Three episodes into the third season of The Shield, it is clear that the show if anything is even slightly better than before.
This comes as a function of character. After a season or two of setting up the parameters of the characters, we're digging in for nuance and angles. The actors and writers have created a whole little world of people and relationships, and they're now figuring out from a couple years of practice and living with the characters the natural logical trajectories of all this.
The same type of thing has happened with many of the other best tv shows historically. They start out with strong premises and characters that make a great show, but then they're only really hitting their creative peak perhaps several seasons in.
All in the Family makes a classic example. Archie Bunker was pretty funny from show #1, but he only became a full fledged character and icon with time. He was always funny ol' Archie, but he gained dimensions and credibility as a dramatic character over time. Edith likewise. It took a couple of years living the character to work up to stuff like the famous scene baptizing the infant grandson.
Even the Simpsons went from funny Tracy Ullman cartoons to multi-dimensional characters. Bart Simpson became a real boy, so to speak. He passed the mundane status of a t-shirt fad into true icon status by becoming a legitimate literary character with more than a couple of broad strokes of personality. He has moments of genuine dramatic conflict, such as the episode where he sold his soul to Milhouse.
Few shows have enough depth about them in the first place to be developed like this. How much character development are you really going to get from some treacly Touched by an Angel or Everybody Loves Raymond? Ain't going to happen.
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