Jade Nolan:
I am a bit lazy, so I won't quote your long post. You are right about Hammer's Down. There he told Ray that he wanted to be just like his father. I also know that his father was in the marines. It was mentioned in one episode, don't recall which one. But it's the episode where we see the young Mac visiting his parents, when his dad got cancer and is soon going to die. Where Mac's dad told him to get the job in New York, as Claire had family there who could help Mac and Claire that day when they get their own children.
Though we do get to see his 'Marine' side when he kicks bad guy butt, or in eps like Corporate Warriors or Charge of this Post.
Yeah, that's what makes it so tantalizing! :drool::evil:
Me and Lisa were talking a while ago about Mac's very formal manner with his father, and wondering if maybe his father outranked him, so maybe his father was a Colonel or something in the army? Or it could be that making it to Major meant Mac got used to calling people 'sir' a lot.
I think there's a good chance it's both. Remember (my bad, I can't think of the ep..... Hammer Down maybe?) that he joined the Marines to "be like my father". So I'm assuming that his father was a Marine officer as well, maybe a career Marine. But I also think that the bare fact that he might have outranked him is way too cold of reason based on their apparently close relationship. I think, given everything involved, it was a title of deepest respect and commonality between them.
In Zoo York, though, he tells Lindsay not to call him 'sir', which makes me think that as a Marine officer, whatever rank he had, he maybe would have preferred a more informal relationship with his men. With his team, he always calls them by their first name, or last name in the case of Hawkes and Flack, rather than 'Detective' whatever. I like that, that he seems to want a more 'equal' relationship with his team, though I also like that he doesn't hesitate to pull the boss card with them when they step out of line.
I looooove that part in Zoo York!! :lol: Given that he was in combat so much, I know he had a more informal relationship with his men than in another setting, but trust me, the intrinsic relationship between an officer and enlisted is ALWAYS going to be the same. I think the reason he stayed on a more 'equal' level with his team is that he
didn't want it to be like the military. I got the impression from Blacklist that a part of him was tired of it and ready to move on (can't blame him given what he'd been through in it), otherwise how else would he have gotten a job offer from the NYPD if he hadn't expressed an interest/applied? But yes, I totally love when he pulls the boss card and uses that "I'm-in-charge" officer voice! :evil::evil:
Now, on a completely different note, got this still the other day and just HAD to share!
Mac's dad was in the Army, in the 6th Armoured Division, I think. He helped liberate the Buchenwald concentration camp in 1945. I totally agree with you that he joined the Marines to 'be like his father' - that is, a military man. Could be he joined the Marines because he wanted to join the military, but be his own man, so he joined the Marines rather than following his dad into the Army. Or he joined the Marines because he was young, and the Marines are 'cool', and he really wanted to make his dad proud. Personally, if he wanted to honour his father and follow in his footsteps, I don't think it would matter what
branch of the military he joined, it would just matter that he joined the military.
Jade, I really like your ideas about why Mac talks to his team the way he does, that makes a lot of sense. There's also the aspect that both the military and police/CSI careers center around ideas of service (Marines = serve country, NYPD = serve city) and protecting people, both of which are important to Mac.
Vildis, the ep where he talks about his father in the Army is 'Yahrzeit'. I watched that again yesterday, it is definitely one of my favourite ever Mac eps, we really get to see into who he is, how he thinks, what pushes his buttons. He was clearly deeply disturbed, shocked, upset when he learnt bits about what had been done to the Jews in the Holocaust, for example when he was watching Hannah's video, and his utter disgust for Elgers and later his disgust and fury Klaus Braun was very apparant. I also thought that it was so incredibly sweet and honorable and just so Mac that he bothered to personally return Esther's brooch to Hannah, he really went above and beyond the call of duty there. It was a lot like when he returned that murdered Marine's watch to his fiancee in Heroes in s2. Both examples show he has a very strong sense of honour and also both are examples of when he feels particularly connected to a case, and also that for him, in every case I think, he really cares about the victim's family/loved ones. He cares about the victims too, of course, but because of what happened to Claire, I think he can't help but feel most connected to their loved ones.
I also love the range of emotions we see from him, especially the scenes with Braun (he was MegaPissy!Mac there) and at the end when he watches the video with the old Jewish man talking about his father, and the scene at the end with Hannah. We saw Mac's 'tough' side but also his emotional, vulnerable, human side. Which was entirely fitting, given the subject matter of the Holocaust.
Thanks to all posters of lovely Mac pics! *drools excessively*
I really felt sorry for him, I mean three/four weeks...
