Personally, I enjoyed Season 5. Julia Stiles and Michael C Hall had great chemistry and the storyline kept things relatively tied together. The ending was a bit of a cop-out though.

What is dead may never die

I accept that. Those games were awesome.

*crunch* *crunch* *snort* *snort*

I was so excited for that show. The premise was interesting, James Purefoy is awesome, and it was about time for Kevin Bacon to do something great again. And then I watched it… :(

"I guess I never thought of myself as an angry man."
"Well, you do a good job of hiding it, and I suppose most folks don't see it, but honestly, you're the angriest man I have ever known."

I was hoping for some Blues Brothers

Yeah, Tully would be displeased

Reminded me of the Blues Brothers

The cops in this show are entirely useless. I don't think we've seen actual police work at any point, ever. Still enjoyed his blow-up with Jax though. Refreshing to see someone call him out for the brutal thug he is.

Yeah, you'd drop in at the local strip joint and SAMCRO would execute you.

I love the way he plays John. He puts on a very grim exterior, but underneath he's obviously very vulnerable. Basically the polar opposite of Martine.

I actually really like Martine. She's clearly a clinical psychopath, who is adept at understanding human interaction and manipulating it, but you can tell she doesn't feel it herself. That's actually a really neat portrayal of the character, since the show is mainly composed of people with blunted, hidden, and layered…

Gotta wonder if that was John or Jim grinning. ;)

I have a feeling that whatever happens, Shaw will get to take down Dominic. After all, they have unfinished business. John constantly gets in Dominic's way and wrecks his plans, but they don't have the same personal relationship. Then again, they might mess with our expectations and have Fusco do it. ;)

I think this is part of the overall question of the show. Finch and Root have very different interpretations of what The Machine is. I'm of the opinion that it has evolved beyond our ability to fully grasp and that it has its own agenda, whatever that might be. There is a great episode in S4 that deals with this issue…

I'll take Shaw/Fusco banter over almost anything

Exactly. They are used to being power players/brokers, not running and hiding from everything. They're struggling to come to terms with their newfound impotency (hopefully not literal) and have been sloppy because of it. These layers are part of what make the show so great, even within the limitations of network TV.

I actually loved the reveal because it caught Team Machine so off guard. Shaw seemed furious that Dominic had managed to play her, when the truth was so obvious; I think she felt like a fool and wanted to punish him for it.

My bad. I blame morning-brain.