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It's
all change at the offices of Hoffman and Associates. In an
effort to save his marriage, and family, Ted Hoffman has left
the firm and is travelling in Europe with Annie and Lizzie.
Lisa and Lila have also left the firm. Successful prosecution
attorney, Jimmy Wyler, disappointed that he's been passed
over for promotion walks out of his office and manages to
land the job as head of Hoffman and Associates. But
can a successful prosecution attorney make the transition
to the other side of the law - defending instead of prosecuting?...
Despite
the ridiculous situation under which this season starts -
would a company's boss really just up and leave? And can't
his team manage without him? Why is it that they seem to be
in such bad financial shape? - the second season of Murder
One has a fairly promising beginning. Unlike
season one, season two doesn't just follow one trial. Instead,
it follows three different cases - all of which start and
end at different junctures.
The first case concerns a woman, Sharon Rooney, who has confessed
to murdering her former lover, the governor of California
Tom Van Allan, and his current mistress. Jimmy Wyler has his
work cut out for him trying to prove that Rooney didn't commit
these murders - especially as she admitted that she was guilty
to him, and then later very verbally while in court.
The
second case sees Ricky Latrell, a basketball player, employing
Wyler's services to ensure he is not accused of the murder
of his team's owner.
The
final case, which also makes for the most dramatic piece of
television out of the three, sees Wyler reluctantly agree
to represent Clifford Banks, branded by the press as the 'Street
Sweeper'. Banks justifies the murders he has committed of
violent criminals - men he decided have not paid their debt
to society and are still a danger to the public. Simultaneously
hailed and reviled as a vigilante striving for justice, the
now incarcerated Banks causes major complications for his
defence team as he revels in the media frenzy surrounding
his case.
For
the first eight episodes the action moves along at a breakneck
pace and I thought that season two had managed to crack the
format that had ensured that the first season was compulsive
viewing. While I had serious reservations about the producers
replacing the Yul Bryner-ish Daniel Benzali with the Al Pacino-like
Anthony LaPaglia, it didn't take long to warm to him - once
the weak plot device, that had him as a bit of a loser, badly
in debt and a little corrupt, was forgotten about
Once
this all settled down it was like Wyler had always been the
head of Hoffman and Associates. I was just starting
to enjoy how everything was unravelling when the producers
wrapped up the first crime case. Goodbye Ms Rooney,
let's move onto the b-story (the Latrell case) to carry the
show for a few episodes. Oh, bad mistake. This story hadn't
been developed properly in order for it to take over the reigns
and so we have a couple of episodes where all the team is
dealing with is the Latrell case. Scene after scene set in
the court room starts to get very boring, very quickly.
The
sad thing about this is the fact that the Latrell case does
end up being powerful viewing towards its conclusion, but
there really wasn't enough material there to allow it to be
stretched out over a few episodes as the only story.
The
final case elevates the show from average to very good. Pruitt
Taylor Vince is incredibly believable as the unhinged serial
killer who strongly believes in dishing out his own style
of punishment.
As
with season one, there isn't a single actor who doesn't deliver
100%. But, again, I wanted to single out the wonderful Barbara
Bosson as the
tenacious prosecuting attorney Miriam Grasso. Without her
presence many of the court room scenes would have been unbearable
to watch.
The
only real extra on this collection is a featurette that includes
recent interviews with some of the main actors. This helps
to get a feel for the background to the show - how the actors
were waiting on a week by week basis to see how they had done
in the ratings. And, being up against Friends, we now
know that they didn't do as well as expected.
It's
a great shame that this show never got a third season. What
was a very entertaining show lived too fast and died too young.
Now that's a crime worth looking into.
Darren
Rea
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