TV Review - Tommy (2020)

The first episode of this series was extremely well-written. Paul Attanasio penned the initial script. Attanasio is a two-time, Oscar nominee. He was up for Best Writing for Quiz Show (1994) and Donnie Brasco (1997). Attanasio was also a writer for Homicide: Life on the Street (1993), a highly regarded, Baltimore cop show. He's also the co-creator of Bull (2016), a successful, legal drama. Attanasio is a very good writer and his scripts are always top-notch, but he's not the showrunner for any of these shows. He helps to get the shows started and a bit off the ground, but his writing talent isn't utilized for the most part. For a series like Bull, Attanasio didn't lean into his talents as hard, so when he disappears, that disappearance isn't as felt as much. Unfortunately, it seems like he leaned into his talents for his script here, so in the episodes that don't feature his writing, the absence is felt even more.

Emmy-winner Edie Falco (Nurse Jackie and The Sopranos) stars as Abigail Thomas aka "Tommy." She's appointed as the police chief of the Los Angeles Police Department. She's the first woman to have that position. This is true in the world of this show and it's true in real-life. In the United States, certain cities like Oakland and Philadelphia have or have had female police chiefs, but the two largest police departments, New York City and Los Angeles have never had either a female police chief or female police commissioner. Not only is she a woman though, she's also a lesbian.

Tommy is breaking barriers and shattering glass ceilings as it were, but, being appointed is only half the battle. There's also a lot of politics that she has to navigate. Her boss is the mayor after all. Last year, the cable series Pearson (2019) featured a big-city mayor as a major character. That series was able to weave the mayor of Chicago into the narrative and plot a whole lot better than this series has with the mayor of Los Angeles. Pearson was more serialized storytelling, so it had a greater plan it was unraveling. This series doesn't appear to have a greater plan. He's just there to remind us of the political intrigue or political stakes.

This series feels like another excuse to have a CBS police procedural show. Yet, it has the same issue as Law & Order: Special Victims Unit when it decided to make its main female, police detective, Olivia Benson, played by Mariska Hargitay, the captain of her unit. Typically, that captain role is a supporting role in a detective story. Yet, making the lead character into a supporting character wasn't going to happen.

Therefore, the captain is still heavily involved almost to an awkward degree. Instead of staying in the office and having a managerial role that's in reality mostly paperwork, she still has to be in the field, sometimes running from place-to-place. It's the same for Tommy. Having her stay in the office would be boring, she has to be in the field too, which characters in the narrative call out as being atypical. Yet, it's supposed to be indicative of how much of a maverick she is. It's the dilemma presented in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (1982) when a person who has been promoted really doesn't want the promotion because it takes him out the field and behind a desk when he really wants to be in the action.

Tommy doesn't necessarily want to be in the field, but she feels it important that she do so from time to time. It's less a character flaw than it is a narrative flaw. Yet, because this series is on CBS, it feels the need to be a procedural and have her moving from the usual point A to point B structure. What is suggested in the first, few episodes is that this show might analyze or critique the LAPD or police departments in general. It also suggested that the series would tackle political issues that relate to police agencies. For example, the first episode tackles the issue of a sanctuary city. The second episode tackles PTSD from a police-involved shooting, but instead of really delving into the issues, the episode is a procedural that's more about figuring out the culprit, which is what all procedural shows do and is less interesting.

The third episode is a bit more promising. It deals with the Me Too Movement. It also connects to a personal incident with Tommy where she was assaulted. It culminated in a great interaction between Tommy and a victim. It's a powerful moment. It sets up Falco to give a really, knockout performance. Given what kind of person Tommy is, she's not the emotional type. That powerful moment was actually more about the other woman than Tommy. It seems as if mostly Tommy is going to be managing the issues of others, which would be fine if those others are compelling enough. She does get her time to shine and Falco is a great actress, so it's likely she'll be able to hold this series together.

Rated TV-14-L.
Running Time: 1 hr.
Thursdays at 10PM on CBS.