The Shield - Season 3

In two subsequent seasons, The Shield has failed to captivate me as much as in its first year, yet it's still more intriguing than the shock value police show I thought it was, and the continuing downward spiral of Vick Mackey's life as his family and career as a dirty cop begin to circle the drain. Everything that can go wrong seems to, as he has trouble keeping his team operating on the same level while worrying about the aftermath of their hit on the Armenians in season two and trying to keep new member Tavon in the dark without losing his talents. Really, what happens after they rip off a dangerous gang gets just as much attention as the planning of said hit, and it's interesting to see a show focus so heavily on the consequences on every single thing that can happen in these situations. There's no time for rest, something's always springing a leak that needs plugging before anyone else gets too close.

And Mackey's not the only one with problems. Dutch again becomes obsessed with a serial suspect, and goes to some dark places trying to understand him. Claudette continues to butt heads with Aceveda, who was supposed to give his job up by now, over what's right for the department and what's the right thing to do. Aceveda himself faces a pretty huge personal crisis after something that happens in the field. The two uniforms the show likes to give attention to still feel like side attractions, rarely bringing much that's truly interesting to the show. They did some things with Julian's homosexuality before that was pretty tough material, but I feel like they only have as much screen time as they do at this point because they have to. Likewise, as the troubles at home for Vick increase, they've become more of a real concern, although I think it's just a way to pile more worries on him while everything goes sideways. It's well done, and I felt like the season as a whole was a bit closer to the first's quality than the third. Supposedly the show only gets better from here, which I'm looking forward to, because now it's sort of sitting in the realm of "really good" and not quite what I'd call a great series.