Don't Forget About 'Burn Notice'

Looking ahead to the summer series coming next month, I tend to focus on "Mad Men" (July 27), "The Closer" (July 14), the 7-part HBO Iraq War miniseries from David Simon of "The Wire" called "Generation Kill" (July 13), and "The Greatest American Dog" (July 10).

I always seem to forget about "Burn Notice," USA's series starring Jeffrey Donovan. It's the quintessential summer action series -- light, wry, filled with explosions and spy maneuvers and Miami sunshine. I sat down with the first two episodes of the new season, which arrives on July 10, at 10 p.m., and I was pleasantly reminded of the show's charms. Since the early episodes, Donovan's Michael Westen now seems to know who put in his burn notice -- ie., who got him fired. And now he is working for her. But really, the uber-plot is kind of irrelevant, as the show moves from one danger-filled vignette to another. You could play catch-up with the season-one DVDs, or you could jump right in to season two.

The pure spectacle of the "Burn Notice" adventures puts me in mind of "Alias," which is a good thing. Westen and his pals (played by Bruce Campbell and Gabrielle Anwar) get duped, and then they dupe back. It's a whole mess of amusing spy vs. spy trickery. And I'd forgotten all about Sharon Gless, who plays Westen's obsessive and passive-aggressive mother with tongue in cheek and cigarette in mouth. Westen can beat any bad guy who comes his way, but his mother? She's the boss of him.