The Last Ship
The Last Ship, which just finished its fourth season on TNT, is an action-adventure series set, mostly, aboard the USS Nathan James, which, in the first series, was the last U.S. Navy destroyer manned and ready to save the world. The series is set in a reality that has been devastated by virus that has wiped out much of humanity. However, while the worst was happening, the Nathan James was stationed in the Arctic on a scientific mission. Their isolation is their salvation, along with Dr. Rachel Scott, who knew about the virus before the pandemic, and was working on a cure for it.
The crew of the James, under the command of Captain Chandler, needs to hold it together, survive out in the ocean, find a safe harbor to resupply, avoid enemies that wish to kill them as well as anyone who could contaminate the ship and everyone on board. All in a day's work.
The show stars Eric Dane as Chandler. You may be familiar with him from his many episodes of Gray's Anatomy, but he was pretty much a fresh face to me, as I've never seen an episode of that show. (Never got into it, and too many episodes to binge now.) Of course, the main reason I tuned in was Adam Baldwin who starts off as the XO of the ship. The two of them have great chemistry and you can believe that they've served together for a long time. There's no forced, scripted animosity between them.
The first season (going by memory, I haven't seen it in years) had nine good episodes and a so-so finale. It reminded me a bit of the original series of Star Trek with a mix of oceanic, ship-to-ship stories and landing party stories. The last episode had some sloppy writing that set up a cliffhanger for season two. Thankfully, the show had been renewed and didn't end on that note.
The cliffhanger gets resolved fairly quickly (and features Alfre Woodard as acting President, as well as the mother of crewmen Lt. Granderson) before moving on to the seasonal story lines: getting the cure to the people, restoring order to the country, and the rise of a group of Immunes. A small percentage of the world population is naturally immune to the virus and are free to move about. Also free to move about it the virus's Patient Zero, who is carrier but otherwise immune to the virus's effects. They look to prevent the cure from being reproduced and spread to the people.
The natural progression of the show moves to spreading the cure to the rest of the world, while trying to rebuild the country back at home. Captain Chandler now works for the President (who was elevated from the Constitutional line of succession in Season 2) and Slattery is now the Captain of the Nathan James. However, there's a power play in China, which leads to genocide in Japan and rogue pirates in the Pacific who blame the U.S. for spreading poison instead of a cure. At home, there are power struggles that look to carve up the country into pieces. I would almost call it "gerrymandering in the extreme", as politicians in power look to protect -- and extend -- that power while giving the people just enough to survive.
Overall, I thought this the weakest season, mostly because the stuff at home bored me. I wasn't a fan of the writing. Also, this show has no problems with killing off characters, but it does tend to restrain itself. It got a little crazier this season.
Season four went back to the show's roots. The virus has returned but this time it's mutated and jumped to crops, killing them off one at a time. However, there's hope for the future in a bunch of seeds from the Middle East that have proven resistant to the Red Rust. They hold the hope for humanity's survival, but as with season one, rival factions wish to control the world's food supply. Control the food and you can control people.
As of this writing, The Last Ship has been renewed for a fifth season, and I happily await it. It's my favorite of the handful of "summer series" I've been watching over the past few years. I don't know where the story line will move the plot, but I'm confident that they're come up with something that's "see worthy".
No, I'm not sorry for that.
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