Lie To Me: The Complete Second Season

The success that Fox has enjoyed with House has opened the door for other shows with a main character that's a misanthropic genius. This led to a bunch of apparently dislikeable leads who were so brilliant that their results more than balanced out their unorthodox methods, such as Dr. Cal Lightman in Lie To Me. Lightman (played ably by English actor Tim Roth) is an expert in spotting deception using body language and other visual cues. Basically, he looks at someone and can tell if they are lying. The biggest issue with Lie To Me has always been its wafer-thin premise. While the idea of having someone who's an expert in spotting lying is rather interesting, coming up with compelling scenarios where his skills can be utilised is another issue altogether. The writers managed to do a decent job in the first season, which was only 13 episodes long, but stretching it out for another season is pushing it. This translates into rollercoaster viewing where there are some highs, plenty of lows and a lot of mediocre episodes that demonstrate clearly just why the show is on the precipice of cancellation. The tragedy is that struggling within each episode is a good show trying to get out. The cast is great, especially Roth, who obviously thought he had found his personal Gregory House with Lightman. While he's constantly let down by the scripts, he's the best argument for Lie To Me sticking around. The second season sees other cast members having their back-stories fleshed out a little, as if to offer up new directions the show can move in, but to no avail. At this point, the most humane thing would be to just pull the plug. There is a wealth of extras spread across the six DVDs. More than half of the 22 episodes have either deleted or extended scenes, which may or may not have deserved to make the final cut, plus there are blog entries written by the series' inspiration (Dr. Paul Ekman) for each and every episode, where he shares his thoughts on the subject matter. Ekman also shows up on "Dr. Ekman/Dr. Lightman: Lie Detection Tutorial," which teaches viewers how to spot untruths in real life, or at least make them think they can. Rounding things out are the obligatory gag reel and a very short look at Brendan Hines's character (Eli Roker), who compulsively tells the truth, with hilarious consequences.