If two seasons of DAMAGES has taught this TV Addict anything, it’s that those who say “No” to Patty Hewes (Glenn Close) do so at their own peril.
Which is why, rather than join Ellen Parsons (Rose Byrne) in turning our backs on New York’s most powerful litigator following two years packed with a seemingly endless cadre of characters and a parade of plot twists so complex they make LOST feel like an easy-to-follow CBS procedural — here we go again, ready and willing to dive in for another season.
Viewers concerned that tonight’s season premiere opens with Parsons trying to move on with her life as a upstanding member of the New York City District Attorney office needn’t be. After-all, Patty Hewes is to the legal profession what Dexter Morgan is to dolling out justice. We may not agree with their methods, but there is absolutely no arguing with the fact that, dammit, they get results. Which means, the question is not so much if Parsons will be brought back into the fold, but when. Particularly with the third season of the FX legal thriller pitting Hewes against her most challenging and potentially dangerous adversary to date: Lily Tomlin.
No really. It’s David versus Goliath when the U.S. government appoints Hewes to recover billions of dollars in stolen (and hidden) assets from a greedy Bernie Madoff-esque tycoon named Louis Tobin (Len Cariou) in a story very-much ripped from the headlines. A task which is made all the more difficult thanks to the the family matriarch Marilyn (Tomlin) who not surprisingly knows far more than she is letting on, her holier-than-though son Joe (Campbell Scott) who harbours one or two secrets of his own and Tobin family lawyer Leonard Winstone (Martin Short) who seems to be willing to do everything in his considerable power to keep the law firm of Hewes & Associates from getting to the bottom of things.
Add to that the mysterious introduction of Julian “sort of an architect” Decker (Keith Carradine), an equally evasive homeless man, and one surprise so killer that we wouldn’t dare spoil it here and once again DAMAGES flawlessly sets the stage, time jumps and all, for another highly explosive and equally addictive season.
In other words: Just when we thought we were out… they pull us back in. Big Time. Grade: A-
DAMAGES premieres tonight on FX at 10PM (Sunday January 31 at 10PM on Showcase in Canada)
Photo Credit: Craig Blankenhorn/FX