3 out of 5

Developed by: David E. Kelley

covers season 1

A great central cast, well-realized setting, and effective grizzled-detective setup are undermined by the poorly justified viciousness of its central crimes and killer in Mr. Mercedes, a TV series based on a Steven King joint.

The opening, extended, flashback sequence depicts the crime which gives the series its title, and also gives (in the present) retired cop Bill Hodges (Brendan Gleeson) the unsolved case which keeps him up at night: the assumedly premeditated slaughter of men, women and children – lined up in the early morning cold for job prospects (financial recession a poorly-defined theme in the show) – by a clown-masked man driving a Mercedes.  Developer/producer David Kelley and a small crew of directors and writers dawdle, in this scene, on introducing us to a sympathetic gaggle of people in the crowd before bloodily running them over.  It’s a purposefully shocking vignette but admittedly grabbing; however, tolerance of such shock tactics will determine tolerance of what follows as well, as it’s something that the show, for better or worse, keeps falling back on.

Present day and Bill, retired, is pretty out of sorts, encouraged to clean up his slovenly, disheveled lifestyle by his still-working once-partner, Peter (Scott Lawrence), and a forcefully flirtatious neighbor (Holland Taylor).  But it’s not until Mr. Mercedes, as the killer from the flashback was thus deemed – revealed to be retail drone Brady Hartsfield (Harry Treadaway) – starts to taunt Bill via computer e-mails, videos, links and etcetera that Bill wakes up, pursuing the lead as something of a disturbing lark, roping in a neighborhood techie (Jharrel Jerome) to do some techie sleuthing.

We also flip to Brady’s perspective: his day-to-day grind at a Radio Shack proxy (the failing of which, and the clueless cruelty of his boss, both attempted parts of the mentioned financial theme) and his home life with a disturbingly sexual relationship with his drinking and drugging mother (Kelly Lynch), from which he retreats into the basement to tinker with murder toys.  It sounds excessive and it is, but the show – initially – takes patient steps to build the profile on someone who would’ve committed the opening crime, and so again, we find ourselves in a don’t-look-away situation with Brady’s antics.

Mr. Mercedes, for the next 6 or 7 episodes, plays out like a slow burn cat and mouse.  And once you’ve gotten the rhythm down, it’s binge TV: Gleeson is fantastic, slowly morphing back into a rapt detective, and he pulls off the constantly conflicted emotional state of his character – caught between wanting to be an isolated grumblebum but desperately needing help from friends and workmates – perfectly; the way he inadvertently ropes in people to help him, and his curmudgeonly ways, are genre gold.  And the piecemeal clue work that brings him closer to Brady is well paced and mostly without obvious deus ex machinas.  Treadaway, though, is perhaps too well cast as a killer, his open-eyed state and sweaty demeanor the kind of “disturbed” you’d pick out of a lineup.  Ultimately, the show’s failing to dig too deep into his psychology – we get distracted by his plans, by his job, by his increasingly gross and bloody behaviors, and then the whole thing diverts down that financial line, which seems like a retreat – is also to the actor’s disservice, as he doesn’t get to work his skills as much as become a villainous cartoon.  The deeper we get into his side of things, the more the show shakes apart, hitting a peak late in the season with a very bleak turn that, again, could’ve used some digging but just feels like shock value.  This runs concurrently with a romantic subplot that never feels necessary over all.  The combination of the two exposes the manipulative inner-workings of keep-watching-me TV, bringing down the show’s overall stock.

The case is resolved in season one.  That there’s a season two is appealing, as it suggests we’ll have Gleeson (and hopefully returning helpers) focusing on another case.  If the showrunners can sever this character from season one’s shock value approach, they may have a more ultimately satisfying show on their hands.