to talk to him. The guy says, and this carries so much weight as you see the detectives face turn whiter than it already is and his lips purse in a tight clinch while the pain goes through his body, “The trees are talking. You didn’t hear it from me. But someone said that boy that hangs here named (don’t remember the name) did it. Rode his bike that way.”
Immediately, the detective runs off down the hill with his partner running to his car. So on foot the detective runs downhill to the bys house. He busts in to the house, knocks the father over and runs to the boy’s bedroom. There on the bed, and here I am breaking up as I write it and remember it, sits the boy with a gun. His mouth his bloody and he has some cuts on his face from his beating. He has some blood on his clothes too and he is crying and just looks so alone. As the detective sees him there he takes the same actions a father would. He isn’t mad, he isn’t angry but every other emotion rises to the surface and all the little boy could say just like any child not old enough to handle this kind of situation is “I’m sorry! I’m Sorry!” The detective runs to him and grab the gun and throws it on the floor. He picks the boy up and holds him all the way against the wall as he hugs him and cries. Then you can hear the detective let out the internal realization that the boys chance at normal life is over. He lets out a muffled growl of pain as if this boy was his own. And that was enough to make me lose my tears but then taking the whole situation in, his father never entered the bedroom, his mother never tried to come in. The by had no one but this detective and now it was out of his hands and couldn’t protect him any longer. He had killed someone. So many options are now gone that the boy had in his mind to attempt as an adult and the detective knew it.
Just seeing him hug that boy so tight with sorrow while he wailed and cried was so powerful: And being an actor I never really cared for really showed me yet again a respect for some of these actors that may just not have found the role that they can naturally play yet. This man transformed his character and put emotion into a situation that can only be imagined.
So now I have cried twice experiencing these scenes again in my head like an old sap. But I feel it anytime I think about it. These are two scenes that will always make me cry just like my song I want played at my funeral by Ellis Paul “The World Aint Slowin’ Down.” I will blubber and get sentimental every time. It like these scenes tell what I feel inside and what my connection to this world is about. Children and teaching children whatever I know, whether it be my mistakes or successes.
XO ILY YM
