Damages: A really smart series, with great acting from Glenn Close

I know I'm a year behind, but Season 3 of "Damages," at least from first 5 episodes, is every bit as interesting and challenging as the first two seasons. With this series, it's virtually impossible (a year after watching it) to recall the intricacies of the plot, the many twists and turns and double-crosses, but what remains is the excitement and the provocation - in part because of the odd use of time, narrrations in all three seasons told in jumbled time sequence, with cues - 6 months later, or 6 months earlier - and because we always see, right from the start, how things ended up - the various dead bodies, etc. - it's not so much that we follow a story but, detective like, we see the outcome and are trying to figure out the clues. Though it's suspenseful, it's not about suspense but about engagement. At times, I feel as if the writers themselves are trying to figure out the plot as it goes along, setting themselves a premise and figuring out how to get there, but most of the time we're in sure hands. And of course Glenn Close as Patti Hewes is a force of nature - every bit as great in Season 3 as in the earlier seasons, this time a bit more vulnerable as her husband's gone and her son is more or less out of her life. Patti, becoming increasingly isolated, is all the more ruthless - and if there's a problem in the series it's that she has no real counterpart, nobody can stand up to her. Ellen (Rose Byrne) is a stronger character in Season 3 than ever before, now working in the DA's office as they investigate a Madoff-like Ponzi scheme and as Patti fights to claim the assets for the victims - you'd think they'd be working in partnership, but there's a lot of opposition and jealousy, that for some reason - we don't yet know why or how - lead to the murder of Patti's partner, the hapless Tom Shayes. A really smart series with great acting from Glenn Close.