Why FOX Sucks - Part I

If I haven’t made it perfectly clear in the past or with the title, I hate FOX (the network, not the news). FOX is in a weird position. They think of themselves as a real network, yet are not seen as one. When some young, hotshot writer comes up with some cool idea (like an outer space western, let’s say), they inevitably bring it to FOX, knowing it’s a waste to go to the big three, but want a step up from cable and the CW. FOX feels all edgy and cool and gets good press from it, and then does everything in there power to utterly destroy the show (running episodes out of order, changing time slots, putting it in crappy time slots) before cancelling it after 3 lackluster performances, never to be seen again until summer or the DVD release. Yet, we keep coming back like an abused wife, thinking it will be better this time (better duck and find the concealer after the third episode of “New Amsterdam”). That being said, I’m going to make this a running column every time I feel a show got slighted by FOX or think about one in the past that got the douche. This week we look at the long departed “Keen Eddie”.

Not thinking I watch nearly enough TV, the Duchess bought me a portable DVD player for Christmas. This way, I get to watch TV and movies on the train rides into and out of work. I have a rack full of DVD’s I haven’t found time to watch, so it seems like a win-win. However, the drawback is that I will remember shows that got “FOX-ed” and spawn bitchy columns like this. That being said, after watching the first season of “Remington Steele”, I decided to grab the 2003 cop show “Keen Eddie”. Basically, a NYC cop gets transferred to Scotland Yard in London after a drug bust gone bad in NYC leads him to London. After he brings down the drug ring, all is well with the world and he is invited to stay on at Scotland Yard, because he gets results. But it is so much more than that. Eddie Arlette (the NYC cop) is your typical fun loving detective, thoroughly American, right down to his catch phrase (“I’m Eddie. How’d you like me so far?”). Putting him in the completely fish out of water scenario of England is great. The supporting cast around him is exceptional. First, you have Fiona, his flat-mate with whom he shares a love-hate relationship with just the right amount of sexual tension (played by the then 21 year old Sienna Miller, when she didn’t look like a strung-out crack whore). His partner at Scotland Yard is Inspector Monty Pippen, the sex-a-holic who has great comic timing. Also at work are his boss Nathaniel Johnson, who is using Eddie to grab headlines and help him move up the latter, and Nathaniel’s secretary, Carol Ross (nicknamed Ms. Moneypenny by Eddie), who is part of one of the best running gags of the show, as only Eddie seems to hear her sexual innuendos when asked typical questions. You also have the semi-recurring characters like Rudy, who is an out of work actor and willing informant, and brothers-in-law One Ball Bill and Johnny Red, who run the best American/Scottish ex-pat bar in London (aptly named “The Sticky Wicket Inn”).

With camera work the mirrors “Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels”, the show is just plain fun to watch. Plus, it’s not just the cop stuff that makes it fun. Anything involving Eddie’s dog Pete is classic (be it chewing the TV remote or using Fiona’s cat as a “shag-toy”.) and the back and forth between Eddie and Fiona is just plain fun. Of course, the cop stuff is the beat. My favorite episode had to be when guys in Duran Duran masks knock over a casino and steal soccer tickets from the casino owner’s son, who is just out of prison. He then proceeds to track down the robbers and kick them in the nuts when they don’t tell him where the tickets are (causing each robber to lose a ball due to the kick). Intersperse it with some music clips of Duran Duran (I can’t quite forgive them for not using “A View To A Kill”) and it made for good fun. So, what happened? Well, for one, FOX put it on during the summer, and let the American Idol spin-off “American Kids” lead it in. Then, they proceeded to show the episodes out of order. The coup de grace was when they moved the time slot, then cancelled it after one showing in the slot. Thankfully, the show would pop up on Bravo, DVD, and most recently Sleuth.

So, this was just one of the many shows that FOX decided it douche. Do I like it? No. Is there anything I can do about it? Well, aside from becoming Programming Director at FOX, not really. So, I guess that every time FOX premieres something that isn’t “House” or “Bones”, I should actually think about whether I should watch it or not. Who am I kidding? If it sounds good, I’ll check it out, if only to give me more fodder for my blog.