White Collar Season Two

 I'm really disappointed to report that season two of White Collar did not live up to my expectations. The show follows an FBI agent and his criminal partner as they investigate white collar crimes (forgeries, bank robberies, art theft, etc.). Unfortunately all of the things I adored about the first season didn't last into the second. Not that it was bad, I enjoyed it, but it didn’t blow me away in the same way.

First, what drew me in to the show was the unconventional pairing of the two series leads. I loved watching them learn to work together and trust each other. They were all over the place in this season and their relationship didn't grow. Worst of all, it ended with them having a huge fight, that I’m not sure can be satisfactorily resolved. I hated everything about the season finale.

Tying into this is that there were a ton of episodes where nothing seemed to happen...because so much was happening with the series storyline. While the overarching storylines for the season and the series are intriguing, what I enjoy is the heist, con, or case that we encounter episode to episode. Around the middle of the season, all of the episodes focused on the season storyline and each episode storyline seemed clichéd at best. And speaking of clichés... the last half of the season had dialog so bad that I was literally rolling my eyes.

Then there are the women. I mentioned in my review of season one how much I love Burke's wife and their healthy relationship. In the first half of season two, Mrs. Suit, as Mozzy so affectionately calls her, is relegated to a conversation here and there. I could overlook that, because she is brought back for some decent storylines at the end, but Neil's love interests drove me crazy.

How do you go from chasing a mystery because the girl you love is dead to
making out with the girl you made out with before you met the girl you loved?  

The driving force of the season two storyline is Neil's grief over Kate's death. He wants to find her killer and he is working to get past her death. At some point, and I'm not totally sure where this happened, he kept wanting to find Kate's killer, but all the sudden felt like he could pursue other woman. It's fine for him to pursue other women, as I didn't particularly care for Kate, but I found it strange and unsettling that he can go from being absolutely in love with a dead girl to kind of into two girls. I just didn't like it. Also, I don't like Alex. She bores me as a character and only leads Neil to bad decisions. However, I love Sarah. She is one of my favorite characters, right up there with Mozzy. She is absolutely the kind of girl that Neil needs in his life. Alex interfering pissed me off, instead of creating enjoyable conflict and tension.

I will watch season three, but I have reservations. Most of the characters are still awesome and there are some great moments, but most of the season left me shaking my head as characters acted out of character and storylines were consistently unoriginal.