The Rescuers

I’ve been pondering a category of show that sits somewhere at the intersection between the law enforcement procedural, the spy procedural, and the action/adventure.  I’ll call it the “Rescuer.”  It’s about a person or group of people who are very good at protecting and rescuing others, and every week they do some rescuing and/or protecting.  There’s a good bit of philosophical overlap between Rescuers and Robin-Hood shows like Leverage, but I think they’re slightly different.  Rescuers not only involve problem-solving and aid-providing, but also require a rescuee in imminent physical peril.  MacGyver (new and old).  Strike Back.  Transporter: the Series.  The A-Team.  Human Target. 

I often really like Rescuers.  The Rescuer comes with a built-in engrossing premise that combines high stakes with dramatic successes.  Of course, like all categories, it can be done well or poorly, but just as the law enforcement procedural comforts us that law can defeat evil in an hour, the rescuer tells us that brave heroes can do the same.  It’s hard to beat that feeling, when it works.

 

It would be easy to observe the extent to which these stories are gendered:  the manly hero using physicality to protect the damsel in distress.  And most of the time, they are, even when the distressed damsel is capable in her own right, or when women are part of the rescue team.  (And increasingly, both are true.)  So instead, I want to spend a moment on how xenophobic they can be.  A lot of Rescuers veer into the international adventure/espionage world, and they pin the evil on a dangerous stranger driven by inscrutable cultural, nationalistic, or extremist motives.  The wholesome American rescuers save the wholesome American victim from a shadowy Other.  I fear these contribute to a general sense that Americans are more heroic, braver, more justice-minded and reasonable than outsiders.  And that’s not a lesson I want to propagate in these global times.

Here are a few Rescuers from the last year:

Criminal Minds: Beyond Borders (CBS, new Spring 2016.  Law Enforcement Procedural.)

Watched: A few episodes

Premise: Profilers bring back Americans who’ve been kidnapped in other countries.

Promise:  This show is into its second season, so clearly it has no shortage of commercial potential.  It’s a solid CBS show, and clearly CBS has found a formula that works for capturing a broad cross-section of audience.  For my part, I like the show’s problem-solving procedural elements (I’m still watching its sibling, Criminal Minds) but it trades Criminal Minds’ “woman in peril” problem for a “foreigners are different” problem that I find harder to get past.   But I do like the cast, especially Annie Funke as the team’s medical expert.  It’s good to see a woman of substance included unremarkably in a team of rescuers.

Verdict:  okay, but not my favorite.

Ransom (CBS, new.  Private Investigator Procedural.)

Watched: most episodes

Premise:  Professional negotiator and his team rescue kidnap and hostage victims.

Promise:  This is one of those shows where a preternaturally confident dude, who’s kind of a jerk to everyone, saves people with his confidence and skills.  I have a whole entry brewing in my head about this variety of hero, who would be unbearable in real life but is supposed to play as charming on television.  On one hand, this one stays just barely on the good side of the charming/unbearable line.  On the other hand, but main skill seems to be knowing when to call people’s bluff, which is supposed to look like skill but all too often looks like luck.  The other characters are exceedingly good at supporting him and intuiting what he wants, but everything about them is so connected to him that it’s hard to get emotionally attached.  This would all be fine if the procedural elements were gripping enough to make us keep coming back, but overall the whole show entertains without gripping, making it good background television but not appointment television.  It’s eminently watchable, but doesn’t have a lot of surprises. 

 

Verdict:  Would do fine in a summer season, but not enough oomph for Spring.

Six (History Channel, new.  Action/Adventure.)

Watched: season

Premise:  The lives and missions of a Navy Seal team after a former member is captured

Promise:  This show is what I imagine Strike Back would be if it took itself seriously instead of being a fantasy.  Six takes itself very, very seriously.  It’s all bravery and machismo and emotional unavailability.  The show’s women exist to be saved and supported, even when their actions are heroic and brave.  They are inconvenient obligations, making demands that detract from the men’s true duty to some abstract notion of country.  When our hero starts to lose his humanity, is it his wife’s fault for becoming increasingly distant? The show may think so.  In a way, it’s a parable about toxic masculinity, but it lacks the introspection to be critical about its heroes or their brand of patriotism, both of which it embraces without a lot of debate.  I’m not saying the show shies away from thought-provoking debate—at its heart is a thoughtful condemnation of the polarizing effect of militarizing foreign relations—but it also embraces abstract notions of American military right and outsider risk.  That said, it manages to tell a good yarn all the way to the end, and it has more nuance than it would need to do that.

Verdict:  I just wish the show were more self-aware.

The Blacklist: Redemption (NBC, new.  Spy procedural.)

Watched: season so far

Premise: A group of covert operatives-for-hire carry out spy and rescue operations

Promise:  This would be a really great cable show, but it’s a little out of place on network television.  It rides the fun train of spy-action shows more than we expect from network, but it has much the same appeal as other pulp action heist shows, and it’s a highly-watchable banter procedural.  Its characters are charismatic and ambiguous enough to make us care and wonder about them.  I don’t love the show’s version of motherhood, which turns an otherwise ruthless spy into a desperate softie.  But that’s a quibble.

Verdict:  A show that would thrive somewhere else, but doesn’t quite belong where it is.

Taken (NBC, new.  Action/adventure.)

Watched: first two episodes

Premise:  the origin story of an intelligence operative whose specialty is rescues

Promise: OH HIS MANPAIN.  Here we have a man whose sister dies, leading him to build and use his “particular set of skills” to save others.  But is his particular set of skills really that particular, or skills for that matter?  He’s good at gritty-voiced declarations of what people will do, and he is correct about what they will do because he’s got a gun pointed a their knee, but it’s not clear to me how “particular” that gritty-voiced gun-pointing skill really is.  Or how admirable.  Also problematic is the show’s overall treatment of women as kind-hearted, compassionate, weakness machines.  “My advice, don’t ever have kids.  Especially not a daughter,” a character says, embracing the show’s essential premise that loving and protecting women compromises the strength of otherwise strong men.  But I could look past that and enjoy the adventure, if I wanted to get to know the character or his adventures better.  Instead, I find his growling and laconic need for action and revenge to be boring.

Verdict:  Doesn’t work for me.

In the hopper:  I think next we’ll talk about some law shows.  Maybe.