The Bridge (2013)

The Bridge sets the bar high with its early episodes--it's easily the best new show of the summer so far. Here's hoping the rest of the season follows suit.

So is born what promises to be one of the great cop partnerships of all time in FX’s stunning new drama The Bridge... At its bedrock, it’s a fine crime drama, full of arresting and gruesome turns, sometimes downright scary, sometimes blackly funny.

An intricate mystery confidently spun out with dark, unsettling shocks. [15 Jul 2013]

The Bridge translates brilliantly, fitting into its new setting so perfectly, you’d never imagine it had aired in any other incarnation.

What could be a relentlessly grim procedural (again, "The Killing") is instead a compelling drama that works (so far, at least) on a number of levels: as a mystery, as an idiosyncratic buddy story, and as a textured sociopolitical treatise. But don't let the latter scare you off.

For a thoughtful drama that's so rooted in national identity, there's only one real misstep: No one will mistake Kruger for a Texan.

Cross The Bridge at your own peril. You just might get stranded in the summer’s best mystery.

With these characters, with this fascinating, complicated place--and one that's at the forefront of so much of what we're talking about in real world politics--and the sense of atmosphere instilled by directors like Gerardo Naranjo, The Bridge is off to such an outstanding start that I can't wait to see what this creative team does not only with the rest of the serial killer story, but well beyond it.

The Bridge is highly absorbing.

The Bridge so far looks to have more promise than [Fox’s The Following, NBC’s Hannibal, AMC’s ongoing Season 3 of The Killing]. It’s still early, though.

A dark but artful and sophisticated drama.

What’s most compelling about The Bridge is that it emphasizes not the psychology or forensics of the case but its context.

Overall, The Bridge is a taut thriller mystery that is compelling and thought-provoking, much as Broen was.

While Kruger's performance is convincing and intriguing, her character begs the question of how someone so unable to communicate could ever be promoted to a position where nuanced interrogation and interaction with suspects is a must. Thankfully, Bichir grounds the show with a sheepish, weary tenacity.

As odd-couple partners go, they're [Marco Ruiz (Demian Bichir) and Sonya Cross (Diane Kruger) are] wonderfully imperfect. {The] 91-minute pilot is full of surprises, large and small, and sets the scene for a larger story.

Even as all of these seeming oppositions are set up, the show insists on the blurring of lines, the bridges as well as the borders.

The show unfolds like a rich, gritty, and addictive novel, with some surprising detours and lots of transporting, grainy imagery.

It has a seamless and almost hypnotic quality to its narrative, and it’s easily one of the best debuts this year.

It's artfully directed, but intensely grisly. And its atmosphere is far more coherent than its sometimes sketchy narrative. But it does string you along. With barbed wire.

At times, the show feels almost as dense to viewers as the case feels to the characters. It’s got an inherent intrigue, though, and even before we fully understand the mystery, Kruger has us rooting for Cross to solve it.

Mismatched cops forced to work together is one of the oldest TV tropes in the book, but The Bridge builds such a realistic, detailed world around the detectives here that the dynamic is often fresh.

The Bridge becomes more intriguing as it gets deeper into the pilot's 90-minute run time.The characters are not as immediately winning as those on FX's "The Americans," but the plot of the pilot raises plenty of questions that should bring viewers back.

The Bridge doesn't overwhelm with information--as too many cable shows do--but it does shock with revelations that fit nicely into the gameplan. Kruger and Bechir are fine leads, too.

The first three hours leave us thirsting for more.

The Bridge, which gets better with each of the first three episodes, ventures beyond a singular quest for a serial killer. Other intriguing storylines and characters are given ample attention.

The Bridge is, overall, a good show with some great performances--including Ted Levine as Lt. Wade, who’s a show stopper.

A few missteps notwithstanding, The Bridge crackles with intelligence and great acting at every turn.

It’s hard to say where The Bridge is going, but so far it looks like a trip worth taking.

The Bridge doesn't have the forceful originality of other socially conscious dramas such as Justified and Hannibal, but it's off to a promisingly lurid start.

There are a few lackluster characterizations and performances, and scenes in which supposedly hardcore professionals seem more naïve than they might be in life, presumably to make it easier for The Bridge to set up little lessons in sociology, history, and politics. But this show’s worth watching regardless of how you feel about its bits and pieces. It’s an attempt to make an epic on an indie-film budget.

The Bridge is mandatory viewing for drama lovers, but it will be interesting to see where the writers take it and whether they have the big-league ability to make the evident potential materialize. One thing they’ve hopefully learned is that sometimes holding back information isn’t mysterious, it’s just confusing.

It has its good points and its less good points, but there's enough of the former to merit a look.

The Bridge will no doubt tie all these threads together in 13 well-executed episodes, after a lot of red herrings, victims killed in horrific ways and one final twist. It’s guaranteed to be a depressing journey, and it’s starting to feel like one we’ve been on before.

There is rich ground to explore in the problems Mexico faces and the responsibility we may bear for some of them-–but the show's clumsy attempt to boil that down to a catchphrase is offensive and silly, particularly as it has no real connection to the story being told.

It is louder, bolder and more lurid than the original, and also more boring.