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| Images Courtesy Apple+ |
Bill Lawrence has been creating television shows long enough to have created his own genre of shows. Scrubs, Ted Lasso, Cougar Town, and Shrinking all have the feel of some nostalgic television from decades ago. There’s heartwarming moments, moving scenes of character development, and sometimes a little optimism not often found in current television series.
His latest, an adaptation of Carl Hiaasen’s 2013 novel Bad Monkey, is everything fans could want but with darker humor and comical violence. The 10-episode series feels like a Bill Lawrence show, which now could be considered classical cable tv. What I mean by ‘classical’ here is juggling various characters through familiar plot structures while using a lovable antihero to tie it all together.
Vince Vaughn is tailor-made to be a former detective Andrew Yancey, who was demoted to restaurant inspector. His usual motormouth charm is what keeps the story entertaining, even when the series suffers from the usual traps of a ‘classic’ TV show. Once in a while, his droll gab even starts to get old.
Yancey gets hooked into helping his former partner Rogelio (John Ortiz) deal with a severed arm that was hauled in by a fishing boat carrying tourists in the Florida Keys. Their old boss wants Yancey to take the arm (which has its middle finger sticking up) to the Miami Police coroner so that the case can be moved to that major city. There, Dr. Rosa Campesino (Natalie Martinez) won’t take the arm, though she will take a cute outfit off a corpse brought in that day.
Over the first few episodes, you meet the cast of characters that interact and converge so that different storylines intersect. On the Bahaman island of Andros, native Neville Stafford (Ronald Peet) is fighting with new American developers who want to take his and other islanders’ beachfront property. One of those developers is the series’ big bad: Eve Stripling (Meredith Hagner), a former cocktail waitress who married up and now wants a resort on Andros.
Juggling these and other main and supporting characters is an art, and author Hiaasen knows how to do that. Hiassen has been writing crime comedies since the early 80s and has been a journalist in Miami since the 70s. He’s made a career out of translating ‘Florida Man’-like stories into classic crime capers.
His novel is adapted in its entirety here, which is one reason this show feels more ‘classic’-y. One or two subplots included in the series drag down the pacing, giving it a meandering feel. Many classic shows suffer from this, too, sometimes stretching out the plot over too many episodes. More modern literary adaptations often use only seven or eight episodes, giving those shows a tighter feel.
Supporting cast, including Jodie Turner-Smith, L. Scott Caldwell, Michelle Monaghan, and Rob Delaney, keep things interesting. Veterans from past Bill Lawrence shows also make appearances in smaller roles. And, to make this series even more ‘classic’-y, is Crystal the Monkey, the same Capuchin monkey you’ve seen in everything from George of the Jungle to The Hangover.
The dark and droll humor in the series really matches Hiaasen’s tone from his novels, which is a feat for literary adaptations. Also enjoyable is the soundtrack, which is nearly all Tom Petty covers. This all works together to make Bad Monkey enjoyable and fun, even if it uses the more ‘classic’ tropes and plot structures of a Bill Lawrence show.
- Eric Beach