Mr Presbo backing down from the girl with the knife
He disappointed me. I thought his POleece background would have prepared him for such an eventuality ...yet he stood like a deer in headlights. What gives?
shareHe was much more of a house cat than some rough and tumble Western District police. He wasn't throwing guys in vans all day like the guys breaking up all the corners.
shareIt's just bad writing, period. In earlier seasons he was a hothead tough guy. Then he suddenly, magically and incongruently becomes a total wussy wimp coward.
The cop Pres and the teacher Pres are completely different characters. They should have gave them different names and different actors. That's what smart writers & producers would have done.
One of people's favorite parts of season 4 was seeing Prez become a teacher and then becoming an arguably great teacher. Seeing him care for Dukie after hearing about his living situation was one of the most touching parts of season 4.
shareI disagree with this. That scene where he pistol whipped the kid didn't seem like it was there to accentuate his brutal nature. I think it was put there to show how he makes poor decisions.
shareIt also showed that he panics in trying situations, that he tries to prove his worth for others and also for himself in a job that was seemingly pushed upon him, that all the tough guy stuff is just a show of machismo to hide his weakness. Later on, it's shown that behind-the-scenes stuff is more his forte, helped on by Lester Freamon.
The scene in the school in season four isn't bad writing, it's what would have been expected if one was paying attention to the characteristics of the character rather than taking a literalistic view of the character (he sure had some fooled). He was on his own in a class of volatile kids, in a job that he wanted to be in but was new to him, in which his need to show off or prove himself wasn't like that which he faced when as a reluctant policeman trying to give off an air of machismo, etc. In season five, you find that he's weathered that storm and is seemingly in control, showing that there's another kind of toughness out there that's maybe not so apparent.
One thing I like to point out about the scene is that if this happened in a typical suburban school district, the girl with the knife would've been expelled and certainly arrested. As Tilghman is a cash-strapped inner-city school, they do what every other institution in the show does, and juke the stats - no police report, both parties are given a couple days suspension, and it's like it never happened.
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