Shawn Ryan

Shield, The - Season 3 Review

Rating
Video: 7/10
Audio: 8/10
Extras: 4/10

Originally known as The Barn, The Shield is a gritty police drama which premiered to high ratings for the cable channel F/X. While the show has been compared to NYPD Blue and other police shows, this is a very unique series. Created by Shawn Ryan (Nash Bridges, Angel), this is a story about cops that cross the line to get the job done. Vic Mackey (Michael Chiklis - The Commish) is the head of an elite Strike Team unit, a close-knit group of cops that make headlines with their busts, often by bending the rules. The Strike Team is flying high after they pulled off the Armenian money train robbery at the end of season 2. The heat is on, and they have to play it smart to protect the money, and their lives.

Ohhhhh yeah! I missed Vic and the gang, and I hated waiting that extra month or so for the DVD set (the fourth season is starting a bit later than the previous ones have). I watched the season 2 finale as a refresher before diving into season 3, and I’m glad I did; I forgot much of what happened in season 2. The set was worth the wait!

Fox has changed the packaging of season 3, ditching the digipacks and going with 4 slim cases in a slipcase. I liked the previous cases, but the slim cases are sturdy and won’t crack (like my season 1 set).

Video

The show is filled with noise, some of which is acceptable, but mostly it’s too much. Much of this has to do with being shot on 16mm (think Buffy and Sex and The City). While indoor and daytime shots have a little noise, it’s most apparent during night shots. It appears that the film was too dark so it had to be pushed during the processing in order to lighten the image. Lightening the image causes noise to be present, which makes the image look poor. While this makes for a poor image, it’s not the fault of the DVD transfer, although the DVD format may make it more pronounced. There’s a chapter placed after the opening of the show, and you can play each episode with the recap on or off, but there aren’t "play all" features on the discs.

Audio

Fox gives us a Dolby Digital Surround track for this release. It’s nothing exciting, but is adequate for this release. The center channel is used for dialog and many sound effects while the left and right speakers are occasionally used for sound effects. The rears are usually used for music, but I was hoping for some front/rear panning effects. The dialog is clear, and easy to understand and the amazing mix of music is appropriate. Each episode is subtitles in English and Spanish as well as being closed captioned.

Extras - How we rate extras

Deleted Scenes (28:25) You can watch the deleted scenes on their own, or with commentary from creator Shawn Ryan explaining why the scene was cut. Playing Tight (2) - 0:43, 0:38 Blood and Water (2) - 0:18, 0:46 Bottom Bitch (2) - 0:29, 1:13 Streaks and Tips (2) - 0:46, 0:22 Mum (2) - 0:32, 0:33 Posse Up (1) - 2:19 Safe (3) - 0:27, 0:30, 0:28 Cracking Ice (2) - 0:42, 0:37 Slipknot (2) - 0:32, 0:38 What Power Is... (3) - 0:48, 0:49, 0:18 Strays (2) - 0:20, 0:38 Riceburner (1) - 0:26 Fire in the Hole (1) - 1:16 All In (5) - 1:09, 0:17, 0:36, 3:27, 1:03 On Tilt (8) - 0:21, 0:29, 0:36, 0:32, 0:45, 1:04, 0:27, 0:31

Commentary Tracks Almost as good as the episodes themselves, commentary tracks on 8 of the 15 episodes. Bottom Bitch - Scott Brazil, Michael Chiklis, Adam E. Fierro and Michael Jace Mum - Walton Goggins, Michele Hicks, Benito Martinez, Shawn Ryan and Kurt Sutter Cracking Ice - Charles H. Eglee, Guy Ferland, Matt Gerald, CCH Pounder and Gareth Williams Slipknot - Michael Chiklis, Walton Goggins, Kenneth Johnson and David Snell What Power Is... - Benito Martinez, Michael Jace, Jay Karnes and Dead White Strays - Catherine Dent, Jay Karnes, Glenn Mazzara and Shawn Ryan Fire in the Hole - Catherine Dent, Nicki Micheaux, CCH Pounder and Cathy Cahlin Ryan All In - Michael Chiklis, Kenneth Johnson, Jay Karnes, CCH Pounder and Scott Rosenbaum

Breaking Episode 315 (1:19:15) Ohhhhhh Marc, you’ve outdone yourself this time! Marc Ostrick produced the incredible season 2 documentary for 24, and the shorter piece, "Wrap Day," for The Shield season 2 set. This is a fascinating look at the final episode, from the writers pitching ideas, to the finished scene. I love how he jumps from an idea in the writer’s room to the finished scene, with bits from the editing room tossed in for good measure. There are some great interviews with the cast and crew as well. This is something that people will take about for a long time, just like the 24 documentary.

Summary

I had the pleasure of hanging out with Shawn Ryan and the writing staff when I was in LA last October. We sat in the writer’s room, ate Chinese food, and talked about the show and DVDs. It’s a lot of fun to hang out with people responsible for a show you love, and to hear stories about their lives, and their work on the show. I’d rather spend an hour with writers, directors and producers of a show than 10 minutes with the actors. I think they enjoyed having me there as well, because they got to hear feedback from a fan of the show. They had announced the addition of Glen Close to the series a few days before I was there, and Shawn was eager to hear what I thought. I told him that I hadn’t seen season 3 to know how she could be worked into the show, but that I had an open mind. I reminded him that he took an actor that played a lovable cop on The Commish, and turned him into a total bad ass cop. It’s something that shouldn’t work on paper, but they pulled it off, and now I have a hard time watching Chiklis playing the Commish. Will the casting of Glen Close work on the show? I don’t see why not.

I never had a sense of how much work it is to be a writer on a series until I took my trip to their offices. I spoke with Shawn Ryan in July, and he was bringing everyone together for the start of season 4 preparation. Three months later they’re hard at work ironing out the details for the season, both the overall season arc, and stories for individual episodes. There were boards filled with breakdowns of the episodes, but I tried not to look because I hadn’t seen season 3 yet. You can see some great shots of the writer’s room in the "Breaking Episode 315" documentary. I sat at the head of the table while I was there, which turned out to be Kurt Sutter’s chair. Kurt was sick, so he wasn’t around, or so we thought. He walked in 20 mins later and looked at me sitting in his chair, then took a chair at the other end of the table. Kurt is a writer/producer on the show, and he played Margos Dezirian, the psycho Armenian. Yes, I had taken the psycho Armenian’s chair! Luckily Kurt is nothing like Margos, and I was allowed to live.

Randy Huggins, the writer’s assistant on the series, took me over for a quick tour of The Barn set. We made a stop at the casting office to drop something off, and I saw stack upon stack of photos. The floor of the casting office reminded me of my floor, though they had photos replacing my DVDs. I’d never seen so many photos of beautiful people in my life! Randy takes notes in the writer’s room, gets people’s lunch orders, and helps out about the office. I really enjoyed talking to him about show, and the actors. He said The Shield is such a cool set, and everyone gets along and works well together. We also talked about our love for The Wire, a totally kick-ass show on HBO. Randy doesn’t get a credit on the show, so I’ll give him one here; Randy Huggins: Writer’s Assistant, and cool dude.

Season three was a home run for the show. I wanted to watch a single episode of the show because I had other stuff to do, but I thought I should watch the finale of season 2 to catch myself up. Okay, I had time for 2 episodes, no problem. Well, 5 episodes later (1 from season 2, 4 from season 3) I wanted more. I was like a crack fiend looking for another hit; I needed more! Every time I went to watch a few episodes of the show I’d watch an entire disc. I’m worried that if a whole season could fit on a disc then I would have watched it all in one shot. There was something at the end of an episode that made me want more, and more, and more, and I couldn’t stop myself.

I’m a bit torn with this set; the episodes are great, but there aren’t as many special features as previous seasons. "Breaking Episode 315" is brilliant, but the previous sets had more commentary tracks, and more featurettes; I guess they put their money into the documentary. The biggest loss to the set is the near absence of Shawn Ryan on the commentary tracks. I asked Shawn whether he went to "commentary school" because his commentary tracks were one of the highlights of the first two seasons for me. He had total control of the commentary tracks, and was able to deliver some of the best commentary tracks I’ve ever heard. Please Shawn, try to do more commentary tracks for season 4.

I love this show, and I have no idea how I’m going to make it until the release of season 4 on DVD. I don’t think they air the show in Canada anymore, so DVD is the only way for me to see the episodes. You have to pick this set up, and if you don’t already own seasons 1 and 2 then you have to buy those as well. Don’t make me call Margos!