Who's Gonna Hear You Cry? A Preliminary Review of Fox's "The Chicago Code"

It presents like every other cop drama: commercials with drab colors, grizzled cops in a notoriously crime-ridden city, a vaguely badass title, and a splash screen with the main characters in confident poses with shiny badges and matte black sidearms at their hips. Except for the occasional Law & Order marathon, I generally don’t watch shows like “Detroit 187,” “Blue Bloods,” “The Shield,” or even the recent reboot of “Hawaii 5-0.” But something about “The Chicago Code” piqued my interest.

I can’t say it was the powerful female character: that’s nothing new for contemporary television or even this genre, with the likes of SVU’s Olivia Benson, CSI’s Katherine Willows, and NCIS’s Ziva with whom to compete. That being said, Jennifer Beals has outdone herself in “The Chicago Code,” making clear that her guest appearances on “Lie to Me” were far below her skill.

It may have been the geography: Chicago is not among the glamorous cities for criminals like New York (Law & Order) or the various locations of CSI (Vegas, Miami). It isn’t a center of federal government, like Washington D.C., home of “Bones” and “Lie to Me.” If Chicago fits any stereotype, it’s one of corruption, from which The Chicago Code seems to be drawing its primary content and purpose.

If not the setting or the characters, the allure of “The Chicago Code” must come from its plot. Six months ago, if someone with a nice suit and a stack of research told me that all the stories we can tell about modern, fictional policework have been told, I would have believed that person. But “The Chicago Code” brings something different to the cop narrative party. It uses something akin to the parallel narrative plot structure that can be found in any hour-long drama on the air today: characters have a specific conflict in each episode, but also devote between ten and fifteen minutes each night to advancing a plot that spans the entire season, or sometimes multiple seasons. In this, “The Chicago Code” is no exception to the norm. Its stock protagonists, the newly-promoted Idealistic Superintendent of Police and the Grizzled Veteran Detective With Authority Problems, are pitted against the slightly-more-original Corrupt Politician Moonlighting as a Crime Boss. What’s interesting about how “The Chicago Code” handles the story arc is the frequent intersection of its episodic stories and seasonal goals. Frequently, Superintendent Colvin (Jennifer Beals) is forced to enlist the aid of the devious Alderman Gibbons (Delroy Lindo) to solve daily crimes and injustices in Chicago, despite her ultimate intentions to bring him down, and his dubious awareness of her intentions.

Now that I have done my due diligence in highlighting clichés, it’s only fair to point out some more original things “The Chicago Code” does. Teresa Colvin, the Idealistic Superintendent, for example, is more than a James Gordon or Captain Cragen. She is a primary character with significant depth, who appears in roughly equal frequency in her full-dress uniform, bulletproof vest, business casual detective clothes, and (admittedly less often) casual civilian garb. The show admits she is a woman in a male-dominated world without it becoming a fetish: the occasional subordinate or villain will push her, she’ll push back, and the plot moves on. By the same token, her archenemy, Alderman Gibbons, is not an African American male by accident, but the show doesn’t constantly harp on his race or gender. Even Grizzled Detective Jarek Wysocki (Jason Clarke) is of overtly Scandinavian descent, though he otherwise remains in the uninteresting “middle aged white male” category. “The Chicago Code” is more interested in the problems of morality, loyalty, and integrity that are common to all of us, regardless of race, gender, or age.

I would be remiss if I neglected to mention the show’s significant cast of supporting characters. Junior detectives Vonda Wysocki (Devin Kelley), the younger sibling of the protagonist Jarek Wysocki, and Isaac Joiner (Todd Williams), to whom any “In Plain Sight” fan will be unable to refer as anything other than Bobby D, have thus far been marginal at best as far as the show’s plot, but are certainly fertile ground for development. Deep-cover cop Liam Hennessey (Billy Lush) is lucky to see five minutes of screen time each episode, but faces a plethora of his own moral dilemmas as he sinks deeper into the corruption Colvin’s team is determined to root out. Wysocki the Elder’s sidekick / apprentice, Caleb Evers (Matt Lauria), is barely worth mentioning as more than eye candy, although this early in the season, it would be premature to disregard him entirely. All that being said, the show’s characters (both primary and supporting) have a well-directed, polished feel to them. From their imperfect wardrobes that speak of hurriedness, dishevelment, and urgency to their subtle but noticeable accent work, they fit in their setting and never distract from the themes of the narrative.

“The Chicago Code” is young, having aired only six episodes since its premiere in early February, and is expected to run for at least seven more. However, let’s not forget this is on the Fox network, which is infamous for executing fledgling shows with significant promise (a generalization based almost entirely on its widely criticized destruction of Firefly before the completion of even a partial season [though I personally enjoyed the short-lived “Canterbury’s Law” as well]).

Did I mention Tim Minear (“Firefly,” “Drive,” “Dollhouse”) is one of the executive producers?

I’m not ready to give The Chicago Code a permanent spot on my television docket. There is still too much that can go wrong, even if it survives its first dozen episodes under Fox’s Damoclean cancellation sword. But I am cautiously optimistic, and would encourage the curious and open-minded to take a look at The Chicago Code. It’s fast, but it’s fun.