The Mysteries of Laura

Kerry Hammond tell us all about one of her new favorite shows now that we're halfway into the season. The show returns tonight from the holiday hiatus on NBC. 

One of my recent television discoveries is the show The Mysteries of Laura, starring Debra Messing, Josh Lucas, and Laz Alonso. The show first aired in September of this year (2014), and I was initially drawn in by the title. When I saw the cast, I decided that I definitely had to give it a try. I was slightly worried that it would be another police procedural show/crime show, providing nothing more than I can already get from my other favorites like Castle and Bones. I was very much mistaken and quickly hooked.

Messing plays Laura Diamond, NYPD Homicide Detective by day, soon-to-be-divorced mother of two young twin boys by night. Her ex-husband, also a police officer, becomes her boss at the end of the Pilot episode, and their relationship becomes more entangled. She and her partner have a great relationship, lots of witty banter, and are forced to investigate in some weird ways. Diamond’s character is anything but flashy, and I found her jeans and sweatshirt wardrobe and comfortable shoes to be a welcome change to some of the high heel wearing police officers I see on TV these days. She’s got a no nonsense attitude and a somewhat unorthodox way of investigating, but she always gets the job done.

I really hope this show continues, I think Messing is great in this role and the storylines have been extremely entertaining, and very funny. If you want straight-laced detectives and accurately portrayed precinct life, this is not your show. But if you can suspend your belief to accept that the NYPD lets a mystery writer names Rick Castle partner up with a homicide detective, you’ll be just fine with this show too. You’ll love seeing Diamond get her kids into a new school by finding one that has a teacher with a ton of parking tickets, in order to strong arm her into admitting her two terrors.

Another fun tidbit, the opening credits that run during The Mysteries of Laura tell you that it was adapted from a television show from Spain called Los misterios de Laura.