• by Adam Buckman , Featured Columnist, December 4, 2017

Don't watch this new Syfy series called “Happy!” expecting to be happy or to get happy.

Happiness has nothing to do with it -- which happens to be a characteristic this show shares with a host of others now on TV. “Sing hallelujah, c’mon get happy”? Not on your life, says this show and others like it.

It's the same thing all over the tube these days: Guns splattering blood, guts and brains on walls, floors and ceilings -- punishment meted out by some damaged principal character who is often a former cop who was once the best in the business but for reasons not yet known, he’s gone rogue.

In “Happy!” (sorry about the exclamation point, but the makers of this show insist upon it), the former cop who has gone over to the dark side is a guy named Nick Sax, who is now apparently a part-time hitman and general troublemaker-for-hire.

He drinks too much, he swears a lot, and is evidently keenly disinterested in maintaining his personal hygiene. He sneers, perspires and generally goes about his “business” with a wide-eyed, unshaven, glazed expression on his face.

The actor tasked to put all of this across is Christopher Meloni, who is very good at this. Early in this century, he played a crazy con named Chris Keller in the HBO drama called “Oz” about the world’s worst prison. Meloni brings the crazy to this role too.

The “Happy!” in the title refers to a little girl’s imaginary friend named Happy. This animated character -- seen with Meloni in the photo above -- also comes alive in the life of Nick Sax after the little girl is kidnapped by a garden-variety TV-and-movie psycho who dresses as Santa Claus.

It is unclear if Crazy Santa dresses this way year-round, but it just so happens that this TV series takes place around the holidays -- which might be why Syfy felt it was appropriate to introduce it at this time of the year.

If etiquette allows one to say “No thank you” to a Christmas gift that you don’t really want and, in fact, find repugnant, than I believe it is OK to say “No thank you” to Syfy for this dubious Christmas gift.

Apparently, this show is adapted from a graphic novel (or perhaps a series of them). And like other such adaptations that have come and gone in the last few years, this one doesn’t make me feel I have missed anything by evading the graphic-novel section at Barnes & Noble.

This show is all stylistic tricks, starting with the animated imaginary friend. He’s a blue unicorn voiced by Patton Oswalt. And if that’s not enough to give you nightmares, then I don’t know what is.

Together, former Det. Sax and Happy the imaginary blue unicorn go in search of the kidnapped girl and get nowhere in the first two episodes of this series that Syfy provided for preview.

The episodes do include a storyline about “the Mob” or “the Mafia” or some sort of organized crime outfit that bears no resemblance to reality in any way.

Like other mob stories and mobster characters in scores of movies and TV shows, the mob story here is based on past movies and TV shows, and not on the real thing (which may or may not exist anymore in the first place).

For some reason, the “boss” in this TV show is named Mr. Blue and the character is so ridiculous, I burst out laughing during one of his scenes even though I doubt it was supposed to be funny.

Popular culture has given us plenty to be happy about, including the Rolling Stones song called “Happy,” the Elvis Costello album called “Get Happy,” and one of the great kiddie show hosts of my childhood in Philadelphia, Happy the Clown (especially him).

But that’s one of the differences between then and now. Back then, there was no doubt that a clown named Happy was supposed to make you happy. Happiness was a warm puppy, along with a lot of other nice things, as Charles Schulz famously wrote..

Today, though, a TV drama called “Happy!” comes along in which Santa Claus is a crazed kidnapper and possibly a pedophile and/or a child murderer. And if a clown shows up in this show, get ready for blood.

 “Happy!” premieres Wednesday (December 6) at 10 p.m. Eastern on Syfy.