The Shield - About damn time!!! - Page 24

Amazon has a pre-order for the complete series DVD set for like $107. Looks like it drops in November. First I have heard about this.

Holy shit! You guys see Billings on HOUSE last Monday?!?!

I never thought about the potential of Vic taking his own life. I always figured him looking at his gun was sorta his own way to cope with the fact that he'll be anchored to a desk for 3 years, and that he won't be needing a gun anymore. It was the one thing that defined him as an individual.

So excited that they decided to release the entire series on DVD. I'll be giving this to myself as an early X-mas gift.

That gun is a signifier that while this may look like the end of the line for Vic, that it may appear he's backed into a corner and out of options, he's not going to ever quit looking for a way out, a way back into the game. The gun shows that even when consigned to his own personal hell, Vic ain't giving up.

If you don't own the entire series on DVD yet, now's a pretty good time.

Damn, $110 + tax for all of it. Dammit, I don't have the disposable income for this!

I've been buying less and less DVDs/BRs these days. I'm a collector at heart, but owning a physical copy of a piece of media is going the way of the dodo. If I want to go through the Shield again, I'll Netflix it while I wait for unlimited on demand streaming to become a reality.

But you won't get the great commentaries. Anyone listened to the commentary for the finale or the rest of season 7 yet?

Coincidentally I rewatched the last 2 episodes just last night. Completely forgot about the commentary, so Ill have to give that a whirl tonight.

So what (besides commentary) are some of the complete series DVDs bells and whistles? Cause If I'm going to get The Shield Dvds its going to be the complete series.

On how many episodes are there commentaries? How many episodes of the final season have commentaries? If the final season has complete commentaries, I think I'd get it.

I know every episode for Seasons 1 and 7 have commentaries.

No they don't. For some reason, a handful of episodes don't have commentaries. I would say approx. 80-90 percent of the episodes have commentary.

As for other stuff, there's usually a couple of deleted scenes per ep and some cool documentaries.

John Diehl is doing some work on Friday Night Lights. Terrific as a space cadet art teacher.

I've been trying to watch FNL online, but no luck. It only got literally 35,000 viewers in the UK when it was first shown. Ther's Itunes but that's like 1.50 quid (about $2)per episode!!

Just a heads-up for the European Chewers:

Amazon.co.uk has the complete series for mere 49.95 Pounds. Now that´s a deal!

For anyone that might be missing an individual season or two, I've seen each season of The Shield for $19.99 at a few of my local Wal-Marts over the past two weeks.

I watched the finale about a week ago and I still can't get it out of my head. Possibly the best closer I've seen for any show. It pounds into your head in no uncertain terms that this is the man we've all been rooting for.

Was also totally impressed by the development of Ronnie's character. Several seasons back the guy could've gotten himself killed and I wouldn't have cared less, but seeing the look on his face as he realised that Vic betrayed him was absolutely heartbreaking.

I sort of wish they had done more with Ronnie over the years. Sure he had the whole burnt face plot but apart from that he was too much in the background. Maybe with only 13 episodes per season it had to mainly be the Vic & Shane show, but David Rees Snell's performance in the final season makes me wish they had used him more.

Interesting rumour I read - with no source, mind - about Michael Jace and the gay plot:

"What I've read (which, I don't have any kind of a source on it, I just read this on message boards) is that the actor that played Julian was only contracted for the first season. Shawn Ryan and the writers liked him, and wanted him to continue on with the series. He stated he only would if the gay storyline was scrapped and Julian was "cured" of it. Ryan agreed, and so it went. I kept waiting for it to come back up throughout the entire series (along with the cat, although I guess that plotline was sort of addressed in the final episodes), and was glad when we at least got a wink to it in the finale."


Not sure about that. I don't think Ryan would have agreed to an actor's demands. Maybe Jace suggested the cure plot and Ryan liked it.

Yeah, that sounds pretty ridiculous. Why demand he be "cured" if you can just avoid his sexuality completely if need be.

Plus the gay plot resulted in much more screentime for him. Honestly when season 6 and 7 starte I forgot he was on the show until I saw him hanging with the strike team.

I really wished they would have given us a flashback scene where they showed Shane getting his ass kicked by the father of that young black girl he was banging. Watched the ep. last night where it opens with him being brought in to the ER and it must've been one of hell of beating, Shane looked like shit.

Have not read this thread, can't deal with any spoilers. But I'm five episodes from the end of Season 7 and I can't remember the last time a show had me this on edge.

Prepare to be fucked up. In a good way.

This last season completely dismantled the aura around Vic Mackey, the only person to bring down Vic is Vic. That confession scene was absolutely riveting, all the crimes he's committed that he would never, ever admit to but only does so out of survival. The look of disgust on Olivia's face that she's just given this man a free pass for all the shit he's done. It absolutely makes sense that Mackey is tied to a desk at the end, I don't think it's fair of Ryan to critiscize The Sopranos finale when he more or less did the same thing.
I know Shane is no innocent but his final scenes were far more heartbreaking and touching than any moment Vic had with his kids or with Corrinne, despite all the shit he pulled, he truly did love Mara. His decision was still pretty unforgivable and a total kick to the gut but Mara was his redemption in the end.
I remember back in Season 3 where Dutch solved that serial killer case and it gave him an ego boost but he came across Melanie Lynskey who completely punked him, sometimes Dutch can be incredibly shortsighted and that's where I thought the arc with the serial killer kid was heading, I was wrong as Claudette stepped into the breach to save his ass.


I haven't watched the previous 6 seasons in awhile but I think Glenn Close entering her home in the middle of the worst part of LA after she got canned was a great moment and also Lem calling out Shane for banging some woman when he should've been doing his job, "What the hell Shane, she ain't even that hot", also, that CI getting a shotgun blast to the chest was a real holy shit moment.

Spoilers for both shows -

I don't think Vic's resolution was comparable to The Sopranos at all. Sure, he's alive and free and bald, but Tony still has his family and his position in the mob is comparatively solid. Vic has no wife, no kids, no friends, no power on the street, and has to work with people who view him as the lowest form of scum in the universe. Now, it's fairly clear from what we've seen that no matter how good his material position gets, Tony is always going to be a miserable bastard, but Vic's comeuppance is significantly more tangible.

For me the comeuppance just feels like another bump in the road. The Vic we know WILL find his wife sooner or later, he'd also parlay his knowledge and connections into another street position in no time.

While that is probably true that he will find his wife, he will never be able to exert the power that he once had over her. At most Vic can make his wife fear him, I doubt that was something he wanted.

Also it was shown in an early season that Vic isn't looking forward to what his new job is going to be (the second one with Carl Weathers). I will say though that if I ever murder a cop, I am more than willing to settle with 2 years of office work as punishment (oh no it makes a bit of a noise when the lights go out at night, how will I ever take this punishment).

I'd agree, but I'm not sure Vic knows how to stay put. The best description of him I've heard was by Ryan himself - Vic is a shark, no matter what happens he has to keep moving forward. The final shot makes that pretty clear. I can totally see him blackmailing a politician or acquiring some invaluable piece of information to get himself put back in the game before the week is out.

It's a Marlo Stanfeld ending. Vic ends up in the very worst place he personally could end up, his entire reputation destroyed in the eyes of just about everyone that knows him, his family gone and him trapped in a job his personality probably couldn't endure. After all, people described as sharks (Melfi makes the comparison to Tony once in the Sopranos) can't quite settle down. The clusterfuck inside a clusterfuck after a clusterfuck that Vic's life had been allowed him not to dwell on all the shit he's done, but the end puts him in a position where that'll eventually bubble up. So, probably he either tries to get out of it, or fails at doing it shortly after the series is over, but the series ends at that place, because thats the tragic ending. It has its syntax. Just like Marlo Stanfield's ending could go either way a few months after The Wire ends, but we get it ends at that place, because that's the greek tragedy end for him.

I would like to think that word got out on the street that he is a person not to be trusted (I image the goverment bust with Vic would be well known). Though its hard to tell because the criminal eliment became dumber as seasons wore on.

Question, I am the only one that was bothered by the Mexican's inability to figure out who stole the blackmail materal or the relative ease Vic had in lying to both sides without anyone become wise to the situation as time wore on.
It seemed weird that Vic became every criminals most trusted source for no reason.

No one's going to take this bait?

There was a specific scene I recall toward the end where some thug resisted giving him info and said "you think Vic Mackey loses his badge and the street don't hear about it?" His influence on the street was definitely on the wane. And given that he has been outed as a cop killer, I don't see any way he worms his way back into the good graces of fellow officers of any stripe, ever.

That's how I see it anyhow. It's not like there is a definitive answer, since the ending was left ambiguous intentionally (that goes for anyone who wants to argue about the cut to black on The Sopranos as well). But even if you imagine that Vic sleazes his way off the desk in a week, the end still manages to be tragic. The Shield was in part about how he managed to survive all these shitstorms, but piece by piece, they destroyed everything worthwhile about his life. He's the ultimate survivor, but with family, his team and his name so thoroughly dismembered by the end, survival has a very hollow feel to it.

Well put Schwartz. That's a good explanation of Vic's fate. Though if Vic was willing to make thhe deal with the Feds knowing full well he'd have to give a full confesion to everything he did, then he clearly had every intention of remaining a player on the streets despite everyone's knowledge of what he did. What about the possibility that his confession would remain under wraps??

Wouldn't Vic's confession put a lot of cases in peril if it got out? If possible, I imagine they'd want to keep it as quiet as possible.

As is par for the Strike Team course, he solved his immediate problem without thinking through the long term consequences. He seems genuinely surprised that Olivia wants to punish him with desk duty. He's stuck in the Vic Mackey mindset, which covers both the way he works the street and how he had always been treated within the department. Mackey rules dictate that no matter how big a scumbag a guy is, you make him useful in whatever way he can be. His mindset was so warped by all the shit he'd been through, he couldn't quite work out that sweeping aside brutality complaints is not the same as ignoring the cold-blooded murder of a fellow officer.

That's the same reason I always thought Ronnie's case/arrest would be quietly swept under the rug. Too many old cases would fall apart if his corruption came to light.

Speaking of Ronnie, it's really impressive that he was once the Strike Team member who would most likely be the first one to go, and then in true brilliant fashion, he isn't, and is the last man standing after Vic.

His arrest was all show, and I agree that because of all the old shit, he would be released.

I only just realized Farrah the Crackwhore was the same girl who played the Russian landlord's daughter in Spiderman 2, that final scene between her and Mackey was intense.

What? No way. Ronnie's arrest was for real. It was never even hinted that it was all for show. The way Dutch handled it and the way Ronnie reacted prove that.

I think everyone in the Barn knew about Vic's confession because of the way they reacted to him. (Or though that could be because of Shane.) Dutch certainly knew. Don't think he could keep it a secret.

I think the reaction was due to Shane, as Dutch and Claudette were playing it close until they had Ronnie in cuffs. But they both knew, and there's no way they keep their mouths shut about it. Not to mention the arrest happened in front of the whole Barn, everyone knew that Aceveda and Kavanaugh had investigated Vic's involvement in Crowley's murder, and the shockingly violent implosion of the Strike Team kind of works to confirm any suspicions people might have been harboring. I don't see any beat cops giving Mackey the benefit of the doubt going forward.

Yes to all this. For us, it looks like Vic has lost everything that ever mattered. But with that character you have to remember:

-"GET OVER IT. DON'T BRING IT UP AGAIN."

-"I don't think about it."

-His breakdown at the end of season one when his family leaves. He has an immediate, relatable human reaction. But within a few minutes, VIC MACKEY takes over, he gets his shit together and walks out.

-When Vic sees the pictures of his dead best friend with family, and knows that he himself has the lion's share of the blame. Which would be enough to break most people with absolute finality, and for a minute it looks like that might actually happen... but again, Vic's defenses kick in.


Vic will put all his problems away in that magic little box of his, and he will move on to a new playground. The confession will never get out, there will only be rumours, which Vic himself will quash because he is after all the kind of guy who could sell ice to the proverbial eskimos. It's the Carpenter takeaway: You can't kill The Boogeyman.