Damages 4.2.

[selenak]

Evil henchman is still evil (and nothing else), and I'm stll not getting a sense of Howard's character, either. Last season was great in many regards, not least in the way it how incredibly damaging a man's weakness, not strength, can be to other people via the main villain, but admittedly this was not already apparant in episode two, so I'm willing to wait. At any rate, the main attraction of this show aren't the villains, it's the emotional and mind game between Pattie and Ellen, and this got served in spades. *is gleefull*

Mind you, the one false note in this to me was that Pattie eventually cracked and told her court-ordered therapist (whom I like otherwise! more about him in a moment!) some actual thoughts of hers about Ellen, because that smacked of plot necessity. I.e. the scriptwriters thought the audience needed to have it spelled out to them why Pattie wasn't volunteering her help, which I think was unnecessary, because the power game here was apparant - Ellen wanted Pattie to offer, Pattie wanted Ellen to ask, it just was a matter of who would get the other to concede first. As I said, otherwise I like the therapist and Pattie's scenes with him, as well as the idea that Pattie has to do this for breaking poor Henry's nose. :) (And the fact Henry won't forgive her, oh no.) He's doing a nice job of being clever without being condescending, and I'm looking forward to more sessions.

All I know about the American military I learned from films and tv, same goes for mercenaries, but wouldn't Chris have to retrain or something like this, considering the shape he was in, rather than being whisked back to Afghanistan without a day's interlude? Anyway, it was obvious that something would happen to prevent him being available for testimony, and this was less predictable than him getting killed. It also contributed to making him three dimensional; he's not an innocent victim, he was all too ready to believe the story of the Afghan assassin, and note he did not question the fact this confession was extracted via torture for a second. Presumably extracting info that way isn't unusual anymore on the front lines. All the same, he's tragic and doomed, so the real question is, how will Ellen manage to get another witness, and who will it be?

Ellen, of course, is quite resourceful these days. Ellen being able to outmanipulate Pattie at this point feels earned because we did see her grow through the seasons, plus they actually wanted the same thing; they just wanted the other to be the supplicant. And the way Ellen does it, by ostensibly placing herself in the weaker position, was so very them.

It occurs to me that so far, instead of a framing mystery which isn't much of one (i.e. those Afghanistan flashes), the inside-story mystery read thread is "what became of Michael?" Considering what the detective tells Pattie - Michael is not in prison, not dead, and not using his credit cards - the answer could be really interesting. (I doubt he got religion and went into a monastary, you know.) And might even end up being related to the High Star plot. Purely speculating here, but it would tie the two plots of Pattie's family life and the season's case together, plus being a mercenary under another name would also account for Michael not needing his credit cards a nd still supporting himself. It also would make that camp for very difficult teenagers Pattie put him in in season 1 in some weird kind of foreshadowing.