“The Unit”

I find CBS’s “The Unit” to be one of the more interesting post-9/11 cultural artifacts. Created by Shawn Ryan (who also created “The Shield,” arguably the best television series of the new golden age of TV — right up there with “The Sopranos”) and David Mamet, the series veered wildly between “kind of awesome” and “kind of lame.” It ran for four seasons, and the complete series is out now on DVD. I remember writing about the show when it first debuted in ’06:

THE WASHINGTON POST EXPRESS began its review of CBS’s new drama, The Unit, with the following: “Just when you thought that mindless flag-waving, fear-mongering and Arab-stereotyping were starting to fade, here comes ‘The Unit’ . . . which ignores the realities of the ‘war on terror’ mire while frolicking in the shallowest jingoistic puddle.”

Needless to say, my interest was piqued. I’m nothing, if not a shallow jingoist.

That whole first season was damn near perfect, though things went off the rails a little bit in subsequent years.