Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Elsbeth’ Season 2 On CBS, Where The Quirky Lawyer Continues To Help The NYPD Solve Murders

Quirky detectives seem to be making a big comeback on network television in 2024. One of the best examples of this old-becoming-new phenomenon was Elsbeth , where Carrie Preston stars as a somewhat enhanced version of her character from The Good Wife / Fight . It was one of the best-received shows of the 2023-24 season, and it’s back for more.

The Stars and Creators Of ‘Elsbeth’ Take Us Through The CBS Show’s 14-Year Journey From ‘Good Wife’ Guest Role To Primetime Procedural

Opening Shot: At an opera house in New York, a man enters, takes off his hat, fixes his hair in a mirror and walks towards the auditorium.

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The Gist: Phillip Cross (Nathan Lane) is an opera afficionado who has a Thursday subscription to the opera, where he usually goes, complains to the usher that the performance will be mediocre, then sits down on the aisle and puts his hat on the seat next to him. But for this performance, a tall, younger man on a date sits in front of him, not the sweet old lady that usually does. He finds out that the woman passed away and this man, her grandson, inherited the subscription and uses it to impress women.

To say he’s not an opera fan is an understatement, and after weeks of rude behavior, Phillip is incensed. One night, after the man takes a phone call in the middle of Tosca , Phillip goes to his house and stabs him to death with a prop knife.

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Elsbeth Tascioni (Carrie Preston), whose presence under a DOJ consent degree has been extended for a year, is talking with Kaya Blanke (Carra Patterson), her closest friend and associate on the NYPD, about how boring the summer break was. They’re called in to investigate the stabbing death of a young finance bro. The detective in charge of the scene, hearing that Kaya is on the detective track, takes her under his wing, but he seems to not be seeing the entire picture. For her part, Elsbeth thinks the actions of whoever killed him are too violent to be about robbery or anything the detective is offering.

In the meantime, Capt. Wagner (Wendell Pierce), gets a new second-in-command, Lt. Cooper (Daniel K. Isaac), who seems to be more about being by the book than being personable. He goes over the operations of major crimes and sees that Kaya’s AP credits didn’t translate to useable college credits, making her short of eligibility for the detective track.

Elsbeth takes a look at the selfies on the finance bro’s phone and sees an angry man — Cross — in all of them; she and Kaya take the dead man’s tickets and go to the next show so they can question Cross. They run into Dr. Yablonski (Daniel Davis) a familiar face from a previous case, who gives them some insight into Cross’s complaining nature. Elsbeth manages to wheedle her way into Cross’s apartment by asking him to educate her about the world of opera.

What Shows Will It Remind You Of? Elsbeth continues to remind us of “howcatchem” mystery shows like Columbo and Poker Face .

Our Take: We will continue to watch Elsbeth as long as it runs for a number of reasons. For one, Preston embodies Elsbeth Tascioni so completely, due to her years playing the character on The Good Wife and The Good Fight , that her playing cat-and-mouse with the wealthy suspects she zeroes in on will always be a delight. Preston and Patterson have fantastic chemistry and the partnership between Elsbeth and Kaya has developed into one of the best on TV. The guest murderers are always fantastic; how can you not like seeing Nathan Lane being a grumpy opera fan who makes up having a wife just so he doesn’t have anyone sitting next to him?

Michelle and Robert King and their writing staff continue to give Elsbeth and everyone around her really clever dialogue, and love to insert self-referential clues in both the dialogue and visuals, like a park bench with the picture of a Season 1 killer (played by Jane Krakowski) on it.

But we have to admit: The mysteries themselves are pretty weak. It’s not because the Kings don’t know how to write effective mysteries. They just don’t have enough time here. A 42-minute episode that has to set up the killing and cover-up, show Elsbeth identifying and slowly ingratiating herself with the suspect, then lowering the boom on them, is going to skip over some details.

Anyone who’s watched Columbo , who had a running time of over 60 minutes per episode, knows the details we’re talking about: Scenes of the killer covering their tracks, the detective pursuing clues and avenues no one thought of, the detective pestering the suspect, who underestimates the person. On a typical episode of Elsbeth , we get leaps of logic or lack of detail that can be called back later on as the detective solves the case.

And then there’s the requisite continuing arc that seems to be required for all procedurals these days. There seems to be a new one this season, though we’re not quite sure what that is. Time needs to be given to the arc in each episode, even if it’s only a minute or two. That also takes away time that could make the “howcatchem” more robust. And, to be honest, it’s most unnecessary reason for that. Given how poorly the first season’s continuing arc was handled, we don’t really need one this season; we just want to see Elsbeth outsmart murderers and get closer with Kaya. Is that too much to ask?

Sex and Skin: None.

Parting Shot: An SUV pulls up in front of Elsbeth as she walks her dog, and a mysterious voice tells her to get in.

Sleeper Star: We do hope that the Kings bring back incidental characters from previous episodes, which is why we were happy to see Daniel Davis return as Yablonski.

Most Pilot-y Line: The detectives that work these cases are getting increasingly inept and cartoonish. The one Kaya works with in this case only follows two types of movies: money or sex. He also knocks off at 5:00. What kind of TV detective does that?

Our Call: STREAM IT. Despite the “howcatechem” aspect of Elsbeth being less than satisfying, Preston is so good as the title character we will put up with unsatisfying cases just to watch Elsbeth do her thing.

Joel Keller ( @joelkeller ) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com , VanityFair.com , Fast Company and elsewhere.

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