Thursday, September 22, 2016

Lethal Weapon - Pilot


Well, at least it's better than the new Rush Hour TV-series. Yeah, that is an incredibly low bar. The show's "Pilot" introduces us to Clayne Crawford as the new Detective Martin Riggs, a Texas good 'ol boy relocated to Los Angeles after the death of his wife and unborn child six months earlier. Riggs' new partner is career cop Roger Murtaugh (a completely miscast Damon Wayans) coming off of heart surgery and not ready for the crazy antics of his new partner. The pair's first two cases involve a bank robbery Riggs solves by killing all three suspects and blowing up the bank (which doesn't get him suspended) and a soldier's apparent suicide which is obviously something more.

While there are certain sequences that work, and the action isn't half-bad, there are so many bad choices (from reimagining Riggs as a cowboy to casting Wayans as the grumpy straight man) where you have to wonder how the show even made it on air. Murtaugh's family is present solely because they were in the movie (and for the running gag of the old cop wanting a blowjob from his wife). None of the cops at the police station are memorable, and Jordana Brewster is wasted as the police shrink who can't keep a suicidal hero cop off the streets despite a mountain of evidence to support that case. The only lethal about this weapon is its effect on the audience.

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