I am – Hercules!!
“Chase,” a bland, clumsy and disposable new crime drama from writer-producer Jennifer Johnson (“Lost,” “Cold Case”), follows a tiny blonde Texas-based U.S. Marshal Service deputy named Annie Frost (Kelli Giddish, fresh off Fox disaster “Past Life”) as she and her team track down fugitives.
We’ve gotten at least four great projects out of the U.S. Marshal Service: “Justified,” “The Fugitive,” “Out of Sight” and “Karen Sisco.” The new series suffers for being nowhere near as good as those other constructs. “Chase’s” characters, villains and heroes, male and female, are all just so much macho cardboard. The pilot’s plot is a bore. The humor is hackneyed. The dialogue is a runny bag of fail.
USA Today says:
… One can hope that once they get past the pilot, the writers will cut back on the most egregiously clumsy expository dialogue and fight the urge to tell us how great their heroine is at her job when they should just show us. … This is plotting at its most basic: chase, catch, repeat, without any twists that even merit the term. True, there is a decent performance by Travis Fimmel as Monday's runner. But he'll be gone next week. You're advised to follow suit.
The New York Times says:
… the story moves like a bullet toward the inevitable apprehension of the fugitive, flying past leaden dialogue and plot holes so quickly that if you enjoy the crime-drama formulas that are in play, you can enjoy the show. …
The Los Angeles Times says:
… delivers just what its name promises, and not much more. It consists mainly of that very thing we are often aphoristically asked to cut to, with just enough banter and back-story to let you know that these are in fact humans we are watching and not just exceptionally well-coordinated robot drones. …
The San Francisco Chronicle says:
… a show you've seen a million times … Not nearly as good or as complex as "Justified" on FX, but it's a decent hour of mindless entertainment. …
The Washington Post says:
… Despite the dusty Texas vibe, all the running around doesn't amount to a hill of beans. The stunts are impressively executed, though. It seems like everyone gets a good workout. …
The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette says:
… a series as old-school and unimaginative as "The Event" is inventive. …
HitFix says:
… The Jerry Bruckheimer version of a U.S. Marshal show - which is to say, one with a lot of running and yelling and nice photography and very thin characterization. I'll stick with Raylan Givens from "Justified," thanks. …
The Boston Herald says:
… A & E’s “Manhunters,” the unscripted series about real-life U.S. marshals, is more suspenseful and filled with far more colorful characters than the group assembled here. “Chase” reminds me of “Trauma,” NBC’s attempt at a Monday drama last year, although the shows couldn’t be more dissimilar (the latter was about first responders). They both seem to be placeholders in the prime-time schedule until the network can scrounge up something better.
The Boston Globe says:
… This is just what TV doesn’t need: Another “elite’’ procedural crew that always gets their man. It’s “In Plain Sight’’ on steroids and without charm. …
The Hollywood Reporter says:
… It's a police procedural with a lot of chases, and its lead is thoroughly and consistently hot. But we don't know that much about any of these places, or any of the people doing the chasing, and it's not clear there's that much to know, either. The fullest-drawn portrait is probably the villain … Giddish projects toughness and sensitivity, especially when dealing with children, but never becomes especially distinctive. In the girls-kick-ass spectrum, she's at least less one-dimensional than the CW's trigger happy Nikita. The characters around Frost generally are less interesting than she is, and they don't bounce off each other in an especially compelling way. … compared to "Justified" and "Terriers," two recent and lower-key cops-and-robbers series on FX, this show has no soul.
Variety says:
… Jerry Bruckheimer's action vehicles have started losing steam, and there's little to distinguish this one … "Now who's ready to go hunting?" asks Marshal Annie Frost (Giddish), underscoring the predictable "Let's find this bastard" dialogue. (A colleague, for example, explains to a newbie that their jobs are "like hide and seek -- only with guns.") … Despite the requisite Bruckheimer flourishes, "Chase" uses such a 1970s template it's hard to imagine the show inspiring much passion, on a night where tracking down an audience poses a formidable challenge -- and check-your-brain thrills can be found against breezier backdrops on CBS' "Hawaii Five-O." The title notwithstanding, in other words, "Chase" settles for inertia, when the task of capturing viewers would appear to call for bolder strokes.
10 p.m. Monday. NBC.
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