WORSE JACKIE

Showtime's Nurse Jackie has always been an entertaining if flawed program.  From the way it dragged out the secret of Jackie's addiction into the 2nd season, to the slap-stick absurdity of Cooper's boob grabbing, and now, it seems to me, the way the characters have become caricatures (Thor and Zoe for instance), it has been skating on increasingly thin ice. 

The reason why many of the characters are left standing around with nothing to do except slyly speculate about Jackie's new romance, or reel off zingers at appropriate moments, is part and parcel of the shows original charm:  the secret and unknowable life of Jackie Peyton (Edie Falco).  Nobody can really get close or have more than a superficial relationship with her.  Even Dr. O'Harrah, who Jackie truly confided in, fell victim to Jackie's addictive behavior.

Now that O'Harrah has gone and Jackie's split with ex-husband Kevin is final, there's room for a special someone in Jackie's life.  Of all the interesting people in the whole city of New York they had to pair Jackie up with, the producers of the show chose a New York City cop.  He's so New York down to earth you can practically smell the coffee and doughnuts on his breath.  Despite, the Season 5 promos talking about the wonderful chemistry of the actors and how perfect Adam Ferrara is as Officer Frank Verelli, the romance feels a bit canned to me.

My larger objection is yet another intrusion of law enforcement personnel into our lives.  Even a fictional one.  It isn't bad enough that we've been conditioned and softened up to accept the burgeoning police state and the excesses of the criminal justice system with the Law and Order franchise, CSI crime procedurals, shows about elite military crime fighters and psychological profiling teams, but when Nurse Jackie needs a man in her life, somebody who is "good" for her, wouldn't you know we'd get her a policeman. The metaphoric message is there for all of us to internalize.  More law and order is more security.  Or in Frankenspeak:  "Cop Good; freedom bad!"  It might be good for addict Jackie one year into recovery, but I for one would like a lot less big brother in my life.  I heard Bill Maher talk about the 4th amendment being obsolete and I just about foamed at the mouth.  Privacy in the global internet age may be a practical impossibility, but it doesn't make privacy any less fundamental a right.

But law and order is what we're about and what we've become.  A country that is immature about its freedoms, must then obsess about its excesses with an excess dose of the antidote.  So while Americans find a million ways to get themselves into trouble on-line--with sexting, racist tweets, racy photos, illegal porn, internet fraud, hook up sites, breaches of job confidentiality on Facebook--you name it--at the end of the day we have those guys in uniform to make us feel we've got it all under control, or, at least, somebody has.