White Collar: Bottlenecked

Alongside a regular review of Chuck one of the other shows I will be following on this blog is White Collar. White Collar is a new show that first aired on 23rd October 09 on the USA network. Its debut season has gone very well with the show garnering a lot of positive reviews as well as receiving good viewing figures.

The show centres on the story of Neal Caffrey, a white collar criminal who ends up working for the FBI. The charasmatic Caffrey played by Matthew Bomer strikes up an unlikely partnership with FBI agent Peter Burke (Tim DeKay) as they solve white collar crimes in New York city.

Bottlenecked sees Neal go up against an old adversary, Matthew Keller, who is a blue collar version of himself. The show featured its usual mix of style, charm & little mystery to create an entertaining episode. Here are some thoughts on Bottlenecked:

• The supporting cast were a bit light in this episode with only Moz making any significant contribution. Elizabeth was entirely absent, which while I like the character is good thing every now and then. After all its hard to accept her appearance in every episode given that she is not directly linked to the investigations.
• The show hardly suffers from focusing on its two leads as they play so well off each other. Peter's beginning to pick up some of Neal habits after using a sly method to get hold of the sellers name from the auction house. Neal meanwhile seems to be just as concerned with catching Keller for the murder of a petty thief than he does for beating his old rival. Neal is becoming more FBI man than criminal.
• Neal's & Keller's interplay was also well done. It helped that Keller brought an edge to his character. You could really understand the hatred that Neal had for Keller. Plus it was good to see a worthy adversary for Neal.
• Loved the bizarro reference by Peter as DeKay played the bizarro Jerry in an episode of Seinfeld.
• Why are all museum curators/auctioneers or anyone else associated with fine arts in US TV shows always English?
• The Kate storyline still doesn't make a lot of sense but I suppose with only two shows left of the current series we will get a resolution pretty soon. Or at least I hope we will. The other aspect of the Kate storyline is that it doesn't allow Neal to play the romantic angle with the host of beautiful women that always seem to be on the show.
• The twist with the bottle was good & not something I saw coming. You wouldn't expect Neal & Peter to be out smarted.
• The wine tasting reminded me of Frasier for some reason. Particularly when Peter commented 'It's a tasting Neal - nose to bottle take a sip & say something pretentious like rich with nice body".

Overall another good episode and I look forward to seeing what's in store for the end of the current season.