If you watched the trailer for the new Perry Mason show that’s upcoming on HBO this June then you might have been furrowing your brow just as much as I did since a lot of us probably remember Perry Mason as a defense attorney and not really given over to doing a lot of investigating. Maybe we missed something back in the day but there were often more courtroom scenes than anything else and Mason really didn’t appear to go out looking for clues that often. In this new show he appears to be doing just that and taking on more danger than usual as Tom Tapp of Deadline writes about, switching things up a bit so as to perhaps draw people in a little more. The timeline that the show will take place in is only a couple of years after the Great Depression and in the midst of an oil boom, which will make for a few great stories no doubt. Anyone else remember watching Perry Mason with your parents or when nothing else was on? Oh wait, that’s right, a lot of us actually went outside or had something else we could aside from watching TV. All in all though this new series looks like it could be kind of intense as it’s giving of what Tapp describes as a Chinatown vibe that could help it along a bit.
This goes to show how much entertainment has changed since several decades ago Perry Mason was somehow entertaining for a lot of people, and action on the same level that people enjoy today wasn’t quite how things were done. The gritty and almost grimy feel of this show is worlds different than what some people might think of when reading the title, but maybe that’s a good thing at this point since it could indicate that the reboot is finally going to be something far different than the original and therefore worth the effort. Too many reboots go back and try to run the same formula with little to no success, or end up fooling people into believing that they’re something new and exciting when really it becomes the same show despite the updates, as Saved by the Bell is already starting to look like. At this time the new Perry Mason is already taking on a look that might play to its advantage given that in 1931, the year in which the story is set apparently, the world as people knew was extremely different and still had plenty of blank spaces on the social map that had yet to be explored or filled in. In other words there were still plenty of stories to be told and, as it’s been seen throughout the years, stories about the past do tend to gain a lot of notice if they’re conducted with some attention to detail.
The fact that Robert Downey Jr. almost had the part might have been enough to keep people from watching due to anything but a kind of morbid interest as to see how he would do, but instead of RDJ the main character will be played by Matthew Rhys, with RDJ producing instead. It almost feels as though the Iron Man actor is trying to fill his days after Endgame as much as he possibly can and is trying to find roles that he can step into without completely bombing his career as Dolittle appears to have been a less than successful attempt. As Adrienne Jones of Cinemablend puts it though, RDJ is notably proud of this project and is ready to see it be delivered to audiences without hesitation. Hopefully the June start date won’t be pushed back since that appears to be the common thing now with the coronavirus still running about and making life a little difficult. With what’s been going on in the news it’s hard to say whether or not the lock down is still going to be in effect in another couple of weeks or if people are really going to decide to take matters into their own hands. People have been stuck inside for too long apparently, even if it’s been deemed a better way to keep the virus from spreading.
But anyway, back to the show. It does appear at this point that Perry Mason is going to be very much a hands on type of individual instead of simply standing in a court room pleading his case as it used to be. Someone obviously had the idea of bringing Mason out into the open and giving him more to do this time around, perhaps as a way to broaden the character a bit and make him more interesting. Time will tell if this new development is going to work in the favor of the show, but for now it looks enticing at least.
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