Reviews

I've been watching Perry Mason since I was a kid, and I never get bored with it. It's somehow both very much a product of its time and timeless. Raymond Burr as Perry is brilliant and charismatic - you can't take your eyes off him. Barbara Hale as Della Street deftly pushes beyond the loyal secretary stereotype to portray Della as a true partner to Perry, not just window dressing. And William Hopper as Paul Drake is both dashingly handsome and goofy.

When you watch this show, you'll quickly see how it has served as inspiration for so many of the crime procedurals on TV today. It's a classic in the very best sense of the word.

I've really enjoyed watching Monk so far, but if this had been among the first of the series I would've gone no further. First, every show on TV just has to have a 12 Angry Men episode, which has become so overdone that's it's pretty much a cliche now. Normally, Monk does well turning familiar tropes on their heads, but it doesn't work here.

The other thing is how Monk's condition is portrayed. The series always plays his OCD and phobias for laughs, and usually it works because we're always reminded that ultimately what Monk is dealing with every day is no joke and no one is more aware of it than Monk himself. But in this episode, the writers skirt around all this by making it seem like it's all an affectation - something he chooses to get attention. Even Natalie tells the judge that Monk is "persnickety" instead being a real advocate for him.

The bottom line is that this episode is so far from being grounded in any kind of reality that it ends up being more annoying than anything else. There is just no way a man like Monk, with his mental health challenges, his career, and his connections to the people involved in the case would ever be chosen to sit on a jury. I recommend skipping this one and rewatching the finale from season 3 instead.

It's interesting that so many reviewers find that this series has gone downhill right when showrunners make a serious commitment to diversity and inclusion in roles both in front of and behind the camera. This show has always had a strong eco/conservation message, so by that measure, this is a classic Doctor Who ep with classic Doctor Who themes. Maybe not the best of the best, but far from the worst of the worst, either. Put your biases aside and give it a chance.

TRIGGER WARNING - This episode is essentially about an older man who is grooming a teenage girl to be his lover when she becomes legal age. And no one seems to care! Ok, so the main story is how this guy, who is a private detective specializing in finding missing girls, is going around shooting pimps, which is where Five-0 comes in. That part of the story is ok, but the depiction of the relationship between the PI and one of the girls he has "rescued" is way creepy. On the surface, it's supposed to be a father-daughter thing, but, I guess to Robert Loggia's credit, his portrayal of this guy turns the yuck factor up to 11. I mean, in his every interaction with the girl, the way he looked at her made my skin crawl. And at the end, McGarrett acts like that's just one of those things you come across when you're a cop. I try not to apply today's sensibilities to older shows, but this goes beyond the pale. I recommend a hard pass on this episode.