Monday, April 14, 2008

Law & Order: Darkness (Season 18)


I'd like to kick off with Ten's trailer for tonight's Law & Order episode: Darkness. "Law & Order's new cop doesn't follow the rules. But when a kidnapping goes wrong, his mistake could cost them everything!!!!" (cue dude saying "You want me to give up everything to fix your mistake?"). O..K..so...uhh...what mistake did Det Lupo make? It was EADA Cutter's mistake, not Lupo's...and, indeed, that dude's comments were made to Cutter not Lupo. Maybe the guys that make the Ten trailers should actually watch the episode before they make the trailer for it.


And, yes, as you can see, it now seems that the loose cannon in Law & Order these days is EADA Michael Cutter, a man McCoy describes as juggling chainsaws. Cutter is a man of convictions - he doesn't care about the law if he can save people's lives, and it is for that reason that he allows Green and Lupo to undertake a search without a warrant. Later Cutter isn't really interested in the power fraud he uncovers because two people have been murdered and it's the killers he wants to send to jail.


So, it's nice to see Law & Order going back to the tried and tested method - a murder takes place, the detectives go after the man (although in this twist, he's not the wrong man, he just gets killed) and the detectives then have to find the other killer. The ADAs take up the case only to find a third man is involved (although there was no arraignment scene!!! What's with that???) and they have to arrest him over an obstacle (that being in this case the power fraud). We even have the old DA telling the EADA that his case is going to fail.


Actually, that's interesting, because there is a very different relationship between Cutter and McCoy than we have seen with the past DA's and their EADA's. Schiff/Stone was paternal, and all the McCoy ones have been dismissive, but McCoy is being actively disapproving of Cutter's methods, which makes for an interesting dynamic. Rubirosa being caught between the two is also interesting as she seems to be loyal to Cutter but also knows she has to answer to McCoy. This is probably the biggest change about the new season of L&O, and it's actually a good change too. I like it!


Law & Order, really, is like McDonald's. You know exactly what you're gonna get when you order, and that's not actually a bad thing.


"B"

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