Actor Ed Westwick researched serial killers from that era, including Ted Bundy who confessed to murdering dozens of women. The main cast also includes Taissa Farmiga, Karolina Wydra, Evan Ross, Anne Winters, and Jaime Ray Newman.
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A decade ago, TV critics were sent DVD screeners in advance of new show premieres for the goal of watching and writing their reviews. Two decades ago, we received VHS tapes. Pagers and beepers go off at opportune and dramatic moments; Kent’s favorite turn of phrase is “Kill me!” The hardened detective (reeling from his partner’s suicide) paired against his will with an ambitious upstart. Emily is just trying find a decent place to live, and Kent has offered to help. Ewww; can you let me see the blade first, Kent? As Kent watches the news reports regarding the “Hillside Strangler” he looks excited that he has the attention of the whole city of Los Angeles.
The press site for ABC is actually the “Disney ABC Press” with a logo in the Disney script font perpetually affixed to the lower right corner of the screen as an episode plays. That’s an odd juxtaposition.
Frontline: Inside Assad’s Syria (10 p.m., UNC-TV) – Martin Smith reports from government-controlled areas in Syria, and provides firsthand accounts from Syrians caught in the conflict. If so, it seems misguided. Yet such is the case in the Tuesday premiere of Wicked City, when Kent, the Los Angeles murderer played by Ed Westwick, asks a potential victim, “You want to see Billy Idol at the Whisky?”
Not even Westwick can attract the now grown-up viewers who loved him on Gossip Girl. Christensen (“Parenthood”) is equally convincing as a nurse and single mother who develops a unique relationship with the killer (and in the pilot, Christensen’s character reveals a few surprises and comes across as the most intriguing). And we’re supposed to be entertained as LAPD detectives Jack Roth (Jeremy Sisto, “Suburbia”) and Paco Contreras (Gabriel Lunas) try to hunt him down.
Kent murders young women for reasons as-yet unknown, and he does it with flair, but he’s not completely evil. But the show’s police story is pretty bland – a smart cop who doesn’t like his flashy partner!
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Zippy though the vintage tunes may be, the rest of the time we’re stuck listening to clunky dialogue, and expected to find Kent and his killing compelling.
