NCIS: Los Angeles - Past Lives

Network: CBS
Time: Tuesdays, 9:00-10:00pm
Cast: LL Cool J, Chris O'Donnell, Daniela Ruah, Barrett Foa, Peter Cambor, Adam Jamal Craig, Linda Hunt

Summary: Callen begins to withdraw from the group when he must revert back to an old alias from his past.

Review: This was another episode that required a second watching before I could write a review of it, which really doesn't bode well for what I'm about to write.  I've been disappointed lately by the trend that NCIS: Los Angeles is taking.  It's focusing too much on the cases and not enough on character development, especially when you consider that the cases are often rather weak.

This was yet another Callen-centric episode.  I understand that the writers need to develop Callen and Sam as our main characters, but they've gone to the point of excluded some of the supporting characters completely.  For example, they begin the episode with a conversation between Dom and Callen, which led me to believe Dom might have a strong role in this episode.  Instead, he completely disappears after that scene, and doesn't even return for the final scene, where the team leaves for what is supposed to be a team outing.  Could this be because Adam Jamal Craig had a conflict on the days when they were shooting?  Absolutely.  And this by itself wouldn't be so bad, except Dom hasn't been really involved in an episode since somewhere around episode 3 or 4.

In that thread, Nate and Eric each got one or two scenes, where their entire purpose was to further the episode for the main characters.  Again, their characters were not developed at all, except that Eric loves his job and Nate won't reveal another person's innermost thoughts to anyone else.  Hetty came and went as usual, giving us occasional glimpses into her past, but never cementing herself as anything more that the responsible, older stereotype.

The only character that the writers have changed tacks with is Kensi.  In the beginning of the season, they seemed to have written her off as a supporting character, somewhere on par with Eric and Nate.  As its progressed, however, they've slowly by surely moved her up, so she's closer (though not yet equal to) Callen and Sam.  They're giving her her own stories, and they even gave her a potential romance in this episode.  And she's developing in a likable way, enough that her successes make me happy and her failures make me sad.  I truly enjoy the scenes with her in them, and I like that the writers have started to use her more.

The actual case was, as most NCIS and NCIS: Los Angeles cases are, the weakest point of the episode.  The purpose was to give the audience more information about Callen's past, including an undercover op where he got involved with a suspect's sister.  Now, the people he was investigating, who were all part of some money laundering scheme where the money was never found, are being killed, and Callen is called upon to use his old alias to figure out who's doing it.  The ending was predictable, not because it made logical sense for the killer to be who he was, but because many NCIS episodes have contained the same "twist."

Certainly the episode had its positives.  Team banter was fun at the beginning and the end.  If the writers could begin injecting more of that into the middle of the episode, they'd have a real winner there.  And, as I said, they've really developed Callen and Kensi (and Sam to a certain extent) into enjoyable characters with both positive and negative attributes.  Now they just need to develop the rest of the cast.

CBS just picked NCIS: Los Angeles for a second season (to no one's surprise), and I think that was a great decision on their part.  Sure, the show has some kinks now, but, if it's anything like its parent show, it will get better with age.  The weak storylines will become more enjoyable once the characters are fully developed, and the audience will come to appreciate the dialogue as much as, if not more than, the investigative work.

Favorite lines:
Callen: Hetty plus mechanical bull plus tequila equals bar fight.  Trust me, I've been there.

Sam: I smell like a cop?
Callen: Actually you smell like baby powder, but that's a whole different conversation.

Eric: Ooh, intrigue, betrayal... this is getting interesting.
Kensi: Sometimes he's so cheerful, I want to punch him.  Repeatedly.

Rating:
[5] Excellent
[4] Good
[3] Average
[2] OK
[1] Bad

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