Happy Town

I'm all about a good Gothic show, so when I saw the ads for ABC's Happy Town I was intrigued. Set in Haplin, Minnesota, the pilot episode does what a good pilot episode does: explain the basic premise of the show and introduce key characters. I was happy to see Amy Acker - I've enjoyed her work on Angel, Alias, and Dollhouse. This time around she plays the wife of the sheriff's son and mother to their young daughter.

While some of the story didn't seem very original - when a mysterious young woman moves to small town you sort of expect all the single men to be interested and that she'll prove to be a key character. There are several characters you'd expect to see in a small town - odd lady that runs a boarding house, rich couple that basically runs the town, overly friendly business people that fill in the new person (and thus the audience) on who's who and what's what.

That said, I love that the show is working to fill a niche that's difficult on network television. Killing off a character in the first five minutes is pretty rare - and they basically gave us a glimpse of The Magic Man (aka The Bad Guy) at the same time. There were a few things that happened that were somewhat unexpected and I'll be interested to see where the story goes next week. There are some fairly well recognized actors on the show - wonder how long they'll survive!?!?

Given the buzz about last year's Harper's Island (which I adored!), I wasn't surprised to see a similar style show pop up on another network - here's hoping Happy Town lasts more than one season.