"The Shield" has come down to two final episodes, airing 9 p.m. this Tuesday and Nov. 25 on FX.
Even if you haven't watched it in years, take it from me: You've hardly missed a thing. To be sure, this is one of the most thrill-packed shows ever to hit American TV, though I'd be happy if it got even one-tenth the publicity that "24" gets. In fact, I would hold up three seasons -- the first, as well those featuring Oscar winners Glenn Close and Forest Whitaker in recurring roles -- with any three years of "The Sopranos" or "X-Files" or any other show this side of "The Wire."
"The Shield" has come down to two final episodes, airing 9 p.m. this Tuesday and Nov. 25 on FX.
Even if you haven't watched it in years, take it from me: You've hardly missed a thing. To be sure, this is one of the most thrill-packed shows ever to hit American TV, though I'd be happy if it got even one-tenth the publicity that "24" gets. In fact, I would hold up three seasons -- the first, as well those featuring Oscar winners Glenn Close and Forest Whitaker in recurring roles -- with any three years of "The Sopranos" or "X-Files" or any other show this side of "The Wire."
But as concerns the central thread, the storyline that's run through "The Shield" from the very beginning, not that much has changed in seven seasons. Rogue L.A. detective -- I'm sorry, former detective -- Vic Mackey (and played by Michael Chiklis) continues to elude the grasp of everyone who wants him dead or gone.
What has changed, besides the fact Vic is now officially impersonating a cop (having turned in his badge a couple of episodes back), is that whereas once he was knee deep in something dark and gooey, by this point the muck level has risen to chest-high. The man literally has no friends or allies anymore; he's betrayed, deceived or endangered every person who's come near him.
But because Vic has a golden mouth and a seemingly endless supply of dei ex machina at his disposal -- last week it was a blackmail file on a federal agent that conveniently opened a door for him -- he has managed to avoid the mother of all comeuppances that we all know he's earned.
In fact, I would likely flunk a quiz about whether the Armenian gang got wiped out, or the Mexicans got sent to prison, or the black guys got neutralized, or the federal agent got compromised when Vic found her blackmail file ... because I just enjoy the ebb and flow of the episodes, and after seven years of this, does it really matter?
The point is, Vic Mackey remains a free man physically and legally, if not psychologically or circumstantially, six years after he brazenly shot dead a fellow cop. And every week, Vic has dealings with someone who can bring him to justice for this unforgiveable act ... and every time he wriggles off the hook.
So if you decide to tune in for these last two hours -- and I highly recommend you do -- all you really need to know is that lots of people now know the truth about Mackey. The precinct commander, Claudette (CCH Pounder), finally figured out that Vic's strike force was rotten to the core and dismantled it.
Vic's estranged compadre Shane (Walton Goggins) figured out that Vic tried to kill him. Naturally, Shane's attempt at retalation, which also included the third man on the team, Gardocki (David Rees Snell), failed miserably. And so he's on the run, but not before spilling the beans to Vic's ex (Cathy Cahlin Ryan), who is so eager to have him gone she's willing to wear a wire ...
In a way, I feel sorry for the writers who have had to string along this inevitable, unavoidable reckoning that we've been waiting for now ever since Whitaker's character, the one who got the closest to nailing Vic, was outsmarted by ol' Brer Mackey just in the nick of time.
I'm also sorry that two of TV's best-defined minority characters -- the striving, sexually confused Julien (Michael Jace) and the ambitious, really sexually confused Aceveda (Benito Martinez) -- have assumed such marginal roles in recent seasons. Julien's personal story was one of the highlights of that Emmy-winning first season, and was essentially parked in a cul-de-sac. Aceveda pops his head into every episode for a few moments of tension, then scurries back to the periphery where he doesn't belong.
As much as some of us have invested in "The Shield," it could turn into a musical for the last three episodes and we'd probably be fine with it. We'd spend years analyzing why Aceveda was given a dance number, why Vic was lowered from the ceiling by piano wire during the climatic instrumental piece ...
I'm not saying "The Shield" can do no wrong. In fact, judging from some of the fan reactions to this final season, it seems many viewers wish that it was playing out differently -- specifically, some kind of painful, awful, cathartic end for Vic, who's used and abused everybody in his vicinity for seven years and yet never seems to pay the price.
And as Vic's ex succinctly put it not long ago, "You have to pay some kind of price!"
I'm just saying that "The Shield" has built up a lot of goodwill with viewers and however it ends, it'll be bittersweet.
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