Lebanna

I have to say, I thought Pino's performance was very good in this episode. I mean, the story wasn't great - coming straight after Rollins' rape trial, having Amaro testifying on the stand that he was beaten as child - it's like most of the offences in New York were committed against the SVU squad, not solved by them. It's just too much. But the acting was great. I also thought that Amaro Sr. was going to call Barba the 'f-word'. But I'm not sure that they're ever going there with him. He easily could be bi-sexual (probably not actually gay, we've already seen that he had a relationship once upon a time with the wife of his childhood friend and was still attracted to her), but I think it could just as easily be that the writers a) just want to lampshade Barba's awesome wardrobe, or b) want to illustrate that he really doesn't fit in anywhere. Last season they had Nick calling Barba a sell out who was trying to 'pass', as it were. His best friend from childhood also basically called him a class/racial traitor. This season, Barba has had racist remarks from idiots, showing that he gets just as much abuse as Amaro or anyone else about his background. And Amaro's dad, whether he was getting at Barba's sexuality or just making fun of his clothes, just adds to the general chorus of unpleasantness. It explains the bitchy, tough act that Barba puts on most of the time, and also shows that he's quite vulnerable - it has to hurt, or he wouldn't bother reacting to it. Also, last season Barba confessed his mamá issues to Olivia, and now it turns out that his dad was evil as well. So nobody on this show has any good parents at all. Please can Carisi turn out to have the most ridiculously sweet, loving family... something like an Italian version of the Waltons? Is that too much to ask? Probably.

I think people have been asking if the actress who plays Nell is pregnant pretty much every week for the last two or three years. You'd think that the costume department hated her or something. I mean... she could actually be pregnant this time. But they've been sticking her in big, baggy, lumpy, unflattering outfits for a long time now. To be fair, it's also good to have a female character who is pretty but doesn't have to dress for attention. Maybe that's what they're going for. They just overdo it a bit, sometimes.

Damn it. The dual timeline thing has sucked me in just where I thought I was free of this show. I still love the sarcastic music choices. This is reminding me of LOST a little bit. Creep island cults will do that, I guess. I'm assuming that Sarah had an abortion when Alan left her to chase after Julia and become a suspected terrorist. We're probably going to have to sit through a whole lot of angst about that. I wouldn't be surprised if Caleb turns out to be their next try at a kid - hence why he's immune to the island virus. In the future, the immortals are 'out', so something big obviously happens there. I guess nobody from main cast is getting out alive this year, except maybe Peter (obviously not buried with his brother) and future-Julia. That's interesting. They cheated, not showing Alan's death date, though. That was some convenient lichen.

Finch and Reese are the heart of the show for me. It's their friendship that eventually hooked me in the first season - the idea that both of them need the other to complete their mission, but also to be complete people, because they both have different pieces missing that the other can block in for them. The idea of shipping them just cracks me up, but I love their platonic mateship. Without that, the show would be interesting to me in principle, but I just wouldn't care much about anyone. I care if Reese gets hurt, because of the guilt it causes Harold and I care if Harold gets hurt because it hurts Reese just as much. I care about Root, Shaw and Fusco, because those two need them. I know the two of them are probably dying eventually - losing Carter nearly made me switch off and now I'm so glad I didn't, so I know that it could lead to wonderful things - but I secretly wish that they both end up happily ever after, whatever that means (and that could even mean dying - I think Harold would be scared but contented enough to die for Grace, for example, and Reese would be fine with dying if it finally meant that he felt that his mission was completed once and for all). I just don't want that to happen until the series is finished too.

Gary Sinise is a good call. Not only a good actor, but he knows how to handle a third spinoff already. I'd expect him to also get a production credit. But objectively, while CSI:NY didn't suck to the level of Miami, it also never got the ratings and eventually ended earlier. And CSI was always a bigger brand than CM. So it gives me moderate hope, but the premise of the show still sounds suck-worthy and they still have the problem that it may not sell outside the U.S. if they make other countries law enforcement look useless, and it may not sell inside the U.S. among conservatives if there is too much of a foreign element. I can still remember the flak (no pun intended) that one episode of CSI:NY got in the Spanish media when they hired a Cuban-American actor to play a cop from Barcelona, who didn't speak a word of Catalan and kept mispronouncing the name of his own police force. And nobody there even watched the episode in English, but it still damaged the show's reputation in the represented city. Stuff like that can really count in overseas sales, which is a growing market. And there was an episode of CM recently where if I remember correctly their mention of the perpetrator 'sleeping with the moose and bears in the Northern Territories' managed to annoy some Canadian commenters on this board. I imagine that if for some reason a red-jacketed Mountie had unironically appeared, the fury in Canada would have gone through the roof, while some perhaps older, less informed US viewers would have loved it. So they may have a tough row to hoe when it comes to pleasing both national and international audiences at once. This show will probably have to do all the research for at least one country a week or risk pissing off half the population there. And I don't have any faith that these writers will bother. So I guess we'll have to wait and see.

Bummer though it is for us, this is going to make Hannibal much more popular, I think. It might even keep the series on the air for many more years. There's just not much competition in summer.

That was not supposed to be a Glasgow accent in any way at all. It was definitely aiming for Irish and missing a bit. The two accents really don't sound in the least bit similar.

And he was totally playing up his Cuban accent too, which made it even better.

I have no idea why it took me this long to think of it, but - if Joelle really thought Callen was just some ordinary guy with a boring job - how did he explain the fact that he is completely covered in scars from bullet holes? I mean, they went all the way through. There's nothing else they could be. What would he say? Embarrassing accident with an industrial riveter? Previous career as a colander for one of the finest sous chefs in Paris?

Well I suppose it's usually short for MacKenzie, but I guess they could just as easily make it be her actual name. It doesn't really sound weirder than Maisie or Misty or something.

Okay, so the spin off has Mack, Sims, Lambert and Monty so far. Do we have any ideas what these other characters are supposed to be yet? New NCIS: New Orleans already has an African-American disabled computer tech character, so they might not even be as original with Monty here as they think. Of course, on NCIS that character is not also sweet enough to make me throw up on my own shoes, so there is that.

This sounds rather terrible. Supposing they have the budget to actually film abroad, it might not be so bad, but how will it work? The idea is that local police of whatever nation have to call in a team of US crimefighters every time a US citizen gets murdered? What's their jurisdiction? Like how on the NCIS shows they investigate anything even vaguely Navy related even when it's ridiculous? Why wouldn't most of those countries have their own elite profilers who would know much more about the criminal element of the area? I know the FBI does do some liason work internationally, but stopping this show looking like they're basically saying that the entire rest of the world can't solve their own crimes without special FBI help will be the challenge here. Or, an even worse thought just occurred to me reading the write-up of this on Deadline - it says that they're 'helping American citizens who find themselves in trouble abroad' - will they be working with US embassies and trying to prove the innocence of US citizens who are thought by local law enforcement to have committed crimes in other countries? Because, given that they'd have to prove most of them innocent to have a satisfying episode ending, that could be even more insulting to the rest of the world. Why couldn't they have just made it about Emily's unit at Interpol instead (yes, I know their depiction of Interpol was utterly insane, but even that might have made slightly more sense than this).

This sounds terrible. Taking it to the spoiler/spec thread!

This episode has the best CSI universe title since 'Smoke Gets In Your CSIs'.

Apparently CSI: Cyber will start on Wednesday March 4th 2015. http://tvline.com/2014/12/05/csi-cyber-premiere-date-battle-creek-cbs/ Get ready, people. Or don't. Whatever.

I'm thinking Louise kills Daniel and then her plan will be to kidnap Margaux so that she can keep her locked up until Marg has finished gestating Daniel's spawn - which Louise then intends to pass off as her own, making her and 'her' child the most important people in Victoria's life. Yes, this is utterly ridiculous and highly unlikely, but, you know... this show. More wild guesses, anyone?

Why did America have to export Black Friday to half the world instead of Thanksgiving? Seriously, a day off work where all you have to do is eat - no presents, no religious stuff, just piles of food and maybe a parade - that all sounds pretty good to me right now. But no. Cruel and unusual shopping with extreme prejudice. That's what we get.

Exactly. I remember watching this as a kid when it aired and thinking that it was a good two-parter, but the idea of such things happening in 2024 was ridiculous, because everything was just getting better and better wasn't it? And our generation were going to be so well educated that we'd have all these wonderful opportunities to do such amazing things... that's what all the grown-ups told us back then. And now I look at these episodes and they remind me of when I was still so hopeful about our future. It just makes me really sad.

I am 100% taking Conspiracy Lab Guy's comment about being convinced about the government developing a time travel device in Area 51 as a Quantum Leap shout out.

I loved this episode too. One little tiny thing that I really liked was that they gave a reasonable explanation of what Ducky was doing in Vietnam, after his time there was mentioned by his ladyfriend a few episodes ago. Annoying pedants like me were going 'He was in the British military, so he can't have been in 'Nam!' So it was awesome that they had actually thought it through and planned on explaining it later. That's the kind of little callback stuff I adore about this show.

I love this thread already. I never would have guessed that Victoria's dead boring plain white sweater was from Gucci. Makes sense.

I don't think so. I always assumed that Sam had an Ex out there as well. The interesting thing there would be if they ever tell us if she was an Ex before or after he met Michelle.

Yes, as far as we knew, poor Chair was thrown out after the incident because old Vick replaced it with a new one which was never quite as cool.

We are finally getting to see one of Sam's kids - and confirmation that he has more than one. This has been bugging me for ages since he is supposed to have plural kids, but only ever mentioned a young daughter, so it's a relief that they've finally gone there and are showing his son, with perhaps an explanation as to why the son is not mentioned as much. http://tvline.com/2014/11/11/sons-of-anarchy-season-7-episode-10-sex-scenes-opening/

I really enjoyed this, it really seems like this show is coming together nicely. I liked that Pride has borrowed his wife's tics and preferences - in this universe that's usually a sign that a couple is meant to be together. The actress is great and the character seemed a lot more sympathetic this time, so as someone else on this thread has said, let's just forget the boring angst and let them be happy, with her popping into the office twice a season or something. I liked the creepiness and thought that they did well with celebrating the city without over-egging it (groan, sorry).