TV Review: ROSEWOOD is Bad

Article originally published as ROSEWOOD Review on Seat42F.

This is my review of FOX’s Rosewood: it is bad. Really bad, wholly unoriginal, and a complete waste of your time. Bad, bad, bad. You can stop reading right now and just skip this one. But if you’d like to know why, and I know many of you want me to back up my opinion with actual information about the show (justifiably so), here’s another 550 or so words about why it’s bad.

First, let’s start with why it’s good. (I tripped you up, didn’t I?) Credit must be given where credit is due, and casting Morris Chestnut as the eccentric lead of the series, Dr. Beaumont “Rosie” Rosewood, Jr., is a good move. I like Morris Chestnut very much, and have enjoyed his work in such programs as Nurse Jackie, American Horror Story, and V. I would happily watch a show in which he is the lead, and the character of Rosie is a fun one in the tradition of Gregory House or Richard Castle.

I also like Lorraine Toussaint (Orange is the New Black) as his mother, Donna, Jaina Lee Ortiz (The Shop), as the cop he works with, Annalise, and love Gabrielle Dennis (The Game) and Anna Konkle (The Escort) as Pippy and Tara, respectively. Pippy is Rosewood’s sister and Tara is Pippy’s fiancé, and both work for Rosewood. So overall, the ensemble is good. And really, few shows fail to put together a good cast these days, with lots of deserving performers out there, working for their chance.

What stinks is the premise. ROSEWOOD is yet another crime show about a quirky private citizen with mad skills who hooks up with law enforcement and helps them solve crimes, even though Rosewood should never be allowed out in the field with the authorities. This is the third review of a series with this premise that I’ve written this week alone, and I’m getting awfully tired of the Big Four networks putting out more and more of these programs that are basically copies of one another. Make something original!

The pilot of ROSEWOOD exemplifies this well. Viewers are introduced to Annalise. Rosewood meets Annalise and there are instant sparks between them. He pushily forces his way into her case, while she tries to stay closed off and keep him out. After he helps her bring the criminal to justice, she softens and definitely seems like she’ll let him assist again in the future.

Now, what sets ROSEWOOD slightly apart from its peers is that most of the main characters are not officers. Annalise is, of course, and her boss, Captain Hornstock (Domenick Lombardozzi, The Wire), who is not much in the pilot, are leads. The other three are more connected to Rosewood than the police. However, since Rosewood runs a pathology business in which he examines bodies and Pippy and Tara work for him, they will still be used to look into the crime, so it doesn’t differentiate itself all that much. In fact, the official website describes this as a medical procedural, so it sounds like the series will highlight the medical aspects of the investigation more, which has already been done by Body of Proof, Bones, and others. Any variations from the basic format of the other shows in the same vein are cosmetic, not substantial.

In short, ROSEWOOD lacks anything to set it apart, other than its talented cast, but many bad shows have talented casts. If it’s going to compete against high-quality fare on cable and streaming platforms, it has to give us something more than case-of-the-week, and it’s not going to. So, it’s yet another disappointment in a broadcast television landscape growing more and more crowded with them. The only good part about this is that I may finally have time for that Buffy re-watch I’ve been craving!

ROSEWOOD premieres Wednesday, September 23^rd on FOX.

TV is FOREVER Making Procedurals (but this one's good!)

Article first published as FOREVER Review on Seat42F.

Make no mistake about it; ABC’s new drama FOREVER is a crime-of-the-week procedural. Those of you who regularly read my reviews will now expect a scathing tear-down of the show. Yet, for some reason, I absolutely love it, or at least, I love the pilot. I expect I’ll probably turn on FOREVER at some point in its freshman season, as many episodes are likely to feel repetitive. However, it sucks me in with terrific characters and an extremely intriguing premise that I really want to know more about.

On the surface, FOREVER could be seen as Castle: Immortal Style. It features a very intelligent, charming non-law enforcement investigator, Dr. Henry Morgan (Ioan Gruffudd, Ringer, Fantastic Four), who begins helping out a tough, independent, smart, at-times-annoyed-by-him female detective, Jo Martinez (Alana De La Garza, Do No Harm, Law & Order). The hook is not that Henry is a writer; he’s an immortal that wakes up naked in the water every time he is killed. And it sure seems like he’s been killed a lot.

Now, Henry is a medical examiner, the type of man who looks at dead bodies and determines their cause of death. This makes him a little more relevant and his involvement a little more appropriate than his counterpart on sister show Castle, which airs on the same network. But I doubt many medical examiners are usually out walking the beat and hunting for clues. The ones shown in other TV shows are usually small, recurring parts, other than in Body of Proof, which is a unique case.

There is a third player who is equally important to the mix, Henry’s friend Abe (Judd Hirsch, Taxi, Numb3rs). The only person Henry has entrusted with his secret, they obviously have been close for a very long time. Abe encourages Henry to help the pretty Jo and tries to get him to engage in life, something Henry has struggled with since the death of his wife. Might now be the time and the place Henry will come out of his shell? Of course it is. Otherwise, there’d be no television show.

When considering why FOREVER stands out above the pack, this central trio, especially the two men, as Jo’s character is pretty stock at this point, are more interesting and colorful than in other programs. Henry has the brains of Sherlock Holmes, but is more centered and calm, having learned much through hard-won experience over hundreds of years. Abe’s role is a bit more murky, but who doesn’t love Hirsch? He brings to the table an engaging personality.

The larger arcs, Henry’s origin and a guy who keeps calling threatening to expose the secret, are dealt with in the first episode, quickly establishing there will be an ongoing story in addition to the procedural. It may just be because this is a pilot, but FOREVER seems to give almost as much weight to this as it does to the weekly case, which makes the hour go down better.

There’s also a heck of a twist at the end that I cannot spoil, and I’m surprised at how surprised I was to see it. But it’s very cool, and I cannot wait for the implications of it to be explored.

The supporting cast includes Joel David Moore (Bones, Avatar), Donnie Keshawarz (The Wolf of Wall Street), and Lorraine Toussaint (Orange Is the New Black). Each plays a co-worker of one of the two leads, and none really stand out much in the initial installment. But that’s par for this type of show. At least they’ve cast people who can handle better material, should it be given to them.

There are a great many crime shows on television, and there are very few I pay attention to, pretty much just Bones, Castle, and Elementary. Somehow, FOREVER seems at least on par with those, a couple of notches better than the Law & Order or NCIS franchises. It strikes a balance between the standardized format and something interesting, and as long as it keeps serious weight on the latter, it could be a show worth watching.

FOREVER premieres Tuesday, September 23^rd at 10 p.m. ET on ABC.