It’s the Upfronts?: Life on Mars

Posted by Dan May 28th, 2008 at 12:56pm In All Things TV

There’s a new show on ABC called Life on Mars, which is an adaptation of a BBC show.[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/1GBHvkoDnOE" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]

As you can see from the above clip, the show follows a detective who gets hit by a car and teleported into the early 1970s. (shhh…. don’t ask questions) There’s a serial killer involved at some point, and a pretty girl two. Colm Meaney (!) shows up as the tough-as-nails police chief. It seems to follow in the vein of the one-man mystery solver with a supernatural twist tradition (see Journeyman, Medium, etc.) — this one seems to be a hybrid of those two shows with a bit of Starsky and Hutch and Hill Street Blues thrown in.

In the grand TiFaux tradition of hasty snap judgements and baseless predictions, here’s my take: This is one of those shows will probably end up being decent, but not a must-see. Thusly, I give it one season. I have a sneaking suspicion I’d rather watch a show that featured Colm Meaney sipping a Guiness and telling stories about small Irish towns in his lilting accent. Oh well.