Monday, August 26, 2024

Apple+ Series BAD MONKEY with Vince Vaughn, Michelle Monaghan, Rob Delaney

BAD MONKEY plays around with your small town crime drama series. It's about a fast talking detective and set in Southern FL. The stellar cast includes the king of jabber, Vince Vaughn. Based on the best selling crime fiction satire novel by Carl Hiaasen (2013). Vaughn plays the lead role of Andrew Yancy, a consummate bachelor whose latest escapade, sending the husband of the woman he's having an affair with, Bonnie (Michelle Monaghan) off the dock in his golf cart into the ocean. This results in his being fired from his job as the town's top cop. Yancy and his longtime partner against crime, Rogelio (John Oritz) have a constant bantering and bickering which attests to their indestructible bond. Episode one starts off big with your typical tourist on a chartered fishing boat. What's not typical is the guy's catch - a man's hairy arm with a middle finger salute. Yancy is trying to get back in good stead with his boss since his demotion to restaurant inspector and assigned to take the arm up to Miami headquarters. At the Miami morgue Yancy meets the sassy and drop dead gorgeous coroner, Rosa (Natalie Martinez). Rosa and Rogelio become embroiled in Yancy's unhatched plan to solve the mystery of the unattached arm while Yancy hits on the unattached Rosa. Everything goes anything but smoothly but it all goes at a fast clip. And there's the actual bad monkey also involved in the shenanigans. The chattering, diapered monkey is the constant companion of Neville. Neville is your benevolent beach bum who won him in a poker game. This wiry chimp does some of the best acting in this convoluted, twisted mystery overflowing with razor-sharp acting and eccentric antics. The rest of the body that gets washed ashore was the husband to the aggrieved  blonde trophy wife, Eve (Meredith Hagner). Snooping around the fringes of the burial for Eve's husband,  Yancy meets nefarious characters who warn him off and the daughter of the deceased. After interviewing both the daughter, Caitlin (Charlotte Lewis) and the seductive widow, Yancy thinks there's something fishy about the widow and learns Caitlin thinks her step-mom killed her dad. Southern FL is painted with vibrant strokes and becomes a central figure in the plot. There's an insidious scheme to take over beachfront property by any means for development. Adding more hot spice to the mix is a Carribian voodoo Dragon Queen (Jodie Turner-Smith) who may have some mystical powers you may not want to provoke. Each episode is narrated over by a wise cracking know-it-all who seems to understand what's going on behind the scenes. Even if you're not clear of what's going on, stick with this surprising and winning series that will have your head spinning,  

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