I’m so annoyed that I didn’t see this eppy in one sitting but that doesn’t take away from the fact that it’s so unbelievably good, there’s literally nothing I can really say in a short intro other than mentioning that Kavanaugh is incredible and this is such a thrillingly apparent step up in quality down to the smallest details. Everything about this emanates the feeling you get when a show enters its prime, it’s clear that the strengths of the show are now being fully capitalised upon without any hesitation, that the slow trail of events that have been swept over so far in the show are finally having an impact, and that this will be something worth remembering. [SPOILERS] The main plot of this episode is about the cast all collectively trying to handle the fallout of a school stabbing/shooting as racial tensions rise in Farmington, and it’s just so good in every way. There’s been at least 4 plots throughout the show thus far that do a similar thing and in concept it’s not that interesting at this point, but I really feel like the execution of this plot was the most immediate way to invest the audience in this season and prove that there’s a clear step up in quality occurring here. As I’ve said already, the show has done plots like this with a similar level of brutality and escalating tension being attempted, and the show generally had some heavy content matter being presented to the audience on an episode to episode basis, but I never really personally felt any of the severity of what was happening. As much as seeing kids murder each other as a result of such morbid scenarios should be emotionally affecting to watch and would be life-altering to be affected by in person, the execution always made it feel like it was just another case of the week and there was nothing to truly make me care about what was going on, I heard someone describe it once as being like “a really violent sitcom” and I feel like that suits it very well. This episode finally breaks this pattern, being immediately intense right from the jump and completely sucking you into what’s going on. In the first scene, we hear people screaming as violence ensues during a funeral ceremony as a member of the strike team is bashed on the head with a cross while trying to control the situation. Not long after, Julien is investigating a murder at a school when gunshots are heard and he gets stuck in a swarm of students rushing to flee the building in a panic. As a suspect is being interrogated, his mother is in the room with him as she laments with heartbreak and disgrace at what her son is turning into. There’s such a visceral feeling to what’s going on, and when this is combined with the entire cast all collectively being involved in this case somehow rather than being split off into more tame subplots that take away from the intense main plot, you feel like this ACTUALLY matters. There’s a level of focus and cohesion that I’ve just never felt before when these plots were playing out in a more tedious way lacking in this constant sense of emotional weight, and as much as having the entire cast focus on one case during a season opener was risky, it still feels like the seasonal arcs and conflicts are established well thanks to how much more efficient and thoughtful the dialogue has become. In general, I think this episode displays season 5 figuring out a style of storytelling that is way more enthralling than everything to come before it, particularly with how it distributes its screen time. For pretty much the first time, it feels like the non-strike team characters are being treated like actual side characters in the way they should have been since the start. Dutch + Claudette and Julien + Danny have always felt like side characters but had the screen time of more major ones, which didn’t really help them at all and usually made their arcs a lot more convoluted then they needed to be. In comparison, the two dynamics I mentioned before only have a few scenes each (and the 1 or 2 scenes that Tina get do as effective of a job as they need to at characterising her, making her likable and establishing her conflicts), and the directions that everyone is going in are way more interesting. The whole gimmick of Danny mysteriously getting pregnant is honestly really great and helps to make her character less repetitive after her dynamic with Julien wasn’t really going anywhere, just like with Tina and the other characters I mentioned in this paragraph, if she just gets a few solid scenes during most episodes this season, her presence in this season should work really well. Finally we have the strike team, and particularly the newly introduced antagonist Kavanaugh. I made that sitcom comparison earlier in this review that I’ll bring up again here because as much as the first 4 seasons of The Shield are great, they were great in a way that was more alike to that kind of show then the best Crime/Drama shows out there that people talk about the most. Rather than truly pushing its cast through challenging scenarios that make us perceive them in a new light, or actively dedicating itself to its main conflicts and artistic strengths, up until now The Shield has merely hinted at them during its best moments. Aside from Kavanaugh’s introduction just being flawless for how immediately fascinating his dialogue, performance and psychological manipulation is (he literally made offering someone a piece of gum intriguing 😭), what makes him so insanely promising is how his character will undoubtedly be an outlet to finally make a change to that. He will pressure the strike team in a way we haven’t seen before, cause them to be pushed to their limits, have their loyalty tested and more, and The Shield will finally be a great Crime show about corrupt cops in a more traditional, and likely more frequently rewarding way. One of the best season openers ever, I really hope this season lives up to my expectations of it.