I don't know why I first developed an intense love of CSI Las Vegas, given that so many of the episodes follow the same basic format, but this is the first time that that format has been completely thrown away and the show went in a completely different direction. We can thank Quentin Tarantino, of course, for that change, since he was given the opportunity to write and direct these two episodes in his own way.
It's interesting to consider that he made these shows a year after making Kill Bill, in which Uma Thurman's character is also buried alive. Nick Stokes' kidnapping and live burial is not necessarily an homage to Kill Bill, but it seems that Tarantino has noticed the effectiveness of a live burial, particularly one in which the person is unconscious when buried and then wakes up underground. Can you imagine? I was particularly affected by these two episodes, because being buried alive is one of my own worst fears, along with drowning, spiders, and Global Thermonuclear War (an intense fear that I developed in 1983 after watching an early Matthew Broderick movie).
I had hoped that Tarantino might take it upon himself to write and direct more for the show, but as of now that has yet to happen, and it looks like it's not going to. Other than these two episodes, all of the rest of the series looks surprisingly homogenized...
Note: my summary is in all lower case letters and parentheses because in my first attempt to post this comment, I had it all in capital letters to emphasize how impressive these two CSI episodes are, but then when I tried to post it, the IMDb told me DO NOT SHOUT in my summary. So it's a whisper. Happy now?
