Common Sense Media Review
By Marty Brown
,
based on child development research. How do we rate?
Dark crime show about all-powerful psychic is pretty flat.
Parents Need to Know
Why Age 15+?
Any Positive Content?
Where to Watch
Videos and Photos
The InBetween
What's the Story?
In THE INBETWEEN, Cassie Bedford (Harriet Dyer) is a bartender with latent psychic powers that allow her to see visions and communicate with the dead. She uses these powers to help her detective father, Tom Hackett (Paul Blackthorne), and his partner, Damien Asante (Justin Cornwell), solve crimes. Meanwhile, she helps ghosts stuck in purgatory to deal with the traumatic events that landed them there.
Is It Any Good?
The trouble with this series isn't just that it gives its central character psychic powers, but that it seems to give her every psychic power. She has premonitions, talks to the dead, reads minds, and sees visions of the past. One of the reasons The Mentalist and some of its imitators are so successful is that they place restrictions on their protagonists. Patrick Jane was, essentially, a con man, so he was constantly having to work within realistic limitations to solve crimes, even if he was exceptionally good at it. Cassie can't do everything all at once, but her gifts change according to what the story needs her to do.
For mystery stories to work, they need to be a fair fight, and there needs to be a reasonable chance the bad guys will win. The InBetween gets it backwards, stacking the deck so far in Cassie's favor that, like her, the viewer always knows what's coming.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Families can talk about Cassie's powers. What do her psychic powers entail? Why does she have them? Do you think anyone really has powers like this?
How does the idea of family play into The InBetween? Who are the families on the show? How do they relate to each other? What about the families involved in the crimes, either as victims or criminals?
How good are the detectives at their jobs? How do they go about their work? If they didn't have Cassie's help, do you feel like these crimes would be solved?
TV Details
- Premiere date : May 29, 2019
- Cast : Harriet Dyer , Justin Cornwell , Paul Blackthorne
- Network : NBC
- Genre : Drama
- TV rating :
- Last updated : March 13, 2020
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