Summer of 2004, Spike-TV started showing reruns of CSI. I was aware of the show on CBS before, but only caught bits and pieces while channel surfing. However, since Spike-TV started from the beginning, I figured I'd give it a look-see. I ended up watching it every night during dinner and got hooked.
What hooked me was the science, the crime-recreation, and the characters of Grissom, Nick and Warrick, plus Greg's comedy relief. I didn't like Brass at first because he kept on clashing with Warrick, but he grew on me over time as he mellowed and went back to Homicide. He's now one of my favorite characters.
Those early episodes reminded me a lot of the XFiles--especially the Serial Killer/autopsy episodes, and the episode with the guy in the Alien Costume found near Area 51 made me hope against hope for an appearance of Fox Mulder and Dana Sculley. Truthfully, CSI filled a void that The XFiles left in my TV viewing after David Duchovny left the series.
When Spike-TV finally showed "Cross-Jurisdictions," I found the Miami crew to be interesting, and an odd mesh of CSI, Hawaii Five-O and Miami Vice. I started watching current episodes after seeing Cross-Jurisdictions, and when A&E started showing reruns, I got caught up on what happened to poor Speed!
I didn't watch New York until last year. I was actually a bit turned off at first because of Providence's Melina Kanakaredes (didn't like her character on that show) and some bad feelings about some characters Gary Sinise played in "Snake Eyes" and "Ransom". However, because Danny Messer reminded me of Logan Cale from Dark Angel, I gave it a go and have found myself quite fond of Mac, Stella, Sheldon, Danny and Sid.
I never miss a new episode of any of the CSI series, which drives my wife nuts. My daughter, however, has a crush on Nick (she's turning 5 on the 26th, so no worries here!) and has occasionally made some odd observations from watching CSI with me "Daddy, that stain isn't blood--blood dries brown!" Suffice it to say, her mom is *not amused* when she says those things!