Covert Affairs was Kinda Lame Until it Became ... Awesome??

Ummmm ... shit.  Covert Affairs has been on for like ... over 2 years now, right?  It's in the second half of its third season right now.  I have successfully ignored the crap out of this show this entire time, which I was perfectly happy about, because as much as I love a good spy show, this one always seemed SO generic to me.  I mean right down to the title itself ... Covert Affairs ... how much LESS descriptive can you get than that?  You might as well just call it, "Spy Show".  Or as I just saw on another blog which made me laugh out loud, "Secret Stuff."  The previews always made it seem like a possible Alias rip-off too, not just because it's about a female spy, but it seemed to focus on the whole "balancing friends/family and my secret spy life" theme as well.  Because of my past deep love of Alias, this made me angry, so I purposely didn't bother to check it out.

The show stars Piper Perabo, a.k.a. "That chick from Coyote Ugly, which I never saw, and whose name I've never known how to pronounce."  It also stars Chris Gorham, i.e. "That dude who played Ben's lab partner on my least favorite season of Felicity, but who seems like someone I might like if I paid more attention to him."  It has some other people too, like Sandy Cohen from The O.C. (which I never really watched) and from Mohinder from Heroes, but bottom line, I didn't care enough about any of these actors for that to be a selling point for me either.  Oh and just a side note, at some point I also realized that the name of the main character on the show is Annie Walker, i.e. Agent Walker ... which ... HELLO!?  Is there not ALREADY a badass Agent (Sarah!) Walker out there in TV Land, and could the writers not have taken five more seconds to think of a different character name??  Just another reason to be annoyed by this show's existence - the creators of this show clearly knew nothing of Chuck ... or Sarah.

Will the real Agent Walker please stand up?

The other thing is - and I am admittedly kind of a t.v. junkie so I pay attention to these things - I had never heard anything about this show beyond it being "pretty o.k."  It seemed like one of those shows that audiences and critics alike found to be mildly entertaining and always non-offensive, but it clearly wasn't making a huge impression on either side of the fence.  I still have not watched the first two seasons (UPDATE: I later caught up on seasons 1 & 2 and it doesn't change anything I wrote here but I did add some extra thoughts on them in another post), but from what I've read, it seems that the show never had real compelling ongoing arcs that people could latch onto.  I've heard that the nature of it was more episodic, and the character development possibly somewhat lacking.  I read an A.V. Club article the other day that says the following in regards to seasons 1 and 2: "... central character Annie was never tasked to change, but only to occupy her time going on various disconnected missions, [so] the show attempted to generate interest elsewhere by shifting the secondary characters around her, with ever-diminishing results."  The same article also describes the show during this time to be "aggressively mediocre, and [it] seemed to be completely content existing in that mediocrity, which was somehow almost worse."

But then, it seems - and here's where it gets weird - God said, "let there be light," and there was season 3.  I heard rumblings on Twitter that people were pleasantly surprised by the season, and it seemed that maybe the writers had sort of bucked their previous trend or changed up their formula a bit, with good results.  So I checked out episode 3.2 out of boredom and curiosity, and then several weeks later I caught most of episode 8.  Episode 8 was the one that accomplished the t.v. equivalent of sucker punching me in the face.  I was shocked at how much it pulled me in, so then I went back and watched episodes 3.1 through 3.7 in order, and was again surprised and confounded that the show I was watching was NOT the show I thought Covert Affairs was.  As a matter of fact, what I was watching actually seemed like a pretty damn good show.

Edit: O.k. so the fact that I'm writing this post prompted me to go back and watch the pilot episode to give myself more background on where this show started vs. where it is today.  I also watched ep 1.2, because it's hard to judge any series based solely on its pilot - which usually tends to be an amped up and slightly bizarro version of the overall series.  Conclusion: Yeah.  "Pretty o.k." is exactly the right description.  There are definite issues.  It does seem like the show I'm watching here is setting the series up for a pretty episodic mission-of-the-week type deal, and the only major ongoing arc I see is the Ben Mercer thing, which I actually find by far to be the most obnoxious and cheesy storyline in these two episodes.  It's like they're trying to add a CW teen soap element to a spy show with that plot.  Lame and unnecessary.  The "how do I balance my spy and family life" is indeed very heavy, including what I used to refer to on Alias as angsty "ovulation music" during these scenes.  (I'll confess I'm actually a huge sucker for great soundtrack music in key scenes, just not when the music is overly cheesy.  By contrast, the music used in 3.8 "Glass Spider" was perfection.)  It also seems like it's focusing more on trying to fit in several action/fight scenes to each episode than it is on telling an interesting and slightly more realistic story.  BUT, with all that said, I do see the potential in here for a decent show to possibly dig its way out of this.

So how did this show transform from what it was in the first couple episodes to what it is now?  Well, first off, I have a feeling it was not as instant and magical as the writers suddenly taking some sort of awesome pill right before they started to break season 3.  I'm betting that a few major factors of improvement were probably gradual, and the reason I say that is because I watched the season finale of season 2, "Letters Never Sent," and I actually thought it was quite good.  It was a much more mature show on several levels than eps 1.1-2.  First off, it seems that the writers were focused much more on simply telling a good story by this point than they were on trying to fill a quota of crazy fight/action scenes and drama/angsty scenes.  And the action that did occur in this episode was written and filmed more elegantly ... I really liked the style and suspense of the final scene in the cottage where the bad guy is attempting to root out Annie and Danielle to try to kill them.  Well done IMO ... felt more like a cool spy movie than a t.v. show.  Secondly, Danielle is clearly in on Annie's CIA career by this point, which always makes things more interesting and makes her character less annoying.  It also cuts out the obligatory "OMG Danielle is so pissed at me but I can't tell her the truth!!" subplots that quickly grow tiresome (for reference, see: Francie Calfo, Will Tippin, Ellie Bartowski, Captain Awesome, Skyler White).  Thirdly, it's apparent that Annie herself has gone through a certain amount of maturation by this point due to now having a couple years experience in the spy life.  I found her character in the pilot episode to be precocious and eager to the point of being a bit obnoxious at times, but I didn't see any of that in her here.

And lastly, the drama/angsty storylines in this episode felt significantly more mature as well.  I found Auggie to be charming and likeable right from the get-go, from his first scene in the pilot, so there were never any issues there, but I found his storyline in "Letters" to be surprisingly compelling.  Without getting into the details, it involves him realizing via medical tests that he will likely never be able to regain his sight, and I thought it was an affective story about coming to terms with loss and the fact that you can never fix or reverse certain things that happen in your life.  i.e., Sometimes life is just kinda shitty and there's nothing you can do about it but move on - a very "adult" theme for a show that I've seen described as "Gossip Girl with spies" in its earlier episodes.  I saw ZERO trace of that CW-soapy element in this episode, and that douchebag Ben Mercer was nowhere to be found either, thank god.  :-P  Not sure what happened to that dude but I hope he never comes back.

This more mature quality continues into season 3 as well.  It just has a non-nonsense quality that I find to be a refreshing change of pace from the wacky fantastical spy shows I've loved in the past like Alias and Chuck (on the non-wacky side, 24 bored me but I absolutely love Homeland).  So then what else does season 3 have that improves on what I just described?  I think the key is that the writers seem to have made a concerted effort on two hugely important factors this season: a) more serialized storytelling with compelling long arcs, and b) more character development for Annie.  A and B have actually been quite intertwined, as they should be, because it's the season long story arc that has provided all the character development.  And of course that would mean nothing if the story arc was not as good as it has been.  I'll also add that the new characters they introduced for it and guest actors they used - Sarah Clarke as Lena and Richard Coyle as Simon - have been fantastic as well.  Both of them keep you glued to the screen for every second they're on it.  I had never heard of Richard Coyle before this, but damn, he has been downright captivating and I hope to see him in other great roles in the future.

Annie's character arc has been excellent as well.  (Warning: SPOILERS follow from this point forward.)  Re-assigning Annie to Lena's division and putting her on the "long con" with Simon ... allowing her to start to fall for him (which seems to be a pattern with her), and he for her, only to then have it all blow up in her face and to be framed for treason by the person she put all her trust into with this job ... well I mean ... this is a lot of shit to deal with.  Including the mental trauma of Simon's murder and the serious physical trauma at the hands of Lena.  As a side note, major props to the writers for throwing these huge plot twists/developments in smack dab in the middle of the season rather than waiting for the last 5 seconds of the season finale.  I hate that tactic, because putting months and months in between such a hugely important part of the story always takes away from it IMO.  Putting it midseason allows us to see it ALL play out rather than feeling like we've been cheaply teased and then having it glossed over in the next season.

Now, here's the thing.  These plot developments all just came crashing down in episode 8, and we're only 10 eps in, so I'm still not sure of how this is all gonna play out.  There are still 6 more eps this season, which still gives the writers plenty of time to screw the pooch.  But the thing that has given me hope and what has prompted me to write this blog post is that they could have taken this story in MANY lame or cheesy directions in ep 10 ("Let's Dance"), given that it was the first time Annie was awake and the audience could actually see her reaction to everything that went down ... but I thought the direction they took it in was exactly spot on.  It was maybe slightly jarring to go from Annie flatlining directly to Annie lacing up her shoes and breaking into Lena's house, BUT I totally get that we couldn't spend a full episode with her laying on the couch recovering, doing internet research on Lena's past and catching up on all the latest Kardashian and Teen Mom episodes.  But then the Annie we pick up with in ep 10, with a couple/few months time jump since the shooting, is clearly changed.  And that, to me, is the key - because, as enjoyable as the main story arc this season has been, none of that is more than just the typical fluffy cool entertainment that you'd see on any primetime t.v. drama, unless it actually has legitimate consequences for the characters.

If this was just your average shitshow, the route the Covert writers would take with this is to spend ep 11 on the big dramatic escape from Russia, and then get Annie back to D.C. and say, "Whew, glad that's over!!  What's the next mission?"  And then she would be reset back to the status quo, and the rest of the season and beyond would be spent on new missions and wacky hijinks, and new hot guys to romance.  I seriously hope that is NOT the route they take, because if so then this show will have been a complete waste of my time.  If Covert goes the quality route, it will actually properly deal with everything it has set in place for these characters, and then build new story arcs around that.  How will all this stuff shape Annie's character inside and outside the CIA?  Will she question her career choice?  Will she lose confidence in her abilities as an agent after she got totally played by Lena?  Who is she even as a person after all this?  Has her spirit been killed a little?  Can Auggie help her through this with his past experience?  How about future romance: will she be way more hesitant to get involved with anyone new after the Simon experience?  Would taking two slugs to the chest and having your chest opened up for open heart surgery as a result leave a person with any permanent physical issues?  At the very least, it would limit Annie on future missions from using a cover that involves running around in lowcut dresses or bikinis haha.  But seriously though, if the way this plays out is at all realistic, these would be the exact things this character would have to deal with from this point forward.

Annie's "eager to please" attitude seems to have escaped her here.

I'm the type that focuses way more on characters than anything else in my entertainment.  It's why I think Breaking Bad is one of the best shows ever - the entire premise of the show is about the character evolution of Walter White, as a result of the no-win situation he's been put in.  It's also one of the main reasons Homeland is so brilliant - at the heart of the show is the character study of both Carrie (and how her bipolar disorder affects her negatively and positively) and Brody (and how the hell his experiences in Iraq led him to *spoiler* *spoiler*).  But these are "serious" shows that win Emmys and shit all the time, and this is "just" Covert Affairs right?  A little "fluffy" spy show on USA channel.  I keep trying to write it off as nothing more than fluff, and to put zero faith into it, but then they keep throwing me off and giving me surprisingly meaty eps like "Let's Dance," and it gets my hopes up.  I won’t get into all the rest of the details of that ep because it would take too long, but practically every aspect of it was a slam dunk for me.  Just a couple examples: 1) The last scene with Lena and Annie.  So great, so suspenseful, and both actresses were on fire.  And speaking of fire, this ep actually made me feel bad for the shit I talked about Piper Perabo being nominated for that Golden Globe a couple years ago hahaha.  I haven’t seen all of season one so I can't say if she deserved it then, but after this ep, I’d nominate her myself if I could.  Which brings me to example 2) Annie and Dmitri at the makeshift shooting range.  Annie shifts seamlessly from total badass to cornered/wounded wild animal and then back to focused/determined badass again within a matter of minutes.  Good shit - well written/directed and expertly played miss Piper.

Anywho, so that’s that.  I’m a pessimist, so I’m still fully ready for the next episode of this show to suck each week.  It has been good for many eps in a row now, so I keep waiting for the good stuff to finally peter out.  There are another 2 or 3 weeks until the next new episode, so we’ll see.  Hopefully I didn’t just jinx it by writing this blog post.  D'OH!!