Pilot Review: The Unusuals

The 2004/05 US TV season delivered the mystery-laden first seasons of Lost and Desperate Housewives. With each show garnering massive ratings, reviving a then-fledging ABC Network, the 2005/06 season spawned several imitators. Each were high quality drama series with a core mystery underpinning their overall storyarcs. Very few were actually engaging, with the shows facing an early cancellation. The Nine, being the most notable example.

The Unusuals, a new series to air on the ABC, is a cop show unlike anything aired before, yet emulates almost every show you’ve ever aid your eyes upon. At its core, The Unusuals has adopted a Lost-style mystery involving the death of a police officer. One of the cops in the squad are responsible and each of them have a mystery background they’d rather not have revealed. The show works where other Lost wannabes failed in that it is to Lost what post-modernism is to modernism. Yes, it’s a Lost wannabe, but it is so much more.

How can one truly describe The Unusuals? It’s Lost meets The Job, meets Pulp Fiction, meets almost every Nickolodeon kids show you’ve seen, meets Escher.

What’s It About?
Detective Casey Shraeger is a cop working Vice. One night she finds herself pulled from her current assignment working a street corner and assigned to the Homicide Department. A cop has been murdered that night and she’s assigned to work with the cops partner to solve the crime.

As Shraeger and her new partner, Det. Joe Walsh, investigate the murder of Walsh’s partner, Shraeger learns that everybody in the squad has a secret. Shraegers new Sergeant, Harvey Brown, informs her that he wants his squad cleaned up and so brought her in to facilitate this.

This serves as the plot of the series. What it doesn’t tell you is that the show is wickedly funny. The dialogue is witty and sharp, with each character offbeat in their own charming way. What really makes the show work, however, is the constant abstract police calls one hears in the background of scenes, met by bizarre background site gags. We’re talking arrests of men in hotdog suits, ninjas, and my favourite, the twin midget ladies identically dressed. Oh midgets, you have my heart.

Who’s in the darn thing?
The casting in this is terrific. Serving as the two leads, Joan of Arcadia’s Amber Tamblyn leads the cast as Shraeger, with Jeremy Renner (who I’ll admit to unfamiliarity with) as her partner Walsh. Adam Goldberg (Entourage, 2 Nights In Paris, Dazed & Confused), Harold Perrineau (Lost, Oz, The Matrix films), Terry Kinney (Oz), and Monique Gabriela Curnen (The Dark Knight, Che) round out the cast.

What happens in that crucial first episode?
Meanwhile Detectives Banks and Delahoy investigate some missing neighborhood cats. Oh, and then there is that ongoing murder investigation.

Is it any good?
At least once a year I get to watch a new show that is filled with promise that is just darn exciting. Sometimes the shows meet that initial promise. Many times they don’t. The Unusuals is certainly oozing with potential. It’s funny, the cast are great, and there’s enough substance that coming back for the second episode is a no-brainer. That said, based on the tone of the show, there is a strong danger that it could potentially fall apart at any moment. Should the show get an early cancellation, expect to hear about this shows for years as people talk about yet another brilliant, but cancelled, series.

Locally, Channel 9 have reportedly got the broadcast rights to the series. It’s difficult to see how a show like this may fit with their schedule. Hopefully they’ll have enough faith in the series to give it a serious go.