Bene Cumb /refers to all 7 seasons in succession/From time to time, one of our TV channels has broadcast this series, but due to its showtime and high number of commercials I never even took interest in it. But this year, since summer, I have had the opportunity to settle into the thoughts and actions of FBI agents performing difficult, at times unmindful tasks.When the first seasons are more case-per-episode stuff, then later are bigger developments into overlapping episodes with flashbacks. Not all episodes are, naturally, of equal quality and thrill, some of them tend to be artificially constructed with questionable scenes, but overall mood and smoothness usually correspond to my views on police work and respective movies-series. The cast is evenly strong, but the number of its main cast is too big; I wonder why Elena Delgado (Roselyn Sánchez) had to be included in the Season 4 as it was sometimes sketchy to follow the activities of 5 special agents before (to me, John "Jack" Michael Malone (Anthony LaPaglia) and Vivian "Viv" Johnson (Marianne Jean-Baptiste) were the most versatile characters-performances.Moreover, I would like to point out the witty inclusion of character actors-actresses in supporting cast, providing a fresh angle and diminishing the quality differences between first and last seasons. They tend to be famous in other series past and present, many of them in leading roles; the "problem" is that they often excel the leading performances (e.g. Laurie Metcalf), and one might guess that their appearances in first scenes would not remain the last, their characters will not die soon, etc. Still, as mentioned, their inclusion helped to decrease the aridity and routine inevitably sneaking in long series with multiple episodes.Thus, a good series, watchable even if not all episodes in a row. But the focus here is on cases and their deductions, personal life of leading characters is secondary.

galensaysyes For three seasons this show about missing persons was a favorite of mine. Then the show itself went missing (it changed nights) and I never saw it again.Well, okay, I did, once in a while. But I'd lose interest before the end and so was never moved to make a note of the new time slot. The show declined, like most shows, a little at a time; it never went bad, but the qualities that had originally drawn me to it slipped away. Really, they began doing so after the first season.Of course the show was mistitled: the missing always left traces, without which there could have been no stories. The reasons for the disappearances varied (and varied more the longer the show continued), but the best and most characteristic stories were variations on the old song "The Raggle Taggle Gypsies," about a wife who has a seemingly perfect life--rich husband, house and lands, featherbed--and runs away from it. In the song the reason is never disclosed; but on the show, in its best period, a series of interviews would build up a picture of the missing person, gradually revealing what was hidden in his life and in his psyche, so that the story became less a police procedural than a character study. The contrast between the victim's outward life and his inner one, which had become intolerable, gave the format a special resonance: the character had become separated from everything around him before he ever took off; he had left already.At first glance the regular cast seemed absurdly over-qualified for this type of show, but their ability was essential to its coming off at all. It wasn't just that they were skillful actors but that they were all able to play in the same key, set by the lead, Anthony La Paglia. They behaved like people who had themselves lost someone (some of their losses were dramatized in later episodes) and thereby set the show's tone: an air of bereavement, of having lost something irretrievable, even after the missing persons were found. As a result many of the early episodes were truly affecting, without being forced. However, as often happens on TV, sincerity was the show's first casualty, and after the first season it seldom achieved the same level of poignancy.Of course not all the episodes conformed to the same pattern. A handful dealt with serial killers, and although most of these were up to standard they weren't really in the show's line.And it had its share of unlikelihoods from the start. Its style was similar to that of the British spy show Spooks: intense, low-key acting and gritty locales overlaid with flash camera-work. These combined to create an impression of devoted realism which masked the impossibility of the scenes: not one of the conversations could ever have happened as written, especially among people in the professions shown.The biggest improbability was a prior affair between Jack, the boss, and Samantha, one of his agents, which continued to inform their dealings and the atmosphere of the office in general. The show normally observed such reticence about its regulars' personal lives that a viewer who left to get a Coke was apt to miss the only testimony to a hookup or a breakup; but this connection was supposed to remain unspoken and unsuspected (notwithstanding Samantha's habit of making doe eyes at her former paramour). The two characters evidenced no grounds for a romantic attraction, and their continual almost-but-not-quite flirtations were incredible from the start.From the beginning, the show had a penchant for sensationalism, which came to predominate in later seasons, with particular emphases on children being molested and women being hit. And then there were the big scenes without significance: Jack tells one of his agents, "You keep screwing things up, one more time and you'll be pounding the pavement"; but the agent hadn't screwed up before, and his status was back to normal next week. There were a few outright misfires, notably a dream play with one of the regular cast in disguise (but recognizable from the first shot).As the show went on it continued to present many good stories and scenes, but more and more often these came to center on the team members rather than the victims. The writers had to strain increasingly to devise plots that weren't mere variations on what had come before, and so they came to rely more and more on crime show brutalities. Yet they always steered clear of certain subjects, e.g. although it's stated in one scene that wives often go missing because they've been murdered by husbands, I can't remember a single episode turning on spousal murder.In the last seasons the writers tried out variations on Jack's character, at one point trying to make him into a funny man, with doleful results, and at another point turning him, more successfully, into Mike Hammer. However, the biggest error during the latter part of the show's run was the introduction of Miss Puerto Rico (not sarcasm; that's literally who she was). A thick accent isn't an insurmountable barrier for an actor, but Roselyn Sanchez didn't only sound like Desi Arnaz, she sounded like Desi Arnaz playing Ricky Ricardo. She acted like an official greeter at the Puerto Rico pavilion at the World's Fair rather than a federal investigator, and her breezy posturing--cocking her head, sharkishly flashing her teeth, tapping her toe, striking poses at odd angles like a character out of The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari--killed every one of her scenes.But she didn't kill the show; it just ran out of inspiration--and eventually, out of cases.

alain1707-586-829740 First of all, to all the people who wanted Roselyn Sanchez out of the picture, your wish has been fulfilled. It seems that WAT will not return for an eighth season.Personally, I thought she wasn't that bad. She even won an award for her acting in this series. Has anyone ever thought that the way she acted was maybe the way her character was supposed to be? Lifeless, cold, emotionless, like a real FBI agent. I had no problem with her accent either. If anyone was mumbling on that show it was rather Anthony Lapaglia! Anyway, the first season was a little shaky with actors finding their characters. The second season was great. The third season had too much emphasis on character personal development and unrealistic involvement with each other. Almost to the point of having the impression of watching a bad soap opera.And it went downhill from there, until the last seasons where the writing got a bit better, but not as good as the early shows.Well all this is academic, since we've seen the very last of Jack, Sam, Vivian, Danny, and Martin. Oh, and I almost forgot, Elena.In my humble opinion, Marianne Jean-Baptiste was the best actress throughout her 159 episodes, even though we didn't see her character's private side as much as the others.My two cents on it.

Catherine It's amazing how Without a Trace went from one of the best shows on TV to must-miss TV in about three episodes.First the writing went down the drain with the characters acting out implausible stories between them that sounded like they had been lifted out of a really bad daytime soap.Then the regular actors got that bemused look on their faces, as if they didn't know what their character was supposed to be any more.Finally, to "spice things up" I'm sure, the producers went and hired one of the worst actresses in Hollywood: Roselyn Sanchez, who can't even enunciate and has a face so plastic she's a walking indictment of the plastic surgery profession.Very sad. Hopefully they'll right the boat, but I'm not holding my breath.Update: It turns out the didn't right the boat. Roselyn Sanchez is still killing every scene she's in and the show is but a pale shadow of what it used to be.Too bad as it was a very promising show.