It is a show like The Glades that makes shows like White Collar and Psych look so much better. All of these shows focus on being light with characters that are always amusing while they solve a mystery within the hour. Except The Glades falls short in the “light”, “characters”, “amusing”, and “solve” parts.
Charisma-less Matt Passmore plays Detective Jim Longworth. As every opening credits explains, he used to be a cop in Chicago. Then after a stupid incident, he decided to move to Florida to work on his tan and golf game. For some reason he didn’t think that people would get murdered in Florida. Even in the promo for Season Two, he’s still surprised that beautiful people in bikinis die and he may actually have to do something as a homicide detective.
Like every other show he is constantly wisecracking, sees himself above everyone else, self-described genius, and will break the rules to solve the case. This type of personality could be charming if it was someone like Hugh Laurie or James Rodney was the know-it-all, but the writing and Passmore’s performance makes the character completely unlikable and obnoxious.
It doesn’t help the entire show is built on how much of a “wildcard” he is. Carlos Gómez plays a medical examiner who is friends with Longworth, but all he gets to do is to be frustrated with his CRAZY ANTICS and talk about those crazy antics for the rest of the episode. Kiele Sanchez (LOST’s Nicki) is a nurse that Longworth is obsessed with. They have “banter” but they will never actually be a couple because she doesn’t want to divorce her inmate husband for the sake of her child. That means they will forever be in “will they or won’t they” TV limbo.
Truly, most of this will be excused if the show succeeded at being the light show it desperately wants to be. It’s not funny and the mysteries don’t really make sense. He’s not much of a detective if he verbally accuses every single character and then it ends up being the random secondary guest actor in the last few minutes.
With so many elements not working, this can’t be a show to casually watch during the summer or something to have on while you’re working on something else. It’s just frustrating. It looks like a likable show, but it’s treating the audience like we’re idiots.
The special features include deleted scenes, audio commentary by the cast and crew, a couple of featurettes talking about how great the show is, and of course a gag reel. Oh actors not being able to remember lines.
Season: 1.5 Yaps
Extras: 2.5 Yaps
http://www.thefilmyap.com/2011/06/11/the-glades-season-one/
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