Just finished watching season two of Rescue Me.  It was GREAT.

This show reminds me of The Sheild and I'm not really sure why.  Maybe because they're both original FX shows, so they're very gritty and use lots of bad language and almost show naked people doing private things but aside from that they're not much alike. 

On the Sheild, you've got you're crooked cops doing awful things to worse people and on Rescue Me, you've got you're firemen who may not be angels but they aren't crooked in the way that the cops on the Sheild are.

I guess they are alike in that both shows manage to make a sympathetic protagonist out of men who are basically unlikable guys.  Vic Mackey is very easy to root for despite the fact that he's as dirty as a cop can be because for the most part the people he's awful to are far worse than he is (even his former Captain, Assevader) and Tommy Gavin somehow manages to keep you in his corner despite the fact that he's quite a prick.

Vic actually seems fairer but feels fouler than Tommy.  Vic is not malicious and he really believes that he's doing the right thing, most of the time.   He does try to   follow his own set of ethics but if it ever comes down to you or him, he's gonna save his own hide.  He has a veneer of charm over a black, cold, selfish heart.  

Tommy is a foul tempered, foul mouthed misanthropic alcoholic who's rather spit on you than say hello but if it ever came down to you or him, he'd save your life at the cost of his own.  Because he hates himself more than he hates the rest of humanity. He has a veneer of porcupine quills over a heart that's torn, bleeding and heroic.

So I guess I'd rather hang out with Vic, but if I ever needed to dial 911, I'd hope it was Tommy that answered the call.

I never in a million years would've guessed that Dennis Leary could be so good.   He's really remarkable.  Tommy is a stinker and a half, yet you totally feel for him and understand him.  The only thing I don't like about the show is the female characters.

There are three: Psycho wife, psycho girl friend and psycho firefighter chick.

Psycho wife behaves in the most dramatically convenient manner I've ever seen in a tv character.  Need her to be bitchy one week and lovey dovey the next?  Okay!  Need to throw in a little more heartbreak?  Let's have her kidnap the kids and disappear despite the fact that Tommy has never shown himself to be a bad father or even a bad ex husband.  Yes, he's annoying, but go underground with the kids?  It made no sense.  Then, when he kidnaps the kids back, what does she do?  She tells him she wants to start over and renew their vows.  Psychos watch this woman and think "What the Hell..?"

Psycho girlfriend is the whiniest, neediest clingiest hellbitch imaginable.  The only possible thing Tommy could see in her is that she puts up with him.  This one actually makes a little bit of sense, though;  She's the widow of Tommy's best friend and cousin, who died on 911, so I guess we can suppose that she's suffering from post traumatic stress just like Tommy and that's why she's so shreikingly awful.

There's no excuse for Psycho firefighter chick.  I can't even tell if we're supposed to like her or not but I hate her guts.  First, she talks through her nose so she's always whining like a bee hive.  Second, her skin is as thin as an over ripe tomato.  Third, she's absolutely convinced that every guy in the house wants her and finally, when she actually lands Hot Franco she turns into the One Night Stand from Hell immediately!!

Seriously; first she shoots Franco down, then she shows up tipsy, calls it sex with no strings attached and the next morning accuses him of seeing other people and gets pissed.  This, for some reason convinces Franco that he's in love with her (the rest of the show is not this stupid, I promise) and when he wins her back with poetry, she practically bounces up and down demanding "write me another one, write me another one!!"  Insatiable nightmare that she is.  Then she has the audacity to tell him that the second poem sucks.  Would a guy who has women kicking in his door put up with this?  Would any man with a drop of self respect?

At this point, I was hoping Vic Mackey would show up and shoot her.

Apparently she's left the show and I'm glad.  I just wish they had killed her off in a fire.

But it brings me to this: here's a show with at least eight recurring male characters, each of whom is an interesting multi dimensional person.  Every one of them has a personality full of flaws and virtues, likable qualities and harsh prejudices.   These guys are all very well written as fully realised people.

Can't we have one woman who's more than a tissue thin caricature?

This show is an A+ anyway.

 

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