Entourage, HBO's original series about an A-list actor and his friends living in Hollywood, has been getting worse for some time now. What used to be the highlight of the television week has become an exercise in disappointment.
It wasn't always like this. For a while, Entourage was one of the funniest, most enjoyable aspects of cable TV.
For many men, Entourage was an answer to their prayers. No longer must they sit helplessly while their girlfriends and wives watched Sex and the City. There was now a cable show - complete with gratuitous sex and foul language ?- about the new American dream: getting rich and famous.
The beauty of the show, though, was that it was so much more. For one thing, the story was multi-dimensional.
On one level, the show centered on actor Vincent Chase (Adrian Grenier) and his rise to stardom. On another, the series examined the friendship of Vince, his best friend and manager Eric Murphy (Kevin Connolly), his brother and fellow actor Johnny "Drama" (Kevin Dillon) and his driver and lovable loser Turtle (Jerry Ferrara).
Perhaps the most enjoyable part of the show came from the relationship between these four men and Ari Gold (Jeremy Piven), Vince's ruthless but hilarious agent. This interaction was even funnier when Lloyd (Rex Lee), Ari's gay assistant, was thrown into the mix.
Sound like a winning combination? Well, for a while, it definitely was. From humble beginnings to starring in the highest-grossing movie ever, the initial few seasons of Entourage were escapist fantasy at its best. Men loved the show because it was their deepest desire fully realized: becoming exorbitantly rich - and getting laid in the process.
Women, too, enjoyed the show - albeit in slightly fewer numbers. The focus on friendship and the different hijinks in which the gang engaged appealed to the female demographic much more than the stories about landing supermodels.
At the onset of Season Five, the show began to turn downhill. Vince was on the outs; his last potential hit, Medellin, had bombed at the Cannes Film Festival. The season proceeded to chronicle misfortune after misfortune, shoving the fact that Vince was no longer popular in the faces of the audience.
Simultaneously, the show began to separate Vince's "entourage" from his storyline. Drama and Turtle were lumped together for virtually every episode; any funny or absurd subplot exclusively featured them. Eric started to branch out from Vince, creating an air of tension that was neither believable nor interesting.
As the season closed, prospects were high. Martin Scorsese had contacted Vince about a new role and the friendship between him and Eric was in full swing. Perhaps an Oscar nomination awaited this young star. As a major theme of Season Five had been Vince's desperation to prove himself a competent actor, maybe this could come to fruition in Season Six.
If you haven't already guessed, it didn't. While Season Five was disappointing, Season Six has been downright unacceptable. To say that the first episode - which aired July 12 after a great deal of anticipation - was uneventful does not do justice to how stagnant it was. Fans have always loved the show because they could empathize with it; living the life with four friends in Hollywood is undoubtedly something about which most guys dream. In episode one, the four friends...chilled. No one needs to watch television to see that.
As the season has progressed, it has only gotten worse. Vince has slowly been fazed out of the show, kept around for mere novelty. It's as if the writers of the show only chose to have Vince make a Scorsese film so that they could ignore him for all of season 6.
A greater emphasis has been placed on Turtle, but this hasn't been beneficial to the show in the least bit. Previously, Turtle didn't have a great deal of responsibility; now he goes out with Jamie-Lynn Sigler and goes to college. One has a little trouble believing any real character development has actually taken place.
As far as Eric is concerned, his plot line has experienced a steep decrease in quality. The majority of his screen time covers his love triangle with Ashley (Alexis Dziena) and Sloan (Emmanuelle Chriqui). While this plot device could potentially be interesting and worthwhile, the manner in which it is executed makes it repetitive and boring. After a while, the viewer stops caring which girl suspected Eric of texting the other.
Even the show's saving grace, Ari and Lloyd, cannot salvage this doomed season. A rift between Lloyd and Ari has arisen, but unfortunately has turned out to be more cumbersome than intriguing. While their acting is still top notch? - a step above many other members of this show - they have much less material with which to work.
A new addition to the show, agent Andrew Klein (Gary Cole), has similarly disappointed. While Cole is a phenomenal actor, the situations in which his character has been put are either ludicrous or tiresome.
So what can be done? If the writers are to save this show, they need to engage their characters in real, definite struggle, while simultaneously capturing the free-spirited, uncertain essence that made the first few seasons just so spectacular.
