For TV producers, networks and streaming services, crime fiction is a genre that keeps on giving. Murder mysteries, in particular, are an enduring drama staple and they often involve detectives, who handily come in a variety of shapes.
They can be police officers, private eyes or self-styled sleuths. Police detectives, including Endeavour Morse, Harry Bosch and Hercule Poirot, are assigned to cases that they need to crack. Investigators can also be lawyers, like Jack Irish, or priests, like Father Brown, or independent operators, like Dex Parios in Stumptown. Maybe they’re stickybeaks with a nose for detection, like Miss Marple and Agatha Raisin. Or they could be characters minding their own business, like Jack Reacher, who stumble into trouble and have to manoeuvre their way out.
Alan Ritchson as the one-note Jack Reacher in the Amazon Prime Video series.Credit:Amazon via AP.
Whatever the variety, detective stories can offer components tailor made for TV: plots with an eventful beginning, often the discovery of a body or a report of a missing person; a meaty middle, a smart investigation; and a satisfying resolution. These stories readily contort to fill a range of timeslots, from single episodes, to telemovies to full seasons. Aside from hopefully appealing protagonists, they often build an engaging ensemble around the hero, and with each case usefully comes a useful influx of fresh characters.
Book adaptations have proved particularly fertile ground for TV crime – just ask Harlan Coben – and they arrive with a pre-loaded audience, sometimes in the millions. But while that might be an asset, it can also be a liability. Evidence of that came with the outcry that accompanied the casting of Tom Cruise as Lee Child’s giant of a hero, Jack Reacher, in the 2012 film adaptation of One Shot. Fans were outraged that Child’s hero, whose intimidating size is frequently referenced in the novels, would be played by an actor considerably shorter. But give me Cruise’s energy, agility and commitment any day over the size-appropriate option offered by the recently arrived Reacher (Amazon Prime).
With a plot adapted from Child’s first Reacher novel, Killing Floor, the series stars man-mountain Alan Ritchson, a one-note actor who translates the hero’s composure, physical prowess and mental acuity into a robotic smugness. This Reacher is a smart-arse who displays his rippling torso at every opportunity and, in keeping with the casting, the series is ham-fisted. The dialogue lands with a thud while the bad guys are portrayed with a subtlety that suggests they might as well be waving placards screaming “Villain”.
More satisfying is the adaptation of another hugely successful and prolific author, Michael Connelly, and his Harry Bosch series. Completing its seventh and final season last year, Bosch (Amazon Prime) is infused with a love of Los Angeles and an evocative mood of melancholy. Its eponymous hero, an LAPD homicide detective, is played by Titus Welliver, whose weather-beaten face and soft growl of a voice help to convey the essence of a veteran who’s witnessed the worst of human nature and remains a resolute crusader for justice. The series supports him with an equally well-drawn and cast ensemble.
The diminutive Tom Cruise was widely mocked when he was cast as the fierce vigilante muscle Jack Reacher. Credit:Paramount Pictures
Given the popularity of crime-fiction adaptations, it’s easy to understand why the ABC might’ve jumped at Troppo (Sunday, 8.30pm and iview). Inspired by Candice Fox’s fourth novel, Crimson Lake, the first in her Ted Conkaffey series, the eight-part production appears to tick many of the boxes required for a healthy screen life.
It’s set in tropical north Queensland, a location that can be spectacular and menacing. This plays perfectly to Australia’s international image as an exotic place of beauty and danger, an island where deadly creatures lurk. In a sign of the series’ tendency to over-statement, the mysteries in Troppo involve not one but two suspected deaths by crocodile.
American Thomas Jane (Hung, The Expanse) stars as Conkaffey, one of the show’s odd-couple of private eyes. A former police detective who was publicly disgraced by his association with a brutal sex crime, he’s fled Sydney and his family, exiling himself to a backwater and numbing his pain with whiskey. He’s drawn into the investigation by another social outcast, tattooist/PI Amanda Farrell (Nicole Chamoun), a convicted killer who’s served her time and returned to the home town where she’s a pariah. When one man plunges into a croc-infested river and another disappears, Farrell persuades Conkaffey to join her investigation. Around them congregate a couple of hostile local cops, a sharp-eyed coroner, a sympathetic bar owner for Farrell and a possibly sympathetic neighbour for Conkaffey, as well as some restless teenagers.
Thomas Jane is a disgraced ex-cop who teams up Nicole Chamoun’s tattooist and private investigator in the backwaters of tropical north Queensland in Troppo.Credit:Daniel Asher Smith
Jane, who’s also an executive producer, is solid but stolid, playing the wounded male with a wooden rigour. Described in the novel as “a fearless, excited ball of weirdness”, Farrell is the eccentric of the pair, instinctive, impulsive and reckless. While Jane is serviceable, Chamoun, with her close-cropped hair and expressive eyes, seizes her role with gusto, generating a nervy electricity and injecting the thriller with some much-needed energy.
Perhaps as a consequence of the dutiful box-ticking, though, Troppo is oddly inert with a plodding, predictable quality. One of the cases involves a Korean scientist at a company spruiking a deep-sea mining project and you can tell they’re up to no good as soon as you see the strutting boss (Damien Garvey) with his slicked-back silver hair.
That’s a large part of the problem with Troppo, which in spite of its odd-couple detective duo, distinctive location and scary critters, feels bloodless.
I like nothing better than to spend time snuggled up with the TV equivalent of a smartly written crime yarn featuring a colourful investigator or two probing an absorbing mystery. But even with many of the ostensibly desirable pieces in play, Conkaffey and Farrell don’t fit the bill.
Find out the next TV, streaming series and movies to add to your must-sees. Get The Watchlist delivered every Thursday.
Most Viewed in Culture
From our partners
Source: Read Full Article
