Intensely manneristic from the city-scape, crowd/mob scene and lab processing montages to Caine's characteristic neck tilt, CSI Miami is a show I should hate. Apart from the mannerism of the visuals, very few of the secondary characters, from the mobs to the perps, are recognizable as humans.
Good example: one episode opens with a hot-dogger hot-dogging down a beachfront road, popping up through the sun-roof and getting decapitated. The mob watching screams, begins flowing towards the scene and then there's a quick-cut to its members pulling out their phones and snapping pictures. Pretty much all of the crowd/mob scenes display similar sensibilities.
When functioning as individuals, as witnesses, suspects or perps, most of the secondary characters exhibit characteristics ranging from self-awareness lower than Amoebas to high Narcissism; clueless to anyone being anything more than a toy or an annoyance.
The primary characters fare a little better: except for names like Boa Vista and Duquesne (pronounced Descane), they're all more or less human. Calleigh, Caine (despite the neck thing) and Alexx Wood led the pack as fully self-aware individuals with Natalie, Wolfe and Delko following as slightly flawed, blinkered creatures, and Frank Trip trailing as comic relief, human but dumb as a bar of soap. All caring, non-the-less, about their jobs and the victims.
And of course the usual cop-show flaws: story-lines that make no sense and procedures that would make real-life cops cringe (the convoys of screaming cruisers being led by over-sized SUV's; CSIs being first responders and acting like cops, confronting suspects often without back-up, etc., etc., etc.).
So it should add-up to a show I hate: Mannerism, secondary characters less than despicable and stories that make no sense.
Guilty pleasure; I love it.
Why I don't know.
Perhaps because the visual Mannerism is engaging and seems to serve the American fascination with dramatic visuals rather than the European species, which focuses on the filmmaker's ego.
Or because the secondary characters' lack of humanity is so stunningly banal that its unbelievability distances it to the level of flies on fly-paper; aliens squirming, trapped by glue (humanistic values) they don't understand.
Or maybe I just like watching Calliegh, Caine and Alexx interact, instructing and dragging their kinder, Natalie, Delko and Wolfe along, often with the dim-witted but well-intentioned Trip tagging behind.
Whatever the reason, very much irrational, I just plain enjoy it.
Good example: one episode opens with a hot-dogger hot-dogging down a beachfront road, popping up through the sun-roof and getting decapitated. The mob watching screams, begins flowing towards the scene and then there's a quick-cut to its members pulling out their phones and snapping pictures. Pretty much all of the crowd/mob scenes display similar sensibilities.
When functioning as individuals, as witnesses, suspects or perps, most of the secondary characters exhibit characteristics ranging from self-awareness lower than Amoebas to high Narcissism; clueless to anyone being anything more than a toy or an annoyance.
The primary characters fare a little better: except for names like Boa Vista and Duquesne (pronounced Descane), they're all more or less human. Calleigh, Caine (despite the neck thing) and Alexx Wood led the pack as fully self-aware individuals with Natalie, Wolfe and Delko following as slightly flawed, blinkered creatures, and Frank Trip trailing as comic relief, human but dumb as a bar of soap. All caring, non-the-less, about their jobs and the victims.
And of course the usual cop-show flaws: story-lines that make no sense and procedures that would make real-life cops cringe (the convoys of screaming cruisers being led by over-sized SUV's; CSIs being first responders and acting like cops, confronting suspects often without back-up, etc., etc., etc.).
So it should add-up to a show I hate: Mannerism, secondary characters less than despicable and stories that make no sense.
Guilty pleasure; I love it.
Why I don't know.
Perhaps because the visual Mannerism is engaging and seems to serve the American fascination with dramatic visuals rather than the European species, which focuses on the filmmaker's ego.
Or because the secondary characters' lack of humanity is so stunningly banal that its unbelievability distances it to the level of flies on fly-paper; aliens squirming, trapped by glue (humanistic values) they don't understand.
Or maybe I just like watching Calliegh, Caine and Alexx interact, instructing and dragging their kinder, Natalie, Delko and Wolfe along, often with the dim-witted but well-intentioned Trip tagging behind.
Whatever the reason, very much irrational, I just plain enjoy it.