In today’s TV landscape, with cookie-cutter crime procedurals being churned out by the dozen, it takes a lot for one of them to stand out. Prime Video’s new entry “Scarpetta” — debuting this Wednesday; I’ve seen the first four episodes — makes a pretty strong case for our attention, taking inspiration from Patricia Cornwell’s bestselling book series and boasting no less than three Oscar winners (!) in its cast, led by star Nicole Kidman. But the end result, unfortunately, doesn’t live up to that billing, sinking into mediocrity with a badly jumbled narrative, ill-fitting comic relief, and a central mystery that is just not all that compelling.
Kidman plays Kay Scarpetta, a Virginia medical examiner who uses his forensic expertise to investigate grisly murders. Her latest case, with a woman’s dead body found by the train tracks, actually ties back to a case Kay worked three decades ago, when she was just starting out. (We get flashbacks to that first case, too, with Rosy McEwen playing a young Kay.) Bobby Cannavale co-stars as tough-talking Detective Marino, with Simon Baker — dusting off his Southern accent from “The Mentalist” — as Kay’s dashing FBI profiler husband Benton.
The drama is gory and jumbled, and the comedy falls flat
Those with a weak stomach should probably avoid watching “Scarpetta” while eating: We get several gory scenes of Kay cutting up bodies to do her examinations, along with flashes of violent sadism. (The show has an unsettling moral blankness to it, actually, where a woman’s dead body is just another puzzle to solve.) We’re told that Kay is an incredible investigator, but we don’t get to see her genius in action enough to be marveled by her prowess. The biggest flaw, though, is that the main case isn’t interesting enough to support one timeline, let alone multiple timelines. (Anson Mount does have a sly menace as an accused killer-turned-cult leader.) All the time-hopping just serves to dilute any sense of narrative momentum, and the show ends up feeling scattered as a result.
“Scarpetta” also tries to mix in some comic relief in the form of Jamie Lee Curtis as Kay’s free-wheeling sister Dorothy, who wears light-up earrings, demonstrates high kicks in the kitchen, and shouts things like “I wanna lose my FUPA!” Curtis is a welcome addition to any cast, but the comedy falls flat, and the sibling bickering between Kay and Dorothy plays like a low-rent “Mare of Easttown.” (It’s shows like this that make you appreciate the nuance and insight Brad Ingelsby brought to “Mare” and “Task.”) On this show, character motivations are spoken aloud, and loudly. We know Kay is a weirdo who is only really comfortable with the dead because her sister literally tells her, “You’re only really comfortable with the dead.”
Scarpetta also boasts the strangest TV subplot in years
Speaking of weird: Ariana DeBose — the cast’s third Oscar winner, for those keeping score — plays Dorothy’s daughter Lucy, whose wife recently passed away. Lucy is a tech whiz, you see, and she managed to create an AI replica of her dead wife (played by Janet Montgomery), who fully speaks and converses with her through her computer. This has to be the strangest TV subplot in years, like a “Black Mirror” episode but played totally straight. This is massive, world-changing technology! And yet Lucy just uses it casually in the background, and it’s treated like a colorful character quirk.
I would watch a show about Lucy, actually, and her AI wife. But judged as a crime procedural, “Scarpetta,” despite its stellar credentials, doesn’t really deliver the goods.
THE TVLINE BOTTOM LINE: “Scarpetta” has serious star power but disappoints as a crime procedural, with a bland mystery and an overstuffed narrative.