Thu 21 May 2009
BURN NOTICE. Pilot episode for the USA cable network series of the same name; first telecast on 28 June 2007. Jeffrey Donovan, Gabrielle Anwar, Bruce Campbell, Sharon Gless, with David Zayas, Ray Wise, Dan Martin, China Chow, Chance Kelly.
![BURN NOTICE [USA]](https://mysteryfile.com/blogImg509/BN-Four.jpg)
Since the third season of this series will soon be beginning, you aren’t likely to need this review of the pilot episode to tell you whether or not you should be watching it. But if you’re a fan of humorous spy comedies, with a bit of Private Eye work thrown in, and if you were to ask me, I’d have to say I think you should.
If I weren’t being a bit hypocritical about it, that is, because I watched this first episode when it first was shown and never watched another one. I recently bought the DVD set of the first season, though, so there you go. Commercials and I have given up on each other. I don’t watch them, and they don’t care.
But just in case you’ve never seen (or heard) of the series, here’s a quick recap. Michael Westen (Jeffrey Donovan, whom I’ve never seen anywhere else, but he’s been around) is either a CIA agent or an independent operative who works with the CIA is abruptly — and I mean abruptly — issued a burn notice; that is to say, he’s out of a job for no stated reason, his friends won’t talk to him, his financial assets are frozen, and he’s dumped in Miami where he’s allowed to roam freely, but he’s followed and watched constantly, and he’s unable to leave.
![BURN NOTICE [USA]](https://mysteryfile.com/blogImg509/BN-Pair.jpg)
That’s the overall picture. Figuring out who’s behind it and why he’s in this fix, that’s the story that’s the basis for the series. In the meantime, to make a living, he’s forced to work as a strictly unofficial private eye, assisted by his ex-girl friend Fiona Glenanne (the diminutive but utterly glamorous Gabrielle Anwar), sporting a wonderful Irish accent, and a pensioned-off rogue of a buddy named Sam Axe (Bruce Campbell, who’s really been around).
Westen’s exasperation with his situation is played as much for laughs as it is for a story line, and I haven’t even mentioned the funniest part. Miami is where his mother lives (Sharon Gless) who wonders if this is the year her son will be home for Christmas, among other worries that a mother always has, even if her son works for the CIA.
Says Westen in voiceover mode: “Thirty years of karate, combat experience on five continents, a rating with every weapon that shoots a bullet or holds an edge… still haven’t found any defense against Mom crying into my shirt.”
In this, the pilot episode, Westen agrees to help a Cuban groundskeeper who’s suspected of stealing several valuable works of art from the home of the wealthy collector he works for, along with getting his life sorted out and set up for the rest of the series. A simple but effective story.
![BURN NOTICE [USA]](https://mysteryfile.com/blogImg509/BN-GA.jpg)
I could do without the mother, and I would have liked to have seen more of the ex-girl friend, who thinks violence is a form of foreplay, but she’s in all the ads for the show, so I assume her part is a major one. Westen himself is a little too smug for my tastes, but maybe not yours. It’s a good show, and if it weren’t for the commercials, I would have told you so long before now.
Says Westen, channeling a chap named MacGyver in a similar vein: “Once somebody sends a guy with a gun after you, things are only going to get worse. But like it or not, you’ve got work to do. For a job like getting rid of the drug dealer next door, I’ll take a hardware store over a gun any day.
“Guns make you stupid. Better to fight your wars with duct tape. Duct tape makes you smart… Every decent punk has a bulletproof door. But people forget walls are just plaster. Hopefully you get him with the first shot. Or the second… Now he’s down and waiting for you to come through the front door. So you don’t come through the front door.”
May 21st, 2009 at 9:44 pm
Burn Notice has only gotten better, though there were one or two glitches this season. By now you probably know there is plenty of Fiona, and the business with his mother has mostly been well handled.
I’ll grant that the character is smug, but somehow that adds to his charm and explains how he got into this mess in the first place. After the smug self satisfaction that passes for character on all of the Law and Order series a character who is actually smart enough to actually earn that smugness is welcome. Burn Notice grows on you, and gradually reveals the human being under the character’s cool. Overall it has been one of the bright lights among all the self repetitive shows that pass as original.
May 22nd, 2009 at 8:18 pm
I watched the second episode last night, and already some of the rougher edges have been smoothed down, with the sense that the show is getting ready for the long haul, making everybody just a little more likable.
Not that there’s anything wrong with that.
Westen appears to be a little less smug, but not enough so that he’s lost any of his edge; his mother seems less whiny; and his ex-girl friend and Sam are bickering with each other, but in a good-natured friendly fashion, and both of them are now a solid part of his team.
I have a feeling that there was also a little less comedy, but I wasn’t really keeping score, so don’t quote me on that.
Some shows are so slickly done that they seem as though they’ve just come off the assembly line. With shows deliberately built for smaller audiences, a few misfit personalities can be part of their charm. Even with the changes toward “likability” that I thought I spotted, I think that’s why BURN NOTICE has caught on.
May 23rd, 2009 at 5:13 am
The thing about the characters of Burn Notice is while we come to like them as we get to know them they really aren’t all that better people. Michael grows quite a bit in relation to his family and Fiona, but Sam remains a charming rogue of dubious qualities aside from loyalty to Michael. The feud between Sam and Fiona has lessoned a little, but still has an edge.
The show never lets us forget though that these are people for whom treachery and violence are tools of the trade. Michael’s attempts to rein in Sam and Fiona’s tendencies toward simple solutions becomes a running plot element as the series goes along, and Michael grows without losing any of his edge as a character. So far it has been one of those rare series that gets better as it goes along.