I’ve said that this series is one of the best there is on TV now and I don’t intend to change that opinion. It remains one of the freshest shows in some time with characters that you find yourself not just rooting for but loving along the way. And season four is no different than the pervious three; it remains a great show.
An intro for those who haven’t been watching: Michael Weston (Jeffrey Donovan) is a spy for the U.S. who suddenly finds himself burned. By burned we mean that he’s taken off the list of active spies and tossed aside with no money, no identity and no history, left in whatever town he was in when he was burned. In this case it’s Miami and fortunately for him he has friends there: an ex-girlfriend Fiona (Gabrielle Anwar) who’s ex-IRA with a nasty temper, Sam Axe (Bruce Campbell) an old SEAL buddy who sold info on Michel to the FBI and his mother Madeline (Sharon Gless), a chain smoking woman who loves her son but is greatly aggravated in learning what he did for a living. Left to his own devices, Michael and his friends help people in trouble using their talents when no one else will help. At the same time, Weston continues to search for whoever it was that burned him in an attempt to get back into the spy game. Got it?
At the end of season three we had Michael saving the life of the man who burned him and capturing a serial killing maniac who was once a spy just like Michael. But Michael broke a few laws to catch him and is now a prisoner himself, held in a lock up that’s not the normal kind. Instead Michael is introduced to a new “friend”, a man who says that he wants to assist Michael in finding out just who is behind a secret global attack on the country, a person or group that is doing damage from within. Michael agrees to help but at the same time still distrust everyone but his friends.
As the season opens, Michael is given a pass card to gain access to a federal building to obtain information. Before leaving he witnesses the man whose card he had, a spy named Jesse Porter (Coby Bell), being escorted from the building. Michael has just burned another spy, doing to them what was done to him.
Keeping an eye on Porter in the hopes of gaining information, Michael discovers another person in need of assistance and takes on Porter’s case. As it moves forward Porter eventually tells Michael that like him he was burned and that his sole motivation now is to find the man that burned him and kill him. So naturally Michael takes Porter under his wing and adds him to the team. So much so that he eventually finds a place for him to live: with his mother in the garage.
The season continues on with various people coming into the scene in need of help. At the same time Michael and the group continue to seek out the truth behind what is going on in the spy world, who is burning whom, how all of it fits together and keep Porter from discovering that Michael was the man who burned him. By the end who knows, perhaps Michael can discover who he was burned by…but then Porter might find out as well.
Each story features the client and subsequent rescue by the team but at the same time adds bits and pieces to the main puzzle that Michael has been going with since episode one. The amazing thing is that each episode while telling these concurrent stories is filled with action, adventure and an actual story to boot.
The acting...I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, this entire team here is a perfect fit. If one were to disappear it would be felt not just by the characters but the viewers as well. They just gel together better than most. That’s rare for most TV series but lately it seems like more thought is going into making a fantastic ensemble in shows than in the past. I honestly can’t imagine this show without the entire team intact.
The new season of this series is about to begin soon. Picking up all four of the previous sets can only help to not just increase your awareness of the show but make you a fan as well. Then you can sit back with the rest of us, waiting in anticipation each week to find out what new case they will assist with and who is behind the whole burn notice plot.
While discovering TV series on DVD is a great thing (and I’ve often talked about how wonderful it is to get into an entire season rather than waiting for the cliffhanger each week) the fact remains that TV needs viewers to keep a show on the air. For me the important thing about the DVD sets is that you can miss a season or half of it, watch the DVD and catch up in time to get back on once more. While BURN NOTICE may not be on one of the three major networks, it goes to show that the cable stations are becoming the place to go when looking for quality programming. Give this series a shot and my guess is you’ll be hooked.
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