Boston Legal's Season 4 Starts with a Bang

Boston Legal kicked off another award winning season with their 69th episode to date, "Beauty and the Beast." As usual, Denny Crane took center stage with his remark to the two women at the table, his and partner Alan Shore's date, "You two women couldn't be more beautiful if you were paid for."

Thats Denny, folks. Denny Crane.

As the season premiere kicked off, Gloria, the beautiful but crafty blond judge that Alan has relations with periodically, confessed to him that she wanted to, among other things, "take him home, ravage him, and have his baby." Denny was soon arrested when he DID try to pay his date for sex, in his limo, and found out his date was actually an undercover cop.

In a special hour and a half presentation, Season 4 began with the trials and tribulations of those in the Boston law office of Crane, Pool and Schmidt. I was enthralled the moment it began.

In their usual edge-of-your-seat style, Boston Legal held many cases in the spotlight as it revolved around their main characters. Clarence Bell is ordered by newcomer Carl Sack to give up his cross-dressing song and dance routine with his female partner after Carl sees it on YouTube. Hilarity ensues when Sack gets head-butted by Epsenson after joking with Clarence that he is indeed fired. Alan Shore defends senior partner Shirley Schmidt when she withdraws her large donation to Stanford university. As usual, the show centers on a large global problem, this time it being global warming, greenhouse emissions, and the problem of reducing fossil fuel dependency. A tender moment was shown between Shirley and Denny as they took a minute to "relive" their old relationship. But the true relationship between Shirley and Carl comes to light near the end. The premiere ended with newcomer Katie Lloyd, played by Tara Summers, handling her first big murder case of her career. As an enticement to next weeks show, that case will be continued.

Boston Legal continues their award-winning style with their usual references to current news, Alan's romps with his variety of women, and Denny and Alan's famous ending balcony scene, complete this time with cigars and cross-dressing. Nothing was left out, and the show was brilliantly written and was even better acted.

Gary Anthony Williams returns in his role as fun loving and comical Clarence "Clarice" Bell, who started out as a transvestite client on the show. He soon evolved into an assistant for the former Claire Sims. Christian Clemenson also comes back as Jerry "Hands" Epsenson, who suffers from Asperger's syndrome. Epsenson routinely walks with his hands stiffly at his sides, whoops and purrs at a moment's notice. Introduced this year to the show were John Larroquette in the role of Carl Sack, Tara Summers as Katie Lloyd, and Saffron Burrows as Lorraine Walker.

The characters of Boston Legal are no strangers to fame, even before the show was introduced. James Spader has won numerous awards for his outstanding work in Boston Legal. Most notable were his 2005 and 2007 Emmy Awards in the category of "Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series." Also included in his accomplishments was the satellite award won in 2006 for Best Actor in a Series, Comedy or Musical, concerning Boston legal. He has been nominated for many other awards, including the Screen Actors Guild award, Golden Globes, and People's Choice Awards.William Shatner was awarded an Emmy in 2005 for "Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Drama Series ". He has since been nominated each year. He also won a Golden Globe Award for "Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in a Series, Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for Television". William Shatner was also nominated for other awards, too numerous to even mention. Candance Bergen was nominated for many awards, including the "Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series" Emmy for her role in Boston legal. She was also nominated in the Golden Globe category for Boston Legal.

Boston Legal has once again proved that it is an award-winning, outstanding show, one I will await with baited breathe each week for. Stay tuned for Boston Legal on Tuesday nights, 10:00 pm, on ABC.