Apr 12 2005
Watch Your “Eyes”
Come on, willya? Help out some really creative people: Give ABC’s spiffy new, but too-low-rated, show “Eyes” a shot this week (Wed, 10 p.m.).
A complete reinvigoration of the private-eye genre, “Eyes” (since you haven’t been watching, I’ll have to do some of that standard tv-critic synopsizing) stars Tim Daly as Harlan Judd, head of a high-tech investigation firm. He’s got a crackerjack team that includes the terrific A.J. Langer (”My So-Called Life” Alert!), and more importantly, some of the snappiest dialogue and plot-twists and turns of any show on TV. Indeed, not since J.J. Abrams’ “Alias” has an hour-long adventure series exhibited such layered intelligence. By which I mean, not only do you get caught up in the individual cases Daly’s firm handles, but “Eyes” is always tossing surprises at you, not least of which is that the cast of “regulars” is anything but: After just the first week, one guy we thought was one of Daly’s main-men (”The L Word”’s Eric Mabius) got shot by another member of the team (Garcele Beauvais), who’s a rogue agent for a competing private-eye company. Through it all, Daly maintains a suave insoucience, rattling off clever comebacks that never register as mere smirkiness.
This week’s episode features a cool guest star, the C-movie icon Wings Hauser, doing a dandy job, but also concludes with yet another fundmantally-altering twist to the main characters’ lives. Oh, and the episode is a triple-pun: It’s called “Wings,” a reference to a valuable airplane that’s stolen, to Hauser, and to Daly’s old sitcom.
Credit for all of this must go to series creator John McNamara. He’s the guy who worked with Daly on the underrated, cancelled-too-soon reworking of “The Fugitive,” but is also the auteur behind two of the most clever, black-humored, and intelligent hour-longs in memory, “Profit” and “Vengeance Unlimited”; they rated a full entry in my book. (Hint, hint; nudge nudge; order now while supplies last or enter the remainder bins.)
McNamara, as producer and writer, deserves the kind of TV anointment that Abrams and the “Gilmore Girls”‘ Amy Sherman-Palladino so richly receive: full credit as someone who pushes TV genres to the edge, and then tips them over, startling the viewer in pleasing ways.
You can pass up dreary “CSI:NY” and the fading “Law & Order” for work like that, can’t you? I implore you: Give “Eyes” a close squint and get back to me with your reaction.