(S01E01) “Pilot”

Mark-Paul Gosselaar stars in this Stephen Bochco produced series about Defenders and Prosecutors in The Bronx. It’s another lawyer show, which I think one could argue that television already has enough of – but, I don’t watch many of them, so I haven’t been completely beaten down by the concept yet.

Add to that the fact that I always have to watch the premiere episode of a show starring a former cast member of “Saved by the Bell”, and I was certain that I was going to check this show out.

Now, as I sit here having watched the first episode, I have to say – I didn’t like it very much. That’s not really the type of criticism that you’ll normally find from me. I’m usually a “love it or hate it” type of guy – but this series left me almost feeling confused.

I can’t decide what it wants to be. The Defenders and the Prosecutors have drinks on a regular basis – some of them are even in relationships together. At first it seems like the show might be about the relationships, with the cases taking a back seat to that action. That’s not what happened, however. This episode’s case, which revolved around a man who was being sent to trial for a rape he didn’t commit, was the center piece of the episode.

The part that was less than spectacular was just that you never really believed for one second that he was actually going to go to jail. They tried to drive it home with a hard-assed judge who was basically punishing the innocent man because she was angry at the lawyer who was defending him, but really – they never convinced me for a second that anyone was going to Riker’s Island.

Before the episode was over Gosselaar’s character had managed to have himself thrown in jail at least 2 or 3 times, but even then, there was no surprise when he and his client were eventually let free (I would consider this a spoiler, except for the fact that the two of them going free is clear from the beginning of the episode).

The previews for next week’s show didn’t look too promising either. Gosselaar spent most of this episode screaming about how his friend was getting screwed. The preview leads us to believe that next week will be more of the same. I truly hope not, because if so, “Raising the Bar” won’t be around too long.

Even with all that, the cast is likable enough that I’m not totally turned off on the show. I’ll give it another week – I just hope that next week is better than this one was.