TVSquad

On Monday night, the CSI:Miami season kicked off with "From the Grave," which for all of Miami's sun and glass-paned buildings, was somewhat on the dark side for this show. Between Horatio Caine visiting a church to confess his "sin," an another officer seemingly popping up wherever he is to talk about "New York," and the hit by a Latin American mafia organization on his life, our lead is having a very bad week. Otherwise, things seem to have more or less left off where they were - except for the fact that Calleigh seems to have regained her senses after walking out of the station after witnessing the suicide of a fellow cop and subsequently having a bit of his brains drip onto her inside the shooting range. It also comes off as if the whole team has taken a bit of a vacation, as Horatio says "welcome back" as the team is investigating the homicide at the faked funeral of a convict's mother - a convict who was a member of a notorious gang, the Mala Noche.

By the time the team has returned to headquarters, Ryan Wolfe has told off his love interest - the TV reporter who made him look stupid to his co-workers last season, and we're introduced to a new and improved area of the police station, where an attractive woman is running a DNA investigation area for unsolved cases only, with the help of a significant grant. It seemed a bit unclear as to how this would loop in with what the CSIs were going to do, but by the end of the episode things make much more sense.

If this show is going to be light on crime-solving and high on cinematography, then that's fine by me, because in high definition this show is simply stunning. I don't know if it's the aerial passes over the city or something about the colors of cast's clothing or the water in the area, but it keeps me coming back for more. Then again, it could be the randomly-featured bikini-clad females who are worked into the case, like last night when the rich kid is involved after it turns out she was trying to be cool by hooking up with gang members - but she seems to be see the error in her ways after being put down about being "passed around" by those guys - ouch!

If we're going to have Caine haunted by this "New York" story from his background week after week, there better be some resolution or more details added, because it's already becoming a burden to watch - after sixty minutes. It'd also be good to hear about his brother, Ray Jr., Yelina, and anyone else who has vanished into seemingly thin air. As CSI attempts to continue being a new Law & Order, taking over CBS' airwaves, I can only hope that the spinoffs aren't just becoming spinoffs because they can't think of any other ideas for programming.