No dues but plenty of don’ts!
Looking to join a club where you don’t have to pay any dues? Look no further than the new television mystery series, Women’s Murder Club which debuted October, 2007 on ABC. While the show’s creators, have obviously infused hard boiled detective genre with hormonal hi-jinks, we can’t help but think that these sisters-in-crime would be better off (and a whole lot more believable) sipping icy mojitos at an afternoon garden party.
Pushing reality aside, TV viewers are asked to accept the premise that these updated Charlie’s Angels are capable of professionally investigating crimes on the streets of San Francisco. Remember that old TV show, The Streets of San Francisco that launched Michael Douglas from TV star to the big screen and into the arms of the delectable Catherine Zeta-Jones? As Karl Malden would say, ‘Way to go buddy boy!’), Women’s Murder Club’seems more like a decaf-strength makeover of ‘CSI’.
One of our all time favorite Law & Order gals, Angie Harmon, leads the pack of crime-stopping girlfriends on Women’s Murder Club. With her oh-so-sexy husky voice and with her long tall Texan legs sheathed in skin tight jeans, Angie is always a pleasure to watch on the tube. In WMC, however, she’s given impossibly trite lines (“You’re under arrest for pissing me off!”) which are more than laughable.
Harmon’s character, Lindsay Boxer, is a San Francisco homicide detective who fronts an exterior as hard as nails to protect her self-doubts and fears. Boxer worries that her dedication to the force has shoved her personal life to the absolute edge of oblivion. If the waters couldn’t be much muddier for workaholic Lindsay Boxer, her ex-husband (Melrose Place’s Rob Estes) as Lieutenant Tom Hogan is now her boss and she still has the hots for him.
WMC has plenty of time devoted to gal pal chat. Too much time. Instead of crafting a mystery worth solving, the show’s scripts ‘inspired’ from the mind of best-selling crime novelist, James Patterson, seem content to merely have the lead characters mooning over lost romances while the trail to capturing killers is grows icy cold.
The ‘club members’ include Homicide Inspector Lindsay Boxer; frosty blonde Assistant District Attorney Jill Bernhardt (played by Canadian actress Laura Harris); hyperactive San Francisco Chronicle crime reporter, Cindy Thomas (portrayed by Aubrey Dollar); sassy and smart medical examiner, Claire Washburn (assigned to actress Paula Newsome). Sadly, this quartet of talented actresses spend half of the show mouthing pity-party cliches and handing out advice on how to solve romantic trysts to their lovelorn friends. Rounding out the cast (and adding a bit of much needed testosterone to the mix) are the obligatory hunks: Tyrees Allen as Boxer’s crusty partner, Detective Warren Jacobi and Rob Benedict in the role of Owen Haight from the crime scene investigation unit.
Women’s Murder Club is produced by James Patterson, R. Scott Gimmell, Elizabeth Craft, Sarah Fain, Brett Ratner, and Joe Simpson. That’s right. Joe Simpson (aka Daddy Joe) the ‘brains’ behind launching the career of his pop tart singing daughters, Jessica Simpson (best known for wearing those Daisy Duke denim cut-off jeans) and her darker spirited sister, Ashley Simpson.
Maybe that’s at the core of what’s wrong with the ‘murder mystery light’ of Women’s Murder Club. It’s more like a munching on a pop tart than enjoying a substantial meal. You’re just hungry for something more when the show’s over.
