Medium: Season 4 (2008)

After a break for Xmas, BBC2 has finally got round to finishing their repeat showing of Medium's 4th season. And as far as I know, that's it's last appearance on free-to-air TV as the rights have gone off to a satellite channel somewhere. Thank goodness for DVD box sets!

Following the waves that were made at the end of Season 3, when Alison was 'outed', Season 4 rearranges the show so that both Allison and Joe are out of work, Devalos is no longer District Attorney, and Scanlon is wary of Allison's assistance for fear of her reputation rubbing off on him. Allison initially works for the curmudgeonly Cynthia Keener, portrayed by Anjelica Huston over a number of episodes during the first half of the (short, strike-hit) season. 

Unfortunately, as good as Huston is in the role, she's not Devalos! And due to the re-jigging of the format, Manuel is often no where to be seen, appearing in only a handful of episodes, despite Miguel Sandoval's name in the opening credits each week. Thankfully, Lee Scanlon, after initial hesitancy, begins to seek out Allison's help more often. The conclusion of Cynthia Keener's story was powerful and unexpected, and then made me miss her! While Allison is often quite grumpy (usually with Joe) it was nice to have a character who was even more irritable to make Allison seem a bit happier. 

There was a new guest star this series too, in the form of a coffee shop where everyone now gets together, despite never having gone there before. I do like it when that happens - the same thing occurred in Kyle XY's second season. Elsewhere in the show, Joe had a brilliant idea for an invention (through his own inspired dream that took place in an animated world), and eventually got taken for a ride by his beautiful financier; Marie got glasses; and... Allison had a lot of dreams! I've been able to work out a few of the cases before Allison this season, which either means I've watched too much detective TV, or the cases are getting easier - yet every time she dreams she has to convince Scanlon (and often Joe) to listen to her. You'd think they'd learn to trust her more! And it would also save a lot of time each episode if she had the full dream at the start, rather than having bits of it over different nights. Though I guess that would make for a boring show. 

By season's end, Devalos was DA again, and Scanlon and Allison are there to help come season 5, and Joe has a well-paid new job, so the money-worries that plagued the DuBois' this season are no more. Despite feeling a little cheated by this series 'reset', it's good to have the gang back together. Now, when's season 5 out on DVD? (And actually I need season 4 as the snooker made me miss 2 episodes!)