I am in only mid season 3 so far, but having seen this show thus far I felt it necessary to leave a review, especially after seeing the many inexplicable 10 ratings which mention Point Break and High Octane.
Animal Kingdom may be many things, but fast paces and high octane it is not. No, this is much more a rather slow burner of a drama with only tidbits of crime and action thrown in almost as if an afterthought. The show doesn't build around the crimes and jobs the Cody's commit and so far every single one of them has been pretty underwhelming. The viewer is show the highlights of the job, and there is very little victory or celebration to be felt even after the most successful heists because too much happens off screen. The action here is best filed under how to make robbery boring. The heists themselves are pretty ingenious, but the execution is just rather meh look we got more money. Give me the money. No we have to clean it first. Gets a little old.
Where Animal Kingdom gets it right, like other great crime-dramas of the past is that there are no heroes. Every character is shown, the good, bad, the ugly, warts and all. Character development and back story are pretty limited leaving the viewer at a loss most of the time. Even the family tree isn't fully painted to the point that there is no clear vision of who fits where or why. Even the relation between characters is not well defined. In a way, it adds more intrigue, but it can also make it hard to follow at first. The only real thing that can be said is that the Cody family are mostly made up of some pretty horrible people, all very deserving of whatever bad karma may be thrown at them next. It is difficult at times to find even a single person to root for here.
Still the show does have many positives. It is filmed in beautiful Oceanside, California and there are great scenes of the Strand, the Oceanside Pier and other locations throughout the city. As former resident, I loved how the characters talk about how real estate is ruining the beachfront because that is a war that has been raging since the mid 1980s. Some great surfing and other water sport scenes are peppered in as well, and the characters love traveling on a whim to Baja, either winding up in TJ or a bit further down south with mixed results.
At this point there have been some pretty good episodes, but also a lot of dull, slow episodes also. There is a hope that the show will reveal a little more each time, that I think is the main reason to keep watching here. Every time the Cody's do something dirty and you think you've seen their worst, you need to wait as they'll even do something more despicable later on. The reason to keep watching is the hope that this strange ride has a destination or a point somewhere.
As many times as I've been tempted to shut it off, I plan to soldier on through season 4 and hopefully 5 with the rest of you out there. Though often unlikable there is something about these Cody's that is down right addictive. If I had to compare this to anything it would not be anywhere close to Point Break. No, this has much more in common with Shameless.
