3 out of 5

Created by: Joan Rater, Tony Phelan, and Max Thieriot

covers season 1

A cozy Fire Country spin-off that, thankfully, feels pretty different from that show. I mean, they’re not worlds apart by any means, sharing the kind of clunky calamity procedural DNA of a billion shows, with Sheriff’s stream of small town antics making it more Longmire-esque than copaganda, but where Fire wallowed for nearly three seasons in tired soap opera and drama achieved almost solely by people withholding information to “protect” someone before maturing ever so slightly, Sheriff Country… has Morena Baccarin. Which isn’t a guarantee of quality by any means, but it’s a good step, and at least ensures exponentially more dimensions to a lead character versus Fire’s.

It goes beyond that, of course, in ways that aren’t just focused on actor-blaming: Fire’s main character is mopey and antisocial and stubborn; Sheriff Mickey Fox (Baccarin) is stubborn in her own way, but only because she tends to be right; she is otherwise open to feedback from her deputies Cassidy (Michele Weaver) and Nathan Boone (Matt Lauria), and is a lot more fun to be around thanks to a bickering but loving family, Sheriff’s richer sense of location and characters, and a quality balance between some ongoing plots – Mickey needs to win the election for Sheriff; Mickey needs to convince deputy Boone to stay at the job – and solid bottle episodes that tour us around the town’s dynamics between a burgeoning pot trade, some radical religions, local politics, and the occasional check-in with the fire department, thanks to Mickey’s relationship with the fire chief, who happens to be her sister (Diane Farr, of Fire Country).

We are well seated in standard procedural-lite fare, but the lead trio of Baccarin, Weaver and Lauria (and Mickey’s father, played by W. Earl Brown) truly gives the show a deep bench to work with, meaning each of those bottle episodes has a compelling character to lead the way; none of the episodes feel like they have to tread water to get us from A to B – Mickey’s no nonsense approach prevents that!