Television Review: Circles (The Shield, S1X13, 2002)
Circles (S01E13)
Airdate: June 4th 2002
Written by: Shawn Ryan
Directed by: Scott Brazil
Running Time: 45 minutes
Unlike many historical events of its time, the 1992 Los Angeles riots affected Hollywood in an unmistakably direct way, leaving an indelible mark on its creative consciousness. It is hardly surprising, therefore, that the riots and their protracted aftermath—culminating in the O.J. Simpson saga—profoundly influenced the content of numerous films and television shows in the years to come. One notably gritty example can be found in the Season 1 finale of the groundbreaking police drama The Shield, which, by coincidence, aired roughly around the tenth anniversary of the event. Circles, written by series creator Shawn Ryan and directed by Scott Brazil, harnesses the raw energy of this societal trauma, using it as a backdrop to weave together its various plot strands and explore the broad social and deeply personal consequences of police misconduct and institutional corruption.
The episode directly closes the storyline of civil unrest ignited in the previous episode, Two Days of Blood. The riots in Farmington, fueled by a scandalous failure of the LAPD to respond to a 911 call that led to the deaths of two black women, provide a volatile opening. Captain Aceveda reluctantly orders the police to use force to disperse the angry crowds; in the resulting stampede, an African American woman loses her life. Before Aceveda and the LAPD can properly process the consequences of this tragedy, the community's distrust and hostility towards the police manifest in an even more extreme form. A fake 911 call is used to lure two uniformed officers into an ambush, resulting in one officer dead and another, Officer Paula Myers (Melanie Myers), gravely injured. The situation escalates horrifically when two more officers are killed the next day in the same manner. The Barn itself, the police precinct, becomes a target when its windows are shot out, although Aceveda manages to apprehend these particular perpetrators, discovering they are young Latino copycats . This narrative arc powerfully illustrates the cyclical nature of violence, showing how official neglect breeds communal despair, which in turn sparks a vengeful, armed response, creating a self-perpetuating loop of bloodshed.
Vic Mackey is given the task of hunting down the police shooters, a mission complicated by the menacing presence of Assistant Chief Ben Gilroy. Gilroy arrives at the Barn under the pretext of personally supervising the investigation, but his true motives are to intimidate Vic into silence about his crimes and to manipulate Aceveda onto his side. The Strike Team's brutal methods appear to bear fruit. Shane fabricates a story that causes a young witness to flee, and after a vigorous chase, Vic corners him. Through intimidation, he learns the perpetrators were two black men and one black woman. Following a trail of illegal cell phone sales through two men, Cyrus (Malik Straughter) and Igal (Alex Veadov), the team obtains their phone numbers. Vic's informant, T.O., provides crucial street information about a teenager named Sonny (Alen Escarpeta) who was brandishing an LAPD badge stolen from one of the murdered officers. In one of the episode's most disturbing scenes, Vic and his team locate Sonny's heroin-addicted father, who readily betrays his son for another hit of drugs When confronted, Sonny is brutally interrogated by Vic, who uses the stolen badge as a tool of torture, stabbing him in the chest with its pin to extract the names of his confederates, Benji (Damen Fletcher) and Twanya (Petra Sprecher). Their hiding place—a squat frequented by homeless people—is subsequently raided by Vic and a now-involved Aceveda. During the raid, Aceveda saves Vic's life by shooting Twanya, while Benji is arrested, thus ending the immediate cop-killing affair.
While the manhunt unfolds, a tense political power struggle simmers within the Barn. Gilroy desperately tries to force Aceveda to move against Vic, leveraging their well-established personal antipathy and Aceveda's political ambitions. Yet, Vic simultaneously attempts to forge a common cause with Aceveda, arguing that taking down a bigger fish within the LAPD, like Gilroy, would be a more significant victory for Aceveda's anti-corruption campaign. Aceveda, in a display of political pragmatism, ultimately opts for the latter option. He exposes Gilroy's illegal real estate scheme, leading Gilroy to fire him in a futile, last-ditch effort to retain control . This move is rendered meaningless, however, as Aceveda has already located Gilroy's girlfriend and co-conspirator, Sedona Tellez (Lana Parilla), who, when faced with the evidence, is prepared to betray him. Gilroy's final attempt to blackmail Vic by planting the gun used to kill Jesus Rosales in the Mackey home also fails, as the Strike Team discovers it in time. The final confrontation in the Clubhouse sees a defeated Gilroy begging Vic to kill him, with Shane even volunteering to do the deed. In a surprising moment of restraint, Vic instead decides to deliver Gilroy to Aceveda to be arrested . His professional triumph, however, is rendered hollow by the personal discovery that his wife, Corrine, frustrated with the dangerous path his career has taken and its effects on their family, has disappeared with his children . This ending leaves Vic alone in his ransacked home, his personal life in shambles despite his victory over Gilroy.
Circles brilliantly uses its inspiration from real-life apocalyptic riots and armed conflicts sparked by police misconduct to connect various plot strands to both broader social and personal consequences. In a sense, the episode serves as a form of karmic punishment for Vic, following his execution of a fellow officer in the series premiere. He meets his mirror image in Gilroy, someone who has also crossed the line between upholding and breaking the law but from a higher position in the police hierarchy and for far less justifiable reasons. Unlike Vic, who justifies his pact with drug dealers with the desire to keep crime low and his family safe, Gilroy deliberately harmed innocent citizens by reducing police coverage in their neighbourhood, purely for financial gain. Vic sees in Gilroy a perverted reflection of himself and apparently dislikes what he sees, which stays his hand from execution. Yet, for all his efforts to do the "right" thing by taking Gilroy into custody, he is left without the family that was his primary justification for his actions, leaving his personal life and purpose in tatters.
With its limited runtime focused on the central crisis, Circles has less opportunity to provide momentous closures for its side characters. Dutch and Claudette end the season as they began, dedicated to the daily grind of detective work, immediately moving on to the next gruesome but petty crime. Similarly, Danny and Julien reach a point of professional peace and understanding, but their fundamental character arcs are not dramatically shifted by the evening's events . The notable exception is Aceveda, whose tactical alliance with Vic and pragmatic choice of the "lesser evil" signals that his political career, to be explored in Season 2, will demand a more complex and morally ambiguous character than the straightforward reformer he initially appeared to be.
Directed by Scott Brazil, Circles is a dynamic episode where a slew of momentous dramatic events is presented in a rapid yet comprehensive way . The pacing reflects the relentless pressure felt by the characters, barely giving them or the audience a moment to breathe. The acting is consistently strong across the ensemble, but Michael Chiklis delivers a particularly raw and compelling performance as Vic Mackey. Reports indicate that during the shooting of the emotional final scene in his empty home, Chiklis went so far into the character that he actually experienced a panic attack. This moment was captured on screen, resulting in one of the more powerful and viscerally authentic season finales in early 21st-century television history, perfectly encapsulating the collapse of Vic's carefully constructed world .
Circles represents very good example how to write a season finale . It delivers explosive action and narrative closure while deepening the show's central themes of corruption, moral compromise, and the cyclical nature of violence. By holding a dark mirror up to its protagonist and to the system in which he operates, the episode ensures that the victory feels as unsettling as it is triumphant, setting a high bar for the seasons to come.
RATING: 7/10 (+++)
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