In Treatment: Week Seven (3.25 - 3.28)

It feels sort of funny to say that a season with twenty-eight episodes ended up a little rushed, but that's always the feeling I get at the end of another year of In Treatment. Stories build, characters grow in complexity, and the finales are always pulled together with a half-dozen smaller ideas left scattered to the wind. And, once again, just like every year, I come back around and realize that it's life itself in a nutshell -- a commentary on the fact that we're never truly 'done', and that actual individuals don't have season finales.

In Treatment: Week Six (3.21 - 3.24)

Something that's always impressed me about In Treatment is that it's never exactly been a ringing endorsement for therapy. There have been obvious success stories along the way, patients coming into their own and recognizing and fixing their problems, but there's frequently an open ending to most of these people's stories: the promise that things will get better, even if there's little tangible evidence that things actually are. This week frequently came back to the idea of therapy as a subject and whether or not it's at all useful, Paul insisting that his sessions with Sunil are greatly improving his well-being, something other characters respectfully disagree with, followed by Jesse wondering if his sessions have at all benefited him. It's a curious position for the show to take, but something that feeds into Paul's general drifting -- he's always seemed to wonder if he's doing any real good.

In Treatment: Week Five (3.17 - 3.20)

While I've enjoyed every season of In Treatment, I still don't think I've been more enamored with the show than I was during season one, which exploited the 'one room, many stories' motif to a heavier degree than anything in recent years. But one of my complaints mid-season involved the dramatic leaps and hurdles the writers had to employ to overcome the obvious limitations of the show's premise. Like the suicidal girl overdosing in Paul's bathroom, to keep the drama contained to his base of operations. Season three has fused both extremes together, maintaining the 'one-room' drama that quickly became this show's trademark, but also creating a ton of soapy, detached drama along the way, something that feels uncertain at times, but proves generally entertaining. I'm not sure it entirely meshes with In Treatment's basic sensibility just yet, but I'm eager to see where it's all headed.

In Treatment: Week Four (3.13 - 3.16)

Every episode this season has opened up with a small vignette about Paul's personal life, usually involving Parkinson's, but recently revolving around his interactions with son Max. What was made pretty clear this week is that Paul is trying to unravel the mystery behind being an absent parent, and whether you can ever leave your footprint on your child's maturation when they barely see you. It's already effective on its own, but it also ties Paul closer to Jesse, who was discussing similar problems in his session this week. Genetics always bleed through whether you like it or not, but little is greater than the family actively present in our lives.

In Treatment: Week Three (3.9 - 3.12)

They say first impressions matter the most, and that it takes a lot to have those perceptions change. It's probably different with television characters, since it's rare to have a ton of literal attachment to a bunch of people moving around on your TV set. But, three weeks in, those perceptions you have about Paul's patients are rapidly changed, characters that seemed troubled but generally pleasant suddenly ugly, all exhibiting nastier qualities. Even Sunil, arguably the nicest new character, received added depth this week that made you question what you thought you knew about him, his actions now creepy and less guided by his supposed naivety.

In Treatment: Week Two (3.5 - 3.8)

True to form, these early weeks feature patients entering therapy with what they believe to be a clear understanding of their problems. In some cases, it's more about other people's opinions, but there's still a general semblance of understanding. What Paul is starting to do, like always, is try and pick at those who have turned to him for guidance, forcing them to confront the true issues that are lurking beneath the surface traumas. It takes aggressive coaxing at times, but we're just about able to spot the specific sources of the various issues on offer this year, including with Paul himself.

In Treatment: Week One (3.1 - 3.4)

It's always tricky to review the very first week of In Treatment. Like life, it's hard to get a complete handle on people after only knowing them for twenty minutes. You can obviously get a sense of what makes them tick and what their general personalities are like, but it's only ever surface. So the first week is naturally a little vague, a rough draft of a bunch of new characters rife with dramatic potential. Like always, though, there's a lot to love so far, the surface of these people already rich and intriguing, played by actors that immediately jump off the screen with intensity and anguish.

In Treatment: Week Seven (2.31 - 2.35)

In its final week, In Treatment once again promotes how different it is to everything else on television. Like last season, anxiety and introspection has been slowly building session by session, presumably about to spill over in this final week. But here is where, traditionally, the show's dedication to naturalism clashes with the narrative's desperation for closure. As a result, you can look at this week of episodes as slightly underwhelming. If you're looking for resolutions and a true ending to the stories of Paul and his various patients, then it's probably not the greatest collection of episodes. But in exposing those small victories, the ones that suddenly grant you the ability to move on to that next phase of life, it's unsurprisingly a home run.

In Treatment: Week Six (2.26 - 2.30)

It's interesting to see how your reaction to In Treatment can frequently differ from your reaction to other shows, primarily when it comes to character motivation. Almost every patient this show has ever explored has issues rooted in how they were brought up, their parents' neuroses generally invading their own psyches and turning them into these troubled, vulnerable adults. It's a theme repeated constantly. On any other show, the use of the same plot device could frustrate after a while, the writers traveling to the same emotional hub over and over again. But there's a specialness about In Treatment that allows you to forgive that. Because isn't it based so much on truth? I would assume in most cases that the way we were raised had a significant effect on our adult lives and how we conduct ourselves, more so than our environments or our experiences outside of the home. It's such a cliche in itself, but also so horribly real.

In Treatment: Week Five (2.21 - 2.25)

There was a simplicity to last week's episodes, events aligning just right in order to allow Paul's patients to open up, or alternatively to allow Paul in. It was a real breakthrough week, but Paul himself had to step over the line more than once to get there, becoming so intimate and personal with his patients that there were few boundaries left anymore. This week was all about the emotional fallout, characters reacting mostly negatively to his sudden need to retreat. Couple that with a weeks' worth of canceled sessions due to his father's death, and bitterness naturally hung over the encounters.

In Treatment: Week Four (2.16 - 2.20)

I feel like I'm reiterating it every week, but season two is about letting people in, to an extent that is potentially damaging. There was at least one instance every episode this week in which a patient took that additional step into Paul's consciousness. This occurred literally, with Mia invading his kitchen and Oliver asking about doorways and Paul's own son, as well as in a less physical movement -- Paul so desperate to help that he's almost clinging onto April and Walter as they walk out the door, intent on keeping them intact and becoming so emotionally involved in their stories that they seem to be the most important people in his life. This was the strongest week so far, breakthroughs occurring in every single session.

In Treatment: Week Three (2.11 - 2.15)

And the intimacy continues. Whether its Oliver's turtle or April's project, or Mia's general presence, Paul is still allowing his patients to linger long after they've left his practice. It was a theme that ran through most of this week's episodes, that constant blurring between appropriate conduct and personal friendship. Like last season, it's never just a patient who anchors their own episode. Every action somehow bounces back at Paul, and I don't know if it's a personal weakness of his that he winds up so rattled by every movement they make. More than ever, this season seems to be about Paul's faults as a therapist as well as a man, and the unearthing of where that comes from.

In Treatment: Week Two (2.6 - 2.10)

Week Two lacked the immediacy of last week's premiere episodes, but you can already see certain ideas and themes that are being generated through each session. There's a harsher, meaner vibe to the stories this year, and it's arguably far more incestuous than the already frantic bending of confidentiality last season, with Paul intimately involved with the far majority of his patients. Whether its Mia and their history, his connection with April or the turtle hanging around in his office, he's allowing himself to be far more attached to these people than is probably good.

In Treatment: Week One (2.1 - 2.5)

I'm assuming luring in new viewers wasn't one of HBO's major priorities while opening up the second season of In Treatment, one of the most absorbing and frustratingly subtle series around. While it's fine getting thrown into several of the series' new patients, the opening week spends a lot of time exploring the aftermath of season one. Notably, this involves Alex's bitter father, who has launched a malpractice suit against Paul. It's an interesting angle to start up the year, and lends the series an unexpected feeling of a dark cloud hanging over everything.

In Treatment: Week Nine (1.41 - 1.43)

For the final three episodes, we were given some resolution, but not so much that it clashed with the naturalistic feel of the show in general. While the fact that pretty much the entire cast have either quit therapy or died is a little contrived, In Treatment has successfully crafted an absorbing closer to the year. Along the way, a lot of the show's patients developed new sides to their personalities, while fittingly other patients remained stagnant. It's the realist approach to such deep, damaged characters that has made the series so powerful.

In Treatment: Week Eight (1.36 - 1.40)

An important part of this week's episodes was the assumptions we make as people, and the realities we either don't know, or aren't willing to find out. Paul questions his own methods, especially when he actually encounters the people who he had so far only "constructed" in his head. Elsewhere, we have Alex's father, and his own assumptions of both therapy and parenting. And then there's Gina. Fiction vs. reality made for the most interesting theme this week.

In Treatment: Week Seven (1.31 - 1.35)

With the series nearing its conclusion, the sessions are becoming a little more fragmented, and each is winding down to their respective endings. There seemed to be a sense of walls being erected or alternatively knocked down for a lot of the characters this week. Paul continues to put up walls between him and Kate, helped by the involvement of their children, walls are being broken down and exposing real vulnerability in both Amy and Sophie, and Alex is forging his own wall, because allowing himself to be vulnerable is just too much for him.

In Treatment: Week Six (1.26 - 1.30)

Fathers affected every single session this week. I figured it was a cliché in bad TV shows that pretty much every psychological problem has something to do with either a) the patient's childhood, or b) the patient's parents. Here, Laura told her father everything, Alex, Sophie and Amy all confided in Paul about their respective dads, and Paul's father trauma is still affecting his mindset. It's intriguing, but surely there's gotta be more to each patient that that, right?

In Treatment: Week Five (1.21 - 1.25)

I understand that "breakthroughs" are an important part of therapy. That moment where the patient suddenly hits a realization, or reveals something about themselves that suddenly casts all of their problems in a new life. In terms of In Treatment, this week was a real "breakthrough". We really do know these characters now, but all of these episodes managed to create new conflicts and expose previously unknown secrets about our protagonists. By far the best week this show has produced.

In Treatment: Week Four (1.16 - 1.20)

The show has become more of a soap opera, with certain story developments feeling more than a little contrived, but the general quality of the series is pretty much the same. Paul continues to be exposed as an idiot, and Sophie's storyline takes a dramatic (if lazy) turn.