Locker Room #17: Danny/Carmine: Our Utility Guy

Don't get me wrong. I love Danny's character, he is my favourite but I'm very curious about the others.
Danny had a special story in S1 (On the job), in S2 (Tanglewood, Run Silent, Run Deep... etc.) and in S3 too with that whole D/L thing. In S4 he had is own storyline too. I think it's time to the others to bring us some new storylines and background info. - Caprian

Less of Danny? Erk! God i hope not. I don't see enough of him as it is..mind you, he is the only reason i watch the show anymore..**misses Season One**
And a shower scene? Which petition do I sign and how much do I have to pay? What? I'm shallow. :lol:

 

I feel it is the natural grow of someone who has been through a lot.
It would have been unrealistic in my opion if he stayed that annoying brat(so to speak) he was in season 1.
Now,offcourse you can argue wether the grow went to fast or too slow etc but he had to grow as a person without losing the little things like his instinct.

On a shallow note,that doesn`t leave out the fact that grown up or not he still needs to shower

 

I may be alone here but i liked the antagonism between Mac and Danny in Season One - gave it frisson y'know?...and made for electrifying watching. 'On the Job' was/is just gut-wrenching because it seems so real.
When they lightened the tone of the show the characters got to lighten up too (Mac randomly strumming guitars?? Jesus :wtf Maybe TPTB thought they weren't appealing or likeable enough. Hence the arrival of wossername. Fantastic.
But i still have hope for Danny, cuz sometimes i see a glimmer of that old passion/fear that seemed to pulsate through him. And he is hot as all hell. Ouch! My mind! Thanks for making me think lady..:lol:

 

Well, since S1, I think that Danny did grow up a bit indeed. He has changed the way he is working, the way he views evidence (not entirely, obviously, but in a good manner he did so), hee also tightened his relationship with Mac. Back then half of the time they were on a conflict. What I would like to know about S1 Danny that turned into S4 Danny is the promotion. Did he get it? Will he ever get it? Is he down from the promotion gridd for a timee that he will qualify again?

Then again, in Run Silent Run Deep we have seen a glimpse of his relationship with Louie. The way he felt abandonned by his own brother, and that it hurt, and it definitely had an impact on him as a grown up.

What I hate about this transfformation, is that S1 Danny was better than S4 Danny. Like many others have said already S1 Danny was a round character, with a touch of mistery, with a touch of passion with a touch of frustration and humor altogether in one person. I remember after watching Tanglewood and after the ending of that episode, I was amazed by that. I wnated to know if Danny is really the good guy or he is the bad one? Or he is playing both sides. Until RSRD this was a big unanswered question for me, that made the character even more intresting.

The latest storyline, Ruben's death brought back the old Danny in someways. He had that mistery again, we never knew 100% how he felt about that, we always saw him torturing between guilt and trying to move on and get on with his life. I loved that scene when at a point he told Mac that he is not able to go look for a killer in schools and kindergartens, and Mac just stood there and looked at him without having any reply.

One other thing that I like about Danny now is that we have seen more and more of his great friendship with Flack. The scenes where those two are together are absolute gold, and I haven't seen or heard of one soul that didn't like the scenes between the two.

As a conclusion, for the future I hope that the writers try and bring Danny that mistery again and make him as passionate as he was back then, to see him at his best.

 

I do agree with you miss_blue and virginia-hell.

As the writers let us know more 'bout the characters they lightened up.
S1 Danny was mysterious, a bit kept back, his way of speaking was totally different than in S4. He didn't gesticulated that much and he wasn't that "cool". I mean he became easy-going. He does not wear suits -which not a prob at all - but shows this change.
His sense of humour still the same. For me the "only" positive thing in new Danny is his closer r'ship with Flack. I love their interactions, masterpiece!

Okay, maybe Carmine made his character to fit more to him, shaped Danny as his own as he got closer to the character -many times he said he likes his character very much- and I do appriciate that, he did and still does a great job. I only say I liked more the mysterious, can't-decide-wether-he's-good-or-bad Danny.

 

I think he has abnormal trust issues. Here are the traits of Dependent Personality Disorder which can be found at the Mayo Clinic's website. They wouldn't C/P nicely like the NPD ones I put in the Lindsay thread.

http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/personality-disorders/DS00562/DSECTION=symptoms

Excessive Dependence on others to meet your Physical and Emotional Needs

It's been said that Danny is the show's "Damsel in Distress." How many times has he needed to be rescued to save him from something, oftentimes his own self?

"Trapped" where he gets caught in the Panic Room.

"OTJ" where he defies Mac, mostly because he feels that Mac doesn't have his back.

All the times he's called on Flack to come an help him, or that he's had to...."All in the Family" comes to mind most clearly. Although the bar scene in "...Comes Around" is a close second. Then there's "Snow Day."

Tolerance of poor, even abusive treatment to stay in relationships

Lindsay and all the things that have gone on between the two of them. The Monologue of Doom, Tolerating her standing him up, Going to Montana for her, then when she says he's hard to love, he's wanting her to come over so they can talk.

Then, there's the fact that Flack really had to jump on his back in "All in The Family" to get him to see reason. My feeling is that if Flack hadn't gotten borderline nasty with him about bringing Rikki in, I'm not sure he would have done it.

What seems to be his continuing hero worship of his brother Louie, even after the events that were portrayed 15 years prior in RSRD seem to bear this out as well.



Unwillingness to independently voice opinions, make decisions, or initiate activities.

Not so sure on this one. Sexually, the stuff with Lindsay in "Snow Day," the scene with Rikki in "RND" seem to bear this out.

Otherwise, especially with Mac in OTJ, and Flack in "All in the Family" he comes across as a bit defiant.

He definitely doesn't seem to want to disappoint anyone. Not Mac, not Lindsay, not Rikki, not Louie. It seems that Disapointment=Abandonment.

Intense fear of being alone

I definitely see a fear of being alone and abandonment. Notice that after Lindsay's Monologue of Doom, and her saying she had to get over him, he started being more receptive to her, and over the next two episodes tried like mad to talk with her about what was going on, culminating in the scene on the phone where he sounded like a drunken werewolf. (kudos to whoever I clipped that from, BTW, it's appropriate)

Also, not wanting to disappoint. He can't bear to be a disappointment/have disapproval/not be okay with others, A la Mac in "What You See is What You See." When Mac said "We'll see" when Danny asked if they were okay, I thought Danny was gonna cry. See Disappointment=Abandonment above.

Urgent need to start a new relationship when one has ended


I know this was discussed in another thread, but the scenes at the end of "Personal Foul" I believe, with the drunken phone call, and where Rikki told him she was moving, it seems like they were switched. It almost felt like Rikki said she was moving, and he called Lindsay. Didn't someone in that thread point out that there was an object that looked like it was blurred out, that could have been the sugar Rikki brought over?

It almost seems like because Rikki let him go/left him, he wanted Lindsay.

Also, Aiden (RIP) was the one he had the tightest bond with in Season 1. They flirted, they joked, they were pretty much best of friends. Then, when Lindsay came in, Danny started flirting with her/joking with her and calling her Montana. Seems like she was a replacement for Aiden in more ways than one. (Though Aiden had the sense to draw the line with Danny, and say she was out of his league)


Also, it was mentioned in the "Is Danny a Slut" thread that Danny can't stand disapproval, which I've noted here.

If sex or his sexuality is something he can use to gain approval, Danny will. The bet in "Snow Day" Rikki in "Right Next Door." He even said to Rikki that what they were doing may not be right, and certainly wasn't the healthiest thing to do, but they were comforting each other. I think that if Rikki had been up for another romp in "PF," Danny would have gone for it.

I won't say that he definitely does or doesn't, because even trained professionals who know the DSM (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders http://dsm4tr.org) back and forth can misdiagnose, a social work grad student with experience in the mental health field and geriatrics can certainly do so too.

I will say he does have issues with trust and abandonment, stemming from his upbringing. I think the incident with Louie really scarred him deeply. I don't think they're quite normal. I know Top41 has said she feels he's one of the most damaged men on television. I'd tend to agree. He is damaged, and has a truckload of issues.

Happy discussion!

 

Interesting points are brought up and I do agree Danny is really damaged.

I wonder if the fact that he uses sex as a tool to keep people,is something he might have seen in his youth.
Not that I think he is sexually abused but who knows with his brother in tanglewood and his family`s somewhat murky past.

 

Now that you mention it, there's something off about the way he was with that pedophile. The whole "What; am I too old for you or something?" comment, coupled with the way he erased the smiley faces and flicked the sugar at him at the end of the scene seemed to indicate more than normal disgust with the man. It was certainly out of the norm. True, most people find pedophiles disgusting, but.....

Yeah. The way he said that to Aiden almost indicated a disgust with the idea of the whole "Rub and Tug" or sex without some sort of connection. The mention of "girlfriends" was intriguing. Does that mean that he's been around the block and sleeps around, or something else? It seems to me that he sees sex as a comodity, something to be used emotionally. Or for him to let others use him physically as a way of keeping emotional closeness.

The way he was with Lindsay and Rikki also seem to show that. I think if Rikki would have wanted to, he'd have slept with her again. I also think that if Lindsay had accepted his invite, he'd have slept with her. No doubt.

I definitely think he could have been sexually abused in the past, perhaps sexually active at a young age or maybe he saw that same dynamic play out with his parents. His mom may have been that way towards his father, so that's what he emulates now.

I really, really hope that TPTB delve into the subject of his upbringing and what made him the complex character he is during Season 5.

 

I third the opinion that the list of symptoms for DPD being applied to Danny is very interesting indeed!

:lol: Hell, yes! You can see the proof in the Switch of Scenes in 4x19 thread.

Danny having been sexually abused in the past is a sad and perturbing thought. I can't imagine his brother Louie or his dad being the perpetrators. I can, however, see the abuser being a relatively close person to the family, close enough that Danny may have looked to Louie for protection for most of his childhood and teenage years. That could be possibly why Danny felt Louie pushing him away like he did in Run Silent, Run Deep was bad enough that he didn't speak to Louie for fifteen years after that. Only a massive betrayal could cause that kind of emotional damage.

... okay, "What, am I too old for your or something?" is a weird comment for Danny to make, or for any other character on the main cast to make without arousing some sort of suspicion about their past. It could be Danny was sexually abused but the person who did it to him never got caught or punished for what he/she did to Danny. Maybe that's also why Danny became a CSI and cop, to save other people from being used/hurt like he was?