Monk, Dragnet & NYPD Blue

This Column first appeared in the Age on September 27

What is it you need for a wedding day? Something old something new, something borrowed, something blue. Well that also sums up Channel 10's Saturday Crime Nights, which are going to give The Bill (ABC, 8.30pm) a run for its money.

What's new? Monk begins tonight (7.30pm-9.00pm) and it's good TV despite its weird premise. Monk is an obsessive-compulsive detective who suffers from an abnormal fear of germs, heights and crowds. All of which makes day-to-day police work (not to mention life) tough going. Monk's the kind of guy who can walk into a room and read the crime scene as clearly as most of us read the front page of the newspaper. Think Colombo with the eccentricities upped a few notches. It's improbable, but fun. He has a sidekick, his nurse, Sharona Fleming (Bitty Schram) who enjoys the break from the normal nursing routine as they solve crimes. In fact the only thing that isn't quite working is the show's pitch as a comedy drama. It's not really funny that Monk is crazed with anxiety the whole time, and Tony Shalhoub - who won the Emmy for best actor in a Comedy series this week - plays Monk's neurosis poignantly. So that wacky music as he tries to climb a ladder, or do something else he clearly can't handle, jars.

What's been borrowed is Dragnet (9.00pm - 10.45pm). Dick Wolf, producer of all the Law & Order gives us a remake of one of a cop show that started as a radio drama in 1949, and moved to TV from 1952 to 1959. It started up again in 1967 and ran for another three years. Wolf's made a good call. I don't know what the original Dragnetwas like, but the reworked Dragnet theme followed by the kind of Film Noir voice-overs that the Los Angeles crime genre does so well, sent a thrill of recognition through me. It's clear from the first scene that this is top-notch, if formulaic, crime drama. In a nod to the concept behind the whole show, the first episode is about a copycat murder who is inspired by a series of murders that took place decades before. Ed O'Neill (formerly of Married with Children) is both passionate and gruff as Detective Joe Friday. Ethan Embry as his young offsider Detective Frank Smith needs a bit longer to make his mark. And for those who like things gruesome, rest assured that while this is a good old-fashioned cop show it's crimes and forensics are new fashioned.

Which leaves us with something old and blue: NYPD Blue (series premiere is next Saturday, 9.30 - 11.30pm). It's been running 10 years now and looks tired beside the two new guns that are on before it. It was a terrific cop show in its day, and Dennis Franz as Detective Andy Sipowicz is still putting in great performances. But unless you're a regular fan, there's not much here to entice.

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