Andrew Yancy (Vince Vaughn), the big-hearted, fast-talking cop at the center of Bad Monkey, has a way of stumbling into trouble. Based on Carl Hiassen’s 2013 bestselling novel of the same name, the series begins with a severed arm turning up in a tourist’s sport-fishing catch off the Florida Keys. Yancy’s boss, Sheriff Sonny Summers (Todd Allen Durkin), wants to avoid the hassle of an investigation and offers Yancy—who’s been suspended for assaulting the husband of his sometime girlfriend, Bonnie (Michelle Monaghan)—a deal: If he wants his badge back, he must make the arm (and the case) disappear.
The plan is upended when a suspicious woman named Eve Stripling (Meredith Hagner) turns up, tearfully claiming that the arm belongs to her late husband. Yancy’s curiosity is piqued, and what follows is a multi-plot romp involving insurance fraud, illegal property development in the Bahamas, and a high school teacher having an affair with a minor.
Bad Monkey navigates these various plot strands with finesse, retaining the feel of a novel. Despite a saggy middle section to the show’s 10-episode season, it satisfyingly culminates in an “a-ha” moment in which the myriad storylines converge around themes of redemption and finding personal happiness applicable to its motley crew of characters.
Vaughn is firmly in his element here, delivering snappy two-liners and quick-fire witticisms. His performance evokes the wise-cracking leads of The Rockford Files and Moonlighting, while Rosa (the always magnetic Natalie Martinez), a coroner roped into following the detective’s copious oddball hunches, boasts the tenaciousness of Jack Klugman’s eponymous medical examiner from the 1970s mystery drama Quincy.
But while Vaughn excels at being the funny man, he exudes an awkward school-boy quality that makes him a somewhat unconvincing romantic lead. Despite an amusing sex scene that takes place in a morgue in episode four, his playful courting of Rosa ultimately fails to ignite a spark.
Thanks in part to the languid voiceover of Captain Fitzpatrick (Tom Nowicki), though, Bad Monkey coasts along seamlessly as it weaves its dual plotlines: the main one set in Florida and the other in the Bahamas, where local corruption, modernization, and tradition collide when a man (Ronald Peet) with a mischievous monkey seeks the aid of the “Dragon Queen” (Jodie Turner-Smith) after his beach shack and land are stolen by Eve and her conspirator. It’s all zany, fun, and very far-fetched. Which is everything you could want from a summer potboiler.
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