Should You Watch: Life on Mars

I wanted to give this one two full episodes, but I bailed on the ABC version of the BBC cop show with a twist about 10 minutes into the second one. The pilot was OK, but I couldn't shake the feeling I had seen it already and had seen it done better. Still, I thought it merited another shot. But in that follow-up, I got so sick of the "Hey, folks, it's 1973!" references crammed into the script that I gave up.

Pretty much everything about the remake is much, much less subtle than the original: The acting, the cinematography (the whole show is shot in a haze meant to suggest the era), the storytelling, and, yes, the establishment of setting. There are ways to remind us we're in 1973 without making characters say awkward things like, "That has about as much a chance of happening as Roe vs. Wade being overturned."

You should watch "Life on Mars" if:

*You have never seen the original.
*You experience severe "Sopranos" and "The Wire" withdrawal (But while Michael Imperioli is a big part of the show, my man Clarke Peters is apparently much less so).
*You Love the 70s.
*You can't get enough of the classic rock and glam rock megahits from the era.
*You think Harvey Keitel's presence in weekly network TV is long overdue.
*You get a kick out of seeing cops beat the hell out of suspects and use questionable tactics to gather evidence (not that I don't).