Flashpoint: Keep The Peace (Part 2)

Posted by: S.P. Young • December 18, 2012 @ 12:05am

"Last time as Team One."

The series ended with a rather disappointing finale. The thing that hurt it the most, was that this episode relied three times on making it look like a character had died, when in fact, they survived. First, it was Clark. Then it was Sam. Finally, it was Greg. These near death experiences are nothing more than deceptions at making the show more dramatic, but the end result only made it more of a let down.

The other thing that hurt this finale, was the bad guy. Last episode, he was established as that competent and sane antagonist that the series had been desperately short on, but he turned out to be neither. Flashpoint just had to make him stupid enough to leave behind the bomb locations, have incredibly poor aim, and be brainwashed. Yes, brainwashed. Something to do with some evil anarchist university professor with revolution on his mind. So basically, this episode's villain was just another victim who acted out by breaking the law.

As the Strategic Response Unit went to the bomb sites, they quickly demonstrated their immense incompetence. Just like in last week's episode, the SRU members all proved to be deficient in the art of bomb defusal, as all the members had to rely on Spike to guide them through defusing the bombs.

Remember that storyline of Ed shooting the girl, that was supposed to be the central focus of this season? Well, that went absolutely nowhere.

At best, it could be explained that with therapy, Ed overcame his inability of pulling the trigger, by killing the bad guy by shooting him in the back. How many police shows can top that in its series finale?

One year later, it turned out that Greg lived to go attend a speech. There was good news for everybody else too. Ed and Sam got promoted. Greg got a new job teaching at the academy, and he actually made a relationship work. Spike got the dispatch girl who changed her mind about dating cops. Jules had her kid. And Leah...

Umm... what happened to Leah? Nothing. The show failed to give her any kind of an ending. Now that is a sign of great writing.

So after five years, Flashpoint has come to an end. The show did a lot of things right, but it was ultimately ruined by the poor writing quality. The fifth season showed more long term planning than the previous seasons, but that did little to improve the show. It was the defining feature of the show -- the reoccurring condescending talking down of the emotionally unstable not-so bad villains, that limited the show's ability to expand beyond its tired formula.

But let us not forget, this is a Canadian produced show. Here in Canada, people are too nice when it comes to criminals. This is a country where it is not uncommon for its citizens to complain openly about prisons locking people away. Whenever some criminal breaks a law, Canadians are quick to make excuses. It is almost as if Canadians are unable to admit that there are such things as really bad people, so they just let criminals use their past to justify their crimes. Flashpoint revels in this belief. This is why the show uses the nice approach of talking and emotionally connecting with criminals, instead of putting down the foot. In every episode, somebody on the opposing side just had to have some blatantly redeemable quality. It was sickening, and it got old fast. But like the general Canadian public, Flashpoint has little intent to change its mind when it came to forgiving criminals.

Tags: Flashpoint, Keep The Peace, Hugh Dillon, Amy Jo Johnson, Enrico Colantoni, Person of Interest, Sergio Di Zio, Power Rangers, Broken Peace, Headstones