By Buzz Byrne

To their credit, the writers of ENTOURAGE have never seriously lingered on the artistic side of cinema. No, to them the drama is in the deal-making rather than the movie-making. The first episode of season four covers the entire shooting of “MEDELLIN” with the tired device of an independent crew filming a “making of …” feature. It was an obvious, lazy and nonsensical way to cover this ground and an unfortunate direction for the show to take.
 
Surprise, surprise, things don’t go well on the set in Colombia and all of the blame goes to tortured genius auteur Billy Walsh (Rhys Coiro). I don’t know how an actor is supposed to work with lines like “I don’t make movies. I make FILMS!” and not come off as an over-the-top, scenery-chewing goofball, but maybe Coiro could try exploring vulnerability. At least that would be an unexpected turn. The Billy Walsh character has become loathsome and the portrayal is singular in tone. Unfortunately, he will be around for a few more episodes, I suspect, as the "MEDELLIN" filming is wrapped but now the editing is beginning.
 
Vinny Chase (Adrian Grenier) floats through the episode, vaguely amused in ridiculous Pablo Escobar makeup effects. Eric Murphy (Kevin Connolly) is holding the production together as the producer and Vinny’s manager. Sure, he gets a little agitated when budgets get blown and deadlines aren’t met, and even when the ending has to be rewritten. You wouldn’t know this is the first time the guys are doing this, though, except they say so constantly. Why portray when exposition does the heavy lifting? You never get the sense that anything really that important is at stake — like, say, their careers and their entire financial future. You never feel like this is a true dream project that either of these guys cares about.
 
The problem lies in who isn’t on set, forcing them to make tough and important decisions. The absent party is Jeremy Piven’s Ari Gold. The end of this series' third season and the start of the fourth shows that Ari is less and less involved, and that makes ENTOURAGE less and less interesting. If the writers aren’t going to have Vinny or Eric go toe-to-toe with the likes of Billy Walsh, then let Ari come down and spill a little blood on the set. Why would an agent be on the set? I don’t know exactly, but why would Ari be bad-mouthing the production to the “MAKING OF…” film crew? That doesn’t make much sense either.
 
Do we really care if “MEDELLIN” is the next SCARFACE? Does it matter if Vinny gets an Oscar nomination? I hope not. What I do hope is that Jeremy Piven isn’t making SMOKIN’ ACES II: SHUFFLE UP AND DIE so he can actually be in the show that got him an Emmy. Life needs to get a little tougher for everyone on this show so it can get back to making the cutthroat deals. That is where the drama is, after all.