Tansin A. Darcos (TDARCOS) wrote:

fabio wrote:

Some unlikeable douche is on the lamb from the government

Bzzzzt! Sorry, thanks for playing and we have some nice parting gifts.

First, he was not 'on the lam,' Michael Westen was essentially placed in the same status that the intelligence community would do to any members of the Impossible Missions Force who were caught or killed: "disavowed." As the story points out, once Westen escaped back to the United States they "dumped" him in Miami and wanted him stuck there. If they had wanted him dead or in jail they could have made him that way or put him in prison.

Second, he isn't "unlikable," you get to realize the guy is complicated and you see that he tries to do the right thing, including avoiding killing people. That gives him that slight edge that makes you want to like him. The producer took another page from Mission Impossible in that - like the character of Batman - Westen never crosses the line: he never kills anyone. He has only killed one person directly, and that was while the person was trying - and almost succeeded - to kill him. And it wasn't murder, he only killed the guy because he was still trying to do the same to him.

Westen's actions in not killing people mirror something that the IMF also did with lots of other people; they would get them to betray their organization and be left holding the bag, whereupon that person's organization would dispose of the person - usually by killing them, although it's not explicitly stated - off-camera.

Every time I want to believe television has gotten better, I remember that Mission Impossible never had to freeze frame on every new character entrance to put their name and "title" up in subtitles.

It's a gimmick, and as you seem to have pointed out - then subsequently forgot - it provides a bit of comic relief.