The Last Ship was, from the start, a bit of a mixed bag. The premise is interesting but the characters are rather generic. Some episodes have shown a thoughtful approach to life in an apocalyptic world, others have been rather dumb action affairs, others have been smart, exciting action affairs.
A few things, though, are very consistent. First off, the show has a very simplistic good guy/bad guy setup. The good guys are noble and self-sacrificing and brave and better than the rest of us. The bad guys are straight-out evil. They do terrible things, often without any convincing rationale for doing them. The series certainly can't be accused of subtlety; one episode had the bad guys burning bodies in ovens.
The show is also very American. This is a very old-school military action series where you see the flag a lot and Americans are portrayed as the most noble people in the world, battling against bad guys who are Muslims or, for a blast from the past, evil Russians.
For all it's flaws, The Last Ship can be pretty darn entertaining. There have been some very impressive action-oriented episodes, like a season two opener in which our heroes take down the evil people with machine- like precision. And there are moments when the show is even kind of smart, particular in its approach to the vaccine the series centers around; it's pretty effective as a medical research drama.
I still find the characters generic and the rah-rah U.S.A. bits silly, but what can I say? I'm entertained.
