‘BALLARD’ ON AMAZON PRIME
  
A prolific author of detective novels and crime fiction, Michael Connelly has a legion of fans not only for his books but for the television series “Bosch,” Bosch: Legacy,” and “The Lincoln Lawyer.”
  
With 41 bestselling novels to his credit, it does not appear the 69-year-old author is slowing down any time soon. His Mickey Haller, the Lincoln Lawyer, is back with a case in “The Proving Ground” novel due in October.
  


This year also brought the release of “Nightshade,” an introduction to a new cop with Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Detective Stilwell exiled to a low-key post on Catalina Island, after department politics drove him off a homicide desk on the mainland. Could this augur a future television series?
 
Several Connelly novels featured LAPD detectives Renee Ballard and Harry Bosch working together to hunt killers, from the “Desert Star” search for a man murdering an entire family, to “The Night Fire” in which Ballard and Bosch become an investigative team.
  
Now streaming on Amazon Prime is “Ballard,” starring Maggie Q as Robbery-Homicide detective Renee Ballard, who is about as popular with the department bureaucracy as Scottish detective Carl Morck (Matthew Goode) is with his own in “Dept. Q,” which was reviewed last week.
  
The connection between “Ballard” and the “Bosch” universe is unambiguous, given the literary existence of the two detectives working together, and yet they never came in contact during the television series until the last episode of “Bosch: Legacy.”
  
We first saw Maggie Q’s Ballard when she entered uninvited into Bosch’s private investigator office, demanding he return the files she accused him of purloining. It looked like the start of a contentious relationship.
  
The investigation was a cold case into the murder of one of the young girls that Bosch was unwilling to forget, even after leaving the police force. This case involved a firefighter suspect returning to Los Angeles after a dozen years.
  
After a reluctant but effective partnership to nab the murderer, Ballard and Bosch exchange compliments for good work. Prophetically, Bosch proclaims, “Maybe somewhere down the line we’ll get to work together again.”
  
With its provenance to the Michael Connelly literary sphere, “Ballard” most appropriately draws in a few familiar faces from the “Bosch” domain, including the lovable retired LAPD curmudgeons Crate and Barrel.
  
As a result of getting on the wrong side of the insular LAPD culture, Ballard is ostracized by friends and colleagues for lodging an attempted sexual assault complaint against a senior officer who is seemingly an untouchable insider. Never mind that Ballard is one of LAPD’s finest detectives.
  
Banished to a file room in the basement of the LAPD training center, Ballard is left to her own devices to put together a team, getting help from Councilman Jake Pearlman (Noah Bean) for some funding, as he has a personal interest in the twenty-year old cold case of his murdered sister.
  
Ballard’s former partner in the Robbery-Homicide division, Thomas Laffont (John Carroll Lynch), comes out of retirement to join the cold case task force. He provides a steady presence inside a somewhat hectic team.
  
An eclectic group of volunteers form the backbone of the cold case unit. Colleen Hatteras (Rebecca Field) is most energetically enthusiastic, relying on intuition and new age superstitions to postulate her crime theories, which are not necessarily off-base.
  
College student intern Martina Castro (Victoria Moroles) is studying law with a perspective on crime that may be unorthodox to some. Ted Rawls (Michael Mosley), wealthy owner of a security firm and acting as a watchdog for the interests of his friend the Councilman, joins the team as a reserve LAPD officer.
  
To round out the crew, Ballard pursues Samira Parker (Courtney Taylor), formerly an investigator on an LAPD cold case, who resigned from the force after a brief, unpleasant stint as a Robbery-Homicide detective. Only Ballard’s persuasive power brings Samira back into the fold.
 
It’s not all about sleuthing for Ballard. She shares a waterfront double-wide trailer home on the Malibu beach with her grandmother Tutu (Amy Hill), and clears her head from the heavy workload with early morning surfing sessions that also allow her to remember with admiration her late father.
  
“Ballard” is not just about the police work on forgotten cases. The storyline takes a deep look into complex issues, ranging from corruption to sexual improprieties to a culture rife with convolutions that go beyond the usual, perfunctory themes of cop dramas.
  
Unquestionably in this reviewer’s perspective, “Bosch” and “Bosch: Legacy” rate highly in the pantheon of police procedurals as among the best of all time TV shows. “Ballard” shows promise to create a trifecta of remarkably essential and laudatory entertainment.
  
Without disclosing the slightest hint of how the first season’s cliffhanger concludes, suffice it to say that a failure of “Ballard” to come back for a second turn would be an unforgivable crime. We just can’t be left hanging.

Tim Riley writes film and television reviews for Lake County News.

COBB, Calif. — An evening of fine food and drink, music and community spirit in support of the Lake County Passion Play Fundraiser will be held on Friday, Sept. 13, at 4 p.m. at Château Grenouille on Cobb Mountain.

Guests will enjoy a delicious New York strip roast dinner accompanied by appetizers, dessert and a fine selection of beverages, including many local wines. 

The event also features a silent and live auction, offering a variety of unique items and experiences.

Top the night off with live music and dancing featuring the popular local band Fogg Revisited.

Tickets are $80 per person or $600 for a table of eight. All proceeds directly support the Lake County Passion Play, a powerful live reenactment of Christ’s life from the Last Supper through His resurrection. 

Celebrating over 40 years, the Lake County Passion Play is the only outdoor production of its kind in the United States, and is a cherished cultural and spiritual tradition in the region.

This fundraiser offers a wonderful opportunity to support a one-of-a-kind community event while enjoying a magical evening in one of Lake County’s most picturesque settings.

For more information or to purchase tickets, contact Lisa Lambert at 707-245-7281 or Laura Ewing Barnes at 707-533-3406.

‘DEPT. Q’ ON NETFLIX
   
The benefit of streaming series is the lack of necessity to jump right in within days of its launch. Netflix, among other streaming services, curates its new series to allow time for the binge-watch experience.


   

“Dept. Q,” much like other police procedurals, may be consumed in the short order of however quickly one wishes to watch all nine episodes. This drama series, set in Scotland, is a worthy candidate for a marathon commitment.
   
The main character, Detective Chief Inspector Carl Morck (Matthew Goode), is a miserable misanthrope. If he were a physician, his bedside manner would be no more pleasing than that of Jack the Ripper. His police colleagues think of him as a jerk, only in words expressed profanely.
   
The series opens at a crime scene where Morck is joined by detective James Hardy (Jamie Sives) and a patrol officer to examine a man stabbed in the head. A masked man appears from the shadows and starts shooting.
   
The patrol cop’s body camera captures the shooting spree, resulting in his death, with Hardy being paralyzed and Morck surviving a bullet passing through his neck. A few months later, Morck is ready to return to work after going through a medical evaluation.
   
Not having been humbled by a near-death experience, Morck is still a pain to his superiors. His boss, Moira Jacobson (Kate Dickie), finds out that a new department is being set up to handle cold cases. What better way to not deal with Morck than to send him to a basement office.
   
Meanwhile, during a high-profile murder trial, prosecutor Merritt Lingard (Chloe Pirrie) is floundering during the proceedings and losing the faith of her superiors. She’s also being threatened by anonymous text messages.
   
The prosecutor disappears on a ferry boat ride, and her mentally disabled brother (Tom Bulpett) who is along for the journey offers no clues. The timing may seem odd, but Merritt’s vanishing turns out to be a cold case.
   
At Morck’s office, boxes of cold cases show up, and his assistant Akram (Alexej Manvelov), a Syrian tech contractor, ends up picking the case of the woman who went missing without a trace four years ago.
   
“Dept. Q” is a gritty crime thriller, and as such, it goes down some dark alleys, which frankly seem suitable terrain for the grumpy detective, who on occasion still has to endure some counseling from therapist Dr. Rachel Irving (Kelly Macdonald). 
  
The primary case being investigated by Morck and Akram, who are joined by ginger-haired Rose (Leah Byrne) as a result of being sidelined from her job as constable, takes a lot of twists and detours.
   
While the case work is acutely intense and thorny at times, what really works best here is driven by complex characters, from Morck’s brash arrogance and biting sarcasm to Akram’s probing efficiency and Rose’s pluck.
   
There is another new streaming series involving a cold case department at the Los Angeles Police Department, with a somewhat analogous premise of a troublesome detective banished to the bowels of police headquarters for a similar assignment. More about that in a future column.

‘WE WERE LIARS’ ON AMAZON PRIME
  
In Amazon Prime’s “We Were Liars,” the Sinclair family, ruled by the media magnate Harris Sinclair (David Morse), includes three adult daughters and their offspring who enjoy the life of East Coast royalty during the summer months on their private island.
   
A terrible accident happens during “Summer 16” when Cadence Sinclair Eastman (Emily Alyn Lind) has a terrible near-death drowning near a rocky shoreline, resulting in a severe case of amnesia.
   
Prior to the accident, Cadence spends the summer with her best friends who call themselves the “The Liars.” The group consists of cousins Mirren Sinclair Sheffield (Esther McGregor) and Johnny Sinclair Dennis (Joseph Zada), and friend Gat (Shubham Maheshwari).
   
Cadence’s mother Penny Sinclair (Caitlin FitzGerald) is recently divorced. Mirren’s mother Bess Sinclair (Candice King) is estranged from her husband, and Carrie Sinclair (Mamie Gummer) has an addiction problem.
   
When “Summer 17” arrives, Cadence is desperately trying to find out about the cause of her brain injury, and no one is willing or able to shed light on what really happened. 
   
Meanwhile, Cadence had moved past the platonic stage with childhood friend Gat, whose Indian heritage doesn’t sit too well with Harris. The test of “Summer 17” is for Cadence to get answers, which are not forthcoming.
   
What’s more interesting than teenage angst and mischief are the strained relationships of Carrie, Penny and Bess, who must face unpleasant truths about their privileged heritage.
   
When a character in the last episode says she’s not into fairytales any more, that’s a feeling that rumbled through my mind in the early stages, which is one argument for “We Were Liars” to have clocked in like a two-hour movie.
   
A dynasty of rich white people cavorting during idle summers on a private island off the Atlantic coast holds not much interest over the long haul as things become a bit tedious and repetitive. 

Tim Riley writes film and television reviews for Lake County News.

‘SHARK WEEK’ ON DISCOVERY CHANNEL
  
A half-century ago one of the most terrifying films induced enough fright that in the summer of 1975 beachgoers were afraid to enter the ocean. “Jaws” was, and remains, a true blockbuster thriller.
  
On the Discovery Channel, “Shark Week” is an annual week-long festival about the seafaring apex predators that dates back to 1988. On Sunday, July 20, a jaw-dropping 20 hours of new specials will premiere.
  
“Dancing with Sharks,” hosted by Tom Bergeron, is a competition show unlike any other. For the first time ever, five divers compete to put together an amazing underwater routine with their toothy partners. 
  
From hammerheads to tigers and nurse sharks, each shark has its own signature dance moves. Not known at this time is whether disco music is part of the score. At the end of the show, a winner is crowned – if all competitors make it that far.
  
Shark expert Alison Towner teams up with Shark Week legend Dickie Chivell to decode how killer whales take down great whites with ease in “Great White Assassins.” To get answers, the team travels to New Zealand and goes to the extreme, sending Dickie underwater to pose as an orca to see how the great whites react.
  
In what will they think of next, “Great White Sex Battle” is a Shark Week first, in which male and female great white sharks compete in a series to determine which sex is the superior predator in the waters off the coast of New Zealand. No mention of an awards ceremony for the winner.
  
“In the eye of the Storm: Shark Storm,” during the summer of 2024, dozens of cameras captured a rare outbreak of shark attacks along America’s gulf coast. Told through first-hand accounts of victims and eyewitnesses, nobody has seen all these perspectives unfold in real time until now.
  
“How to Survive a Shark Attack” finds shark attack survivor Paul de Gelder attempting the unthinkable – getting attacked by a shark, again. Useful information may come from this if you are in the ocean in Florida’s Volusia County or certain areas of Australia.
  
Under the supervision of experts, Paul provokes sharks to attack him in multiple scenarios, where they bite and tear off prosthetic limbs to teach life-saving tactics for surviving an encounter with nature’s deadliest predators.
  
“Great White Northern Invasion” reports on great white sharks finding a new home off the shore of Nova Scotia, Canada, where the water temperature is nothing like that of Australia or Florida.
  
With the waters in Canada now frothing with great whites, interactions with humans are on the rise. A team of scientists tracks down and tags the biggest sharks to uncover the sharkiest locations before there’s a fatal attack.
  
In “Expedition Unknown: Shark Files,” global adventurer Josh Gates solves some of the strangest and most disturbing shark mysteries of all time.
  
One such mystery is the real-life bloody inspiration for “Jaws” and the gruesome case of the Tiger Shark who vomited an arm while in captivity and ultimately helped police solve a murder mystery.
  
“Alien Sharks: Death Down Under” finds wildlife biologist Forrest Galante injecting himself with shark venom after diving down under into Australia’s dangerous waters, home to some of the weirdest alien-like and deadly sharks.
  
The biologist hopes this risky and potentially lethal experiment will bypass years of red tape to finally discover the potency of the venomous Port Jackson Shark and Ghost Shark.
  
We know that fifty years ago “Jaws” changed the beachgoing experience by striking fear into millions of Americans who vowed never to go into the water again. “Surviving Jaws” will explore myths and facts.
  
Marine biologist Tom “Blowfish” Hird and predator ecologist Michelle Jewell re-examine the movie and dive with Great Whites to separate fact from fiction by answering questions.
  
For one, does skinny dipping really attract great white sharks? Good question, but is it really a good idea to swim nude where you may not see what is swimming in the ocean? Also, could a monster shark chew through a boat’s hull?
  
Florida takes another hit with “Florida’s Death Beach,” which indicates that New Smyrna Beach (in Volusia County) has earned the title of “The Shark Attack Capital of the World,” accounting for 30% of the global shark attacks.
  
But why has the popular spring break’s party beach become so deadly? Wildlife biologist Forrest Galante (featured in another Shark Week program) and his team investigate before even more blood ends up in the water.
  
“Attack of the Devil Shark” tells the tale of a rogue tiger shark that attacks and kills a person in Saint Martin. Weeks later, the shark strikes again in this Caribbean paradise.
  
Locals fear it could be the work of the legendary Devil Shark — a massive and ruthless tiger shark who’s haunted their shores for decades. When a team sets out to track down the shark responsible for the attacks, they uncover a seismic force that may be triggering aggression in sharks. 
  
There’s more to Shark Week than what’s reported here. 

Tim Riley writes film and television reviews for Lake County News.

‘THE WATERFRONT’ ON NETFLIX
     
Screenwriter, director, and producer Kevin Williamson, known for the screenplay for the slasher film “Scream” and TV drama series “Dawson’s Creek” and “The Vampire Diaries,” finds his life story to be inspiration for his creation of the Netflix streaming series “The Waterfront.”
     
The coast of North Carolina, where Williamson spent his high school years, is the setting for the story of the fictional Buckley family trying to hold on to their fishing empire through dangerously illegal means.
     
The parallel to the creator of “The Waterfront” is that his family’s patriarch, similar to the head of the Buckley clan, had to keep the family fishing business afloat by using his trawler to smuggle drugs to make ends meet.
     
In the fictional town of Havenport, Harlan Buckley (Holt McCallany) is the big fish in the community, running the largest fishery and an upscale restaurant that has been owned by the prominent family for generations.
     
Understanding the pivotal character of Harlan’s desperate return to illegal activity is rooted in the story of Williamson’s own father who found himself handling a financial predicament that resulted in being arrested and serving time.
     
Whether Williamson’s father was as complex as the flawed Harlan Buckley would probably make for a good story on its own, but that’s something for the show creator to contemplate if he ever thinks of doing a documentary that would likely be even more fascinating than fiction.
     
The opening scene takes place on a dark night when a boat is hijacked by gunmen who throw two men running the vessel into the sea in order to steal the $10 million in drugs waiting for pickup.
     
Harlan’s son Cane (Jake Weary) happens to find the boat washed up on shore, while police and DEA agents are on the scene.  A bit of quick thinking has Cane scurrying over to the town clerk to backdate a transfer of the boat’s title to one of the missing crew members.
     
Meanwhile, Harlan the philanderer wakes up next to a girlfriend gripping his chest in pain as he suffers yet another heart attack.  Harlan also has a penchant for whiskey any time of the day, much to the dismay of his wife Belle (Maria Bello).
     
The matriarch of the Buckley family appears to be the glue holding the family together in spite of their reckless behavior.  While cunning in many ways, Belle can also fall prey to a shrewd developer taking advantage of her willingness to sell the family’s prime oceanfront land against Harlan’s wishes.
     
The most dysfunctional family member has to be Cane’s troubled sister Bree (Melissa Benoist), struggling with addiction that has caused her to lose custody of her teenage son Diller (Brady Hepner) that she’s not allowed to see without a court-appointed chaperone.
     
Bree’s bad decisions don’t just involve drugs and alcohol.  She becomes romantically involved with DEA Special Agent Marcus Sanchez (Gerardo Celasco), who runs with his gut instinct that something is rotten in Havenport and it points to the Buckleys.
     
While Belle runs the restaurant business, Harlan and Cane stick to the seafood empire that slips back into drug-running.  But the relationship between father and son is fraught with tension that even boils over into physical confrontations.
     
Central to the essence of the series’ drama is the turbulent relationship between a father who thinks his son is too soft and feckless and a son who feels his father, despite his tough demeanor, has lost a step in dealing with the family business.
     
As the episodes unfold, interesting characters come into the mix.  Sheriff Clyde Porter (Michael Gaston) runs the town like a personal fiefdom, though mindful of Harlan’s influence.  Topher Grace’s Grady is a shady character, and the less said about him the better lest spoilers ruin a surprising turn.
     
The eight episodes of “The Waterfront” are very tempting to binge-watch.  A bit of patience is required in the early going as the story unfolds slowly while the introduction of essential characters carefully lays the foundation for a lot of twists and turns.
     
The series is a curious blend of soap opera drama and thrilling suspense.  The drama can be compelling but also formulaic given how the Buckleys are tormented by betrayals, greed, dark secrets, and festering psychic wounds common to the genre.
     
“The Waterfront” is not unlike a soap opera like the long-running “Dallas,” where backstabbing, lust and greed create an emotional rollercoaster ride, except the oil empire drama largely avoided violence aside from J.R. Ewing being shot.
     
Indeed, the Buckley family is a dysfunctional mess as the result of simmering tensions between the parents themselves and with the offspring often untethered from responsibility and family bonds.
     
“The Waterfront” benefits from charismatic performances across the board, intriguing dialogue, a bevy of surprising twists, and proving to be far more entertaining than most of the current crop of streaming series.     

Tim Riley writes film and television reviews for Lake County News.

A painting by John N. Harris of Groveland, Fla. has been chosen as the winner of the 2025 California Duck Stamp Art Contest. 

The painting, which depicts a cinnamon teal, will be the official design for the 2025-2026 stamp.

The judging was held at the end of June. The judges were immediately struck by the realism of the painting, almost as if the bird were alive. They noted the spot-on dimensions, specifically the shape of the head, and the perfect, finely detailed feathers. 

This attention to detail was also seen in little additions throughout the painting, such as the faint reflection of the teal’s eye in the water, its indistinct leg visible beneath the surface, and the patches of bubbles in the swells. 

The watery background, with enough detail to provide an interesting visual element in itself, put the teal center stage, highlighting its cinnamon color and making it pop for a stamp.

Harris, who is now a three-time winner of California’s Duck Stamp Art Contest, was excited for this year’s stamp. He had never painted a cinnamon teal before, though they had been on his radar for some time.

“Over the last few years, we've had a few cinnamon teal overwinter at our local Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge, so I was able to observe a couple individuals and take some beautiful photographs of them,” he said. One particular bird, however, caught his eye. “The color was amazing when the sun hit it right and it just glowed. How can an artist have any better inspiration than that? He was an absolute jewel to watch, feeding and jousting with all the local blue wings.”

Harris’s first goal was to make the setting and water as realistic as possible. “I really wanted to make it look like you could just dip your hand right into it,” he said.

Once that was done, he started on the bird. He began with the eye to bring life to the painting and inspire him moving forward. It took a few tries, but he eventually created an eye that looked natural and alive, and the rest of the painting fell into place.

“I knew it was one of my most outstanding waterfowl paintings yet. It will be a great honor to have my artwork help conservation work and protect waterfowl and habitat in the great state of California once again.” 

Artists from around the country submitted entries for the contest, sponsored by the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, or CDFW. 

Frank Dolphens of Omaha, Neb., placed second, Jeffrey Klinefelter of Etna Green, Ind., placed third and Brian Murillo of Norwalk, Iowa, received honorable mention.

The top four paintings will be displayed at the Pacific Flyway Decoy Association’s Annual Classic Wildlife Art Festival in Sacramento July 12-13.

Since 1971, the California Duck Stamp Program’s annual contest has attracted top wildlife artists from around the country. The contest is open to artists from all 50 states in order to ensure a wide pool of submissions. All proceeds generated from stamp sales go directly to waterfowl conservation projects within California.

In the past, hunters were required to purchase and affix the stamp to their hunting licenses. Today, hunters are no longer required to carry the stamps because California’s modern licensing system prints proof of additional fees paid directly onto the license. 

However, CDFW still produces the stamps, which can be requested on CDFW’s website at wildlife.ca.gov/licensing/collector-stamps.