Are any of you watching
Manhunt: Unibomber, on the Discovery Channel and want to discuss it? Tonight is Part 5 of an 8 part series. (One can find the first 4 parts On Demand.)
It seems to be pretty good so far, though some parts I think are annoying. What I think is good is that instead of the usual dry formula for true crime stories, where there is a narrator telling about the events and then they show snips of melodramatic reenactments by actors obviously portraying the real people, this series is done in the style of a super-long
Criminal Minds episode. And since they know anyone who's been around for the last 30 years & socially aware, loosely knows of the Unibomber and how he was caught. (There's even a reference to this in
Good Will Hunting.) So this show isn't playing this like a whodunit mystery. Anyone can Wiki the full history. And, it's not a biography of Ted Kaczynski. Instead, they use flashbacks to the last couple years of the 17 year FBI manhunt instead of the whole story.
The show is presented through one agent's point of view: "Fitz." He's the new, very green agent to the case. He's very much a "Reid" type of character. He's in the process of creating a new process of profiling, calling it "Forensic linguistics." It's incredible how much they disparage and dismiss his work and attempts.
Since the show is shown through his point of view, it's hard to know how much of that was real, and how much was his perception.
Although, Wiki says, John Douglas, who created behavioral profiling and started the Behavioral Science Unit, as it was known then, (and CM creators have confirmed Douglas was the basis for Gideon & Rossi's characters,) says, "At the time of criminal profiling's conception, Douglas claimed to have been doubted and criticized by his own colleagues until both police and the FBI realized that he had developed an extremely useful tool for the capture of criminals." So maybe Fitz really was demeaned that much. Douglas actually DID get the original profile right for the Unibomber
but it was replaced with a different, traditional profile that went on the physical evidence instead of behavior.
And the two bozo agents who are continually disparaging Fitz and got a subsequent profile wrong, that they went with for 13 years before Fitz was brought in on the case, are really annoying with their bad, one note acting.
They remind me of the two FBI agents in
Die Hard, Agent Johnson & Special Agent Johnson.
Again, it's hard to know if it's just Fitz' point of view or they really were that bad, as they did get the profile wrong, yet kept insisting they were right.
Still, I think I will watch the whole series.