Weeds - Season Four

After compelling second and third seasons, season four receded back to the quality of season one. This wasn't necessarily due to poor writing; it was more to do with the direction they chose to take the story. Having Nancy and her family skip town and go into hiding in a nice little beach town by the Mexican border just didn't offer much in the way of excitement, tension, danger, plot twists, or cliffhangers. In general it was still entertaining and funny, and they managed to keep most of the characters in the show (except for Conrad and Heylia, but I don't particularly miss them), but it feels like a let-down when the last two seasons were hitting their stride with constant cliffhangers. It may also be that Nancy's new boss, Guillermo, is not as intimidating as U-Turn was last season, and her relationship with Mayor/Kingpin Esteban didn't have the same sense of underlying danger as her secret marriage to the DEA agent in season two. I think the season picked up slightly after Albert Brooks's character left, because until then it focused too heavily on the Botwin family.

But there were still fun moments to enjoy. Nancy uncovering the secret tunnel under the maternity store (blurting "What the F?", which somehow was funnier than actually swearing) was a landmark moment, and Doug and Andy starting an immigrant-smuggling business was great because those two doofuses work well together comedically. And I was a fan of the title sequences this season (no more awful theme song covers!), from the classic one in the premiere shown one last time - but with everything in Agrestic now on fire - to the new format, which is to write the title on a significant object from the episode and have something in the image morph into a marijuana leaf. I'm a nerd for that kind of thing, so I actually looked forward to those titles each episode.

Best Episode: "No Man is Pudding", in which Celia comes to stay and the Botwins have a family dinner where everybody looks less than healthy, Andy realizes how poorly the illegal immigrants are treated, and Guillermo gives Nancy a seemingly boring and average job with more to it below the surface (literally).