The Inside

The mercurial FBI Agent Virgil Webster (Peter Coyote) leads the L.A. Violent Crimes Unit. After losing an agent, rookie agent Rebecca Locke (Rachel Nichols) joins the group. As a 10 year old, she was held prisoner for 18 months and escaped. It's a past that only Webster is purview to as he tries to use her experience from The Inside.

The obvious question is why this show crashed and burned while a similar show like 'Criminal Minds' keeps going and going and going. It has to be both the show and what Fox does with the show. For Fox, this was nothing but a summer burn-off. They aired the episodes in a jumbo and dump them like dirty laundry. The show has a bit of serial element and showing the episodes out of order doesn't help. Criminal Minds is an easy to digest police procedural. There is hardly any serial element to the show and CBS actually supported it.

The central aspect of Locke's past is a bit too fake and the show is trying to make her too special. She is still a rookie after all. As for the look of the show, it is very stark and somewhat dark. The visual is almost drained of color. In fact, the most color in the show comes from some dream sequences. The show makes a basic mistake that some of these serial killer show at the time makes. The dark material convinces the showrunner to film it darkly. The material is dark enough that it doesn't need to be starkly filmed. It drains the life out of the show. With a few tweaks and actual support from Fox, this could have been a successful show.

I have found this on my must see list of shows for the week. It has a number of hooks that brings me back each week. The reference to Silence of the Lambs has definite merit. However, I have seen a number of other comparisons such as Coyote's vague similarity to Mark Harmon. But, I still go back to the show for it's own merit. I have hope that the show will survive and be on the coming season's lineup, or brought back in at mid-season. I think Locke has the ability to carry the character which she has demonstrated up to this point. She recently made the adjustment to become one of the crowd, and attempt to lose her standoffishness.

This series has just finished its UK run on ITV4, a minor satellite channel. I thought it was really good but, just as others have commented on the rotten support by Fox Network, the scheduling on ITV4 was also unhelpful. Halfway through the series, it got demoted from prime time to a graveyard slot post midnight. Still, we all have video timers . . . And the good news for UK viewers who missed an episode is that the series will be repeated from October. I wouldn't really compare The Inside to The Shield or CSI or Law & Order; those shows are similarly violent but less involving I think. The obvious comparison is with Criminal Minds - FBI specialist team, IT expert, damaged/socially inept team member, aspiring to high mindedness - but the scripts on Criminal Minds do tend towards an unpleasant didactic ism. Maybe that's why that show continues to run . .

You see, I'm a TV jinx. Any show I like, no matter what the network, is sure to be canceled abruptly with no explanation. I liked this show from the first episode, and after the second episode it went on "hiatus", and then was abruptly canceled. The same thing happened with "Nowhere Man" (FOX), "Now and Then" (CBS?), "John Doe" (FOX), "The Fugitive" (the remake series, I forget the network), and many, many other shows that I grew to like. I'll try not to let it happen again. Maybe I'll try liking really bad shows like "So You Think You Can Dance", or "Survivor" or any one of those other insipid reality shows. Maybe then the networks will cancel them and leave the good shows on the air. Only problem is, what will I watch then?

Was there any doubt this show would get canceled? After all it had 2 things going against this series from the get go. First and for most it played on FOX which is famous for and that would be keeping cartoons and reality shows for great shows, which is why I avoid the FOX network like the plague.

The 2nd would be it was too sophisticated and required the viewers to actually use their brains more than a 1/2 hour at a time 2 things fox Viewers don't have. They prefer The Simpson's, American dad, The Cleveland Show and Family Guy instead of shows such as The Insiders and Justice I hope many read my comments before you decide next time to watch a complicated shows like the Insiders on FOX, heed my warning steer as clear away of it. That way you won't ever be disappointed when its AXED also while your at it NBC is just as bad as Fox when it comes to yanking great shows off the air that have serious depth to them.

Just a small comment on this show it was a brilliant and it was a well written show that should of lasted more than 13 Episodes. This show makes any of the CSI's look like a poorly written sitcom. This was a show that just had to be watched weekly, few shows can even come close to this one and yet only 13 episodes were made. It such a shame to lose it I'd give it a 20 out of 10 if I could but I can't so I gave it the next best thing, a perfect 10.