CSI (Las Vegas)- season 10

Liz Vassey and David Berman finally added to the opening credits.

I would have mentioned that Lauren Lee Smith was leaving as a late addition to the season 9 thread, but that news came so long ago that I figured no one would see it there. For the record, if you aren't aware of why she's gone it's because she was written out of the series, not because Smith wanted to leave. Producers stated that they didn't feel the character was working and couldn't fit her into the ensemble as well as they would have liked, so that's the reason she's gone.

I feel they simply gave up too easily and took the easy way out.

Not once did I even think of the Matrix.

Me neither. I thought of it at least six times, not once.


I was glad to see Jorja back. Never understood the hate on her.  Glad to see Stokes get his due.

I haven't seen or heard anything Matrix in almost 7 years, since I never bothered with the sequels.

I thought that was a great start to the new season. Glad to see Sara back with some bits on what she and Grissom were up to. I hope they decide to keep her on. Agreed about Nick's promotion.

The Matrix homage was fun.

I realize that they needed a reason for why they wrote Riley out but was there any serious problems with Catherine's leadership last season? I could be wrong but I don't remember any major dysfunction with the team and nothing serious enough that someone would quit and trash their former boss over it.

I'm not really a fan of The Matrix movies but it was fun to see Fishburne in Morpheus-mode kicking a guy. I also liked that the frozen moment at the beginning probably 2 minutes to go through but when it happened in real time, it only took about 20 or 30 seconds and the events just flew across the screen. If you hadn't seen the opening, most of what happened would have been too quick to even process.

I recorded the episode, since I had a dinner mishap so I haven't seen the whole thing but for the second time now, two different shows featured a similar plot - in this case the forced theft of a dead body. "Castle" had the same thing on Monday, and during its first season it had another plot shared with another show.

I think the show itself was a little "off" last year, and the transition to a post-Grissom (and post-Sara, and post-Warrick) series didn't run as smoothly as they had hoped.  So this could be both a subtle way to acknowledge that to the fans (substitute the producers for Catherine), and to set up changes they hope will make the show stronger.  Losing Warrick, in particular, which was clearly not planned, caused some problems.  I think he would have been one of the characters to pick up the slack for Grissom, and it might well have been Warrick, rather than Nick, who ultimately became the assistant supervisor. 

I disagree that they gave up on Riley too early.  I just don't think the writers ever got a handle on her character, and if you can't do that after 15 or 16 episodes or however many she did, I don't think you're going to succeed with the 17th or 18th.  Better to cut your losses and try something else. 

Bringing Sara back for the transition was a great idea, as far as I'm concerned.  I really like the character and the actress, and have since the first episode I ever saw - "Caged", the second episode of S2.  That immediately hooked me on the show, and it was really the Sara/Catherine "B" story more than the Grissom/Nick "A" story that did it.  (And I liked Sara even better when I caught up with the series from the start on DVD.)  Count me in as another fan who has never understood the hostility some people have for Jorja or Sara or both.  Since both Jorja and William Peterson said that they would be open to returning for guest appearances I've been waiting to see one or both.  When it was announced that Sara would be back for a multi-episode run I was a little concerned that the writers were going to have pulled an off-screen break-up between Sara and Grissom, which I think would have been stupid.  I was pleasantly surprised to hear that they are married and working together.  I hope their grant comes through and brings them back to the States, so that one or both can consult for the lab maybe once or twice a year.  

I hoping that this will be a more solid season than last year with Fishburne's character less of a newbie, Nick as Catherine's "Catherine" (he really is the solid dependable one who will see to the paperwork and keep the minor issues from ever getting to The Boss, freeing her to handle the big stuff) and - hopefully - a more solid character as the new CSI who replaces Riley.

Regards,

Joe

If Petersen does make an appearance some time down the line, he'll hopefully slim down a bit beforehand to his usual self - he's really put the pounds on (possibly for his stage roles) since leaving.

I would just be happy to see Grissom back, regardless of how much he happens to weigh.  I do think it would be tough to explain from a story point-of-view, though, since it seems unlikely he would have fattened up on Sara's cooking. 

Speaking of Sara - I loved the moment when she and Nick were digging through the decomposing body fragments, reacting to the stench, and then started laughing a little.  ("Bully for You", 2.4, in which Sara has trouble getting the smell of a decomposed body out of her hair and skin in time for her date with an EMT she met at the dump site)  Both the wood-chipper ("What's Eating Gil Grissom?", episode 5.6) and the smell issue were nice call-backs to earlier episodes, made even better by the fact that nobody said anything about them on-screen.  If you happened to remember the earlier shows, you got a little chuckle, and if not you never noticed anything.

Later,

Joe

Sara seems to be more of a canned / frozen / mean with a microwave type, not a cook by any means. :)

She's not even that (or at least she wasn't when she was living alone.)   In 2.12 ("You've Got Male") Sara compares herself to the wallflower murder victim who shops out of catalogs and has a collection of take-out and delivery menus on the refrigerator door.  Even at the end of the episode, when Sara self-conciously tosses all the catalogs and menus in the trash, she doesn't make a move to cook dinner.  She calls a friend and arranges to meet him or her at a restaurant.    I have a feeling that Grissom was a lot more domestic than Sara, and that's saying something.  Maybe's he's taught her about cooking as well as baseball. 

Later,

Joe

Bit off topic but I thought I'd mention it:

A couple of months after the Blu-ray release of CSI season 1 came out, I was looking around at some TV-DVDs and came across a new package for season 1 on DVD. I immediately thought they caved and released a widescreen DVD version, but no - they simply repackaged the existing full screen DVDs in a box with the same cover art as the Blu-ray release. Cheap bastards.

While seeing CSI season 1 is fantastic in widescreen HD, it sucks that Paramount /  Alliance didn't take the step to issue a DVD version.

Not only does it suck, I think it is a stupid move on Paramount's part.  The installed base of DVD players is still several times the size of the installed base of Blu Ray players.  A widescreen standard def DVD release with the same extras as the Blu Ray version would give a lot of people a reason to double-dip on this set.  I know I would buy it.  (The existing DVD set is almost extras-free as I recall.  Without stopping to check, I think there are only a couple of relatively short documentary segments and maybe one episode has a commentary track.)  In this economy I can't justify a Blu Ray player (especially since I'd also have to replace my non-HDMI receiver) or pricey new Blu Ray discs, but I do buy the odd DVD and I'd love to have a CSI season one set that really deserves to sit next to the rest of the seasons on the shelf - which the current one just doesn't.  

Regards,

Joe

The DVD version of season 1 has no commentary tracks, is in Dolby 2.0, not 5.1 and the only extras included are a featurette called 'People Lie...But The Evidence Never does" and an odd "Who Are You" music video which features clips from the show and clips from a 1990s Who concert. The song itself is heavily edited as well. The featurette was included on the Blu-ray, but not the music video.

In terms of Blu-ray and prices, despite the high price tag I'm grateful for the PS3 because I use it so often for video file playback, even more than Blu-ray playback (and I don't play games) and I actually should have waited before getting season 1, because I've seen copies of it in quite a few used CD / DVD stores for $10 - $15 less than brand new.

The director's cut of the pilot is structured a little differently, and features different music cue placement and is a bit more graphic with the autopsy scene which makes Holly Gribbs sick. Of course it's tame compared to what they show now, but network standards was very apprehensive about how graphic the show could be at the time. Being a director's cut, Grissom's line "you assholes!" is much louder in volume compared to the broadcast version. It's the only episode with a commentary track, by director / producer Danny Cannon.

I didn't like the remixed 7.1 mix, because they placed what you would hear in the rears of a 5.1 mix into the rears of the 7.1 mix, replacing the 5.1-based rears with a 'mid-surround' effect so when watching in 5.1, you miss a lot of the details. It's the same when you listen to the 'core' DTS 5.1 track as well.

So did anyone catch the trilogy of the 3 CSI shows?

From start to finish, I felt like it was going from worst to first, in terms of quality. And watching the Miami episode just reminds me again why I dumped it few seasons ago.

I basically only watch the original CSI but I watched the three shows to see the full story. What stuck out the most to me was how terrible CSI: Miami is. I've seen an episode of it here and there before but the show and especially David Caruso are more like parodies of the procedural cop drama than an actual procedural cop drama. Even with Larry Fishburne in the episode, it was a fight to get through it. On a more positive note, I liked CSI: New York and I probably haven't seen an episode of that show since the pilot.

 Did anyone else think the video/audio tech from CSI:Miami (Wes Ramsey) sounded and looked like Ryan Reynolds??

I've only seen the Miami part of this so far, and +1 to the above (except I only watched a few eps of Season 1).  Everything they did seemed like a big joke, or yes, a parody.  Do they have any competent staff at all?  While I appreciate their wanting to tie the episodes together, and I get that one of the victims went missing from LV, I couldn't find a single reason for them saying they needed Fishburne to be there.  They need his help?  Really?  A brand-new-not-even-a-CSI-for-a-year needed to help them figure out this relatively mundane murder (compared to other stories of CSI)?  Really???

Plus I hate, hate, hate the yellow coloring they give it.  Yeah, it's not dark all the time and flashlights are less evident, but it's extremely annoying to look directly into the sun for 45 minutes.

Didn't CSI:NY have a blue tint for the first part of the first season?

And what's with Wolf always wearing a jacket this year. It's Miami for crying out loud!

Maybe, I don't remember for sure--I was more distracted by their jittery camera shots.  I'd have to look away several times just to get through the show and almost gave up.  They don't do it as much now, though, so I can keep watching.  But now that I think of it, it seems like yes, they did have a blue tint and the original LV was kind of greenish.  For some reason, though, those colors don't bother me nearly as much as the yellow, which to me wasn't even a tint--it was a flat out color saturation of burning sun directly into my eyes.

Yes they did. Later they decided it was too dismal so the warmed it up to the usual NY City standard. The original idea was to distinguish the show from C.S.I. (well rendered color) and Miami (heavy tobacco grad filtration and over the top color saturation).

Quote:
I wear a suit jacket or sport coat all the time.  Like most people who actually live down here full time, I spend as little time outdoors as possible.    I go from my air conditioned home to my air conditioned car to my air conditioned office with side trips to air conditioned stores, restaurants and theaters.  You can always tell the residents from the tourists around here.  The tourists are the ones with tans. 

It is usually quite cold in my office and coats, sweaters and even space heaters are not unusual sights.  (Controlling the temperature in a 5-story building with lots of outside traffic and tons of computer equipment can be tricky, and we tend to err on the side of cool.  You can always throw on another layer of clothing.  There is a limit to how much you can take off in most public places - and more's the pity.  Although there is also something to be said for extremely cold air in the workplace.  )

This season seems to have drawn less comments than past seasons, but I hope that most people are like me - still enjoying the show, just not moved to write about it as often.  (My limited web time has been more devoted to "mythology" shows like Fringe and Flash Forward.   Since the departure of Grissom, the show has been even more stand-alone heavy than before, with less connection between episodes thus less to discuss and speculate about.)

I thought the last episode - with a  format-busting, "outside the lab"  A plot - was a lot of fun.  I always like it when the supporting characters are highlighted.  BTW, did anyone notice the PVR saved shows screen in the B story?  The crime fan had recorded a bunch of documentary mystery shows, from the kind of non-fiction forensics series that inspired the series in the first place.  And all of titles were based on old CSI episodes.   (Two, "Blood Drops" and "The I-15 Murders", even had the same titles as the episodes they referenced.)   I love that kind of in-joke that only works for real fans who record the show or watch "live" on a PVR and can freeze-frame something like that.  (Or who will eventually watch it on DVD or Blu Ray.)  It is like an Easter Egg you don't have to wait for. 

Anyway, still watching, still enjoying the show, still think it is the best of the CSIs.  But I'd sure be happy to see Grissom return for a visit. 

Regards,

Joe
Edited by Joseph DeMartino - 4/1/10 at 2:25pm

It's just for this week but CSI is on at 10 PM tonight. Given what they show at 9 PM, this episode must either be horrendously violent or deal with sexual content or deviance for CBS to have moved it.

Or CBS wants to get The Mentalist in front of more eyeballs by airing it an hour early for one week, condifident that Old Relialbe CSI viewers will still tune in at the later time. 

I guess we'll have to see what the two episodes look like.

Regards,

Joe

After I posted earlier, I took a look and this week's episode is called The Panty Sniffer. I could be wrong but that alone seems to indicate that they changed the time to skirt any potential content issues than wanting The Mentalist on earlier.

This was probably one of the few times that I wasn't sure I understood that last shot of the episode with Catherine on the floor after Detective Vartann shot the bad guy on top of her. Maybe I missed a key line of dialogue earlier in the episode when Catherine and Vartann were chatting. What was she thinking? Why did Vartann take so long to shoot the guy? Or were they booth realizing a key suspect was killed? Or was Catherine just happy he shot the bad guy? Or maybe they were both in shock at what happened.

Seems like CSI has been off for so long, I can't remember what the last new episode was and if I missed one since March Madness.