Jo
FOX - 9pm
Who's in it?
Shambling around every scene with the expression of a man who's JUST THIS SECOND out of bed, Jean Reno is downtrodden cop Jo Saint-Clair in this peculiar new crime series.
In a nutshell
Uber-cool film star Jean Reno gracing a mere cop show with his presence? A French cop show no less? Sounds entirely awesome on paper. Sounds like it'll be intense, complex and uncompromising, like recent Gallic crime sagas Spiral and Braquo. Well forget that, because this is in fact a completely unremarkable, Law & Order style procedural. Body gets found (in this case, some famous musician), suspects are interviewed, the bad guy is ultimately apprehended. Repeat till the ratings soar or nosedive. (Oh, and did we mention the main cop has personal demons and a shambolic private life? Of course he does.)
What makes things really jarring, though, is the fact it's in English. A kind of flat, internationalised, accent-less English that makes everyone sound like a UN interpreter, or badly-dubbed porn star. Except for Jean Reno, who's allowed to keep his thick guttural French accent, presumably because hey – he's Jean Reno and he does what he likes. The net result, last night, was a weird-yet-formulaic pilot to a pointless-seeming series. Not the best of starts, then.
What's the verdict?
Reno fans will probably stick with this out of sheer Reno love, but Jo really doesn't have much to distinguish it from every other show of its type. Apart from those accents. And pretty Parisian landmarks. Hey, it's got lots of those.
Star rating
2/5
