By Brandon Nolta

We begin with a tremendously annoying elevator bell dinging several times. A door opens, revealing a pretty girl — battered, bloody, and wearing only a trenchcoat and underwear under all that blood. She runs out into the street, catching eyes everywhere, almost getting plastered by a taxi cab. Brought into a police station, her only identification is a business card for a partner at a law firm, and she refuses to speak.
   
That’s just the first minute of FX’s new show DAMAGES. Talk about in medias res. But, anyone who has seen the commercials knows at least half of what I’ve just described. Let’s talk about what more there is.

There’s Ellen Parsons (Rose Byrne), an ambitious, talented, young law school graduate who was headhunted with a lucrative offer to join a high-stakes litigation firm. There’s Patty Hewes (Glenn Close), the toughest legal predator in a firm full of sharks, piranha and other assorted bundles of teeth and fury. There’s Arthur Frobisher (Ted Danson), a corporate mogul and subject of a massive fraud suit related to stock-dumping á la Enron. And, there’s the cast of thousands (or so it seems), providing support to what is likely to become a clash of wills between two powerful, unyielding women. Maybe.

Then again, about the only thing we as viewers can count on — according to the title cards — is six months go by between Ellen’s hiring at Hewes and Associates and the opening scene, and a lot of monkeyshines that go down in those months.
   
As a network, FX specializes in raw, gritty dramas that don’t flinch from tough subject matter and story lines that range from unpleasant to plain old freakin’ weird. This is, after all, the network of THE SHIELD and RESCUE ME, and DAMAGES is right in that tradition. The fractured time line lends this pilot episode a ton of foreboding, and the fact that good ol’ Miss Boil-a-Bunny herself is one of the lead players tends to add the expectation of trouble ahead (it’s probably no coincidence that another pet meets the Grim Reaper in a violent way in the course of the pilot). This is no reflection on the acting involved.

Close, who turned in a killer recurring turn on THE SHIELD a couple of years ago, probably holds the patent on steely women of strength on film; she leavens Patty Hewes with both weary tenderness and Machiavellian willpower. Byrne, whose resume includes cavorting with Brad Pitt on the shores of Troy and rolling with Queen Amidala in the second STAR WARS prequel, isn’t given a chance to show her chops, but there are hints of fire and steel in her portrayal of a woman who is willing to give her ambition free rein if she could just get rid of those nagging twinges of conscience.

Of the main characters, so far, it’s actually Mr. Danson who surprises the most; after years of playing charming cads and dim-witted nice guys, he gives us a man who uses his charisma to disguise his utter ruthlessness and willingness to sacrifice whatever success requires. Frobisher may yet turn out to be a decent guy, but so far he’s a smooth bastard, which is a nice play against the usual casting.
          
Despite the acting artillery brought to bear on this show, and the obvious writing talent behind the scenes, FX has set itself a challenge in bringing DAMAGES to the schedule; namely, do viewers really need another show about lawyers? For a segment of society that is fun and easy to hate (only politicians get less love, and most of those yahoos are lawyers too), TV sure loves to splash their fictionalized lives on the small screen. What’s here is nicely rendered and enjoyable to watch, but it’s too soon to tell whether the broad strokes and detail work of this show will justify another season pass on this reviewer’s DVR. Then again, with Glenn Close and the lovely Ms. Byrne in the lead roles, I’m willing to give DAMAGES a little bit more rope.