My No. 1 Obsession of This Season's Crop of New TV Shows

McDermott and Q on "Stalker."

I'm not the kind of guy who refuses to be away from home on particular nights because of being hooked on some TV series. That's mostly because I have a DVR and record everything I even think I might want to watch. If that weren't the case – and with what ATT Uverse charges me per month for my HD channels and DVR it might not be the case much longer – one of the shows I wouldn't miss is the CBS series “Stalker.” Wow; am I ever hooked!

My DVR provides such freedom from being tied to the TV that I had to look up the series just now to know that it airs on Wednesday nights. 

The "Stalker" squad.

I somehow missed the first episode when it aired, but then set the trusty DVR to record the rest of the series. I think I had 10 or 11 episodes piled up by the time I finally got around to watching the pilot on my PC. I then binge watched all the recorded episodes over three nights.

The premise is fairly simple: A squad of detectives specialize in stalking crimes. There, that's it. Of course nothing is ever that simple on TV. There are a couple of back stories afoot, too. One involves Dylan McDermott's character Jack Larson, who has a checkered past with another police force and is estranged from his wife. His ex also just happens to be with the DA's office. Then there is the squad leader Beth Davis, played by Maggie Q, who has a tragic past and is currently being stalked herself by a nut-job she came across stalking someone on another case. 

A fangless Klaveno.

Another key character is Mariana Klaveno's Janice Lawrence. “True Blood” fans will know her as Lorena. She looks pretty good without fangs.

One of the elements that keeps me coming back is the music track for the last three or four minutes of the show. It's an eerie cover of some 80s hit. Sometimes I have to listen for a minute or two before I recognize which song it is. “One Way or Another,” “I Want You to Want Me” and Hungry Like the Wolf” are particularly good. In fact, I searched around on iTunes, Amazon Digital and other places to find seven or eight of them, which I downloaded.

Is it “Masterpiece Theater?” Nope, but it is good TV.