Watching – New Tricks (2003-2015)

I found myself once again seeking out a light murder of the week show and stumbled upon New Tricks.

The Pitch: Detective Superintendent Sandra Pullman was on a fast track until a case went bad. Now she’s been put in charge of an initiative that has her recruiting retired detectives to help her through cold cases that have need to be reopened. Throw in the young Police Constable that helps them with the advances in technology since they were last on the force, and you’ve got New Tricks.

I wasn’t sure I was going to like it, but as the personalities began to show themselves, it grew on me. I’m only in a couple of episodes but I’m enjoying what I’ve seen so far. The antagonism between the tough boss and the retired detectives quickly turns to a team bonding, even as some quirks continue to provide friction.

• D.S. Sandra Pullman: She has enough problems of her own, personal and professional, but she is good at what she does and does not back down from what has been handed to her.
• Gerry Standing: He’s that bit of a rogue and a charmer (as evidenced my multiple ex-wives) that almost every police show has.
• Jack Halford: A recent widower who takes up the job to get out of the house. He talks out the cases to his dead wife’s ashes in the back yard.
• Brian Lane: Compulsive, exacting, and still troubled by the case that he can’t let go of (and will continue to chip at as the series goes on – though I expect a major development or reveal by the end of Series One or Two)
• P.C. Clark: The young pup of the team, competent with modern police procedures and the IT guy that the team relies upon.

It’s a mystery of the week format, usually around a murder (or a murder turns up during the investigation) and some particular office politics that have to be worked around. I wouldn’t call it a comedy like Brooklyn 99 but the personal exchanges tend towards the lighter humour and even while it has the occasional moment of dramatic seriousness, it steers clear of the grim dark approach of many other shows that deal with murder and law enforcement. There isn’t much in the way of action so it comes close to a cozy mystery format in many ways. The big test for me is that there is enough evidence presented that the viewer has got a good chance of coming to the conclusion as the detectives do.

The interesting twist is that with the age of the cold cases, they tend to fall into a time that the retirees were active, something many other cold case mysteries don’t have as a connection (excepting when one of the team was a rookie at the time of the original case). On the flip side, there’s the advances in techniques that shed new light on the evidence locked away those decades ago (in the way it’s presented, I’m gonna rate this a science light with the almost all of the lab work being off screen and the results being fairly quick).

Despite the title and theme song, I’d say that it’s more about old dogs using their years of experience than them learning new tricks (though they aren’t afraid to turn to the P.C. to gain the required information). The gimmick of retired detectives returning works well enough without resorting to super star pathologists, technological marvels, or the special talent (author, psychic, psychologist, profiler, etc.) that solves the case. I’m planning on sticking it out for the series and see if it holds up as the cast begins to rotate through, giving way to different actors and changes in chemistry.