Review by C.J. Bunce

Let’s face it, Only Murders in the Building had a good hook.  Well, at least a new hook.  A TV show about a podcast!  But for that series, it really was just a hook–a lure to get you in the door.  From there it was the Martin & Martin laugh (half-)hour, and for that it provided a season of laughs (and two seasons that tried hard).  The new Netflix series Bodkin seems to try harder, and in doing so the writing comes out richer.  It’s quirky in many ways, beginning with co-lead Will Forte as Gilbert Power, the man who achieved some (fleeting) infamy from his first podcast, and who now finds himself in Bodkin, Ireland, tracking down a cold case of three missing young people who vanished at an annual local celebration.  Americans will find it’s also a short series, one episode longer than the typical British season.  If only the seventh episode had been tucked into the first six and the ending stronger, Bodkin had the potential to be the year’s best new series.  But making perfect TV is hard.  Bodkin just couldn’t stick the landing.

Even more important to the story than Gilbert is Siobhán Cullen as Dublin-born Dove (a short form of Dubheasa), an orphan raised in a convent who became a journalist, now exiled for protecting a source, and being hounded to return to stand trial.  Cullen owns every scene she’s in for all seven episodes.  She may remind you of last year’s nun on the run, Betty Gilpin in Mrs. Davis.  This series is more down to Earth, but it lacks that satisfying ending.

In a year with The Gentlemen, Culprits, The Brothers Sun, The Tourist, the second seasons of Tokyo Vice and The Tourist, the eighth season of Shetland, and the third season of Guilt, Bodkin holds its own.  Its humor has more in common with Nicola Walker’s Annika, but Cullen’s Dove exhibits that drive and determination that we loved in the women stars of The Gentlemen, Culprits, Mrs. Davis, and yes, Annika, too.

Wait–humor in a crime show?  Sure, why else would you have Will Forte?  That said, Forte proves in Bodkin that he has that acting skill many (most?) of his Saturday Night Live contemporaries never found: He knows when to dial it all back, when to turn off the humor, when to be subtle.  Bodkin will make you hope for a next project with Forte doing more dramatic roles.

So what’s all going on?  Dove is exiled by her boss (because of the government case against her) to return to Ireland where she is to work with Gilbert on the podcast research.  Dove provides all the necessary protests, since podcasts aren’t journalism and this is far beneath her skill set.  Dove takes the mentor role to Robyn Cara’s Emmy, a younger journalist sent a bit earlier to work with Gilbert.  Emmy is that fine mix of eager and naive we’ve seen before–the best via Nina Oyama’s Abby Matsuda in the far more brilliant dark crime comedy, Deadloch.  Emmy hires a driver who ends up at the heart of the mystery, Chris Walley’s Sean O’Shea.  Sean is the most we get to spend with the ordinary local Irelander.  He exemplifies the over-eager youth trying to find the quickest get-rich scheme available.  Here that’s a smuggling operation, smuggling rare eels to the Far East for incredible wealth.  Here’s where the story mirrors what has already been done this year in both The Gentlemen and Season 2 of The Tourist–mob doing mob things, just change the crime and the long-lost kid whose parent is right in front of us.

Sean works for David Wilmot’s Seamus Gallagher, the next best actor of the series.  He’s also quickly set up as the road-worn criminal with the secret past.  The show’s seven writers know their characters well–until they don’t.  Seamus is building to be a solid villain until he hugs Gilbert.  Gilbert has a singular vision until he suddenly doesn’t in the last episode.  Dove would never ever fall apart… until that last episode comes out of nowhere, as if the writers didn’t get to read the scripts for episodes 1 to 6.  But it’s still a fun ride that will suck you back in for the next episode.  Watch for long-time genre actress Fionnula Flanagan as the savvy rough old Irish nun Sister Bernadette.  Flanagan has always been brilliant and adds some street cred to the show.

Note for those that care: a dog character is shot for no reason in the show, a stupid story device that reflects some novice writing, intended to show some mostly off-screen villains are particularly evil.  It’s one of the many things the show doesn’t get right.  Plot threads, especially involving Dove, go unaddressed.  But for that last episode, Bodkin might have been so much better.  It also seems like it’s a one-and-done series–there’s not really any need for a second season, nor is there any set-up at the end for a second season.  If you’re look for eccentricity, Derry Girls sure did Ireland better.  Ultimately it doesn’t have a lot to say about podcasts, but it does everything better than Only Murders in the Building.  The mystery itself takes a backseat to the characters getting along and not getting along.

One thing Bodkin does the best this year?  Paul Leonard-Morgan (Limitless, Dredd) wrote a superb score for each episode filled with mystery and intrigue–and doses of quirky comedy.  It’s a bit of Hans Zimmer’s Sherlock Holmes and a bit of Daniel Pemberton’s The Man from U.N.C.L.E.

It’s in a league with some hefty competition this year.  But show up for the actors and the music.  Bodkin has a lot going for it and is worth giving it a try.  Catch Bodkin now–all seven episodes are streaming on Netflix.