holy crap.

i was flipping through the channels tonight and just saw something absolutely gripping. despite my goings-on about cartoons, i am not a big fan of most tv shows, so this really surprised me—enough to make me blog about it i suppose.

i stumbled into the show in media res, catching the tail end of a fractured (been favoring that word lately) montage of images and sound bytes, clipped phrases over flashing explanatory stills. suddenly the motion stopped as the protagonist made a connection, some sort of grim realization that he was facing something truly dangerous and horrific, and the pause was agonizingly tense. i was trapped.

i actually didn't recognize mandy patinkin at all. i was too caught up in the subtle yet obvious look of terror on his frozen face, in his eyes. i was terrified as we watched the unstable mad-eyed murderer approach in the mirror. the sound of the cocking shotgun made us both jump and blink.

i didn't realize how much this had taken hold of me until i caught me going over that theme i've ruminated on in the past, of how many people simply have never experienced a number of such things as the pain of being hit so incredibly hard that you actually lose consciousness from the blow. i had just added to that list the terror of being plastered up against a wall with a frightened, twitchy madman pointing a shotgun at the back of your head, your legs buckling as you slowly slide down, down, onto your knees, your heart and your hope sinking along that same path down, down, down.

and somehow (unusual for me) i was also removed enough able to appreciate the surprising fact that this was actually good acting on tv. i guess this was the opening hook, and boy did it work on me.

of course, cut to a group of young and boringly/vaguely attractive people all sitting around the figurative feet of the protagonist as he related the experience. his face looked so much the same as that terrified man from before, i mean, it was such a subtle expression! but now he was relaxed. he threw in a mysterious ending with a mental puzzle to solve. hmm, possibilities, potential.

patinkin's name flashed across the opening credits, and then the whole good acting thing made sense. and then i realized this is that new show with thomas gibson in it—i like him for different reasons—and that was it for me.

oh, and yeah, it really is too bad that mandy patinkin has such a lame-looking website.