In March 2001, when The Job premiered, it’s safe to say there had never been anything like it on network TV (except for perhaps the wonderful Action, a lock for future attention in this column and a show that also stars a loquacious stand up comedian who was in Suicide Kings). Denis Leary and his newly minted partner in grime Peter Tolan produced a somewhat traditional workplace sitcom with a few major departures from the norm, including an unlikely protagonist, a drastically different production style and a ton of foul language. Unsurprisingly, the world wasn’t ready for it, and it lasted a total of 19 episodes over two seasons. With Leary and Tolan's more recent show, the similarly themed Rescue Me, beginning its sixth and supposedly penultimate season last week, this seems like a good time to revisit its predecessor.

With its single camera, varied locations and lack of laugh track, The Job can  be framed as the progenitor for all of the important half hour comedies of the last decade, including Scrubs, The Office and the granddaddy of them all, Arrested Development. Its adherence to, and willingness to play with, tired traditional sitcom conventions places it very close to these three in particular. What makes The Job significantly different from these though, is that they all employ very obvious attempts at sentimentality. The current mood is to mix laughs with melodrama. The Job, however, never tugs at the heartstrings, and the drama it employs is much more of the existential dread kind. We never really see the warm inner workings of people on The Job. Instead, we just stare into the abyss. In some ways, it’s closer to Homicide: Life on the Streets than its comedy brethren.

Despite the many similarities to modern half hour comedies, I’m thinking of a different show as I revisit The Job’s opening moments. I’m thinking of The Shield. Granted, I’m often thinking of The Shield, and chances are good that if you’re talking to me I’m thinking about The Shield because I wish I was watching The Shield because The Shield is fantastic. But in this case, I’m thinking of the father of the prestige programming movement because it’s the gold standard for establishing your protagonist as a bad guy early on. Of course, Leary’s Mike McNeil does not plan and execute the murder of another cop in the first episode, but he is exposed as a heavy drinker, a pill popper, an adulterer, a cop with a disregard for regulations and results, and just an overall mouthy jerk.

For all the preconceptions that it shatters however, The Job is a pretty standard workplace comedy and a terribly unorthodox cop show. The characters bicker, play jokes, and obsess over small things. Largely they find ways to not do their jobs. There is usually some case or assignment to be worked, but the case and its resolution are often almost an afterthought. This allows for the development of characters and dynamics that fuel the stories rather than investigations.

Another great performance in a career filled with them

Leary’s cohorts in this pageant of rule-breaking make for a truly stellar supporting cast. In fact, on my second viewing of the complete series, I found myself far more interested in and taken with two of the secondary characters than with McNeil. McNeil’s partner, Pip (played to perfection by Bill Nunn), is an extremely well realized character. He’s essentially traded his autonomy in for the love and stability of his marriage to a thoroughly religious and overbearing woman. As exasperated as he is at times, it never seems he would trade it for the tumultuous lives he sees in the squad room around him. He’s a happily neutered man, and Nunn plays it so well that it's almost an understandable choice, despite how awful his wife is.

The other major performance of note is Dianne Farr as Jan, the token female, resident wisdom giver, lonely and sympathetic single mother and earnest object of affection. Farr’s character is a terrific foil for all the juvenile males around her, yet she never turns into an annoying know-it-all, and she’s one of the most consistently funny characters on the show. Her speech to McNeil towards the end of the pilot, in which she tears apart McNeil's claim that he acts out in so many ways because of how tough the job is, gets The Job off to a great start, and makes Rescue Me seem like a bit of a regression.

Keith David was also an excellent post-pilot replacement as the perpetually agitated and shouting captain. It’s a cliché for sure, but David adds an extra dimension by playing him as a man who actually enjoys seeing his subordinates suffer when they mess up. He goes from annoyed to gleefully sadistic in a matter of moments.

Of course, all these people simply exist around McNeil, at least in his self-centered worldview. What separates McNeil from similar anti-heroes is that for all his lies and cover ups, he spends very little time actually attempting to make people believe his bullshit. While cheating husbands on TV often go to comic lengths to make sure their wives don’t find out, McNeil is basically waiting to get caught, tossing out feeble excuse after feeble excuse. He’s even worse when cornered by his girlfriend, since he has so much less to lose with her. The lying seems as annoying to McNeil as any other way of dealing with his problems. His general inactivity and apathy is wonderfully established in the pilot when Jan tells McNeil that his girlfriend called and claims she’s going to tell his wife everything. It’s a joke on Jan’s part meant to elicit a reaction, but McNeil hardly reacts at all. He thinks his life is so shitty that what's intended to be a major catastrophe is really just more of the same.

From Loveline to upstaging professional actors

Leary is at his best when he's most manic and desperate. The episode in which he quits drinking and instead finds solace in a larger quantity of pain killers, new kinds of prescription medication, and green cough syrup is a ride down the drain I’m all too happy to take with him. Likewise, McNeil’s literally pathological lying when he gets leveraged into meeting his girlfriend’s parents gives Leary a chance to really let loose.

For these articles, it’s always interesting to see how the show ends. The Loop, for example, ends on a down note that lasts much of the second season, and makes me sort of happy they didn’t keep it around long enough to tinker it into something unrecognizable. The Job, however, ends on a terrific high note. Unlike many of the modern network comedies it paved the way for, The Job is not all that serialized. You have a cast of well-defined characters with established dynamics and stories that play out on an episode-by-episode basis. This is the reason that McNeil’s girlfriend and (even more so) wife are not seen for episodes at a time. This all changes late in season 2 though, when we are hit with three episodes that lead one right into the next and culminate with what ended up as the series finale. Things end so well that I won’t dare ruin it for you, but so many things go right in the final episode. They show us a new dimension to Pip. They drastically change McNeil’s place in the universe (by brilliantly placing him on the sidelines). They connect the case being worked to the officers’ lives in a way they haven’t previously. All in all, The Job ended with its strongest stuff. I’m not sure if it was a case of a show finally hitting its stride, or of one finally doing what it had wanted to all along because they knew they were cancelled. It set things up great for a third season, but it also brings some arcs to a nice close and a satisfying ending, if you choose to take it that way. The Job is pretty "slice of life" throughout its run, so anything too final would have been out of place anyway.

BFF

Rescue Me, Leary and Tolan’s far more successful, and significantly inferior attempt at the “civil servants in crisis” motif is primed to bow out much more gracefully with its final season airing next fall, to coincide with the 10^th anniversary of 9/11, the event that looms over the premise of the series. I say Rescue Me is “inferior” not based on some serious qualitative study of the two, but rather because I just happily re-watched every episode of The Job and I don’t imagine myself watching another episode of Rescue Me anytime soon. If there are current Rescue Me viewers reading this, I'd love to hear from you in the comments. I gave up on the show in the second or third season when I found the whole thing growing tiresome. What have I been missing? Are the later seasons worthwhile? Is Dean Winters still on?

With The Job and Rescue Me, Leary and Tolan are proud of how many stories they get directly from real police officers and firefighters. Leary has always painted himself as a champion of the blue collars, and both shows celebrate civil servants without glamour. They celebrate them by painting them as flawed, troubled people who are notable less for their superior character, and more for their dogged determination to keep showing up. I imagine there are many more good cop stories than firefighter stories out there though, and The Job had a much better balance of witty character humor and shock laughs than I remember Rescue Me managing. Unfortunately, the history books will always show that Rescue Me is the time Tolan and Leary got it right.

Sometimes, a show can succeed in spite of potentially debilitating limitations. The Loop features one (count ‘em) impeccable character/performance, a lot of energy and an overabundance of dirty jokes and double entendres. That might not sound like a recipe for a worthwhile show, but in this case it was more than enough.

The Loop centers on Sam Sullivan’s work/personal life balancing act (at least in the first season, I’ll get to the second season later). Sam is fresh out of college, the youngest executive in the history of TA Airways and living in Chicago with his slacker older brother, a grad student he has a crush on and a ditzy female bartender. Sam’s ridiculously demanding boss, Russ (Philip Baker Hall in that one impeccable performance), inhibits his ability to live it up with his less burdened roommates. And he calls Sam “Thesis” due to Sam’s thesis paper that got him his job. If this sounds like the set up for tired sitcom plots, that’s because it is. Surprisingly, the humor of the show isn’t generally derived from Sam trying to simultaneously please his friends and his boss. Instead, it comes from just how extreme the demands of his two lives are. After a night of heavy drinking, Sam wakes up in Mexico when he’s supposed to be at work. He makes it back to work only to have the magic marker bra he’s sporting from last night (he did Naked Mathematics too) revealed during his presentation at an executive meeting.

Looks like a normal day at Culture Blues HQ.

The writers of The Loop even take pleasure in subverting obvious sitcom situations immediately after setting them up. When Sam is ordered to take a flight to Hong Kong on Virgin Air, he’s afraid to break his date with a girl he’s already blown off, so he hatches a plan to bring her with him and disguise the whole thing as a date (ballin’). When they get to the airport and Sam’s two bosses appear and say they’ll be flying as well, no one would blame you for dreading scenes of Sam on the plane bouncing back and forth between bosses and date. But before you’re done rolling your eyes, Sam is getting dragged out of the airport by his bosses, deserting the girl who then ends up getting on the plane and flying to Hong Kong all by herself! A little unlikely? Absolutely. But it’s proof of an admirable level of self awareness. The Loop may employ some raunchy humor, but that’s not to say it features no sophistication.

Speaking of the raunchy humor, it is sublime. The workplace dialogue is just jam packed with lewd sex talk (overt and otherwise), inappropriate language and double entendres. From offhand sexual harassment to sexcapades with celebrities to bringing Sam in on a “two-hander” (I’m not sure why this is dirty, but in the context of the show it most certainly is). There is even one point where a character uses the word “cocksureness.” There is no joke. There is no double entendre. But I am 100% certain that the writers chose that word solely so that the character would say “cock.”

This all may not sound funny to you. For sure, the power of these jokes comes more from their quantity and the rapid deadpan manner in which they are delivered and less from their immaculate design. However, there is something satisfying and, I would argue, artful about the way the episodes are saturated with these jokes.

The Loop certainly aims for your funny bone more than your heart, but it isn’t as emotionally stunted as, let’s say, It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia. Sam’s longing after the sweet roommate/really good friend with a boyfriend is a bit shallow, but it’s also relatable and makes him more sympathetic. Likewise, with the way his Peter Pan syndrome (harmfully exacerbated by those around him without adult responsibilities) clashes violently with his ambition, drive, and passion for airplanes (seriously, that’s how they explain it).

The greatest Senile, Wisecracking, World-Weary Veteran ever.

Unfortunately, things take a violent turn downhill in the second season. All of a sudden it’s just Sam and his brother living together, and we rarely see their apartment. Instead we are treated to scenes in Russ’ office and the executive lounge. The show is no longer about balancing the party life and the executive life, and the added dimension of Sam’s unrequited love for his roommate is entirely gone. They even ratchet the dirty jokes way, way down. The show becomes only about pleasing unreasonably demanding bosses. It’s so work centric that Sam meets his two short lived love interests through work. For everything that Fox took away, the writers added pratfalls (lame), made Russ more human (unnecessary and unwelcome) and gave an expanded role to some other executives (pretty good) and Sam's college “buddy”/tool Derek Tricolli (terrific – sometimes). Derek’s dialogue is mostly where the dirty jokes live in the second season, and it seems like they expect an unfair number of knee slappers to come out of his relatively scant screen time.

Don’t get me wrong, the second season is enjoyable and it maintains some of what made the first great, but it isn’t nearly as unique or fresh or entertaining. The difference between the seasons is actually a great example of how short sighted and unimaginative network executives are. They realized that most of the humor was in the workplace, so they shifted the focus of the show. This flies in the face of creators Pam Brady and Will Gluck’s original idea (the work/life balance), and ruined the dichotomy that made the show distinctive. While the majority of the laughs did come from the workplace, the network suits unfortunately failed to realize that Sam’s double life fueled much of that humor, that his life outside of the office is what separated the show from more traditional workplace comedies filled with 30 and 40-somethings, and that just because the workplace scenes and characters were funny doesn’t mean we needed to see more of them. They could have tried to, you know, make the apartment scenes funnier (personally I think they were just fine), but I guess that would have made too much sense.

Taking pot shots at consumerism.

Not surprisingly, around this time the writers started taking shots at Fox and television in general. It wasn’t nearly as venomous or overt as shows like Sports Night and Arrested Development, but they did employ jokes about synergy and product placement before 30 Rock made them commonplace, and they made fun of 24.

In March 2006, when The Loop premiered, Fox also debuted another single camera comedy with a very similar concept, Free Ride. Both featured a main protagonist just graduated from college. Both of these protagonists found it hard to honor adult responsibilities while also enjoying the uninhibited fun they became accustomed to in college. And both of them sought to take a longtime friendship to another level.

Free Ride treated the after college years somewhat realistically and seriously. The main character moved home without a job. His parents were in marriage counseling. It seemed primed to succeed in the new, more serialized world of half hour comedies. Instead, it lasted one 6 episode season, and was amusing but underwhelming.

Meanwhile, The Loop was ridiculous, manic and snarky. It offered contrived plots filled with dirty jokes and new euphemisms for sex acts. It lasted two truncated seasons for a total of 17 episodes and occasionally achieved brilliant hilarity. The Loop remains undeniable proof that sometimes it doesn’t matter what you do, as long as you do it well.

After Lost's surprise success in 2004, the networks immediately rushed to fill the airwaves with as many rip offs as they could. But Lost was so out-of-left-field, that they weren't sure how to copy it. The networks were absolutely certain that people were tuning in for that loveable and unseen “monster.” So they gave us three different shows about alien invasions which absolutely no one watched. Invasion, Surface and Threshold were all miserable failures.

After Lost’s second season, the networks realized that the monster wasn’t the key and, in a rare bit of sound insight, decided Lost was popular largely due to the simple fact that it was different. So, in an all out blitz, they unleashed an army of shows with “original” premises. The 2006 TV season gave us:

The Nine – Lost in a bank robbery

Day Break – Lost on repeat

Jericho – Lost on Main Street

Traveler – Lost in a terrorist attack

Six Degrees - Lost in a drama

Heroes – Lost with super powers

Vanished – Lost in a high profile kidnapping – with Freemasons!

While all of these shows were ignored and promptly canceled (except Heroes which inexplicably survives to this day), there were also some shows that unjustly got lumped in with these Lost imitators. If you had action, serialized stories and mysterious occurrences, it was tough to distinguish yourself. But Kidnapped was far from a Lost clone, and with its pulpy characters, sharp dialogue and action packed plots, it's closer in tone and look to comic books like 100 Bullets than it is to anything else on TV. And it's closer to these crime comics than Heroes will ever be to the super hero ones it blatantly rips off (mostly X-Men).

"Hey, fuck your uncle."

The first (and only) season of Kidnapped starts with the abduction of Leopold Cain, the teenage son of a very wealthy Manhattan family. Leopold’s parents, Conrad and Ellie, played by Timothy Hutton and Dana Delaney, turn to Jeremy Sisto’s freelance kidnapping/retrieval specialist Knapp rather than go to the authorities. But it isn’t long before Delroy Lindo’s FBI agent Latimer King is on the case anyway. Naturally, Knapp and King used to work together. Knapp is assisted by electronics expert Turner (Carmen Ejogo) and King by his second in command Andy Archer (Linus Roache). Throw in Leopold’s bodyguard Virgil (Mykelti Williamson), who was injured by the kidnappers and is VERY disappointed in himself for failing the young man, and there you have the good guys of Kidnapped.

The acting is top notch. Obviously the principals are all bona fide, but the smaller roles are uniformly filled by good actors you've seen other places (mostly HBO dramas – always a good sign). Characters and situations that could easily come off as tired and cliche come to life thanks to the stellar cast.

Many of the characters are exaggerated examples of archetypes we’ve seen many, many times before. Knapp is a brilliant but damaged hero. Conrad Cain is the self-made man who has never fully escaped his past. Latimer King is the veteran agent on the verge of retirement. They are too tough, too well connected and too knowledgeable to be real. They are essentially action heroes, but that's not a bad thing. They are the perfect characters to pursue this labyrinthine case. While the characters are not terribly original, what will stick with you is the truly bad ass stuff they do and say.

Doesn't he just look like a brilliant but damaged hero?

Kidnapped features witty, stylized dialogue that will be immediately familiar to people who saw creator Jason Smilovic’s 2006 feature screenwriting debut Lucky Number Slevin. After watching the pilot, I was convinced that David Mamet was involved because of the literate and playful tough talk. At times, the tough guy poses are a bit much and the dialogue doesn’t sound as clever as intended. Mostly though, it’s head and shoulders above what other shows offer. And the writers are smart enough to tone it down where appropriate. When Turner feels the FBI agents are invading her work space, she comes to Knapp and complains, “It’s stupid and it's redundant... and it's just completely stupid.” While the dialogue is still clever, the character isn't trying to be.

While the characters may sometimes seem superhuman, their process of uncovering clues in the case is undeniably human. They follow the leads they have, and when they hit a dead end, they take a step back and try a new approach. There are no massive, impossible leaps of logic and as the show progresses, the viewer can actually look back and see what the big breaks in the case were. Kidnapped’s handling of the actual investigation is one of my favorite parts and it will be a treat for anyone who appreciates deductive reasoning and detective work in their crime dramas.

The viewer will always have a better handle on the mystery than the heroes though. In the first episode, we find out that Leopold is alive and are shown where he is being held and by whom. We are also introduced to quite a few of the bad guys involved in the planning and execution of the kidnapping. Of course, there are big reveals to be had, but the show never conceals more than it has to and, right from the start, it gives the bad guys more screen time than you might expect.

The face of a very determined man.

While the investigation and action come first, the writers take the time to develop all the players involved (the victim, the family, the investigators, the captors, the conspirators). The characters all behave according to understandable motives and priorities, which often brings them into conflict with each other. There really are no unimportant characters and everyone get a moment to shine. There is plenty going on if you want to dig deeper than the explosions and gunfire.

The show moves at a great pace. It doesn't waste time. The abduction (and subsequently the first shootout) occurs in the first 10 minutes and that momentum is never really sacrificed. It's also very economical. It's impressive that in a story this complex, the characters and the audience never lose sight of the original crime. The suspense builds steadily as the case nears it conclusion.

Stories this complex make a satisfying resolution difficult. It has to be complicated enough to make the audience feel like it was worth all the intrigue, but if it's too complicated and unbelievable, it doesn't have much resonance. The plot has to expand to create something far reaching, and then it has to contract so that the resolution doesn't come out of nowhere. Often, people forget the latter and end up with a Kansas City Shuffle, which can be very frustrating.  In this regard, Kidnapped does just about as well as any show could. Which is to say it’s very good but not quite perfect, and it probably would have been even better if the writers hadn’t had to suddenly adjust to 13 episodes instead of 22. As you get close to the end, you will definitely feel like Knapp and King are closing in. And in a very pleasant surprise, the ending thematically ties in with something that has already come up time and time again.

Man on fire, indeed.

There were plenty of easy reasons to dismiss Kidnapped back in 2006. The premise and parts of the pilot episode make it look like a clone of Denzel Washington’s 2004 action revenge flick Man on Fire. It was the second show of the season to center on a kidnapping with conspiracy implications (seriously, fuck you Vanished). There were all those other shows striving to melt your brain with connections, coincidences and hokey storytelling gimmicks. And shit, Lost was on.

The reasons to ignore Kidnapped in 2009, however, aren't nearly as plentiful. It features better detective work than you’ll find on any Law & Order, CSI or NCIS this season. Better acting than admirably acted shows like Bones, House and Lie To Me. And a conclusion already exists, which is more than we can say for this year’s crop of serials – Flash Forward and V. But most importantly, Lost isn’t on yet. So why not catch a show that wraps up its storylines in a satisfying manner to get ready for the inevitable letdown that is Lost: The Endgame.

I wish Kidnapped had come back for another season and another abduction, but as it stands it's a tremendous portrayal of one extraordinary case from start to finish.

Andy Richter has had a strange career. He was an original member of Late Night with Conan O’Brien. He left the show while it was still steadily on the rise (after the 5^th anniversary show in primetime but before Conan started hosting mainstream awards shows). Then Andy had a few small unmemorable film roles before getting his first shot at a network show with Andy Richter Controls the Universe. It was well liked but failed to take off (some people consider Better Off Ted a reworking of this idea by Victor Fresco, the creator of both).  Then Andy went the typical sitcom route with Quintuplets, perfectly illustrating something that network execs simply do not understand: people who like lame family sitcoms are not fans of unorthodox comics like Andy Richter and Tracy Morgan (The Tracy Morgan Show being one of the most egregious examples of a square peg crammed into a round hole). Similarly, fans of Andy and Tracy are not going to watch someone they like shoehorned into a lame sitcom that doesn’t suit their talents. It’s a lose-lose. After Quintuplets was unsurprisingly cancelled after a surprising 22-episode run, Andy appeared on NBC’s schedule in 2007 as Andy Barker, PI, along with shows like 30 Rock and My Name is Earl.

He's on the phone with Conan.

Looking back at articles from the time is pretty shocking (it seems like an eternity ago). NBC hit historic lows in ratings – thanks in part to 30 Rock and Andy Barker. But critics liked both shows and some even wondered if NBC had successfully shattered the mold of conventional half hour comedies with these quirky, single camera efforts (The Office was starting to take off at this time and Scrubs was already NBC’s single-camera patron saint).

Two years later, 30 Rock isn’t breaking any ratings records but it’s an MVP for the still slumping NBC and is appointment television for fans and critics alike. And while its most recent season turned into a celebrity filled circle jerk-athon ratings grab that even the writers couldn’t help but poke fun at (see the Night Court episode), it still entertained people AND won the Emmy for Best Comedy. Meanwhile, Andy Richter is once again playing second fiddle on The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien (demoted to “announcer” no less) and Andy Barker, PI is nothing more than a memory. For most, in fact, Andy Barker is less than a memory because everyone I talk to claims to have never heard of it.

Andy's done being a sidekick.

Andy Barker, PI begins with an unpromising mistaken identity concept that seems more suited to a Michael Myers (or 1997 Bill Murray) feature film vehicle than a weekly television comedy. Richter’s Andy Barker is an accountant with a wife and a seemingly undetermined number of kids (this is actually a great sign for the show, believe it or not). He has just opened his own business and has a brand new office in a typical suburban shopping plaza. Before long a damsel in distress has walked into his office looking for the prior tenant – a private detective. Barker decides to help the woman and suddenly, and for the rest of the series’ short run, he is effectively a private eye.

Andy’s indeterminate number of kids is good news because the show spends very little time on Andy’s home life and avoids tired Conflicting Schedule plots where the main character has to juggle his two lives.  Andy’s baby daughter factors into the plot of just one episode, although he makes vague references to other kids, and his wife basically makes one token appearance per episode.

Rather than traditional sitcom boilerplate, the episodes focus on Andy’s amateur detective work. Andy gets in over his head at times, but he’s no bumbling idiot. His instincts and intuition prove sound, and in the best episodes, Barker actually “cracks” the case. The show never really wanders into Mistaken for Badass territory, which was a serious concern for me, but there are definitely episodes where Andy solves a case based more on coincidence than his detective work. These unfortunate incidents make for much less interesting episodes. The show is at its best when portraying Andy as a competent and observant yet inexperienced and unassertive private eye.

Let's see Jack Bauer try this!

Most of the episodes end with some sort of action set piece - a chase or a fight. It seems a little odd for a show like this, but I’m sure the network thought it would help bring in viewers. They do something very smart though; by creating relatively modest set pieces that fit the tone of the show, they are able to stage them impressively. The golf cart battle at the end of the second episode is a perfect example. Andy is driving the cart with a criminal hanging onto the top. Since this scene is set on a speeding golf cart, they are able to use long shots of a guy actually hanging on. Frankly, it looks better than when TV shows feature high-speed car chases consisting entirely of tight shots that help keep costs down and that help the viewer not be able to see what’s going on.

While he displays some aptitude for the job, Andy Barker needs help to succeed as a detective. Similarly, Andy Richter needs help to make this show work. Andy’s most successful gigs have been as sidekick to the energetic and lithe Conan O’Brien. Andy’s specialty is to observe the insanity around him and respond with a perfectly timed bemused quip or a slightly mortified reaction shot.

The nitty gritty legwork involved in being a fake private detective.

This is where the supporting cast comes in. Tony Hale (Buster from Arrested Development) plays Simon, the owner of the video store underneath Andy’s office.  He’s a film snob and an all too eager member of Andy’s crime fighting team.  In the pilot, Simon serves to place the show in the proper pop culture context (“This is just like Chinatown”). In a world where everyone, including recent immigrants and gangsters, have seen the appropriate movies, Andy is more familiar with Judging Amy and Miss Congeniality (1 and 2). Rather than being bumbling and inept, Andy’s status as a square is his major drawback. Simon is also responsible for one of my favorite moments from the series. When the shopping plaza has a fund raising fair, Simon hosts a “Find Out Why Your Favorite Movie Sucks” booth. Brilliant.

The MVP of the show, however, is Lew Staziak, the “retired” private eye that sets everything in motion. The late Harve Presnell plays the senile, wisecracking, world-weary veteran to perfection. Character-wise, his hilarious (sometimes nonsensical) quotes are either the result of dementia or being a fucking genius. Think of Rip Torn in Dodgeball or Philip Baker Hall as the library cop Mr. Bookman on Seinfeld and you’re basically there. This is an archetype we have been seeing much more of in the past few years as it is perfectly suited to today’s more “memorable quote” focused comedy. For Andy Barker, PI, Lew provides most of the laugh-out-loud moments as well as a little bit of edge. Lew gets some welcome back-story and a little added depth in “The Lady Varnishes,” one of the series’ best episodes. Unfortunately, it’s also the last.

He looked exactly the same in 2007!!!

Which brings us to the biggest problem with Andy Barker – there’s only 6 episodes. Three of them (the pilot, and the last two episodes: The Big No Sleep, and The Lady Varnishes) are absolutely terrific. In the last episodes the show is clearly hitting its stride. Huge assists are provided by guest stars Nestor Carbonell (Richard Alpert of Lost) in “The Big No Sleep” and Amy Sedaris and Ed Asner in “The Lady Varnishes.” A comedy with episodic plots of this nature likely would have needed regular efforts like these from guest stars in order to stay in top form. The fact that “The Big No Sleep” and “The Lady Varnishes” aired in a glorious one hour block that earned NBC the aforementioned historic low… well, it’s an absolute miscarriage of justice.

NBC’s Thursday night successes provide a pretty bleak view of 21^st century American life. The ideas that work will always infringe on one’s personal life (30 Rock) and that no one, no matter what they do is capable of escaping their mundane and soul crushing workplace (The Office) rule. Andy Barker, PI presented a very different viewpoint; that the modern male is capable of indulging his adventurous urges without sacrificing peaceful domesticity. This harmony seems almost revolutionary for television. Andy Barker was a good show that could have become great, but it will probably just be remembered as one of NBC’s missteps in its attempt to rebuild its Thursday night comedy lineup.

Every month in "Why didn't you watch...?" we will take a look at a television series that was criminally and irresponsibly canceled before its time; taking a critical look at the show while also delving into what was wrong with all of you people that you couldn't tune in for 30 or 60 minutes each week. The rules are simple: the show must have been canceled, it can't have lasted for two full seasons, and we have to like it. So, why didn't you watch...

For years, I've thought that horror movies could tell more resonant stories and develop compelling mythologies if they would just get out of their own way. Stop ignoring previous movies in the first act, retconning huge amounts of backstory in the second, and wrapping everything up in the third as if we all don’t know the killer will rise again. Horror movies deal with pretty epic stuff: death, the devil, ancient mumbo jumbo, family secrets, machetes. Rather than engage in franchise-building, slasher films basically force themselves to start from the beginning with every sequel. Watching all the movies in a series generally doesn’t offer any benefit except a larger pile of bodies.

Harper’s Island is, essentially, a slasher film told over the course of 13 episodes of television. But don’t tune in expecting to see a maniac stalking around right from the beginning. The identity of the killer is naturally the big hook of the series and, at least initially, all the murders are shrouded in mystery. I was worried the creators would hold back the reveal of the killer too long, hoping people would continue to tune in just to find out who the killer was. Fortunately, this is not the case and for a significant portion of the series you will get to watch a psychopath stalk and kill yuppies - graphically.

Harper’s Island’s commitment to genre standards means that all the problems normally encountered in a slasher film are present here, and perhaps even amplified by the expanded runtime. The writing and acting slip into bad more often than great. There's a lot of time dedicated to less-than-compelling storylines that only serve to fill time between kills. In fact, the first few episodes (which would correspond to just the first 15 or 20 minutes of a film) are fairly frivolous and serve only to introduce you to characters that you don't really need much time to get to know.

On the flip side, the payoffs you get from a slasher film are similarly amplified. There is more time to explore the backstory, to chase red herrings and to, in general, thicken the plot. There are even more kills than your average horror movie (I'm certainly not saying it bests some of the most zealous films).

Is that a body, or just an ornate crucifix?

Speaking of murders, one of the prerequisites for slasher films is that we get to see blood and guts spew from victims as they are killed in unusual and gruesome ways. Seeing as how this was a show on CBS in primetime, I was pleasantly surprised by how graphic some of the murders were. I’m sure my expectations were tempered, and by actual horror movie standards it’s not going to blow anyone away, but I’d be pretty surprised if you could put all this gore into a movie and still get a PG-13. By that reasoning, you’re getting a legitimate R experience from a broadcast network show which I think is rare and noteworthy.

While Harper’s Island suffered through an unfortunate pre-premiere marketing campaign that had me convinced for weeks that it was just a horror themed reality show, some sort of unofficial sequel to Murder in Small Town X, I would argue that the show actually offers an interesting hybrid of both the past and the future of dramatic television. Television shows used to be conceptualized to run indefinitely and written to maintain the status quo. One of the biggest changes in American television over the past few years is the move toward ending a show when the story dictates rather than the ratings. Harper’s Island is perhaps the most extreme version of this possible. It was all filmed and in the can before a single episode aired.

A change that has arrived hand in hand with the increased focus on serialized story-telling is that television has now become a medium for the gaze, like film, and not the glance. Networks formerly operated under the assumption that members of the audience would not see every episode of a season, much less the series, and that people were likely to miss portions of episodes. Important events did not happen right after a commercial break because people were still coming back from the kitchen or bathroom. References to previous events were worked into the dialogue for the benefit of people who missed the beginning of the episode.

While VCRs have long made it possible for people to keep up with a show even if they can’t sit down every week, the rising popularity and revolutionary convenience of DVRs and the availability of episodes online and in complete DVD sets are what have really opened the market for serialized television. Shows that require beginning to end attention like Lost and The Wire were much more rare just 10 years ago than they are today. This is where Harper’s Island takes a cue from television’s past. Harper’s Island doesn’t require that much attention.

While giving Harper’s Island your undivided attention will certainly yield some rewards, it’s entirely unnecessary. After CBS relegated the show to Saturdays, I watched new episodes online. I surfed the internet, checked emails and paid bills. All while keeping an eye on my CBS window. With the handy ability to rewind should I feel like I missed something, I was completely satisfied watching the show in this way and don’t really feel like I missed much.

While this may seem like a clear indication that a show isn’t worth your time, it is actually an endorsement. Harper’s Island is a 13-episode slasher film, and even the best examples in the genre don’t require constant attention. Being able to zone out or crack jokes between grisly murders is part of the fun.

Just one of Harper's Island's unfortunate inhabitants.

Of course, I would be remiss if I did not point out that the last four episodes turn the entertainment value way up. I would likely burn through these in one sitting if I were watching them on DVD.

In terms of story, Harper’s Island doesn’t break any new ground. People visiting the picturesque Harper’s Island for a wedding are being killed off one by one. There is a mysterious connection to the island’s legendary killing spree of 7 years ago. It’s all pretty familiar territory, but the writers do a commendable job of setting up the pieces and then dismembering them one at a time. There are some small surprises along the way, but the major revelations will be predicted by astute viewers. What Harper’s twists lack in shock value, however, they make up for in terms of being well placed and well played. The past and present stories are both told satisfactorily, and in the end they end up enhancing each other rather than forming one convoluted mess as is the case in many slasher movies.

One thing that immediately distinguishes Harper’s Island from the slasher films it emulates is the span of time. Most slasher films take place over just a few hours once the killing really starts, taking us through a bloody prom night or one seriously traumatic night at summer camp. Typically, we don’t see too much of the characters’ psychological reactions to having their lives (and bodies) dismantled by a homicidal psychopath. Harper’s Island, on the other hand, takes place over several days.  We spend a great deal of time with these characters even after it becomes obvious that something is seriously wrong and that some members of the party are not, in fact, selfish flakes but are instead, very dead.

In a film, there’s usually one scene where a token victim loses their cool until another protagonist calms them down and, before we know it, our heroes are back on the hunt or back on the run. In Harper’s Island, the longer time span translates to more downtime for many characters. These characters are forced to face the fact that they are being hunted. This could have been the show’s undoing. I wasn’t sure anyone in the cast was prepared to offer us a compelling portrait of someone who is all at once scared for their own life and processing the sudden murders of many people close to them. However, as the series draws on, and the focus is less on grief, the acting becomes much less of a weakness. The creators don’t attempt to do psychological drama and, ultimately, whether the acting is terrific or not, the audience feels the draining effect that this experience has on the characters. As they find themselves in a situation that most people would consider unimaginable, they react believably, which is to say they completely fall to pieces. A few characters never lose sight of the goal of getting off the island and surviving. More interesting though, are the other characters who display signs of depression, and feelings of anger, hopelessness, helplessness and regret. These are all shown in enough depth that they feel genuine and earned, yet the show never wallows in them so long that it detracts from the maniac killer plot we all showed up for. There is a scene late in the series when the would-be bride puts on her wedding dress, which has become nothing more than a memento from a past life. It’s a scene that could have been cheesy, but it provides a poignant moment considering all that has preceded it, as well as a great visual. Most importantly, however, it quickly leads into some exciting killer shenanigans.

She's not running to the chapel.

The main aspect of what I referred to as the “unfortunate pre-premiere marketing campaign,” was saddling each of the recurring characters with some sort of cheap label: the bride, the groom, the sheriff, the outsider. While I don’t think announcing that the characters are easily summed up in one word is a good way to advertise a show, it’s actually a pretty accurate and honest representation of these characters. The labels are slightly oversimplified, but the characters are not complex or deep. Some of them have nice little character arcs, but for the most part they start at point A and die there as well. However, while they may not develop much, the number and variety of characters and the shifting dynamics that come with them stop things from becoming too tiresome. Furthermore, without the contrivances of complicated histories and shadowy motives that many shows foist upon their characters, the people on Harper’s Island actually seem like normal people. This is integral to making them sympathetic. And while the characters may not be terrific creations in their own right, the writers obviously know how to use them for maximum effect. There are a number of deaths that stand out, and there is even one confrontation late in the series that all by itself made me happy to have stuck with the show. It showed a flare for the dramatic and a stylistic sensibility that I, at once, wish the creators had employed more often and am happy that they kept in check, making its use more effective and preventing the show from becoming ostentatious.

The killer gets a considerable amount of screen time late in the series, and it’s not all limited to walking slowly and sticking sharp things into people. Once revealed, they get some unexpected and welcome characterization and interaction, going well beyond the emotionless killer we are used to. There’s an amusing and human moment when the killer recalls the struggle involved in one of the most recent murders. It’s great. With a deeper understanding of the killer, the murders themselves shake off the somewhat arbitrary feeling they have early on and become memorable dramatic moments that propel the story. It’s slasher protocol that the villain take a backseat to his own murderous rampages and Harper’s Island wisely breaks from this convention.

Finally, please rest assured that everything is wrapped up at the end of the series. This doesn’t mean every insignificant detail is explained and question answered. But the major storylines all come to a conclusion and the characters’ stories are completed. There is no hand rising from the grave or Jason jumping out of the lake in the last frame. I think this sort of closure is going to be a rarity for “Why Didn’t You Watch…” entries.

Not this time...

There are many totally reasonable and accurate criticisms that can be leveled against Harper’s Island. But, it’s always nice to see something genuinely different on television, especially one of the networks, and Harper’s Island delivers just what I’d hoped for: a solid slasher experience that is unlike anything you could get from a feature film. With so many great ways to entertain yourself out there, I wouldn’t uniformly recommend Harper’s Island as a must see, but it’s worthwhile for fans of the genre or people who are just looking for something different. Hopefully before too long, someone will be encouraged to give the “slasher mini-series” another shot, with a bit more support than CBS offered this time around.