(TV SERIES) Evil Season 1 - Wonderfully Written Supernatural Drama Series with Really Interesting Premise

I noticed this series some time ago on one of cable TV and finally got the chance to watch it during the weekend. I was not that intrigued by it until I read the synopsis which promised an interesting premise. Well without further ado, I'll just get right on it.

Brief Story Line

Kristen Bouchard (Katja Herbers - Manhattan TV series etc) was a forensic psychologist who worked for the D.A as expert witness. Due to a disagreement, she stopped working for them and was hired by Catholic church's assessor/Priest-in-training David Acosta (Mike Colter - Luke Cage, Black and Blue etc) to investigate possible supernatural incidents and verify the truth. They worked together with a technology consultant Ben Shakir (Aasif Mandvi - The Brink TV series etc) who provided background check from science point of view.

Kristen herself had to juggle her work with her family as she has four pre-teen daughters Lynn (Brooklyn Shuck), Lila (Skylar Gray), Lexis (Maddy Crocco) and Laura (Dalya Knapp) while her husband was working as professional climber and seldom at home. She would usually be helped by her mother Sheryl (Christine Lahti - Chicago Hope TV series, Running on Empty etc) to take care of the children. Kristen would sometime go to Dr. Kurt Boggs (Kurt Fuller - Office Uprising, Wayne's World etc) for therapy.

Things got more complicated with the appearance of Dr. Leland Thompson (Michael Emerson - Saw, Lost TV series etc) who claimed to know a lot about David's past and consistently disturb Kristen's life. So what would happen to David, Kristen and Ben as they face these cases? Find them all in this wonderful series.

End of Brief Story Line

When I started watching the pilot episode, I was a bit cautious at first as I did not know what to expect. But after a few minutes, I was immediately hooked by it. I thought the way the main characters introduced were quite flawless as I liked them from the start. It was fun to see when they first met each other and the natural & convincing chemistry made it hard not to root for them.

What attracted me the most was the unique premise of the work this team were doing, assessing whether or not possession and miracles were true and justified further solution from the church. The skepticism of Kristen as psychologist, Ben's scientific approach and David's religious views were such a treat to watch as they really complete one another when finding the truth. Even if they sometimes would be at each other's throat but they could always looked past their differences to achieve the same goal.

Aside from those "cases", I also like how the support characters in here were not just for background purpose but would have roles to some degree. It made the series exciting to watch during the subplots which usually were just fillers in general. As a supernatural drama series, I thought the supernatural element was quite frequently shown though it was not the horrifying ghost movie type. There were disturbing scenes here and there (especially when involving demonic possessions) but not so much that would make this series categorized as horror.  

The main appeal for me was the cases to be solved by the team and also the chemistry between Katja Herbers, Mike Colter and Aasif Mandvi. I also like Michael Emerson whom I have regularly seen in two long running series Person of Interest and Lost. Christine Lahti also had strong presence despite her screen time lesser than the others. Btw, this series was created by Robert King & Michelle King who together have created series like The Good Wife, The Good Fight and comedy drama Braindead. The first season has 13 episodes of standard 40+ minutes with my favorite the pilot episode and also the finale which provided some shocking revelations.

Overall this was a wonderful show that I really enjoyed. The story developed nicely without any rushing, although I think there were so many things unresolved by the end of season 1 which might be worrying if for some reasons the series is halted abruptly. I just hope the series could maintain the good writing that would make it continue and finish at its own term. Those of you looking for interesting new supernatural drama series, this one definitely can be an option. I noticed the critics like it too with the high ratings. But if you want to see more of the horrifying images, then other supernatural series would be more satisfying. The choice is yours.

Mike's movie moments rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars