I Miss "The Guardian"

From:Thinking Weblog
Date:October 27, 2004
Posted by Shrode

It was a TV show that aired its last episode in May with little fanfare or notice. It had been airing on Tuesday Nights at 8pm (CST) on CBS. My wife and I watched it faithfully for all three seasons. What a great show. I suggested we watch the first episode when the show premiered thinking it would be sort of a replacement for “Early Edition”. We liked “Early Edition” because it was a fairly family friendly show about a likeable guy who helped somebody different every week, but without all the sappiness of “Touched By An Angel” and “Highway To Heaven”.

“The Guardian” was supposed to be about a corporate attorney who did community service in a “Children’s Legal Aid” office in Pittsburgh. It was that, but much more. We got a whole lot more than we bargained for. Initially the show was about the main character, Nick Fallin, helping a different kid each week. But it was far from sappy and sweet. Instead the show turned out to be gritty and realistic. The episodes rarely had neat endings, and were often sad. The show was hard to watch at times because it was so sad. But it was so realistic, so well written and so well done we couldn’t stop watching it.

The show, over time, began to focus less on the weekly clients of Nick’s and began to focus more on his character. It became a story of redemption. Nick was an anti-hero. He was a corporate attorney in his Father’s law firm who had been convicted of illegal drug use. He was sentenced to a zillion hours of community service in the Children’s Legal Aid office. He didn’t like being there and let everyone know it. He was rude and abrupt. He rounded up when counting his hours at the clinic. He was ethically challenged; often using knowledge he gained in the Legal Aid office, to benefit his corporate law firm. Sometimes, Nick was the scoundrel you couldn’t help but love, because you began to see that deep down he started to care about those children, and it scared him.

The show was incredibly well-acted. Nick Fallin was played by Simon Baker. Simon was a fantastic actor, and could let you see a whole range of emotion, with just the way he moved his eyes and changed his posture. (He only let his Australian accent slip once in one of the early episodes of the first season.) Dabney Coleman co-starred as his father and managing partner of the corporate law firm. Dabney Coleman was the cheesy villain in some of the dumb comedies of the ‘80’s like “9-to-5”. His performance as Fallin, Sr. was without a doubt the best of his career and he showed himself to be an incredible actor. He deserved an Emmy.

Anyway, the last episode came as its season finale. And each character reached some sort of closure. But the network never advertised it as the “last episode” as it did for so many others. So when it ended, I turned to my wife and said, “I think that was the last one. It’s too bad.”


P.S. DH posted a comment on it.
Was just doing a bit of reminiscing about the guardian, googled nick fallin, and saw your comments. Thank you for writing them, for taking the time. We had a hell of a time making that show and did it with a great amount of passion, intensity and desire to be truthful and tell hard stories. I appreciate your watching and taking note of a show we miss making.
DH
Friday, May 27, 2005 @ 12:22 am



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