White Collar, The Show That Had Me Conned

sorry to drop in on the ladies' blog unannounced like this, but i have an important update to the post i did about the summer season on the TNT and USA networks.  in that post, i mentioned as an afterthought that the USA show White Collar was returning for its third season.  it was a show i had never seen because i thought it was about wall street crime.  i decided to give a shot this summer, though, and i'm so glad i did.  it became one of my favorite shows on TV.

it's not about wall street crime.  it's about art crimes and cons.  i love art crimes and cons!  you know why?  because they're sophisticated crimes that are based on being more clever than your adversary rather than using guns or being mean.  i can relate to that kind of crime!

the premise is that Neal Caffrey (matt bomer) was a notorious art thief and con man that FBI agent Peter Burke (tim dekay) finally captures.  neal agrees to be a criminal consultant for peter (with a tracking device on his ankle) in exchange for serving time in prison.  in order to help solve these crimes, he often has to resort to his old tactics (including a fondness for wearing fedoras), often with the aid of his nebbish/nerdy underworld partner Mozzie (willie garson).

the cons are cool, but what really makes the show great is the relationship between neal and peter.  they genuinely like, admire, and respect each other and become friends, even trusting each other with their lives on occasion.  however, they still neither one completely trusts the other, and it turns out that they both have reason not to do so.  you really root for both in this show.  the other great relationship in this show is that of peter with his wife Elizabeth (tiffani thiessen).  now that Friday Night Lights is over, the Burkes may be the best married couple on TV.  she's not as big a part of the show as Tami Taylor was on FNL, but her scenes really help flesh out peter's character.