Review & Commentary: USA Network’s Burn Notice

I’ve been meaning to do a review of Burn Notice for a while now. The thing is that most of USA Network’s programs are a little too “cutesy” for me. Even my wife, who normally loves that kinda stuff, has grown tired of Psych. Monk remains a favorite of hers, and I’ll admit that I had no trouble stomaching it for the first couple of seasons or so. For me, Monk has become the Home Improvement of the USA Network; I already know what’s going to happen every single episode and that just bores me. “Oh! What’s this one about? Is Monk’s quirkiness going to get him in trouble again? Yuk yuk! Aw, I never thought he’d figure out yet another mystery! That stinker.” Finally, at long-long-last, USA Network gives me Burn Notice!

I like Burn Notice so much that I’m reviewing it even though it hasn’t come out on DVD yet. Now that is something.

If I had to compare Burn Notice to another show, I’d probably go with Alias (which is out on DVD as you can tell). Only Burn Notice is a little funnier and offers us Gabrielle Anwar as the skinny hot chick instead of Jennifer Garner. Sam Rami alumni Bruce Campbell is also part of the mix. Campbell is the perfect guy for the freeloading, hard drinking Sam Axe.

Anyway, here’s the show in a nutshell: Michael Westen (played by Jeffrey Donovan) is a super spy who gets a burn notice from some mysterious higher-ups telling him that he’s out, baby! That’s out, as in out of a job, a career, his money, his home … he’s been burned, you see. But he doesn’t know by who.

Next thing Westen knows, he wakes up in his home town of Miami, Florida with his old girlfriend, an ex-IRA operative named Fiona Glenanne (played by Anwar). From that point forward, all his actions are monitored by government flunkies and he’s warned not to leave Miami for any reason. (If he wants to live and whatnot) Westen ends up turning to his estranged mother and starts using his uber-spy skills to help the helpless like the Equalizer or the A-Team. (The eighties are coming back, I tell ya!) The show is full of smart-guy spy stuff and star Donovan has enough charisma to make Westen a likable character that even I can enjoy.

So go check it out before USA cancels it. Go! Go now, dang it!

-the Atheist Geek-