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Without a Trace
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Without a Trace is an American television show set in New York City. The show is about a fictitious full-time FBI missing persons unit. (The real FBI has no such unit; it investigates disappearances periodically as the situation warrants.)
Each episode usually follows the search for one individual under tight time pressure. The stories also focus on the personal lives of the team members, and illustrate how their different experiences give them insight—and sometimes traumatic reactions—to certain cases.
Without a Trace was run on Thursdays at 10 p.m.
Discussion
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Quotations
Martin:
I'd like to say that you're smarter than you looked but then I'd be lying.
Encyclopedia
Without a Trace is an American television show set in New York City. The show is about a fictitious full-time FBI missing persons unit. (The real FBI has no such unit; it investigates disappearances periodically as the situation warrants.)
Each episode usually follows the search for one individual under tight time pressure. The stories also focus on the personal lives of the team members, and illustrate how their different experiences give them insight—and sometimes traumatic reactions—to certain cases.
Without a Trace was run on Thursdays at 10 p.m. ET on CBS until September 2006, when it was moved to Sundays at 10 p.m. ET on CBS. In the 2007 season it swapped timeslots with Shark, returning it to its old timeslot. However, this lasted only until the 2008 season, with a move to Tuesdays at 10 pm.
Premise
Without a Trace debuted as part of the CBS fall line-up in 2002, created by Hank Steinberg and produced by Jerry Bruckheimer. The show was the first ever to score strong ratings opposite longtime NBC hit ER—which, like Without a Trace, is produced by Warner Bros. Television. The first two showrunners were Steinberg and Ed Redlich. Between Seasons Two and Three, Steinberg and Redlich moved away from active participation in the series, with staff writers Jan Nash and Greg Walker taking over.
One element that sets the show apart from other current TV crime dramas is the display of information about real-life missing persons at the end of most episodes. Occasionally such information is replaced with other public service announcements, such as an episode about an attempted suicide which presented information on a suicide help line instead. Showings in other countries tend to omit missing persons info; however, Australia's Nine Network usually shows Australian cases, and in Hong Kong the TVB Pearl showed information about local missing persons during the first two seasons.
In 2003, the TNT Network acquired syndication rights to the series for US$1.4 million per episode.
The show is the only prime-time U.S. drama to feature two Australians (Poppy Montgomery & Anthony LaPaglia) and a Briton (Marianne Jean-Baptiste) playing Americans in the regular cast.
Universe
Without a Trace takes place within Jerry Bruckheimer's CSI universe, as a crossover episode involved a guest appearance by Gil Grissom and Jack Malone appeared in CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, following the same case.
Main cast
Season synopsis
In season 1 we meet the team.
As the team continues to track down missing people, Jack and his wife slide towards divorce, while Jack must also care for his father (Martin Landau) who has Alzheimer's disease. We learn about the team members' life histories, including the fact that Martin was practically raised by his aunt and uncle, and Danny is an orphan whose brother (Alex Fernandez) is a convicted felon. Martin fatally shoots a man whom he provoked, and both he and Vivian must keep quiet in order to keep their jobs. Jack makes a last ditch attempt to save his marriage by moving to Chicago with his family, giving Vivian a long-awaited promotion to his post, but at the last minute his wife leaves without him, taking their daughters with her.
Vivian loses her promotion when Jack returns to his job, causing some commotion among the group. She also experiences heart trouble that endangers her life and her career, and undergoes risky surgery. Martin and Samantha begin a secret office romance, but it ends badly. Jack undergoes a brutal custody battle with his ex-wife. Danny has to confront his traumatic past and his estranged brother. The season ends with a cliffhanger as a hired mercenary opens fire on Martin and Danny's car while they transport a prisoner.
After barely surviving the gun battle that ended Season Three, Martin must recover from near-fatal gunshot wounds while Danny battles PTSD. Stretched for help, the team gets a new member, Elena Delgado, a former NYPD vice squad officer with an aggressive, streetwise attitude. She has a past connection to Danny, the nature of which is unknown until Season Five. Martin develops an addiction to painkillers, and Jack begins a romance with the widow of a former mentor killed in the line of duty.
Jack's girlfriend miscarries and abruptly ends their relationship. Danny and Elena begin to date each other, while her ex-husband, Carlos, sues for custody of their daughter, Sofia, and later abducts the child. More about Samantha's difficult past is revealed, including her strained relationships with her mother and sister. Jack is abducted and tortured by a psychotic woman, but initially appears to show few effects. At the end of the season, Carlos is freed, leaving the team worried about Elena's safety, and a serial kidnapper appears to be preying on young women.
Vivian is put in charge of a task force to locate the serial kidnapper, who is part of a sex trafficking ring. Samantha reveals that she is pregnant from a one-night stand with a bartender, Brian; by the end of the season, he waives paternal rights and she gives birth to a son. Jack begins a pattern of roughing up suspects to make them talk, which appears to be related to PTSD. He also gets into a dangerous situation without backup and is nearly killed, and becomes over-involved in the life of a teenager he saved from the sex traffickers. In the season finale he is demoted and put in mandatory therapy with Dr. Clare Bryson (Linda Hunt).
This season also contained a two-part crossover episode with CSI, as Jack and Gil Grissom and their teams track down a serial killer responsible for the disappearance of a boy six years ago.
Season 7
The series' seventh season began airing September 23, 2008 on a new 10:00 p.m. (EST) Tuesday timeslot. Steven Weber joined the cast for the first five episodes of the season as Special Agent Clark Medina, Jack's temporary replacement as unit supervisor. The episodes focused as much on missing persons cases as Medina's war against Jack, as he revealed that he had not only been sent to replace Jack but also to convince him to leave the bureau. Medina ultimately realizes that he cannot get Jack to resign, and uses him in a power play to get himself promoted; in return, he arranges for Jack to get his old position back. Following Jack's return to Unit Supervisor, he sets about trying to repair his relationship with Sam and takes custody of his elder daughter, Hannah.
Season 8
CBS has renewed their contract with the television series Without a Trace.
Episodes
WGA Strike Impact
Without a Trace completed twelve episodes of Season Six before the Writers' Guild of America strike . Because the show's writing staff all joined the strike, there were no more new episodes until the issue was settled. Once the strike ended, the show returned April 3, 2008 with six episodes.
U.S. Television Ratings
Seasonal rankings (based on average total viewers per episode) of Without A Trace on CBS.
Note: Each U.S. network television season starts in late September and ends in late May, which coincides with the completion of May sweeps.
| Season | Timeslot | Season Premiere | Season Finale | TV Season | Ranking | Viewers
(in millions) |
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| 1st | Thursday 10:00pm/9c | September 26, 2002 | May 15, 2003 | 2002-2003 | #15 | 15.09 |
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| 2nd | September 25, 2003 | May 20, 2004 | 2003-2004 | #11 | 16.74 |
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| 3rd | September 23, 2004 | May 19, 2005 | 2004-2005 | #8 | 18.68 |
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| 4th | September 29, 2005 | May 18, 2006 | 2005-2006 | #7 | 18.54 |
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| 5th | Sunday 10:00pm/9c | September 24, 2006 | May 10, 2007 | 2006-2007 | #16 | 14.7 |
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| 6th | Thursday 10:00pm/9c | September 27, 2007 | May 15, 2008 | 2007-2008 | #20 | 13.1 |
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| 7th | Tuesday 10:00pm/9c | September 23, 2008 | May, 2009 | 2008-2009 | #15 | 12.19 |
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DVD Releases
Season Releases
| DVD Name | Region 1 | Region 2 | Region 4 |
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| The Complete 1st Season | September 14, 2004 | January 10, 2005 | December 15, 2004 | | The Complete 2nd Season | March 13, 2007 | January 16, 2006 | November 16, 2005 | | The Complete 3rd Season | TBA | July 24, 2006 | May 2, 2007 | | The Complete 4th Season | TBA | July 14, 2008 | TBA |
Without A Trace Season 1 has been released on Region 1, Region 2 and Region 4 DVD. Season 2 (region 1 DVD), which was thought to be indefinitely scrapped, was released on March 13, 2007.
Seasons 1–3 have all been released under region 2 and region 4 encoding.
Season 4 DVD was released in the UK on July 14 2008.
External links
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