Previewing King and Maxwell and Major Crimes

You doubtfully have ever seen a show that starts with a gopher driving a mass transit bus and I doubt you will ever see it again. But that is how King and Maxwell opens. Based on the David Baldacci best sellers, the new series stars Rebecca Romijn (Rollerball) as Michelle Maxwell and Jon Tenney (The Closer) as Sean King as two former secret service agents turned private investigators which leads to a humorous reading of the Miranda Rights on a count that they do not actually read them because they are no longer officers of the law.

Unfortunately after the gopher incident, the rest of the premiere fall into your formulaic crime procedural and feels more like Tenney’s former show on TNT than Veronica Mars even had the show focused on Keith rather than his daughter. And the setting of Washing D.C. (these are former secret servicemen so they still have a few connections) just means there are going to be a lot more political intrigue than bail jumpers on the show and a lot of run ins with the FBI considering two agents, Michael O’Keefe (Caddyshack) and his partner Chris Butler (The Good Wife), are also part of the cast.

The first non-gopher case involves a serial killer (Sons of Anarchy’s Ryan Hurst who looks a lot different with a clean shave and a Tim Riggins haircut) whose lawyer, and friend of King, is murdered and King is out to find out why his friend was gunned down and why if it tied to his latest case (spoiler alert: of course it is). The client is not much help as a high-functioning autistic savant. But the case is so run of the mill, I was able to spot the killer the moment they walk on screen. If the rest of the episodes were more gopher chasing and less political intrigue, I would watch every episode but sadly I have a feeling we have seen our last gopher bus chase.

King and Maxwell airs Mondays at 10:00 on TNT.

The series premiere of King and Maxwell will be preceded by the spin-off of Tenney’s old show Major Crimes, now in its second season. Though the show is still dominated by the Philip Stroh case that started way back in the days of The Closer. Nadine Velazquez (My Name is Earl) joins the cast this season as the Deputy District Attorney prosecuting Stroh and quickly butts head with Captain Raydor over the key witness Rusty and her guardianship. The case of the week tonight involves a movie director comes home to find his wife murdered and Provenza is ready to prosecuted him on the spot, which of course probably means he did not do it (again, I was able to spot the actual killer the moment they walked on screen which probably means I watch too many of these types of shows). And look out later this season when Raynor’s estranged husband shows up in the form of Tom Berenger.

Major Crimes airs Mondays at 9:00 on TNT. You can also download Major Crimes on iTunes.