Janet McTeer

Lunchtable TV Talk: How to Get Away with Murder is Damages

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As I tuned in for the much-anticipated start to the sophomore season of How to Get Away with Murder, hot on the heels of a deserved Viola Davis Emmy win, I was struck by how a lot of TV is about placement and timing. See, How to Get Away with Murder is basically Damages with much more diverse cast and much better promotion.

Damages had a worthy rival to HtGAwM’s Annalise Keating in a strong, ruthless and tightly wound Glenn Close as Patty Hewes. Both women are conniving, bright, cutthroat and lethal in their own often twisted pursuit of their own definitions of justice. Both have done insane and questionable things. And most of all, both women have very little control over – and are practically unhinged in – their personal lives. It’s in their personal lives that things come apart. The story comes from those cracks in the power-hungry, driven veneer they project. And both stories are compelling and revealed key pieces of information in fragments, so you might think you knew – sort of – what was going to happen later in the season based on glimpses of things you had seen earlier – but not until the final episode would the entire story have unfolded.

The difference… Damages got short shrift, at least from viewers. Damages was intense and critically praised, but never found an audience. It was technically cancelled, in fact, after FX decided to get rid of it after three poorly performing seasons. It was given a two-season reprieve via a deal with DirecTV (which also revived the loved and lauded Friday Night Lights after NBC wanted to cut it short). With the way it moved around, it certainly never found its footing, and was gone too soon despite stellar casting and tight stories for all five of its seasons. In addition to the formidable Glenn Close, Damages featured Rose Byrne, Timothy Olyphant (the one and only from both Deadwood and Justified), David Costabile (increasingly visible all the time in all manner of shows, from Flight of the Conchords to Breaking Bad, from Suits to the rather irritating and cancelled Dig, from Ripper Street to Low Winter Sun), Janet McTeer (love her and sad her recent show, Battle Creek, was cancelled so soon), Ted Danson, Lily Tomlin, John Goodman, William Hurt, the ubiquitous
Željko Ivanek, Ryan Phillippe and the leader of the John Hannah School of English Elocution, John Hannah.

When I binge-watched the compelling first seasons of HtGAwM, it felt familiar in many ways because it covered a lot of the ground Damages had already tread. It was still fresh because it has its own story and feel, but it made me feel regret that Damages was so little seen during its original broadcast (hopefully people are picking it up on Netflix). None of this takes anything away from the magnetic nature of How to Get Away with Murder, but instead, it’s worth stating that if you like it, maybe you will also like Damages.

Lunchtable TV Talk – Battle Creek: Embattled

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Even if Battle Creek gets the axe (which seems pretty likely right now), the first half of its one and probably only season has been entertaining. I recognize that I pull out the “entertaining” word an awful lot. It suffices often enough for these shows that don’t knock it out of the park but pass the time reasonably and pleasantly. But average adjectives are just about all that distinguish TV shows that fail to distinguish themselves.

Battle Creek’s cast should have done half the work by virtue of its experience and talent. The cast, anchored by comeback kid of sorts Dean Winters (best known for playing “Dennis”, Tina Fey’s on-off, loser boyfriend in 30 Rock, “Mayhem” in a long-running series of ads for Allstate Insurance, Ryan O’Reilly in the disturbing HBO prison drama, Oz as well as Rescue Me and Law & Order SVU) as Detective Russ Agnew, comes together within the beleaguered Battle Creek, Michigan police department. They’re led by the multitalented Janet McTeer as their commander, and the police department has basically no resources with which to work. In comes Josh Duhamel as dapper, charming FBI agent, Milt Chamberlain.

The story, with this group of actors, should gel better. The premise pits two very different detectives with two different perspectives on investigative work and on life against each other, but forces them to partner up. Agnew is cynical and distrustful (and his reasons for being this way become clear in the course of the show); Chamberlain, at least from what we have seen in the few episodes we’ve seen, is cheerful and trusting (but we don’t get a very good look at what motivates him or is behind his actions). They work together, improbably, to solve crimes, and the acting should complement the story – but I don’t feel like the show has unfolded a compelling enough story for us to care or to make people watch.

It’s unfortunate because there is potential. Its DNA has a little bit of Vince Gilligan (creator of Breaking Bad, Better Call Saul); guest casting has been clever and fun (a superb and hilarious as well as topical guest appearance from the great Patton Oswalt as Battle Creek’s mayor – a terrific comedic send-up of Toronto’s former mayor Rob Ford; Candice Bergen as Detective Agnew’s con-woman mother).

The actors – both regulars and guest stars – have done their part with the material they have, but the show itself, so far, has not been tight enough, has not been more than middling. If given a chance, I imagine that the show could hit its stride (many shows have surprised us after slow starts in their first seasons). Now it’s just a matter of Battle Creek getting that chance.