Homicide Life on the Street - Season 3

Rating:
Summary: Excellent, but not quite as good as you remember
Review: When I first caught the season 3 episodes of Homicide: Life on the Street, I thought it was the second coming of the drama series, unlike anything I'd seen. Now, more than a decade after its airing, I'm not so sure that's true - it's far more conventional than I ever gave it credit for. Plotlines like Russert's discovery of her ex-partner's spousal abuse ("Partners"), the watering-down of dark/light-skinned African American racism a la Spike Lee's School Daze ("Nothing Personal") or the lame Frank-vs.-beauracracy plotline ("Cradle to Grave") all seem to come out of the affecting-social-melodrama handbook. It means, I think, that Homicide hadn't quite come into its own yet, not in the sure and galvanizing way it did in seasons 4-6. Perhaps it was still unsure of what to do with the fact that it had accidnetally stumbled onto one of the best performances in the history of television in Andre Braugher, and felt the need to set him off as much as possible. Or perhaps it was a need to give their most recognizable face, Daniel Baldwin, more screentime (who could care about the Beth-kids debacle plotline?). Some episodes are rightly considered classics - like the devastating "Every Mother's Son" and the gorgeous send-off "Crosseti," which features work of magestic grief and strength by both Ned Beatty and Clark Johnson. Those episodes prove that Homicide was on the right track, but I disagree with most fans that think it had already entered its glory days - the best were ahead.