Spaintv's Complete Series Watch: Third Watch

[Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 5,737
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Am currently nearing the end of my 12 season watch of NYPD Blue and ready to move on to a new long running series. I still have loads of shows that I want to watch, especially those from my "TV Withdrawl Years" (1996-2000 Uni Years & 2004-6 Went off TV) including The Sopranos, West Wing, Homicide, and a whole lot of others.

But after watching NYPD Blue, Ive decided on Third Watch, a series of which Ive only seen a number of "loose episodes". I really enjoyed the episodes I saw but never got a chance to watch the series in full or properly.

If I recall rightly, Channel 4 did not treat the series too well, scheduling episodes in late night slots etc. Spanish terrestial TV where the show also aired, gave the show similar treatment, launching it as a Primetime show, then a Saturday evening pre-Evening News filler, with the show eventually ending up in the weekend sunrise block (630am) where it eventually aired all its episodes.

Have read much about the show, and always read good reviews, with many saying it was a shame it was cancelled after six years cos the show like NYPD Blue could have gone beyond the 10 year mark.

Anyone on DS watched the series from start to finish? Did you enjoy it? Highlights?

Thanks
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Comments

  • NinjyBearNinjyBear Posts: 8,317
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    Watched it, loved it! Channel 4 treated it appallingly, skipping entire episodes and heavily editing the episodes they did air. Myself and a few others on the discuss4 forum managed to irritate them to the point where they decided to air the more violent episodes in a late night slot, so I've seen all but 5 of the episodes. Really need to find season 2-6 so I can watch again.

    Highlights from the first season include the low-speed chase after Bosco gets his squad car stolen, and later turning the tables on an armed mugger.....only to spend the rest of the episode trying to avoid being identified. It's really a brilliant programme, but I found the quality declined once they decided to focus almost entirely on the cops. It ended at the right time.
  • MoreTearsMoreTears Posts: 7,025
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    I have seen every episode of Third Watch. Highlights? I'm not spoiling anything for you.:) I will say that I don't think the show really came into its own until Season 3. The show started out trying to be a variation on ER, with an emphasis on thrills. Attention was almost evenly divided between the police, firemen, and paramedics, but without much individual character development. After Season 1, it seems like the producers realized they under-served the characters, so they tried to tailor individual episodes around specific characters in Season 2. It was a dramatic shift in tone, and came across as awkward. I think after Season 2, the producers decided that the firemen just weren't that interesting, so they were minimized and the show gradually became more of a conventional cop show, with bits devoted to the paramedics. This was essentially a betrayal of the whole concept of the show, but it allowed them to make the police cases more interesting, more fleshed out.
  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 5,737
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    Hey peeps thanks for the feedback. Not surprised to hear you have watched the entire series Moretears :D I think you and I together with a few other DSers could really do with a sort of TV Addicts Anonymous Group to help us with our TV addiction :D At least its a healthy one ay :)

    Am looking fwd to starting 3rd Watch. Am about to complete NYPD Blue soon and Ill start on it when I do. Have quite enjoyed the little I have seen, and I always enjoy a cop show, and this one has the added bonus of fire and paramedics so it allows for more action scenes.
  • FunkmasterTFunkmasterT Posts: 14,369
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    I watched it regularly on C4 in the afternoons, and last year I started watching it again properly from the beginning, but I had to stop near the end of season 2 because I had trouble finding episodes. It's fantastic stuff, an excellent bunch of characters.
  • FunkmasterTFunkmasterT Posts: 14,369
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    MoreTears wrote: »
    I have seen every episode of Third Watch. Highlights? I'm not spoiling anything for you.:) I will say that I don't think the show really came into its own until Season 3. The show started out trying to be a variation on ER, with an emphasis on thrills. Attention was almost evenly divided between the police, firemen, and paramedics, but without much individual character development. After Season 1, it seems like the producers realized they under-served the characters, so they tried to tailor individual episodes around specific characters in Season 2. It was a dramatic shift in tone, and came across as awkward. I think after Season 2, the producers decided that the firemen just weren't that interesting, so they were minimized and the show gradually became more of a conventional cop show, with bits devoted to the paramedics. This was essentially a betrayal of the whole concept of the show, but it allowed them to make the police cases more interesting, more fleshed out.

    The point where it kind of went downhill, for me, was when they brought in Cruz and it seemed to be the Bosco & Cruz show, with Faith being sidelined. Bosco was a great character, but I never found Cruz to very watchable.
  • carl.waringcarl.waring Posts: 35,579
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    I too have seen every ep, but it was so long ago that I couldn't tell you anything about the show!

    There was one "special" episode (other than a cross-over with "ER") that was supposedly filmed with just one camera; possibly in 'real time' too. S5E9.
  • StarryNightStarryNight Posts: 7,289
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    Third Watch is one of my favourite ever programmes. Could never work out why it went under the radar, ever person I have persuaded to watch it has come away loving it.

    Highlights?...pretty much all of season 3 is excellent, as mentioned above an episode in season 5 called 'a call for help' is amazing. I'm quite partial to alot of season 4 episodes too. And the first episode of the sixth season.

    Incedently as we're talking about it does anyone know where to get good copies on dvd? I have the official first season but most of my other copies suck tbh.
  • StarryNightStarryNight Posts: 7,289
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    MoreTears wrote: »
    I have seen every episode of Third Watch. Highlights? I'm not spoiling anything for you.:) I will say that I don't think the show really came into its own until Season 3. The show started out trying to be a variation on ER, with an emphasis on thrills. Attention was almost evenly divided between the police, firemen, and paramedics, but without much individual character development. After Season 1, it seems like the producers realized they under-served the characters, so they tried to tailor individual episodes around specific characters in Season 2. It was a dramatic shift in tone, and came across as awkward. I think after Season 2, the producers decided that the firemen just weren't that interesting, so they were minimized and the show gradually became more of a conventional cop show, with bits devoted to the paramedics. This was essentially a betrayal of the whole concept of the show, but it allowed them to make the police cases more interesting, more fleshed out.

    I think it was more like season 4 that the firemen got less and less coverage, there was alot in season 3 because of 9/11.

    For my money season six is its poorest time - the show became nothing like it was in that season, it was just like watching any other detective show. Third watch was pretty unique in the fact that it focused on the emergency servies on the street and suddenly there was non of that.
  • scoobyju1scoobyju1 Posts: 1,785
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    Third Watch is one of my favourite shows. As previously mentioned, CH4 treated it really bad & More4 were only allowed to show the seasons they had paid for & FX can only show the last 2 seasons I think. To top it all off, it's really difficult to find anything but S1 (maybe S2) in the UK as apparenty there were issues with the rights to the music they used for never got released.
    The point where it kind of went downhill, for me, was when they brought in Cruz and it seemed to be the Bosco & Cruz show, with Faith being sidelined. Bosco was a great character, but I never found Cruz to very watchable.

    This was the worst season for me personally. I always liked the Bosco/Faith partnership & also wasn't too keen on Cruz.
    I think it was more like season 4 that the firemen got less and less coverage, there was alot in season 3 because of 9/11.

    The 9/11 episode they did was amazing, such a fitting tribute.

    All in all, a fantastic series & I loved the final episode. Wrapped up nicely for me :)
  • SXTonySXTony Posts: 2,910
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    The point where it kind of went downhill, for me, was when they brought in Cruz and it seemed to be the Bosco & Cruz show, with Faith being sidelined. Bosco was a great character, but I never found Cruz to very watchable.

    No, I didn't like Cruz either. Bosco was good, and the show suffered when he wasn't in it for that period of time in season 6, I think.

    I read that it they focused on the police due to budget constraints. The fires, pile-up and other dissasters that involved the ambulance and firemen were expensive to stage and they no longer had that sort of money in the latter seasons.
  • shelleyj89shelleyj89 Posts: 16,292
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    For my money season six is its poorest time - the show became nothing like it was in that season, it was just like watching any other detective show. Third watch was pretty unique in the fact that it focused on the emergency servies on the street and suddenly there was non of that.
    SXTony wrote: »
    No, I didn't like Cruz either. Bosco was good, and the show suffered when he wasn't in it for that period of time in season 6, I think.

    Agree with both of you. I was going to reply to the first quote and say it was because of a lack of Bosco IMO, but someone else got there first. I'm assuming the actor, Jason Wiles, was possibly doing other stuff so they had to write him out, but I really missed him.

    I also could not stand Cruz.

    But I love this show. I'm so sad over the way it was treated over here because I think it could have done very well. But I found it, and loved it, so I'm happy.
  • StarryNightStarryNight Posts: 7,289
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    shelleyj89 wrote: »
    Agree with both of you. I was going to reply to the first quote and say it was because of a lack of Bosco IMO, but someone else got there first. I'm assuming the actor, Jason Wiles, was possibly doing other stuff so they had to write him out, but I really missed him.

    I also could not stand Cruz.

    But I love this show. I'm so sad over the way it was treated over here because I think it could have done very well. But I found it, and loved it, so I'm happy.

    I think the lack of Bosco in season six was a major major problem for most fans, he was argueably the most popular character. Jason Wiles had to have an operation at the start of season six, hense why he wasnt in the first half. He was going to leave at the end of that season but it proved to be the last anyway so didnt matter.

    I think another thing that went wrong in season six was that they broke up all the partnerships that people loved.
  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 794
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    scoobyju1 wrote: »
    Third Watch is one of my favourite shows. As previously mentioned, CH4 treated it really bad & More4 were only allowed to show the seasons they had paid for & FX can only show the last 2 seasons I think. To top it all off, it's really difficult to find anything but S1 (maybe S2) in the UK as apparenty there were issues with the rights to the music they used for never got released.

    Season 1 is available in both the US and the UK.

    Season 2 is available in the US and Australia. It hasn't been released here mainly due to the fact that the first season didn't sell that well which led to heavy discounting on the first season (£5 on some sites).

    Seems to have done okay-ish in the US, but not holding my breath for more DVDs. Hopefully, when the rights expire at FX someone will pick up all the seasons to show. Seems like a good fit for the CBS channels or Universal.
  • shelleyj89shelleyj89 Posts: 16,292
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    I think the lack of Bosco in season six was a major major problem for most fans, he was argueably the most popular character. Jason Wiles had to have an operation at the start of season six, hense why he wasnt in the first half. He was going to leave at the end of that season but it proved to be the last anyway so didnt matter.

    I think another thing that went wrong in season six was that they broke up all the partnerships that people loved.

    Did he? I hope it wasn't anything serious.

    Yeah. I missed Faith and Bosco. Sully and Ty weren't together much either. Kim got a bit boring towards the end, but I missed her when she went off to be with Jimmy. And Doc went crazy. I wasn't too keen on Grace either.
  • StarryNightStarryNight Posts: 7,289
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    shelleyj89 wrote: »
    Did he? I hope it wasn't anything serious.

    Yeah. I missed Faith and Bosco. Sully and Ty weren't together much either. Kim got a bit boring towards the end, but I missed her when she went off to be with Jimmy. And Doc went crazy. I wasn't too keen on Grace either.

    I think it was to remove a hernia, not serious as far as I know.

    I thought the new characters Grace and Finney were ok but they just seemed like a poor mans Bosco and Kim really.

    I didn't like Faith being a detective and not being partnered with Bosco and the spliting up of Sully and Davis. Carlos was the only character left I cared about in the firehouse and I did enjoy the relationship with Levine, but they never made her a proper character (FYI she is Anthony Ruivivar - Carlos'- real wife)
  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 5,737
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    Started my Third Watch "watch" with the two part opener late last night.

    Enjoyed the Opening two episodes, although at times I felt it was way too busy. Loads of characters and some of thir back stories to introduce sandwiched in between their taking calls. Most of the first episode sees us going with the paramedics, fire and police from one call to another, revealing bits about who they are, what they do and back story in between. For a while it felt like a crazy non-stop ride and it felt like it was just action sequence / incident after another with little else.

    As the episode progressed though, they established one "current" story with the shooting of the paramedic "Doc" which conrtinued into the second part as they tracked down the shooter.

    Again, the second episode saw us attending multiple calls with the resolution to the shooting coming at the end when Doc's shooter is tracked down in the abadoned building.

    Good action sequences in the first two episodes, with some showing that the series is not going to shy away from crude or harsh realism - the fire in which the mother threw the baby out of the window in order to save him!

    Characters at first impression were on the whole likeable. We have two new guys - one a paramedic who freezes when his colleague is shot and carries the shock / blame intot he second episode where he manages to redeem himself when he saves a man who is hanging out the window by his legs. And then a rookie cop, played by a younger Cody Bell off Burn Notice, who is partnered up with his late cop-dad's partner and the memories and problems this presents to the partner Sully, the noble guy in the bunch it seems.

    Excellent comedic moments in the two episodes too, and I have to admit I laughed quite a few times at the sarcasm, craziness and arrogance of cop Sully played by Jason Wiles (Fresh out of 90210 must have been by the date); he told his partner, Faith who simply treats him like one of her kids, <let's join hands and sing a rousing chorus of 'We Are the World'" > in an attempt to mock her "neighbourhood policing" style LOL! Brilliant line!

    Anyway, good opening episdoes. Looking forward to the rest!
  • shelleyj89shelleyj89 Posts: 16,292
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    I think it was to remove a hernia, not serious as far as I know.

    I thought the new characters Grace and Finney were ok but they just seemed like a poor mans Bosco and Kim really.

    I didn't like Faith being a detective and not being partnered with Bosco and the spliting up of Sully and Davis. Carlos was the only character left I cared about in the firehouse and I did enjoy the relationship with Levine, but they never made her a proper character (FYI she is Anthony Ruivivar - Carlos'- real wife)

    I agree with everything. BIB - that's probably why I didn't warm to Grace. Finny I wasn't fussed about either way. I did like Sasha though, and her under-cover stuff.
  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 5,737
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    Im ten episodes into season one now and really loving this. Great stories and good casting. Love the action scenes. Great drama in there too. Just watched a really dramatic episode that actually made me teary-eyed, "Demolition Derby" about a man and his brother in law who are trapped in a collasping building. Have to admit I did get teary eyed! Glad I started to watch this! Brilliant theme tune and soundtrack too, fits the show perfectly!
  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 5,737
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    Just started watching episode 12 and have paused to come online to say that this is a frakkin awesome show. The pre-opening credits teaser for s01e11 is brilliant. A car blocks the Fire station doors and the Fire truck just rams into it to clear passage. Awesome! And then a lady falls from a building on fire as a result of the delay. Love this show. Some of the pre credits teasers are brilliant. Love the number of action scenes they have! Hope they don't reduce them drastically as I fear from what other posters have said that the series has several budget cuts throughout its run.
  • StarryNightStarryNight Posts: 7,289
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    spaintv wrote: »
    Just started watching episode 12 and have paused to come online to say that this is a frakkin awesome show. The pre-opening credits teaser for s01e11 is brilliant. A car blocks the Fire station doors and the Fire truck just rams into it to clear passage. Awesome! And then a lady falls from a building on fire as a result of the delay. Love this show. Some of the pre credits teasers are brilliant. Love the number of action scenes they have! Hope they don't reduce them drastically as I fear from what other posters have said that the series has several budget cuts throughout its run.

    You still have pleanty more dramatic action scenes to look forward to.
  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 5,737
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    Completed season 1 and like I mentioned earlier, really enjoying this.

    Great stories, brilliant cast and characters, nice story development, nice pacing, good drama and brilliant action scenes.

    Im now three episodes into season 2 and have noticed a dramatic change in style. So far episodes in the second season have shifted to become very character centric, which is good for character development, but the character development was good with the season one format. The change in style really stands out. Do they keep this up for the rest of the run? Or is this just something they do for a while?
  • StarryNightStarryNight Posts: 7,289
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    spaintv wrote: »
    Completed season 1 and like I mentioned earlier, really enjoying this.

    Great stories, brilliant cast and characters, nice story development, nice pacing, good drama and brilliant action scenes.

    Im now three episodes into season 2 and have noticed a dramatic change in style. So far episodes in the second season have shifted to become very character centric, which is good for character development, but the character development was good with the season one format. The change in style really stands out. Do they keep this up for the rest of the run? Or is this just something they do for a while?

    They do this for the majority of season 2, although there are some episodes which are more like the first season. The first one is around episode 7 I think. After hours, a personal favourite of mine. Once you get to season 3 it will go completely back to the original format.
  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 5,737
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    Four episodes away from the season 2 finale and I am living this show.

    Admittedly I did prefer the story style / format they used in the first season, but it doesn't mean that I havent enjoyed the second one.

    Season two took a while to get used to. The sho'w format was completely changed from the word go, and instead of getting episodes focusing on stories which allowed for all three services to cross paths and interact, season 2 has mostly been character driven with very character centric episodes. This in turn has favoured the series by allowing them to give us deeper characterisation and really flesh characters out. Stories have largely been character driven and this in turn has seen a more "economical" use of the cast - rather than featuring most characters in every episodes, we go various episodes going without seeing most, only getting a few characters interacting with the character on whom the episode revolves.

    I assume that the character centric episodes and new styler for the show may have been in order to control budgets. Looking at eason one is is easy to see how much a show like this might cost, and how hard it would be to keep the standard and level and number of action scenes, especially when you consider it involves three emergency services. Whilst the police ones might be cheaper, it is easy to see that the fire and rescue scenes might be more costly.

    The character centri format though has really worked I feel. Season 2 has produced a number of very strong episodes, ranging from dramatic with episodes like After Hours, and the two parter involving Bobby's death, to the comedic one centering on Nieto and his self centredness. The character centric episodes have also allowed most characters to move forward and we have seen much more development than we saw during season 1.

    Enjoying this. A number of episodes have admittedly made me go all misty and all :o Guess the character development thing is working! :o:)

    Going to finish season 2 tonight and will be moving onto season 3 tomorrow. looking fwd to that as I believe season 3 opens with a 9/11 story. I know season 3 started off with a Speciale pisode which was really a Factual episode based on the real 9/11 and featuring the actors reactions. Is it worth watching???
  • NinjyBearNinjyBear Posts: 8,317
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    spaintv wrote: »
    I know season 3 started off with a Speciale pisode which was really a Factual episode based on the real 9/11 and featuring the actors reactions. Is it worth watching???

    Channel 4 didn't show it. They also cut the episode after 9/11 happened in the show (which is either 3/22, or 2/21, depending on how you count the special episode).
  • [Deleted User][Deleted User] Posts: 5,737
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    Completed the second season last night!

    Great season and loved the season finale episode! As I pointed out in my earlier post, season 2 felt "experimental" in contrast to season 1. The style of the series varied greatly from that established in season 1, going from stories driving the series and involvig characters, to character driven and centri stories driving the series. As a result, the pacing for characterisation sped up, but onyl for the character involved, whilst at the same time, most of the cast were sidelined for various episodes until "their turn" came along or they were involved in a story through interaction with the character centric character of the week.

    Not bad, it did give us very deep insights into the characters, and I believe it allowed the actors to really take charge of their characters and really get to know them too. There were very powerful performances throughout the season witht he character centric episodes really shinign the spotlight onto different characters and giving us a really deep insight into their world, their makeup, etc.

    Whilst not overjoyed at first with the change, I have to admit that i really did enjoy the character centric episodes because they really work, and when later on we go back to the old format of the first season, you really get to enjoy the series much more having gotten to know the characters that much better.

    Season 2 already established "favourite characetrs" for me, and these defintely have to be, in no particular order; Bosco, Yokas and Sully. Conicidentayylt hey are all cops, but I really had a preference for their characters. The interaction between Yokas and Bosco is brilliant, and there is a lot of on screen chemistry between the two. you can really see that sort of "Mother-son" dynamic which Yokas points out in the series pilot, at work throughout. Bosco provides a lot of comic relief by uttering a lot of comments without thinking; Yokas is brilliant in transferring her "mother" mode to the job and in displaying the difficulties of the job and how it affects police officers personal lives, and how their personal lives creep into the jobb - mothering; and Sully is brilliant as the older cop with a lot of life experence and a man who has seen how the job has completely overtaken the job and not allowed him to develop his own life (I know loads of cops like this!).

    In pointing these three out, I don't mean to say the other characters aren't as good. Doc is another strong character, and possibly the cement of the paramedic / fire side, but sometimes I found his moral core too annoying, so it really was quite refreshing when they brought in his past and how he was involved in the death of his childhood friend. Ty is also a good character and I am liking his partnership with Sully - their is some chemistry there although it fails to achieve the same level of the Bosco - Yokas partnering. Ty works, but I think his character still needs to beef up a bit - over the course of the two years we have seen a lot of development, going from rookie to becoming more experienced, but he needs that bit more - perhaps it has been done on purpose and they are showing a real time development of a rookie, hence why Ty still sometimes may look like he's not completely inside the loop (a reminder ebing his interactions / stories with Candyman).

    Kim in another interesting character, and although initially ehr appearances were a bit annoying - moaning constantly about Jimmy etc, her characterr became that much more interesting first when Jimmy decides to remarry, and then with the death of Bobby. Jimmy I felt was largely forgotten about, and was more of a Kim-support character for the large part of season 1, but really became a character of his own this season, with writers really giving us another side to him and really making his character stand on his own two feet. With Kim's attempted suicide, his development has ben propelled again, and it will be interesting to see where Jimmy, and as a consequence Kim, will go to in the third season.

    Carlos, has been a characetr I found annoying for the most part. With him I think the charaacters tried to achieve comic relief in the way they did with Bosco, but whilst Bosco worked, I never felt Carlos did, finding his "comic relief" tiring and annoying after a while. He was also largely forgotten about in the development side, and he was probably the last of the characetrs to get a proper beefed out story of his own - the post Bobby death epsiode. Here Carlos shone, and I believe the laregely comedic episode worked brillianty, especially after the high drama of the previous two episodes. Again, Carlos was shown in a different light, and it was interesting to see how the writers echoed the audience.s sentiments (at least mine) by having Carlos tell Doc that a year on he still didn't feel part of the family and that he was still an outsider!

    And one thing that Third Watch has certainly delievered is ion high drama. Very dramatic episodes in this run and many a brilliant episode- soem stand out for me have been; Four Days, After Hours, History, A Rock and a Hard Place, Requien for a Bantamweight, Unfinished business, Honor,and the finale, And Zeus wept.

    Moving onto season 3 now. Looking fwd to seeing how 9/11 influenced the show - I believe they got various awards for episodes depicting this.
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