I Like to Watch

David Mamet brings us tough-as-nails soldiers fighting terrorism (and their even tougher wives) in CBS's "The Unit," while FX presents an insufferably "colorblind" white couple in "Black. White."

By Heather Havrilesky

Read more: TV, David Mamet, Arts & Entertainment, Reviews, Heather Havrilesky, I Like to Watch

Carmen Wurgel in FX's documentary series "Black. White."

Feb. 26, 2006 | "Mistakes were made." That statement should be inscribed on all of our graves. It has a little bit of the shrugging, passive quality of "Shit happens," but without the utter lack of responsibility that statement implies. After all, we can only learn from the shit that happens if we recognize that we were the jackholes who made it happen.

Of course, we can't learn from our mistakes if we don't recognize them as mistakes in the first place. If we see our mistakes as odd mixtures of circumstance and unfortunate luck, if we see them as twists of fate, or as insignificant side effects of a greater good, or worse yet, if we embrace our mistakes as beautiful creations filled with accidental grace that were simply interpreted by onlookers or by the media as mistakes, then we won't learn anything at all. That means we'll be doomed to repeat history, which means that big hair and boy bands and "Three's Company" will come back to haunt us, but instead of recognizing them as the colossal mistakes that they were, we'll thoughtlessly embrace them, putting the free world at great risk. That's right, Gavin MacLeod could rise to power once again, if we don't straighten up and fly right.

As a wise man once said, "The ultimate measure of a man is how he handles his biggest screw-ups." While some bounce back from their mistakes, shaking off their failures and moving forward without hesitation, others get hopelessly snagged on their blunders and then start to define themselves by the bad decisions and missteps they've made. Of course, those who refuse to acknowledge that their mistakes are even mistakes have the easiest time of all. These "mistake-blind" types -- or "politicians," as they're commonly known -- blithely go about making more and more mistakes but remain utterly unburdened by the knowledge of their own responsibility for suffering at home or death and destruction in exotic, dusty lands far away. This means they can enjoy their coffee and buttered toast without any regrets or nagging guilt tugging at their hearts, at least until that fateful day when Gavin MacLeod rises to crush us all under his iron fist of tyranny.

Truly, madly, manly
But if anyone's equipped to deal with Captain Stubing's inevitable power grab, it's the boys of "The Unit" (premieres at 8 p.m. on Tuesday, March 7, on CBS). Created by playwright David Mamet and co-written by Shawn Ryan, who created "The Shield," "The Unit" explores the workings of a military special-forces team that takes on high-pressure missions worldwide, from blowing up the homes of arms traders in Afghanistan to subverting terrorist plots at home.

If there's ever been a career where your mistakes are painfully obvious and frighteningly significant, this is the one. But these are tough guys who savor the weight of their responsibilities in the world, guys who spend their time, in the wake of every error, obsessively atoning for their sins and aiming to do better. Starring Dennis Haysbert, who thankfully isn't doomed to appear only in Allstate insurance TV ads for the rest of his life, "The Unit" offers a merciless look at the intense life of specialized factions of the military.

Of course, this show has Mamet's sticky fingerprints all over it, from the unrealistically sharp and somewhat leaden dialogue to the melodramatic, suffering-hero scenarios. While Mamet's men are steely-jawed macho studs who glower and growl and sweat a lot, Mamet's women stride around explaining what they believe in and what their intentions are every other minute. Although the military wives are very different from each other, they're all smart and almost heroically confrontational. Take the new recruit's wife, Kim Brown (Audrey Marie Anderson), who pushes hard to live off-base and to reject the Christian hand-holding culture of the other wives. Or take Tiffy, a perky blond wife who, although she seems the weakest and most confused of the group, still marches into a tea held for a female senator and angrily confronts her about cuts in the men's training budget, which she eloquently and passionately explains is necessary to keep the men alive out there in the field.

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