'Grey's' Isn't Going Anywhere
'Red Widow' Gets The Axe
Review: 'Criminal Minds: Suspect Behavior' Delivers More of the Same
by Maureen Ryan, posted Feb 16th 2011 12:15PM
If you like what 'Criminal Minds' does, then 'Criminal Minds: Suspect Behavior' should be right up your alley.In this spin-off of the popular CBS procedural, Forest Whitaker plays Sam Cooper, the leader of an "elite team" of agents who use "unconventional methods" to track down America's worst criminals, according to CBS's press site. The "elite team" part sounds right; it almost goes without saying that this team is the best and the toughest and could be described with many other words that end in "-est."
But really, "unconventional" methods? I beg to differ. Doesn't every CBS procedural revolve around an uncompromising team leader who schools lesser cops and cuts through stupid bureaucracy until he gets what he needs and Delivers Justice? As a cop show, 'Suspect Behavior' is about as conventional as they come.
Whitaker, of course, has presence to spare, and Janeane Garofalo does her level best in her role as one of Cooper's team members. And even if the rest of the cast is merely serviceable and quite a few plot turns are predictable, the show has a brusquely energetic pace.
The most interesting thing about the pilot is that it deals frankly and thoughtfully with issues of race; that is to 'Suspect Behavior's' credit. A debit: The pilot dwelled on potential harm that might come to young children, a procedural standby that gets more threadbare by the year. (The second episode, it must be said, features a much less predictable "Unsub." Sidebar: The 'Minds' shows love to use the word "Unsub.")
All that being said, perhaps the 'Criminal Minds' franchise is just 'Not for Me' (in this essay on 'Big Love' I wrote about the difference between a show being Not Good and Not for Me). It's true that in the television realm, dark stories about serial killers and other evildoers don't particularly appeal to me.But there have always been a couple of bigger issues when it comes to the 'Minds' shows and they tend to fall outside the Not for Me parameters. First of all, the outcomes on these shows are usually easy to predict (what, you think the bad guys are going to get away with their terrible acts? Think again). Moreover, the show has a Whatever character whose presence tends to make the plotting convenient at best, lax at worst. The use of this Whatever character on 'Minds' is not necessarily a deal-breaker but is generally Not Good, in my humble opinion.
A Whatever character is someone who pops up when the lead characters need a certain item, a special skill or a piece of information, and this character always happens to have whatever the story needs to move forward. These characters are pretty common in genre storytelling (think Castiel on 'Supernatural,' Willow or Giles on 'Buffy' and wizards in most fantasy tales) and used the right way, they don't have to be a problem. As long as those characters have other functions, work within some kind of framework of rules and are developed in their own right, these characters and their magically convenient abilities don't have to detract from the proceedings.
But Penelope on 'Criminal Minds' -- who pops up on 'Suspect Behavior' as well -- is a Whatever character whose presence tends to grate on me. Let me be clear: It's the character, not the performance, I find problematic. Kirsten Vangsness, who plays Penelope, is quite skilled and brings a sweet, zesty energy to both 'Minds.' But whenever the investigators need a clue or a location, Penelope does her computer magic and -- Shazam! -- the team instantly has the information they need. It's just never seemed realistic to me that all that information would be that accessible that quickly, and Penelope is far too frequently stuck behind her computer doing database magic. She literally needs to get out more.
Still, Whitaker's talents are considerable: His charisma gives 'Suspect' a strong center and his line delivery is consistently interesting. If the original 'Minds' is one of your favorite shows, there's no reason not to give this drama a shot.
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