Set in the cookie-cutter nouveau rich suburbs of some nondescript southern California neighborhood with an Orange County flavor to it, Showtime’s Weeds has made for compelling television for the last 3 seasons.
Part of the show’s success has been the juxtaposition of a widowed mother making a living as a pot dealer juxtaposed with a community of infantile hedonists. This juxtaposition blurs the lines of “proper society” and immorality and has the effect of exposing the moral bankruptcy of middle-class consumer values in a way that is always pungent and entertaining.
Now we’re in Season Four and after a raging fire the family has moved near the Mexican border, the mom makes a living trafficking drugs from Tijuana to a major dealer and we see the family acclimating to a cranky relative’s home. The cranky relative is none other than Albert Brooks, one of my favorite actors.
Having said this, I’m sad to say that after two episodes the show leaves me cold. Albert Brooks is to sensitive and neurotic to be a convincing crank spewing expletives. He seems miscast.
But more damning Weeds seems to run out of ideas. What is the show about? I hate to say this but it seems to be about nothing.
I’ll keep watching to see if I’m wrong. I hope I am, but I’ve got a nagging feeling that this is Weed’s final season.
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