For whatever reason I tuned into the premiere of Fox’s latest action/comedy The Good Guys earlier tonight and figured I’d give you my initial reaction. From the creator of Burn Notice a show that I’ve never really had any interest in comes The Good Guys a supposed comedic throwback to the buddy cop genre. Colin Hanks stars as the straight laced by the books cop while Bradley Whitford plays the washed up rebel, constantly reminiscing of his glory days. Performing a job primarily consisting of petty burglary cases, things escalate when they get themselves involved in a complicated international drug fiasco. Kooky situations ensue right? Well The Good Guys may have a couple laughs but unfortunately it falls flat far too many times.
I like the pairing of Hanks and Whitford but there’s something missing here to separate it from any other cop show. Bradley Whitford is by no means to blame as he gives an amusing and energetic performance as the greasy macho type. I think the big problem here is this show doesn’t know how much of a comedy it wants to be or how much of just a straightforward cop show. It sits in a weird middle ground and I’m of the opinion that with a premise like this “You either go big or go home.” Make it absolutely ridiculous, TV has had enough tongue and cheek cop shows already. I could only imagine how awesome this could be if it was handled by perhaps Adam McKay and WIll Ferrell’s Gary Sanchez Productions (those guys by the way actually have a buddy cop movie due out this summer.) Something more in the mindset of Eastbound and Down. That would be a cop show worth seeing.
This show hardly deserves a third paragraph of myself reviewing it so I’ll wrap it up. The Good Guys needs to find some kind of niche or dynamic that makes it work but I doubt it will. Solely based off the pilot it feels like a funny sounding project being handled by the wrong people, therefore it will most likely fail.
