By LillyKat
PTR Senior Staff Writer
Sometimes, things really are better the second time around.
Or when you do actually get a second chance to make a first impression.
Case in point: Saving Grace returning here to PTR after we swore we were done watching the show – as in, could not wait for it to just.go.away. It was last summer’s biggest disappointment as far as we were concerned – some sort of soft-porn-in-your-face-overly-recycled-premise that was all over the map and gave us no real reason to care about whether anyone should save Grace Hanadarko.
And yet, if you’ve been following PTR these last couple of weeks, you know we’ve had the opportunity to do some promotion of the show as it prepared for its second season premiere. Ironically enough, it has been as a direct result of that opportunity – with our visit to the set and interviews with the cast members – that I came to feel as if I should give the show a second chance.
And I’m quite glad I did.
In tuning into the second season premiere last night on TNT (titled “Have a Seat, Earl”), I found myself going, “’kay … this is what I thought last season was supposed to be like.”
Seriously.
Grace, whilst still a wild child (heck, there’d be no show if she wasn’t), actually seemed to have a conscious.The shock and awe factor seemed to no longer be about how many HHWMs (Holly Hunter Wardrobe Malfunctions) we had or creating a basic cable alternative for watching soft porn. Instead, it was about story with serious resonance – Grace dealing with the priest who molested her as a child and of which Angel Earl deliberately put back in her life.
Disclosure: I’m coming into this premiere having opted to ditch watching a four episode arc in December, when Grace (alongside The Closer), aired this batch of “special” episodes. Essentially, they were an extension of the first season but withheld by TNT to get a bit more bang for the buck come December, and in turn, make the hiatus not seem quite so long.
The good news: I only seemed to have missed the fact that those episodes served to reveal that Grace was in fact molested by her Catholic priest (played brilliantly by Star Trek: Deep Space Nine alum Rene Auberjonois) beginning when she was 9-years-old and of whom is now the focal point of the premiere.
Or, should I say, Grace’s rage, anger and all-points in between, including her kidnapping - almost - executes - the - guy song and dance number, is the focal point.
Wowza.
When she unrolls him out of the carpet (no doubt having thrown him in the trunk of her car to truck him back from his “retired” life in Tulsa), I now get why Lorraine Toussiant told us: “The season premiere is a bit provocative – she tortures a freakin’ priest!”
No joke. But you know what? Given the subject matter, and how the Catholic Church has gotten away with this sort of absolutely deviant and disgusting behavior FOR-EVER, I was like, “You go, Grace. Kill him.”
True, not the Angel Earl way, but whatever. It was the story I was intrigued by, not the shock value. I could finally start to see Grace outside of her wild-childness.
I actually cared about her.
Turns out Father Murphy (or Father Satan Murphy, as Rehtta liked to call him) gets offed in the end by an unlikely source – another cop who was also molested. The kicker? Said cop turns out to be … how should we say … a little too willing to give his own fiancé’s daughter a bath when she’s 11-years-old. At that revelatory moment, it was the second time I said, “Whoa ...” whilst watching the ep.
A good sign – means I’m really into what I’m watching.
But more than that, Grace’s sense of conscious and purpose won me over. And she seemed, at least to me, to finally be worth saving.
Now, I still don’t think she’s for everybody. She is still hard-charging, still spinning around like Hurricane Issues. And the show could go back to being … well, less than stellar á la its first season.
But in watching Grace struggle with her anger and hatred for Father Murphy, in watching Rhetta fret Grace had gone postal, in watching the squad just be tenderly awestruck at the fact Grace – rebel, badass, all-things tough – had this horrible part of her past come blazing a trail back to the present, in watching her be ripped a part by a former friend of her sister (who died in the Oklahoma City bombing because of Grace’s screw up) remind her she is no hero no matter how many bad guys she takes down, I thought about what Holly Hunter told us this week:
The show had to “find” their balance last season. This season, they already have it.
New episodes air Mondays at 10 p.m. on TNT. You can watch full episodes of the show anytime over on the show’s official Web site. You can also visit EmbraceYourGrace.com to share your stories of how you embrace your inner-Grace.
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