Terriers

My choice as the best new show of the season, Terriers, has been canceled. This isn’t exactly a surprise, but when the ratings went up a little bit for the finale, I was hoping the network might use that as an excuse to bring it back for another season. No such luck, though; the improvement wasn’t enough. It’s sad, but the show will at least make a good single-season DVD boxed set, and I suggest buying it and watching it all the way through.

Tim Goodman of the Hollywood Reporter has his own theory of what ails Terriers (approaching the last episode of its first-maybe-but-hopefully-not-last season): it’s a branding problem. The show just doesn’t fit what viewers consciously or subconsciously expect from the network.

As we wait and see if Terriers will get a surprise renewal (many people online are emailing FX, having been informed that the network pays more attention than usual to emails — the address is [email protected], by the way), I was thinking a bit more about whether my favourite new show of the season has really been hurt by its title. The star, Donal Logue, is one of many people who claims that the show would have been more successful if it had had a better title. And it’s hard to argue that it’s a good title, since no one would hear it and know what the show’s about or even what it’s like.

I still hope Terriers finds its way to Canada at some point (or to a DVD) because I now think it’s the best new show of the current season. This is not saying very much, but it would even be one of the best shows in a good season. The new broadcast shows are “yes, but” shows at best — shows that have potential but haven’t fulfilled it. And on cable, the same mostly applies: Boardwalk Empire is a more exciting show in theory than it is to watch (so far), and while I know most critics I respect have come around to Rubicon, I still don’t like it. (These last two shows may benefit from the “halo” that surrounds both HBO and AMC; I know that if Rubicon weren’t an AMC show I’d feel less guilty about not liking it, but from pilot to finale it has struck me as a very by-the-numbers show, especially the dialogue, which has the same kind of functional, personalty-free style that sinks a lot of procedurals. However, I hasten to add that many people I know seem to like it, and the showrunner has some interesting things to say about it. It’s just not for me.) But Terriers is the real thing, a show that started good, got better, and knows exactly what it’s trying to be. Is it a great show? I don’t know and at this point I don’t care; it’s just about the only new show I can watch without wondering whether it will ever be able to live up to its potential. It already has, and it’s a smart, dark, modernized take on film noir the Stephen J. Cannell style of private-eye show about loser heroes. It has the serialized storytelling that FX viewers expect, yet it handles the necessary weekly cases more confidently than, say, Veronica Mars. The performances are good, funny and moving by turns; the characters are individualized — including the guest characters — and the whole thing just feels like it was made by pros. (Update: In response to a discussion in comments, I should clarify that the weekly cases don’t dominate or overpower the show they way they did on the first season of Angel. The show is already using the cases as a vehicle for revealing character, not for their own sake.)