The Shield: Season Seven - The Final Act
by Michael Chiklis, Bill Gierhart, Clark Johnson, Craig Brewer, Dean White
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DVD details
Actor: Benito Martinez, CCH Pounder, Jay Karnes, Michael Chiklis, Walton GogginsDirector: Bill Gierhart, Clark Johnson, Craig Brewer, Dean White, Michael Chiklis
Brand: Sony
DVD: Region Code 99
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language)
Format: Box set, Color, Dolby, DVD, NTSC, Widescreen
Picture Format: Anamorphic Widescreen, 1.77:1
Running Time: 619 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2009-06-09
Audience Rating: Unrated
Studio: Sony Pictures Home Entertainment
Product features:
- Condition: New
- Format: DVD
- Box set; Color; Dolby; DVD; Widescreen; NTSC
DVD Reviews of The Shield: Season Seven - The Final Act
DVD Review: A mostly-successful final season juggling act
Summary: 5 Stars
Caution...spoilers ahead. I'm assuming many of the people reading this either saw the episodes on TV, watched the DVDs or both. If you're not one of those people, you may want to read this at some other time.
One thing about the bonus materials on The Shield DVDs...it's always interesting and provides excellent "peeks behind the curtain" for the series' fans. It's made clear that the show would end with "closure" on Vic Mackey...perhaps to avoid the kind of backlash that came with Tony Soprano's onion ring-munching "non-ending" at the final moments of The Sopranos, or perhaps the complexity of the Mackey character demanded closure.
In reality, series creator Sean Ryan is a genius, because whether it's immediately clear or not, Season 7 of The Shield ended with Vic Mackey munching onion rings. Please allow me to elaborate.
The set-up is that Vic is being exiled to a cubicle for the next three years, where he'll crank out a ten-page report every day, five days a week, 52 weeks a year. We see Vic look pensively out the upper-story window as squad cars, lights and sirens in full blaze, head toward some unknown crime scene. And when he stuffs his gun in his belt and walks out of the office...the last shot of the series...we see that VIC MACKEY LOOK. The only thing that has changed is his surroundings. He's still the same coiled snake that's depicted on the Strike Team calling card used throughout the series.
Three years in Vic Mackey time is nothing, and he would game the system every inch of the way. He'd hired private detectives in the past to find his wife and kids...what possible reason do we have for believing he wouldn't do it again? Vic was simply transplanted to a new playing field. If Ryan wants to do a Shield movie, I've just handed him half the script.
CCH Pounder...Captain Wyms...provides another insight when she says in the bonus materials that she is "cold blooded about walking away from a job well done." It's an honest and refreshing moment from an actor in a series that was known for its brutal honesty.
One reason why NYPD Blue limped to the finish line is that every time the show lost a major character...David Caruso, Jimmy Smits, Rick Schroeder, on and on and on...the writers took a time-out to regroup, to introduce a new character, to re-build momentum, and over time it simply became tiresome.
The Shield broke the mold by keeping the freight train roaring down the track, no matter who left. They moved the character of Julien from uniformed officer to Strike Team and back to uniform again. But they never took a time-out, not even for a second. The viewer was never allowed to catch their breath.
In terms of major characters...The Strike Team...the series had to end. This became clear after Lem's death, when the only logical progression was to have Shane pay for his sins. Vic exhibits some tough talk about taking a deal from ICE only of Ronnie gets the same deal, but in the end...in true Vic Mackey style...he saved his own hide, took the deal, and sent Ronnie "off to Antwon Mitchell-land."
Other than the death of the Lem and Shane characters (and Captain Wyms revelation to Dutch that she is dying of lupus), Sean Ryan fed you a big, fresh from the deep-fryer platter of onion rings. There was no more "closure" in the final episode of The Shield than there was in the final episode of The Sopranos. If and when he decides to do a movie or any other form of follow-up, Ryan...just like Sopranos creator David Chase...can pick up the pieces right where he left them.
On the "Blue Comet" episode from the final series of The Sopranos, Steve Van Zandt reveals on the DVD commentary track that actor James Gandolfini, at the table read for the final episode, paused, looked up, and asked "Why?" (regarding the onion rings ending). Without missing a beat, David Chase replied "Because I did not want to show that crime paid, and I did not want to show that it DID NOT pay."
Sean Ryan did exactly the same thing with Vic Mackey. He will spend the next three years drawing a paycheck as the single most corrupt cubicle dweller on the planet. After that, he will regain full ownership of his game, with all sins from the past wiped away with the single stroke of an ICE signature.
This, my friends, is genius.
Description of The Shield: Season Seven - The Final Act
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