It’s been years since I’ve ginned up enough interest in a television show to actually warrant writing a review.
This year, I’ve found two.
Since it’s been a while, I should mention that my practice is to try a show for three episodes before judging it worthy of sticking with. Granted, there have been some exceptions, normally when the BS is Piled so Higher and Deeper, it needs to be killed with fire.
Anyway, this year, two shows have jumped out on me.
The first is Murder in a Small Town, on Fox
The premise is simple. Rossif Sutherland (son of Donald, brother to Kiefer) is playing Police Chief Karl Alberg, who is a big city cop moving to a small town to take over the department. Kristen Kreuk (Smallville) is Cassandra, the town librarian.
The first scene in the pilot was the two of them meeting through a dating website. At first glance, the match feels like cradle robbing, until you remember that Smallville was 20 years ago, and Kreuk is in her 40s.
Of course, Alberg has moved to a sleepy small town on the water. Apparently, he’s moved to Cabot Cove, Canada edition. And it’s Canada in the novels. Whether it’s supposed to be Canada in the television series is another question that I’m not quite clear on.
Murder in a Small Town is very much a police procedural rather than a murder mystery. Each episode has had only one Big Name Celebrity per episode. The first had Sutherland’s father, Donald, the second had a very, very creepy Stana Katic (Kate Beckett from Castle) and the third had Erica Durance (also from Smallville).
The dynamics of every episode are interesting. Thus far, Kreuk is there to advance character arcs and understanding the suspects. She’s the local who knows everyone because she grew up with them in one way or another. She’s pleasant and charming. Sutherland’s does a great job, allowing us to see Alberg think. Alberg is stoic and silent, speaking only when he needs to. He brings a gravitas to the role, but it might also help that he’s taller than everyone else in the cast by a good foot or more. It seems that Rossif got all of Donald’s height, and Kiefer got most of the acting roles.
As for the plot, every murder is different. One is an impulse revenge killing that was more manslaughter. One is felony murder / murder two. And the third … I did mention that Stana Katic was really f***ing creepy, didn’t I? We get to see plenty from the killer’s perspective.
The end result feels from an episode of Columbo, only Sutherland isn’t as chatty as Peter Falk was.
The cinematography is interesting. I’m almost certain that they’re either using a higher FPS or maybe just a high def camera. It’s a standout method, and mostly positive. But I don’t know enough about camerawork to explain it.
Overall, I like this show. Trust me, I didn’t expect to. The first episode was 90 minutes, and I was concerned that it would be a multi-part episode. But it’s clear that the series will be purely episodic, and these mysteries will be wrapped up every week. I am almost certain that the quality comes from the series being based off of a series of novels. I’ve never read the novels, so I can’t tell you how many things have been altered to make the episodes work.
Overall, I would recommend it. So far, 4/5, easily.