Johnny Moronic Television

Rake (US)

US remake of the just finished Australian TV series. And a wholly unsuccessful one by the looks of it with the series not looking like being picked up for another series. There is a lot of cherry-picking going on from the Australian series, but that isn't the problem. A lot of the issues revolve around the translation of the series in that the Australian series is played in with a laconic, laid back style where Cleaver Greene (Richard Roxburgh) plays a man who sees the system rotten to the core and decides that he's above all of it. Except he isn't as he has more problems than any one man can handle. In the US version, it plays more fast paced, in a style not unlike that of a David E. Kelley legal series and because it plays in the 42 minute US network time limit, everything is more rushed including the cases Keegan Deane (Greg Kinnear) handles and his equally complex personal life. And that rush rush style is one of it's biggest problems. Many of the cases are barely thought through (although that is also an issue at times in the Australian version) and a fair bit of it is toned down for network TV as the Australian version has a fair bit of sex and profanity, but US version is all wink wink nudge nudge get down to the bra and that'll do.

I could probably go on all day about other things like characters and plotlines, but you're not here for that. There are moments in the US Rake that work, particularly Keegan's relationship with the prostitute Mikki (Bojana Novakovic) which is closely lifted from series 1 of the Australian version, but works equally well here. But, on the whole Rake US is a very average series and one that will end up on the scrapheap, I'm afraid.

At least Rake US kept up the two Australian actors (Bojana Novakovic, Miranda Otto) in a US series policy. There won't be any complaints to the High Commissioner about this... Although I do find it baffling that Australian actors star in a remake of an Australian TV series. I can only imagine the consequences if either of them actually appeared in the original as well... (they didn't)

Tags: Bojana Novakovic, Necar Zadegan, Miranda Otto, Pamela Adlon, Tara Summers, Kim Hawthorne, Michelle Forbes, Kelly Frye, Susie Abromeit