Poker Face is thin gruel but watch it anyway
That doesn’t mean it’s not worth watching because… Natasha Lyonne.
The premise of the show has been compared to Columbo: there is no mystery on the murder. We know who did it, why, and how. As in Columbo, it’s always the famous guest stars. The point of Columbo was always how he was going to figure it out through his painstaking and famous slow but relentless questioning. In Columbo, I also always enjoyed the class aspect: the murderers were usually wealthy and powerful and Columbo was, well, Columbo: disheveled, frumpy, driving a beat up Renault (in the US!!), and never having needed his gun. So the wealthy and powerful criminals always underestimated him and treated him as a nuisance, until he had them.
Poker Face has the same premise: we know who killed whom, how, and why. It’s always the famous guest stars, who are all very good and seem to have a great time doing this. Meanwhile, Charlie (Lyonne) is running from assassins (so not a cop), living out of an old car, taking odd jobs, that put her at the center of each episode’s murder.
The show is always structured the same: we see the murder with a bit of context. Then the show returns to the beginning, and we get to see when and how Charlie entered the picture, which means she will be well placed and motivated to solve it. Either the victim was someone she learned to like, or some innocent person is being accused of the crime, or some combination of that.
So, like Columbo, Charlie pesters people with questions, but there is a catch. Charlie can tell when people tell the truth, and when they lie. Without fail. So she’s got one over Columbo who had to build his case piece by piece (even if you suspect that he figured out right away who did it and works backwards from that). But this means that the cases are rather easily resolved.
That’s the think gruel part.
It doesn’t matter what elaborate plans the perpetrators plan. Charlie will know almost from the get go who did it. There’s not patient building of the case. And so the murders / mysteries are very thin. The minute one person lies, Charlie knows. Game over. Frankly, this week’s episode felt like it lasted 10 minutes by the time it was over.
Does it mean it’s not worth watching. Of course not.
First off, Lyonne is worth watching, period. I’ve been a fan of hers all the way back to Die, Mommie, Die!
And, of course, Russian Doll.
Poker Face is just fun. Lyonne is her usual laid-back, slightly annoying, smoking, swearing self (“Bullshit!” when she detects the first lie). And the guest start pairings have been really good. My personal favorites are Judith Light and S. Epatha Merkerson. Who knew these two would have such great chemistry.
So even though the writing is meh, you should still watch.