TV Eye: An old-fashioned approach

The new Charlie's Angels aren't modern female heroines. Photo / Supplied

One's a rehash of a 70s TV series that spawned a movie franchise about three supposedly kick-ass babes upholding the law.

The other's a vague rehash of several comedy-dramas designed to subvert the dry world of law.

The first is the new Charlie's Angels (Wednesdays, TV2, 9.30pm). The second is Harry's Law, (Wednesdays, TV One, 9.30pm) and though not technically a rehash, it does bear the hallmarks of other David E. Kelley shows, namely Ally McBeal and Boston Legal, vehicles for the mega-writer/producer to give levity to serious issues.

If only he could've done the same for the Angels. For crime-fighters named after winged creatures, they seem depressingly rooted on earth. Farrah, Kate and Jaclyn weren't this smug, and at least Cameron, Drew and Lucy had a sense of humour.

"I take my cover very seriously," said Kate (Annie Ilonzeh). Yes, and Alfred Gough's big-budget Generation Y Charlie's Angels takes itself very seriously too. Last night's episode felt as though it was out to prove itself to the boys with its complex underworld and violent stunts.

Bosley (who's been rendered young and handsome) joined the Angels as they tried to save a missing journalist caught up in a drug racket, all the while looking incredibly well-groomed. The Angels, that is.

"I want more," spluttered the journo, who'd been turned into a mess of an addict.

I don't, I muttered back. For a show designed purely to entertain (unless you count its morality lesson that greed and drugs are a bad combo), it lacks the satirical factor its predecessors had in spades. It also fails to answer the not-so-feminist notion as to why a faceless male could still be telling these grown women what to do, via a strange little box. Why is Charlie not Skyping the Angels on their iPhones? Couldn't the new Charlie have been a woman?

Aside from the occasionally self-deprecating Abby (Aussie actress Rachael Taylor), these chicks aren't modern female heroines - they're old-fashioned action Barbies. When Kate blathered on about how she'd destroyed her life and "hurt everyone in the process", Eve (Minka Kelley) told her she had her back.

Ugh. At least the hug-resistant heroine from Harry's Law wouldn't stoop to soppiness. Would she? Well it seems David E. Kelley has gone a bit soft. Playing his new hero, the pot-smoking, accident-prone fired patent lawyer starting up her own practice, Oscar-winner Kathy Bates gives the character the gravity - and levity - she deserves. Not exactly Denny Crane, but flawed and funny.

Problem is, amid the inevitable courtroom ramblings on what must be Kelley's misgivings about the justice system, and Harry's dealings with defendants' family members, she comes across as a big softie too. She'd set up her legal practice in an abandoned shoe store and hadn't the authority to dissuade her dizzy assistant Jenna (Brittany Snow) from selling the high-end footwear.

Prada shoes in a neighbourhood where there are shootings, and bums lying on the footpath? It made as much sense as Harry's irritating adversary in court whose gimmick was to repeat things, and Adam, the fellow lawyer who had to work for Harriet because it "felt right".

Perhaps Harry's Law has more in common with Charlie's Angels after all. It ended on a note designed to appeal to the jury's (and viewers') "humanity". You can bet her colleagues had her back.

- TimeOut