(S01E01) "You know why we're all here? It's about helping you." -- Sgt. Gregory ParkerYet another cop show has blasted into our lives: Flashpoint, which premiered Friday at 10 PM on CBS. I'm not much for cop shows, and never got into all the CSI, Law & Order shows that continue to grace the airwaves. But I have to say, I was riveted to this one. Not as riveted as I am to 24, but you never know. We'll see how it goes.
It revolves around an elite emergency police unit in Toronto known as the Strategic Response Unit (SRU). The show was actually inspired by Toronto's real-life Emergency Task Force, and the series is filmed in Toronto, which gives it an authentic air and allows the city to shine in a way it hasn't before. Even in this first episode, we see beautiful shots of the architecture and urban landscape.
The SRU team handles all the nitty-gritty stuff -- hostage situations, gangs, bombs, suicidal teens, you name it. Because of this, they also have an impressive array of state-of-the-art weapons -- sniper rifles, tasers, flash-bang grenades, and a bunch of other stuff I've probably never heard of.
As I understand it, the term "flashpoint" refers to that one instant when people converge in a tense situation. One person has to make a snap decision, and the others figure out how to respond to it. Tonight's pilot episode centers on a Croatian guy with anger-management issues. He stalks his estranged spouse, shoots her, then takes another woman hostage in the middle of a public square. The SRU team assembles, and Ed Lane ((Hugh Dillon, pictured), has the best vantage point, and ends up taking the shot.
While Ed seems calm and cool about it -- and the department's psych doc even makes a joke that she doesn't need to talk to him -- on the inside, you can tell his guts are churning. I think that's what I like about this show. This team is the best of the best, they're heroes, but they still have their own personal demons about the job.
It's something they can't share with anyone else except their team members, their "band of brothers," so to speak, because their real-life family can never understand. Ed ends up in the middle of an inquest about the shoot, and he's conflicted about it, even though it was the right thing to do at the time. In that respect, maybe the series seems more "real" than other cop shows. We get to see the real deal of what these guys go through, not just a Hollywood version of it.
The music is also spot on -- haunting and dramatic in all the right places. If anyone knows the song that plays over the montage at the end, please tell us in the comments section.
I look forward to seeing more of this series.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
7-12-2008 @ 3:30PM
Nathaniel said...
A show with the Pink Power Ranger and Keith Mars? Now I gotta see this!
(oh, careful there, you pictured Enrico Colantoni, not Hugh Dillon)
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7-12-2008 @ 9:17PM
killer_twinkie said...
I agree 100% That was the first thing I said when the credits were rolling and I saw Amy Jo Johnson. I was like "OMG it's got the pink ranger and Keith Mars" that alone makes it a must watch.
7-12-2008 @ 4:35PM
Christopher said...
Ok this show is based in Canada, from what I watched in Bowling for Columbine, I thought there aren't that many shooting deaths in Canada.
For them to have a hostage situation every week is a stretch for me, but please correct me if I'm wrong.
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7-12-2008 @ 8:01PM
Brent McKee said...
Homicides in Canada (2006): 1.9 per 100,000 people
Homicides in Ontario (2006): 1.5 per 100,000 people
Attempted Murders in Canada (2006): 2.6 per 100,000
Attempted Murders in Ontario (2006): 2.5 per 100,000
Homicide Rate in the United States (2004): 5.5 per 100,000
Population of Toronto (2006): 2,503,281
Homicide rate in Chicago population 2,882,746 (2004): 15.5 per 100,000
Percentage of murders in the US committed using firearms: 70%
Percentage of murders in Canada committed using firearms: 30%
27% of Canadian households own firearms, mostly in rural areas. It is illegal to carry concealed handguns in Canada with limited exceptions. "There is a permit that allows people to carry if they can prove they need to to protect their lives but the permit is very rarely issued." There is a problem with guns, particularly handguns being brought into the country illegally.
The incident in the TV show was based on a true event in 2004 when a man took a bystander hostage at Toronto's Union Station before being taken down by the Metro Toronto PD's Emergency Task Force. Of course not every episode of the show has to be about a hostage taking.
7-12-2008 @ 4:42PM
cashew_76 said...
The song was by a group called Dala. I'm pretty sure that it was written specifically for the show.
Love the show by the way, great to see some good Canadian programming out there.
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7-16-2008 @ 8:08AM
chris said...
nope, we picked it for that particular episode. Its from their first record.
7-12-2008 @ 9:46PM
Argus said...
Heres some info on the ETF: http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20061130/wfive_noescape_061130/20061202?hub=WFive
Video on the right hand side.
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7-12-2008 @ 10:54PM
stjohnob said...
So a couple of things. First the music. I thought it sounded very much like the music on House.
Second, and I'm nit-picking, but about 17 minutes into the hour, they show a shot of a female cop walking up to a cement barrier with plants, with her right hand on her gun. After the SRU gets out of the trucks, announces the locations for the members, the show the same exact shot of the female cop walking up with her right hand on her gun.
Again...I'm probably just looking for too many details, but really? The editors didn't catch this? I rewound my DVR 4 times to confirm this. First around 16 minutes, then again at 17.
Otherwise, great show!
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7-13-2008 @ 5:54AM
Will said...
I liked it better than I thought I would, CBS has played so many ads for it, I was starting to get sick of them. But I watched it & it was pretty good. I didn't really understand why at the inquest the IA guy was being such an ass. Is that really how it works? I mean I understand that they have to discuss the events just to be sure everything was by the book, but that guy seemed like he wanted to take down the officer that took the shot? I've seen inquests done on other shows (the Without a Trace one was intense) & it always sees like the IA guys actually want the cops to be rouge or something. Just seems odd to me.
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7-13-2008 @ 10:59AM
Argus said...
This show has gotten a hell of a lot of views on Surththechannel.com. If only CBS paid attention to other sources of viewership.
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7-13-2008 @ 11:40AM
Susan K. Scheidt said...
The song is called Fortress, artist is Dala out of Ontario. Listen at http://www.myspace.com/dalagirls. Buy whole cd (This moment is a flash) at maplemusic.com. Dala site is dalagirls.com.
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7-13-2008 @ 11:44AM
Derek said...
I like that they included the inquest. In the real world, there's an investigation every time a cop takes his gun out of the holster. I've never seen that on a cop show before. The lawyers seemed realistic - both sides were asking questions in a bored, are-we-done-yet? manner.
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7-13-2008 @ 6:32PM
Carissa said...
This was one of the most incredibly boring shows I've ever seen. And the message - the oh woe is me I have to shoot people for a living my life is so awful...crap.
Enrico deserves far better than this drivel.
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7-14-2008 @ 8:13PM
Robin said...
I totally agree with you about the show being boring. And you are also right about Enrico deserving a better show.
7-14-2008 @ 8:27AM
Drew said...
I don't think we were watching the same show. This show was terrible. There was no connection for the audience to the characters. We don't learn who they are until the end and even then the characters were easily forgotten. I liked when the show was called Standoff and the characters were people we could actually care about.
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7-19-2008 @ 4:56PM
nattyff said...
i really like it.
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