Intelligence

Found on Netflix by accident. I'm on the 2nd series and don't want it to end.

From the literally up-in-the-air first scene to the rueful end-of-the-day drink between reluctant allies, smuggler Jimmy Reardon (Ian Tracey) and his top-cop handler Mary Spalding (Klea Scott), in the series opener, this show moves with startling speed. Those who found last year's Da Vinci City Hall and the Intelligence pilot off-putting in their complexity should enjoy the series anyway. The pilot juggled maybe too many balls and sometimes felt jagged as a result. The show does not have that problem. It goes down smooth as Irish whisky.

The look is cool and different, with a sinuous style--think Miami Vice in 21st century Vancouver. Tracey is fascinating as the conflicted, but ultimately good-hearted, Jimmy. Talk about a guy trapped in a pit full of snakes. Scott is similarly fine as the professionally and personally beleaguered Mary. If you've been missing Helen Mirren in Prime Suspect, you'll quickly get hooked on Mary's tough, no-nonsense style. The fact that she's not your usual little-girl-lost blonde we seem to get in every cop show these days certainly doesn't hurt. It's really nice to get a modern noir story with protagonists you actually like. Jimmy and Mary, at least so far, are the good guys. It's just that they're very unusual good guys.

This is the kind of show that could claim a wide range of audience if it can get half a chance against the heavy-hitters on Tuesday night. Let's hope.

I demand an explanation. This show is a winner in every way. A veritable needle in the haystack. Superb character development, convincingly acted, and plausible story lines.I was stunned when I discovered it was cancelled. Such a waste of cinematic acumen. Maybe it got a little too close to the truth.

I taped this show each week, and if I made the mistake of starting to watch the tape when I had other things to do, thinking "I'll just watch the first few minutes", there was no way I could stop. I had to watch the whole thing.

When the credits rolled on the season finale I swore loudly at the screen. I didn't want it to end, especially not at the point that they left it dangling at! Next season promises to be explosive.

"Intelligence" isn't just great character-driven storytelling, it's a fascinating view into the machinery of domestic intelligence-gathering in both Canada and the U.S. as well as the politicking and maneuvering within and between the variou intel organizations and the criminal organizations they're supposed to be monitoring.

But it's not all wiretaps and whispers, it's robberies, assassinations, and gang warfare. Make no mistake, this is exciting crime drama.

The characters are vividly drawn and so believable that I expect to run into them in the street on my next trip to Vancouver. They are textured with flaws and weaknesses, exhibiting flashes of decency and kindness one moment, ruthlessness and cruelty the next. There are no clear heroes or villains. There are sympathetic and repugnant characters on both sides of the law. Sometimes I felt sorry for those I had despised, or I felt betrayed by characters I had trusted. I'm invested in all their stories, and I'm dying to know how they resolve next season!

Hopefully season one goes to DVD shortly. As a tightly-paced serial it will be good to watch all of the episodes back-to-back unbroken by commercials. It would also be an opportunity for many, many more people to get hooked on this show!

I came across this old favourite of mine on late night TV today and once again found it a wonderful change from the usual drivel. The plots are well written and character driven; the writer Chris Haddock assumes that viewers have intelligence themselves and writes to entertain adults, not juveniles. I had not intended to stay up so late but could not help myself after just a few minutes into the episode. The acting is excellent and understated and it is that plus the brilliantly complex story lines which drive the show, not bombs, guns and fighting that are so common in most shows. Having said that, when there is action but it is used to drive the plot line, not hide the fact that there isn't one.

It has always puzzled me why this sort of show along with others such as The Border are cancelled prematurely while so much lesser crud survives. Maybe they are just too real and to the point ? Meanwhile Clint Eastwood seems to have found Haddock and uses him to make great movies, so maybe this is more of our Canadian inferiority complex once again asserting itself ? Like Joni Mitchell said "Don't it always seem to go that you don't know what you've got 'til its gone....."