Spy Novel TV

“Jack Ryan”  —  (Seasons 1 – 4) (2018, 2019, 2022, and 2023)
Today’s review is for the four season / 30 episode Amazon Prime video series “Jack Ryan” starring:  John Krasinski as Dr. Jack Ryan (main character / hero / CIA analyst), Wendell Pierce as James Greer (Jack’s senior agent / friend), Abbie Cornish as Dr. Cathy Mueller (Jack’s love interest), Michael Kelly as Mike November (a recurring role / field agent who can do a little of everything) and Michael Peña as Domingo Chavez (a former Navy SEAL and a senior CIA operative).  The series is an action / drama / spy thriller which (to my mind) tries to impress everyone with the need for and effectiveness of the Central Intelligence Agency.  There have been numerous public relations shows (movies and TV) for the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) over the decades and this series tries to do positive PR for the CIA.  It mostly succeeds.
There are (to date) four seasons:
Season 1 (eight episodes):  Islamic terrorists want to release nerve gas to kill the President and several members of the Cabinet.  Curiously, the goal doesn’t seem to be to cripple the U.S., just to continue the disruption of the country with the goal of keeping terror in our hearts.
Season 2 (eight episodes):  Jack (Greer and November) are in the middle of political warfare in a corrupt Venezuela to determine their Presidential election.  Of course, the CIA is on the side of the noble female and against the reelection of the corrupt current President.  The U.S. interest is in a mineral which Venezuela has recently discovered and a plot by a U.S. Senator to profit off of the discovery.
Season 3 (eight episodes):  Jack stops a plot to re-create the former Soviet Union by detonating an untraceable tactical nuclear bomb in a former Soviet country.
Season 4 (six episodes):  Jack, newly promoted to the CIA’s acting deputy director (for internal affairs), must stop a Mexican drug cartel joining up with an international terrorist organization trying to release biological weapons in Texas.  It is never really explained why either a cartel or a terrorist organization want to do this.  The impression is that it’s only for the money.
Running time is from 40-64 minutes of 30 episodes, so you’re looking at a 25+ hour commitment for viewing all episodes and seasons.
So, is the series any good?  The acting?  The drama?  The action?  And, do I recommend your investing your time watching it?  The short answers are all:  it’s an okay series and, if you like this genre, you’ll like the series.
Background:  I have been a big fan of Tom Clancy (the character’s creator and novels author) for many years.  I’ve read several of his books and seen most of the theatrical adaptations over the decades, so I’m very familiar with the title character.  I own and have seen the other five movies, although I’ve not viewed any of them recently.  I have also read several of Clancy’s other “series” / works.  Generally, his works are very detailed and specific in how military technology is actually used (and intended for use) and therefore his writing style is action / drama oriented and translates well to cinema.  It is rarely ever original, though.  (IMHO)  That is not a criticism of his work, after all, a murder mystery is a murder mystery is a murder mystery…  It’s the fleshing out of the characters and the clues which make the difference for us as readers or viewers.  The bottom line is you know what you’re going to get when you start one (book or movie) and the question is really:  does it deliver.
The series (all four years) is entertaining and does deliver within those limits.  It delivers reasonably good character and story development.  The action(s) is reasonably paced with “something” happening in every other episode and alternates between character development and action.  Note:  the action is “entertaining”;  it is not “realistic”.  As for the show itself, I (personally) felt all / each of the four years were too long (too many episodes) and they could have all been shortened to the 3 to 4 hour length (each) and been just as entertaining.  In fact, the first three seasons (eight episodes each) were mostly sub-hour episodes and the fourth season was six episodes of mostly full-hour episodes.  But, then (I guess), the “series” would have been just LONG movies and not a true episodic TV series.  The running theme in the series is that our enemies are foreign and domestic.  Each of the seasons turns on someone high in the U.S. government betraying us (the country) for profit.
Of all the characters and scenes in the series, I found Michael Peña as Domingo Chavez was my favorite.  The Ryan character is consistently played as a “Boy Scout” / good-guy who does things for the “right” reasons.  (Mostly BORING.)  Chavez is NOT.  He is a stone cold assassin type killer.  Not a murderer (for no reason);  but a weapon, you point at the enemy when you want to get the job done and who defines himself by his relentlessness.  My favorite scene in all four seasons is:  the good guys have broken into the bad guys lair, taken him prisoner and retrieved the triggering device(s).  They are about to leave (leaving the bad guy alive) when the bad guy calls out to them (roughly – not a direct quote):  “You can’t do this!  Not to me!  I will track you down and kill you and your families!”  Chavez turns and shoots him in the head.  Everyone else looks at Chavez, but he doesn’t even shrug.  A completely missed opportunity in the dialogue was Chavez should have quipped:  “YOU won’t,” in a classic 007 / James Bond style response.
Final recommendation:  moderate to strong.  To quote Abraham Lincoln:  “For people who like this sort of thing, this is the sort of thing they like.”  I did – but like I said, a bit too long.  I imagine the series would have been better viewing spaced out instead of binged in three sittings as I did it.  The series has apparently concluded as the lead actor (Krasinski) was only contracted for four years.  The concluding scene leaves a perfect opening for a spin-off “team” series, but I think they will need a new center piece if Krasinski doesn’t return.
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On This Day In:
2022	This Is A Time…
2021	Feeling Younger
	In It  (In The Mood)
2020	One Person
2019	More Likely Unsinging
	What’s At Stake…
2018	But What Are You DOING About November?
	Or His Elected Position
2017	Some Good
2016	Edges
	Sums
2015	I Hope Not
2014	Study The Means Of Expressing Yourself
2013	That Stubborn Thing
2012	Like Mike
2011	Flawless Or Candid
2010	Browning…

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A Series Of Observations

Today’s TV series review is for the seven season / 151 episodes / 115 hours total viewing time, drama / crime-police / mystery series: “The Mentalist“.  The show stars Simon Baker as Patrick Jane (the Mentalist) and Robin Tunney as Agent Teresa Lisbon (his long suffering boss / side-kick”Watson”).  There are three other “main” supporting characters:  Kimball Cho (played by Tim Kang), Wayne Rigsby (played by Owain Yeoman) and Grace Van Pelt (played by Amanda Righetti).  The series originally aired between 2008 and 2015.  I viewed / “streamed” the series over several weeks in 3-to-4 episode chunks.  Some spoilers follow, so if you are intending to watch this series, do so before continuing this review…
The basic premise is that a “reformed” con-man / fake psychic (Jane) assists law enforcement (the California Bureau of Investigation [CBI]) with solving crimes (mostly murders).  Because the CBI is a state law enforcement unit, the crime is generally on California state property or CBI involvement is “requested” by someone with sufficient political influence to warrant the notice of the CA State Attorney General.  Sometimes this aspect is a REAL stretch…  and then has to be narratively explained away by dialogue.
The main character – Jane – has highly developed observational skill, exceptional memory skill and high intelligence which combined with his years as a con-man / magician / fake psychic allow him to “solve” each case in intuitive (sometimes illegal) ways – much to the discomfort of the supporting cast (professional law enforcement officers).  Jane becomes involved with CBI after recovering from a nervous breakdown following the brutal murder of his wife and daughter by a serial killer (“Red John”).  Red John’s modus operandi is “generally” a rape, disembowelment and then throat slitting of his (mostly female) victims.  Red John is a cult leader type criminal, generally following the “Dr. Moriarty” character type from the Sherlock Holmes genre.  Lisbon is Watson to Jane’s Sherlock.
The series has two over-arching series themes:  the developing romantic relationship between Jane and Lisbon and the developing friendship(s) between Jane and the rest of the law enforcement supporting characters.  Within this there are also three main seasonal story arcs:  seasons one through three are single episode murder mysteries developing the two main arcs.  Seasons four, five and half of season six are devoted to both episodic crimes and the hunt for Red John.  Red John is revealed (and killed) and then the last half a season six and all of season seven is Jane assisting in various FBI cases.  Season seven is an abbreviated season of only twelve episodes.  All of the other seasons are twenty-one plus episodes. Most of the series is based in Sacramento.  Post-Red John, the series moves from CBI to FBI and is then based from Austin, Texas.
So, is this series any good?  Has it stood the test of time?  How is the acting?  Is the show realistic for leadership, psychology or law enforcement?  And, finally, is it worth investing 115 hours of your life?  In order:  yes, mostly, poor to excellent, more often than not, so-so, “I sure hope not”, and yes.
More specifically, overall, this is a VERY good series.  It is as predictable as any police procedural:  crime, investigation, resolution.  It is mostly predictable for character development – but at a surprisingly / interesting slow pace and then – bang – your in rapids, and then – back to slow pace.  The series ends “happily” from a romantic perspective it is well rapped up – the two main couples wed.  So, bottom line, the good-guys win and live happily-ever-after.
Test of time / acting / theme portrayals:  As a police procedural – I hope not.  As a romantic drama, yes.  As a “Sherlock Holmes” genre, so-so.  In practically every episode, some person’s rights are either ignored or aggressively violated.  This is morally acceptable because the team is putting very bad people (mostly men) behind bars (or killing them).  No matter how honorable the character starts in their role, they are always corrupted by Jane and the concept of acting for “the greater good”.  On the romantic side, a big part of every drama is how long can you maintain the sexual tension between the main characters.  Although obvious from the first episode, both main relationship arcs are well developed.  As a super-sleuth / Holmes procedure series, the show has problems, but it (the show) still works because of the believability of the actors in their slowly developed / multi-layered character portrayals.  The portrayals of most of the bad-guys are mostly flat and one dimensional, but there are notable exceptions.  As the series progresses most of the other (non-super-genius) characters say:  “This is what Jane would (would not) have us do…”  For me personally, I found the various depictions of leadership styles / personalities to be one of the most interesting aspects of the series.  The whole gamut of leadership from criminal to sainted is represented and the strengths and weaknesses of the various styles is examined, critiqued and accepted or rejected.
Investment:  I feel there has been an on-going transformation in home entertainment happening over the course of my lifetime.  The progress is roughly equivalent to that of written literature.  In writing we have daily comics, short stories and comic books, short-moderate-long books (texts and novels), books series and encyclopedias.  In TV, the corresponding genre would be animated / cartoon shorts (multiple stories in a half-hour show), episodic stories (half-hour to hour long shows), movie length (90 minutes to mini-series [sub-30 hours of total viewing time]), and seasonal arcs (episodic, but with 3-5 minutes devoted to long-term character / story development), and then generational shows / series.  I consider “generational” series to be any series over 15 years / seasons – so, most day-time soap operas and multi-series franchises (“I Love Lucy“, “The Simpsons“, “StarTrek“, “Law & Order“, “NCIS“, etc).  I (personally) do NOT consider game shows to be “generational” series, even though many have gone well beyond 20 seasons, because they are normally not re-watched after the initial viewing.  Although, there is now some give on this characteristic, too, as you can “watch” some of the prior episodes (on TV-history channels).  The point of the “re-run” (though) is to view the contestants (famous personalities from yesteryear) and not viewing the contests, themselves.  At any rate, I would put a seven seasons series in the “War & Peace” – lengthy story grouping, but not in the generational level group.
Final recommendation:  This is a moderate to strong recommendation for an initial viewing (see caution later), a low to moderate for re-viewing in its entirety and a strong to highly for individual episodes (if you develop a favorite character or mini-story arc during your initial viewing).  For me, 100-plus hours is almost certainly too long to spend re-watching the entire series. I purchased my “series-bundle copy” on steep discount ($30 as I recall), at which price this a bargain for entertainment value – even if only viewed once – $.25 per hour or $.20 per episode.  One note of caution:  there is the occasional swear word used at least once per season and there are repeated scenes of victims injuries (almost one per episode), so this is not appropriate for viewers under 12 years of age.
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On This Day In:
2022	And Longer To Stay That Way
	A General Guideline For Voting In The 2022 Mid-Terms
	A Series Of Observations
2021	Press On
	Mama Said There’d Be Days Like This (Love Yourself)
2020	AMA
	Still Shiny (Sunshine On My Shoulders)
2019	Things That Go Bump In The Night
	Hoping I’m Careful
2018	I Must Be Truly Wise
2017	My Sensei
2016	The Worst Sin
2015	Rules Of Thumb
2014	A Prayer
	Orange October (IX) – Giants Lose Game 2 In Bullpen Collapse
2013	Complacent Reality
2012	Two-minute Sex
	Just Staring, Why?
2011	A World Of Difference

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The Man With A Code

“The Punisher” (2018 – Season 2)  —  series review
Caution:  “some” spoilers in this review.  If you intend to view the series, stop now…  You’ve been warned.  Also, much of this review is the same as / similar to my review of season one.
This is a Marvel Comics Universe “TV” series appearing on NetFlix.  The “Punisher” character was introduced in the (recently cancelled) “DareDevil” series (in season two) – and pretty much took it over – and this review is for the second season of his (the Punisher’s) series.  Basically, (in season 1) the family of a military expert is killed and he takes revenge against the killers.  He leaves one guy, who he promises (“threatens”) to come back for.  Blah, blah, blah.  Segue to season two…  So, now the guy who survived season one escapes from the mental hospital and the Punisher has to finish the job.
Ok, that’s pretty much what I expected from the end of season one…  And, it’s almost what you get in season 2.  The thing about the “Punisher” series is it is NEVER about the dozens of people he kills.  It is ALWAYS about “justice” for the guys behind the violent criminals.  The ones who are actually pulling the strings.  (And in this series, discovery means execution.)  In DareDevil, it was finding out who had his family executed.  In season one, it was about who actually did the executions.  Because that season ended in a non-fatal way, the antagonist could be a returning villain, but they could not be the “main” baddie.  Like season one, a new string-puller has to be introduced:  in this case a husband and wife team who use religion to make themselves wealthy and powerful.  And, then they have a puppet (on a string)…
This season, the series still stars Jon Bernthal as Frank Castle / Punisher, Ben Barnes returns to the second season as Billy Russo (Frank’s wartime friend who was the bad guy in season 1), Amber Rose Revah returns as Dinah Madani (Homeland Security Officer), Corbin Bernsen and Annette O’Toole as Anderson and Eliza Schultz (the “real” bad guys for this season), Josh Stewart plays John Pilgrim (the hyper-violent “religious” puppet of the Schultz’s), Giorgia Whigham plays Amy Bendix (the “innocent” who must be protected by Castle), Jason R. Moore as Curtis Hoyle (the Vet “do-gooder” medic), and Deborah Ann Woll as Karen Page (a carry over from Daredevil).
The season is dark but not as dark as the first season.  Literally.  There just seemed to be a lot more daylight / outdoor scenes.  But the killing is mostly done at night or in darker / indoors lighting.  (I think it’s meant to be a metaphor, but it’s easy to make this type of show more sophisticated than it really is:  always remember, it’s “just” a comic book adaptation.)  The series continues to try to deal with a host of issues, “BIG” philosophical issues, from right and wrong, to innocence, vigilantism, friendship, personal loss, and a rather bizarre attitude that “justice” almost always ends with violence – particularly gun violence.  While the depiction of gun violence is pretty accurate, the depiction of physical recovery remains essentially: “and then a miracle happens.”  There are scars, but recovery (from blows, gun shot wounds, knife cuts and broken bones) is almost instantaneous.  Like I said:  comic book…
Does it work and is it any good?  If you like this kind of thing (same as season one:  explosions, excessive violence, explosions, hand-to-hand combat, lots and lots of guns and gun fire, and did I mention explosions), and I do, then you’ll continue to enjoy this series.  And, I did.  The question was:  is it any good and was it better than season one?  Everything I said about season one remains true:  “As a comic book adaptation, it is very good.  As an action / adventure / who-dun-it, it’s pretty good.  As a realistic portrayal of armed and unarmed combat, uh, it’s a comic book…”
Final recommendation:  moderate to strong.  This season is rated higher than season one because they let the actors act more and kill / maim less (slightly).  In typical Marvel fashion, Billy Russo “almost” becomes a sympathetic character as we are introduced to his childhood and his earlier relationship with Castle.  Again, the series is definitely for mature audiences ONLY.  It feels strange to say (admit) it, but I (again) enjoyed the acting and the story more than I did the violence.  I particularly enjoyed the four part twist at the end of the season.  This was a better season and I hope Marvel and NetFlix give “The Punisher” another season to see where Castle’s wandering takes us.
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On This Day In:
2023	Almost
2022	A Happy Realization
2021	Is Science Cumulative?
	We’re Aging With Time (Yesterday’s Wine)
2020	Where #45 Is Leading The Republican Party
2019	Your Own Blog Posts
	The Man With A Code
2018	Choose Goodness
2017	Developing Translations
2016	Think Like A Hero
2015	Reductionism
2014	Gravitation, n.
2013	Ups And Downs
2012	Nerd Heard – And Good-Bye
	Your Continuum
2011	Career Tips (Part 2)

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