The Glades

TL:DR Great series don't watch the last episode.

With this show up on streaming services now I thought it apropos to post an updated review. The show is great. I started accidentally watching it when it aired on Sundays in between Criminal Minds marathons. After a few episodes I was hooked.

I watched it up til the last episode and the cliff hanger is insane! ..... I spent the fall waiting for it to comeback and then the show was canceled. No posts on what the plan was to be, no wrap up, just hanging there. Still.

I work afternoons and like to watch a little TV when I get off work and after midnight it's usually pretty bleak so I DVR shows that look interesting to me, "The Glades" is one of them.

No, this isn't classic anything but it is pleasant and non offensive to watch. The cast is interesting, the subplots keep building and except for the weekly murder victim, has a minimum of violence, sex and drugs. No, your life won't change from watching it, the world won't stop turning if you miss an episode, but you won't feel like you wasted an hour if you watch it.

Oh yeah, the actual Everglades aren't vital to the stories, but Miami, New York, Las Vegas, San Francisco, or Honolulu weren't either in the popular cop shows that had those cities in their names.

I really liked this series. Until the end of the last episode, that is. Oh, it started out okay, but the ending! It upset me so much, that I couldn't sleep. Sick writers that came up with that ending. Don't want to spoil it for anyone, but it was not a happy ending! And I'm still upset about it.

I've been in Florida for 35 years, working as both a script writer and newspaper editor. I've been on the sets of most of those made-in-Florida productions and invariably they try to over-sell the Sunshine State with the glamorous South Beach style that typifies almost every show since Miami Vice. The Glades, however, gets its right with stories about the warm heart of Central Florida, with stories most Florida shows forget. Instead of Cuban drug lords we get stories of the football heroes bred in Imokalee, the spiritualists in Cassadaga and the surfers in Melbourne. The cast is down-to-earth with the right accents and attitudes. Very shows have understood their material this well since Ivan Tors migrated to North Miami.

I enjoy cop dramas. Having said that, I REALLY enjoy The Glades. It's such a nice change of pace, not as deep or dark as some of the fare is now-a-days.

What some call hubris, I would call being glib. It's nice to see a cop who's not always beating his chest or tearing his hair out over a case. The interaction of ALL the characters is also refreshing. Actually seems more true-to-life than most. The little gibes, off the cuff remarks to each other really lightens the "mood" of the show.

This is a great example that a good cop drama doesn't have to be heart-rending or bloody. Don't get me wrong, I'll still watch other cop dramas. But it's hard waiting a week for each episode of The Glades. It's on my DVD "series-to-buy" list, no other cop shows made it, yet.