The Bridge

I saw a CTV interview last week with Aaron Douglas promoting the show's premiere – they made a point of mentioning this was a Canadian show, shot in Toronto (and about Toronto cops), starring a Canadian. That was all good – I was looking forward to the premiere. Through the first hour I thought there was something missing – during the second hour it was clear ..... significant effort had been made to ensure this was NOT seen as Toronto (or Canada for that matter). Why is it so important that a Canadian cop show must allow for the possibility of being anywhere in America? Are US ratings THAT important that we have to mask the fact that the story is taking place in Canada (perhaps the more profound question is, why would US viewers be less likely to tune into a Toronto cop show vice, say, Denver?). I scanned back through my PVR recording of the show and, apart from a half second glimpse of the Toronto skyline, everything else had been de-Canadianified! I don't think I'm only on a post-Olympic patriotic bent – I simply don't understand why they have to blur out the "Ontario" on every licence plate shot, or even make up fictitious "Metropolitan" newspapers as they pan across headlines (vice simply using the Toronto "Star" or "Sun"). I recently rented "The Wire" as I hadn't seen it when it originally aired – the contrast is overwhelming. They spend the whole show talking about Baltimore PD, FD, Marine Unit, etc. etc. etc. – no shame there! But we can't mention the word Toronto once?! I guess the only consolation is that there are not fake US flags put up everywhere (as is normally the case with shows shot in Canada). Not a maple leaf or Canadian Flag visible for two hours of driving around Toronto? How about some Canuck pride, eh?! Canada has some truly amazing talent and fantastic potential (James Cameron comes to mind - you might have heard of him) - it is about time TV & movie execs had the courage to accept "Canada" on both sides of the camera. That all being said - I still think the premiere was somewhat mediocre. I'm not sure the audience was left caring enough about Aaron Douglas' character's plight. Hopefully this series will develop over time.

Sooooo...we see in the listings this title on a Saturday night on CBS here in the States...we assume (wrongly?) that this is either a summer replacement show or a tease at something coming in the fall. We realized 10 minutes in that it was one of the shows with an unnamed city, no name of city on police cars, fuzzed out license plates, etc. This, alone, made us suspicious. Then, as to the plot: we were frankly confused as to who we were supposed to root for. Yes, we GET it -- cops are sometimes portrayed wrongly by the press and public. But this seems to be out to make cops look incredibly whiny and pathetic. A walk out??? We honestly think that kind of action here in the states is illegal. We have heard of a "sick out" to protest something, but for cops to just walk off the job because they don't like something or they don't get their way is too weird. That's when I got up from the couch, came to computer, and checked out IMDb on this show. I needed a little background, and I got it. Not sure what CBS is going to do with this -- it just wasn't very appealing. Acting wasn't great, situations were just odd, and oh by the way, any woman in a uniformed service here in the states has to have her hair up off her collar. Being military, this irked me! Can't explain why -- it just looked so weird to see all your model-quality policewomen with their hair flowing down their uniforms. And when old cop died -- yeah, doubt if he would get a formal police funeral here in the states, no matter what the union did.

Bottom line -- we GET it -- we just didn't like it. Made cops look whiny, petulant, and controlled by their union.

Yes it's time for another cop show review, before we get into all the technicalities let me say that this show reminds me very much of the lighter side of "the shield".

So we have the main cop Frank Leo and he seems to be the voice of the cop community, now while most other shows focused on cleaning up the streets and then secondly on what goes wrong this show seems to focus on the exact opposite. That's right he's trying to clean up the police department from the ground floor all the way to the top, and of course we have our usual dirty cop clichés' like chiefs taking bribes, and your real estate schemes but mostly its just Frank doing his thing helping out his fellow street cops from getting in too deep when they do things a little beyond protocol and then get buried by the higher ups for only about a third of what they actually did.

Is this show fun, yup it's fun, entertaining, and there's some nice emotion/acting involved. It's off to a pretty decent start so far lets see if they can keep the momentum rolling.

8 out of 10.

I thought that maybe, just maybe, this would be different. Why, could you ask, why would this be different?

I projected credibility and honesty into the main character, because he played a similar role - dedicated to get his job done - as he did in Battlestar Galactica.

Now we are approaching the halfway mark for the series, and I am sorry to say... You've lost me. I will not follow the series anymore.

The reason? What began as an interesting story about a cop becoming head of the union of copes, not in uniform, not legally a cop, but still in soul and dedicated to both helping his many colleagues and do occasional police work... There is a lack of realism in the series. He doesn't grovel to anyone. This is realistic in any world. I have no faith in a union boss having ultimate say over anything - even if this is portrayed as very tough deals with his commissioner, to who he also loses once in a while. He is simply too strong, played, portrayed too strong. I would say it's a miscast.

I am fed up with the police world, talking about anybody as if they are citizens or scum, no in-between, or hero or coward... grow some hair on your chests, scriptwriters and watch some The Wire. But you had to accept the job that demanded action. Bang Bang, people dead, heroes here, witnesses her, victims here, and scumbag stupid motherfracker here. It is tedious, we want people. Feeling, not bleeding. No, I want - I want cost, consequences, real consequences, everything that interacts with a job like the one a policeman has. Like the one the criminal has. People.

The Bridge tries. It tries to be The WIre, and CSI and Heroes without superpowers at the same time. Strong man leading the flock. Strong man can admit his mistake Strong man has unbridled libido. It hints at feeling and human interaction, but is constantly interrupted by strategic talks, where the support actors feed the main character. ABit tiresome tiresome tiresome.

It's not even BG. It deserves new writers, or it deserves to die. It is beginning to stink of mediocrity. That is waste of bandwidth. And support.

I only watched 20 minutes of the episode on Saturday, July 17 (with high hopes after reading the reviews), but I was totally turned off. I love police dramas, but this particular episode seemed very unrealistic, and depressing, without any redeeming positive qualities. I did like the premise of telling the stories from a union rep perspective, but I did not believe that in a matter of moments 2 gorgeous woman (one a lawyer and one a cop) were coming on to this guy. I didn't see the appeal. I also did not think putting a cop who everyone liked (but who accidentally killed his wife), into the general prison population without any real protection, was lame. This same (ex-) cop also was totally unfit, looked soft and out of shape, and did not project any kind of power or strength in his appearance. Good police dramas need a sense of humor (no matter how macabre or ironic the humor is) and also at least one strong, assertive and interesting character who rises above the minor characters in his/her wisdom, charm, charisma, or skill level. A good program also must have excellent ensemble acting, with meaningful interaction between the principal characters. This poor show lacks both meaningful dramatic power, and charisma of any kind in my opinion. my opinion.