K-Ville

Our New Hero

“Everyone’s going to think there’s crime like that in New Orleans,” my daughter said after the machine gunning of the fundraiser by the river. She’s right, because most Americans are easily led idiots. I mean, some of them think we’re winning in Iraq, or that New Orleans was destroyed by a hurricnae. I don’t care what they think. I’m New Orleans to the bone and I love this damn show.

On balance, I thought subplots around the deserting partner and Boulet’s struggle with his wife over staying or leaving were both genuine and believable. If you wander in here from the Outside, both are as close to home as you can get on television. Much of the rest of it was pure TV fantasy of the sort I liked when I was a kid (think Startsky & Hutch or the Rockford Files). However, the major plot isn’t that far off from conspiracy theories you can hear on the street today in NOLA about people buying up land in the Ninth Ward. And there were Blackwater mercenaries all over town in the days after the Federal Flood, riding around with automatic weapons and questionable deputations to act as law enforcement.

And as to the female bad guy’s statement toward the end: pure reality television. From a post I wrote what seems like a lifetime ago on Wet Bank Guide titled Knights of the Invisible Hand:

Jimmy Reiss, head of the New Orleans Business Council Reiss told the Wall St. Journal, with better services and fewer poor people. “Those who want to see this city rebuilt want to see it done in a completey different way: demographically, geographically and politically.”

Marlin, speaking for everyone who came home: you’re my new damned hero man. I may have to start watching a TV series again, something I haven’t done in a long time. Sure, it hits all the stupid cliche marks about New Orleans, but a lot of what went down in the premiere rings true. It is worth fighting for. Three hundred thousand of us can’t be that wrong.

If the idea that this show was more reality TV than fantasy bothers you, well, I hear that Britanny Spears will be on MTV later. If you hurry you can catch it again.

Me, I’m going to watch the director’s cut online at the Fox site for the show

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