Review: Anna Paquin Takes Her Turn as a Detective in ‘Bellevue’

It’s a warped sign of progress, perhaps, that the work-obsessed mother who neglects her child has achieved parity on television with the absentee father. The latest example is a detective, Annie Ryder, played by Anna Paquin in the new WGN America series “Bellevue” (starting Tuesday). Reckless, relentless and plagued by childhood demons, Annie becomes so deeply involved in the show’s eight-episode-long mystery that she risks losing custody of her daughter.

“Bellevue,” originally shown by the Canadian network CBC, is typical of its genre — the contemporary prestige mystery series — in some positive ways. It’s handsomely shot, competently directed and, when the writing allows, generally well acted.

But it’s markedly derivative. Like the fictional English town of Broadchurch, in the BBC America drama of the same name, the fictional Canadian town of Bellevue has a striking topography, an abundance of secrets and an assortment of stock village characters — the hockey coach, the priest, the suspicious mayor — that make up the pool of suspects.

The story also recalls “Broadchurch,” as well as AMC’s “The Killing,” introducing a missing child and connecting that case to a long-ago murder in a way that dredges up buried trauma in half the town, including Annie.

“Bellevue” doesn’t do a bad job with chilly small-town menace, if that’s what you’re looking for. But unlike the better mysteries it evokes, it seems to have been run through a plot-generating machine — insert number of episodes, number of investigative breakthroughs per episode and extent of conspiracy, and voilà. The writers decided to spring for not one but two bonus credulity-stretching late twists.

They also add a little David Fincher flavor by having an unseen character feed Annie information in the form of gnomic riddles. (One clue will be found “where the hypocrites weekly wear the mask of good,” for instance.)

Paquin, at her best (as in Kenneth Lonergan’s film “Margaret”), has a rare ability to communicate intensity and complex, conflicting emotions. That’s probably how the show’s creators, Jane Maggs and Adrienne Mitchell, envisioned Annie, but what ended up on screen is a half-sketched, formulaic character that Paquin can only occasionally make convincing.

The reasons for Annie’s volatility, gradually revealed, become increasingly far-fetched, and it’s easy to ignore them and just ride along with Paquin’s likability and intelligence. People keep telling Annie she’s out of control, but as far as we can see, she’s the most sensible character in view.

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Additional Information:

‘Bellevue’

Tuesdays on WGN America