In the US: Mondays, 10/9c, ABC
There’s a long and honourable tradition on television of mystery authors going out and fighting crime. Obviously, back in the 80s, there was Murder She Wrote, more appropriately entitled Large Scale Holocaust She Wrote or Little Old Lady of Death – Don’t Let Her Come Near You.
But in the 70s, there was Department S and spin-off Jason King, which saw the original Austin Powers, novelist Jason King, solve crimes the police couldn’t; Edward Woodward’s crime writer Maxwell Beckett cowered his way around murder scenes in the 90s with the help of his more able assistant, Nikki, in Over My Dead Body; and in the noughties, we have forensic anthropologist-come-author, Temperance Brennan, helping David Boreanaz in Bones.
There’s probably more, but I can’t be arsed to list them: fancy a go anyone as part of a weekend meme?
Now comes Rick Castle (Firefly/Serenity/Drive/PG Porn‘s Nathan Fillion), a bad-boy novelist with extreme writer’s block who’s unfortunately just killed off his lucrative main character. Fortunately (?), a killer starts copying scenes from his books and he finds himself having to help the police with their enquiries. Except the police happens to be attractive fan Kate Beckett (Heroes’ Stana Katic).
Suddenly, he feels his creative juices flowing again. Cue Moonlighting for the 21st century?
