Las Vegas: Season 2

Photo Credit: Copyright ©2005 Universal Studios Home Entertainment.

 
The NBC series Las Vegas is a perfectly harmless little piece of television. And that’s exactly the problem with it.

I had never seen an episode of the show until I watched the DVD of the second season. Against my will, I found myself sucked in. I’ve always been a sucker for stories about surveillance and bugs and wiretapping and the like. The movie “The Conversation” is a personal favorite, and I love the general themes of invasion of privacy that stories about surveillance usually delve in to.

Las Vegas, about the security staff at a casino primarily and secondarily about the other workers at that casino, offers none of that. It’s just another attempt at empty TV escapism, designed to numb minds after a hard day at the office. It’s popcorn TV.

But is that such a bad thing? Especially when it’s executed as well as this? I would argue yes.

When we see a popcorn movie, we’re seeing something escapist, to be sure, but film, as a medium and artform, has evolved so far beyond simply being escapist all the time that a little harmless fun out at the edges of the greater world body of cinema is perfectly excusable. Television, evolve though it tries, usually ends up mired in a miasma of cop shows and Aaron Spelling clones. Even when one is done really well, it does absolutely nothing to advance the artform.

In short, Las Vegas is a throwback. It’s like The Love Boat on land. It’s got hot guys, hot girls, all of the cool camera tricks it can rip off and a fancy setting—oh, and James Caan growling at the camera, having a fine time hamming it up.

That’s all there is. Say what you will about the extended “serials” that make up too little of the TV landscape (Lost, 24, Arrested Development, etc.), but they generally have intricate storylines that try to say something about the world we live in today. Whether or not you agree with Deadwood’s vision of America in microcosm, you have to admit it’s at least making an attempt to portray such issues.

In addition, television has yet to experiment in any way shape or form. It remains stubbornly attached to the traditional episodic narrative format. Film has blossomed through storytellers who realized that the story could sometimes be secondary (or non-existent) if you had compelling images. Television has yet to reach that point.

It should keep trying. Television has not yet earned the right to throwbacks, so a show like Las Vegas—occasionally well made, often entertaining, but ultimately disposable—is not worth your time if you’re a serious TV aficionado.

If you just want something to watch while you kick back at night… you could do worse.

Give me a fascinating failure over a show that doesn’t try too hard any day.