Shark
CBS | Release Date: September 21, 2006
CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
60
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 26 Critic Reviews
Positive:
11
Mixed:
15
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
80
Detroit Free PressMike Duffy
Season 1 Review: Feels like a hit show about to happen. Read full review
80
Miami HeraldGlenn Garvin
Season 1 Review: Shark works some of the same ground as Fox's new legal drama Justice, but with far more wit and style. Read full review
80
Washington PostTom Shales
Season 1 Review: "Shark" is one of the season's best and fastest-moving new dramas. Read full review
75
People WeeklyTom Gliatto
Season 1 Review: Woods is every bit as entertaining as he strives to be. [25 Sep 2006, p.43]
75
USA TodayRobert Bianco
Season 1 Review: Nothing about this cookie-cutter courtroom drama is really up to Woods' talent, but given his head and a lot of room, he makes it work. Read full review
75
New York Daily NewsDavid Hinckley
Season 1 Review: The series... is pure formula, but it's a formula that works. Read full review
70
NewsdayDiane Werts
Season 1 Review: Good actors can get away with glib, and Woods is one of the best, persuasive enough to have you spotting freshness in the familiar and wisdom in cliches. Read full review
70
Pittsburgh Post-GazetteRob Owen
Season 1 Review: "Shark"... is clearly a "House" imitator, but a pretty crisp copy. Read full review
70
The New York TimesAlessandra Stanley
Season 1 Review: Mr. Woods has found a television role that suits his gift and runs away with it. Read full review
63
Chicago Sun-TimesDoug Elfman
Season 1 Review: "Shark" now looks like above-average, workaday TV with promise. Read full review
63
New York PostLinda Stasi
Season 1 Review: The show is not as good as Woods makes it, but not as bad as some of the new shows. Read full review
60
Seattle Post-IntelligencerMelanie McFarland
Season 1 Review: If you don't like Woods' frantic, frequent speeches, and you can't get out of the "Without a Trace" Thursday habit, best to steer clear. Read full review
60
Newark Star-LedgerAlan Sepinwall
Season 1 Review: If the "Shark" writers feel the need to, in the very first episode, soften their hero in a way the "House" writers haven't had to do in two-plus seasons, how warm and fuzzy will the character be by November sweeps, let alone the end of the season? Read full review
60
Philadelphia Daily NewsEllen Gray
Season 1 Review: If you watch "Shark," it's going to be for those Woods-ian rants and for the sheer exuberance he brings to them. Read full review
60
Philadelphia InquirerJonathan Storm
Season 1 Review: Subtract James Woods from Shark, and you'd have an empty carcass. Instead, you have a carcass with James Woods and all his crazy energy inside. Read full review
60
Boston GlobeMatthew Gilbert
Season 1 Review: "Shark" is a very conventional courtroom TV drama about a do-good lawyer, and its only distinction is the ferocious acting of Woods. Read full review
60
SlateTroy Patterson
Season 1 Review: The show works only because Woods is a honey-baked ham playing a character who lives to be a showman. Read full review
60
The New YorkerTad Friend
Season 1 Review: The lapping tide of gooeyness would be more tolerable if Stark’s empathy made him lose a big case, and if that loss got messy. “Shark,” though, wants to have it both ways: he keeps winning, but now for the right reasons. Read full review
50
VarietyBrian Lowry
Season 1 Review: Woods is such a compelling presence that he might be able to elevate even procedural fare. Read full review
50
San Francisco ChronicleTim Goodman
Season 1 Review: This is a paint-by-numbers legal series that's as predictable as they come. Read full review
42
Entertainment WeeklyGillian Flynn
Season 1 Review: Of course, it's near impossible to break new ground in legal dramas at this point. But Shark doesn't even try to hide its weariness. Read full review
40
Chicago TribuneMaureen Ryan
Season 1 Review: The level of the writing and the bland supporting cast do not match Woods’ wit, intelligence and slightly scary ferocity. Read full review
40
The Hollywood ReporterBarry Garron
Season 1 Review: It's an attractive premise but a pedestrian execution. Read full review
40
Los Angeles TimesRobert Lloyd
Season 1 Review: The episode galumphs loudly across a checkerboard of scenes -- Stark at work, Stark at home, Stark at work at home -- that achieve neither the convincing quality of detailed realism nor the dumb fun of untethered melodrama. Read full review
40
TimeJames Poniewozik
Season 1 Review: The problem is, where Hugh Laurie's Gregory House is a hilarious character study, Stark--while played with ebullient aggression by Woods--is just another tool in a suit, and neither the characters, the stories nor the writing rise near House's level. Read full review
40
Wall Street JournalDorothy Rabinowitz
Season 1 Review: "Shark" suffers from a variety of flaws too numerous to detail here, not least its sentimentality, its wooden characters, its tin-eared dialogue. Read full review
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