‘Bad Monkey’ Review: Vince Vaughn Is the Ted Lasso of South Florida in Apple’s So-So Detective Show
Andrew Yancy (Vince Vaughn) is your dad’s ideal protagonist. His happy place is his front yard, with his butt wearing a groove in an Adirondack chair and a local beer keeping his hand from overheating. That his lawn faces the ocean is a nice bonus, and that his endless blue view is being impeded by a monstrous yellow mansion next door, well, that’s his primary complaint. You see, Yancy doesn’t need much. A view, a drink, and a comfy spot to appreciate them both — that’s bliss. But, aside from the hideous remodel going on next door, Yancy’s stress stems from a love/hate relationship with his job. On the one hand, being a detective feeds his ingrained need for justice — he just wants things to be fair, for everyone to get along, and for those who get in the way of the world’s good time to be kicked out of the party. On the other hand (the one with a beer in it), his restless instinct to be “the cop of the world” interferes with his restful desire to live life unencumbered, aka enjoying the view, the chair, the drink.
Striking a healthy work/life balance may seem like more of a Gen Z goal, but it’s a struggle as old as time, and framing it around a nice guy who just wants nice things but can’t ignore a grander purpose, well, that’s the stuff of classic detective yarns — noir pictures and crime novels, Sam Spade and Jack Reacher, all those reluctant heroes who mirror generations of men called to serve in wars they wanted nothing to do with, or who simply had to go to work each day to put food on the table. There isn’t much room for women in these stories, save for the distressed damsels and fatal femmes, and wouldn’t you know it? Yancy doesn’t have a lady, either. He worries his inability to disconnect from his official duties is inhibiting his own need for companionship, and thus contentment.
Spoiler alert: There’s no real answer to Yancy’s conundrum, and “Bad Monkey” isn’t really trying to find one anyway. Based on Carl Hiasson’s 2013 novel of the same (lousy) name and adapted by “Ted Lasso” Seasons 1-2 showrunner Bill Lawrence, the new Apple TV+ series is a low-stakes detective drama — the kind of show your dad quietly yet loyally consumed on CBS every Tuesday night for the better part of a decade. (To be clear: My dad doesn’t do this. My dad has excellent taste. I’m specifically talking about your dad, who’s not as cool or clever or strong as my dad.) It may be dressed up with Apple money and talked up by the multiloquous Vaughn, but you’ve seen it before, many, many times. You’ve seen better versions, you’ve seen worse versions, so the success of this version likely comes down to expectations. Set them low and be rewarded. Set them high and– Who am I kidding? No one’s expecting “The Maltese Falcon” from a title like “Bad Monkey.”
This season’s case centers around an aptly wild plan hatched by a Florida Man and his partner, but getting into what makes it as nonsensical as the surrounding state’s education policies would risk spoiling one of “Bad Monkey’s” few decent twists. So, let’s just start from Yancy’s entrance. Suspended from duty for pushing a golf cart (and its driver) into the ocean, Yancy’s me-time is interrupted when his precinct partner, Rogelio (John Ortiz), throws him a life raft in the form of a decomposing arm. A fisherman pulled in the lopped-off limb, which now needs to be driven to Miami, where it can be returned to the owner’s grieving widow, Eve (Meredith Hagner), who’s under the impression her husband died in a fishing accident. He either drowned and was then eaten by sharks, or simply preyed upon by the prey he set out to snare. Either way, his body is gone, all that’s left is the arm, and all Yancy has to do is give it to her, earn a few “‘atta boy”s from his bosses, and go back to waiting out his suspension in his favorite chair.
But Yancy just can’t do it. Alarm bells are going off left and right. The shark teeth found in the arm don’t belong to the type of shark typical to the area in which it was found. (Yancy knows a lot about the local wildlife.) The timing is a little convenient, what with the victim’s massive life insurance policy, and even more questions spring up when Rosa (Natalie Martinez), the Miami medical examiner, takes a closer look. Be it his innate drive for justice or the cute coroner charmed by his polite chatter, Yancy starts his own investigation into the appendage’s actual origins — pissing off pretty much everyone in the process — and that’s when things get dicey.
“Bad Monkey” suffers from oppressively awful narration and obvious plot twists. Too many people die for the dangers to be taken as lightly as Yancy’s banter suggests, and too many people illogically evade certain death for the story to feel like it has any actual stakes. There’s a sizable B-plot featuring Jodie Turner-Smith’s Gracie — a Bahamian woman suffering a crisis of faith regarding how best to abide by her grandmother’s African religion — that never gels with the bright white A-story. (There’s an acknowledgement of gentrification in the Keys that’s hard to swallow so long as Yancy, a Caucasian cop, represents one of the region’s true locals.)
Still, “Bad Monkey” mostly plays as an easy-going crowd-pleaser. The supporting cast is extremely likable, from Hagner and Ortiz to Rob Delaney and Michelle Monaghan. It’s refreshing to see a modern noir filled with so much color, and the Florida setting provides a unique flavor. Most of all, it’s an effective delivery device for its lead. Aside from a recurring role in the last three seasons of “Curb Your Enthusiasm,” Vaughn’s been out of the public eye for the better part of a decade, and when he did pop up — in indie action flicks like “Brawl in Cell Block 99” or “Dragged Across Concrete,” as well as the second (and best forgotten) season of “True Detective” — he wasn’t deploying his trademark comic shtick. Absence, as they say, makes the heart grow fonder, and Vaughn’s fast-talking quips and imaginative conversational patter pair well with showrunner Bill Lawrence’s recent fondness for nice guys operating outside their element.
In “Ted Lasso,” Jason Sudeikis played an American football coach shipped across the pond to inspire a British soccer team to glory. In “Shrinking,” Jason Segel played a therapist fed up with his patients’ lack of progress, so he goes off book to give them the best shot at a better life (much to his mentor’s chagrin, played by a magnetically surly Harrison Ford). Both characters’ optimism was rooted in trauma, which Yancy so far lacks, but he’s still a middle-aged white guy so desperate to do good, he’s willing to risk his livelihood for what he believes is right. That guy in the golf cart he sent tumbling into the ocean? He hit Yancy’s ex-girlfriend (Monaghan, having a ball as an intermittent agent of chaos), so the big guy took matters into his own hands. The same goes for his wildlife-endangering next-door neighbor, just as it does for the case of the missing arm, which he’s working despite everyone telling him to leave it alone. He’s living a fantasy, sure, but “Bad Monkey” does just enough to allow us to live that fantasy along with him.
Yancy may sit in his chair, dreaming of doing nothing else, but he knows, at the end of the day (or the start of the next one), he’s going to get up, go out, and be the hero. Dads see themselves in this figure. He speaks to them. And that’s just fine, if little more than that.
Grade: C+
“Bad Monkey” premieres Wednesday, August 14 on Apple TV+ with two episodes. New episodes will be released weekly through the Season 1 finale on October 9.
