Entourage Needs a 5th Season Pick Me Up
September 3rd 2008 16:20
Entourage premiers its 5th season this week, September 7th and will no undoubtedly attract the massive audience it's been pulling in since its inceptions. However, some of those eyes will be watching with far more skepticism.
As the seasons have progressed and Vinny Chase (Adrian Grenier) and his boys have seen his career trajectory start to plummet, the mood of the show has gone with it. The first few seasons were infectious, each episode filled with sunlight, a party vibe and a general feeling that this was a life most could only dream of. As the seasons have progressed and fortunes have turned whole episodes have gone by with nothing but anger and shadows. I understand the necessity of this for character arc and certain plot lines, so I will not questions the intent. However, I do think the show could do with a Vincent Chase rebound.
We've seen Vince throw away an Aquaman sequel, publicly bash the artistic failures of Queens Boulevard's distribution team and now flop with Billy Walsh's (Rhys Coiro) "Medellin." Similarly, his grab-life-by-the-balls Agent, Ari Gold (expertly played by Jeremy Piven) has been on a similar downhill: losing his assistant, failing to get his son into private school and constant fights with the Mrs. Vince's manager, Eric's (Kevin Connelly) once promising career is fledgling and the show has all but forgotten about Turtle (Jerry Ferrara) and his music venture. The only character experiencing any success is Johnny Drama (Kevin Dillon) who scored a hit TV show.
It's about time the show hit an upswing again. Vince is becoming much like a real life Nick Cage, he puts out films and people just seem to shy away from them. I'm not saying he needs to have a Robert Downey Jr. type of comeback, but a sniff of success would help liven up the show again. That could hopefully put Ari back in ball-busting mode where he offends everybody and makes people laugh in the process. At-home Ari is interesting in spurts, but not nearly as much fun to watch as powerhouse agent Ari.
Similarly, Turtle needs to get back on track. I know its funny to watch him and Drama argue about furry fetishes and where to buy their weed, but it can't all be a big Turtle beatdown. His storyline with Saigon was promising and very interesting. It unfolded another side of the Hollywood dream and gave Turtle some relevance. I think that's an avenue that needs to be pursued again. As is commitment-friendly E. When E was with Sloan, or Emily, or Kristen and the rest of the guys scoured the town for the hottest thing they could find, it created a great character difference that was easy to fill with jokes. Now that E is single, and everybody else is, and they all seem too worried by other things, they romance and sexual aspect of the show seems to have gone.
While I have high hopes for Season 5, there are still some troubling elements. For instance, the rumor that the character of Dom (Domenick Lombardozzi) will come back in full force. His character didn't fit the first time, creating an annoying hanger-on that nobody wanted to see on screen. The other problem is that Vince is signed on to star in "Silo" another Billy Walsh movie. The out-there, Billy, idea has already been used to death and I worry that another Billy movie will just result in more fights with E, more arguments with Vince and more clamoring about how awful the business of Hollywood is.
It's about time they embraced that business again. Showing the guys some success and sending them on another great trip, which produced awesome episodes for Sundance and Vegas. Regardless of what happens, I'll be eagerly waiting by the TV when they HBO logo pops up on my screen.
As the seasons have progressed and Vinny Chase (Adrian Grenier) and his boys have seen his career trajectory start to plummet, the mood of the show has gone with it. The first few seasons were infectious, each episode filled with sunlight, a party vibe and a general feeling that this was a life most could only dream of. As the seasons have progressed and fortunes have turned whole episodes have gone by with nothing but anger and shadows. I understand the necessity of this for character arc and certain plot lines, so I will not questions the intent. However, I do think the show could do with a Vincent Chase rebound.
We've seen Vince throw away an Aquaman sequel, publicly bash the artistic failures of Queens Boulevard's distribution team and now flop with Billy Walsh's (Rhys Coiro) "Medellin." Similarly, his grab-life-by-the-balls Agent, Ari Gold (expertly played by Jeremy Piven) has been on a similar downhill: losing his assistant, failing to get his son into private school and constant fights with the Mrs. Vince's manager, Eric's (Kevin Connelly) once promising career is fledgling and the show has all but forgotten about Turtle (Jerry Ferrara) and his music venture. The only character experiencing any success is Johnny Drama (Kevin Dillon) who scored a hit TV show.
It's about time the show hit an upswing again. Vince is becoming much like a real life Nick Cage, he puts out films and people just seem to shy away from them. I'm not saying he needs to have a Robert Downey Jr. type of comeback, but a sniff of success would help liven up the show again. That could hopefully put Ari back in ball-busting mode where he offends everybody and makes people laugh in the process. At-home Ari is interesting in spurts, but not nearly as much fun to watch as powerhouse agent Ari.
Similarly, Turtle needs to get back on track. I know its funny to watch him and Drama argue about furry fetishes and where to buy their weed, but it can't all be a big Turtle beatdown. His storyline with Saigon was promising and very interesting. It unfolded another side of the Hollywood dream and gave Turtle some relevance. I think that's an avenue that needs to be pursued again. As is commitment-friendly E. When E was with Sloan, or Emily, or Kristen and the rest of the guys scoured the town for the hottest thing they could find, it created a great character difference that was easy to fill with jokes. Now that E is single, and everybody else is, and they all seem too worried by other things, they romance and sexual aspect of the show seems to have gone.
While I have high hopes for Season 5, there are still some troubling elements. For instance, the rumor that the character of Dom (Domenick Lombardozzi) will come back in full force. His character didn't fit the first time, creating an annoying hanger-on that nobody wanted to see on screen. The other problem is that Vince is signed on to star in "Silo" another Billy Walsh movie. The out-there, Billy, idea has already been used to death and I worry that another Billy movie will just result in more fights with E, more arguments with Vince and more clamoring about how awful the business of Hollywood is.
It's about time they embraced that business again. Showing the guys some success and sending them on another great trip, which produced awesome episodes for Sundance and Vegas. Regardless of what happens, I'll be eagerly waiting by the TV when they HBO logo pops up on my screen.
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