• by Adam Buckman , Featured Columnist, March 15, 2018

One or two impressive credentials are never enough for CBS crime fighters.

After all, they are geniuses, with powers and abilities far beyond those of mortal men (and women).

The network's newest tracker of serial killers (of which there are always plenty on CBS, if not in real life) is a case in point.

Meet Dylan Reinhardt Ph.D. -- Dr. Dylan Reinhardt, that is. He is a best-selling author and very popular university professor of behavioral psychology.

But that's not all. He has a long list of college degrees, which another character helpfully lists out loud over lunch in the premiere episode of this new detective show called “Instinct,” premiering Sunday night.

As if these credentials were not sufficient, he was also featured in a “Sexiest People” issue of People magazine.

Oh, and by the way, he used to work for the CIA. And he was one of the best operatives the agency ever had, according to a former colleague who provides this helpful tidbit of information in the premiere.

Dr. Reinhardt is played by Alan Cumming. In the show, he is teamed with a brash female NYPD detective played by Bojana Novakovic. Based on a book he wrote, she recruits him to help her solve a series of murders.

His motivation for joining her is that he feels that his career is in a rut, and it is reflected in his latest book, which his agent (played by Whoopi Goldberg) thinks is boring and also unpublishable.

So, like Sherlock Holmes and his (female) Watson, Dr. Reinhardt and Det. Lizzie Needham will apply her street smarts and his instincts concerning the workings of criminal minds to solving mysteries in and around New York City.

The Holmes-and-Watson reference is intentional. These two are not unlike the Holmes and female Watson seen on “Elementary” on CBS.

The words “criminal minds” are also applied here because the CBS show that was titled “Criminal Minds” also concerned itself with the behavioral psychology of murderers.

While Dr. Reinhardt has keen “instincts” when it comes to predicting the potential behavior of criminals, he is no mentalist, although “The Mentalist” is yet another CBS series whose essence can be detected in “Instinct.”

I even felt pangs for “Murder, She Wrote” at various points while watching the pilot for “Instinct,” particularly when Dr. Reinhardt and Det. Needham conversed in seemingly merry tones about the behavioral tendencies of their unknown murderer, even literally over the dead bodies of the killer's unfortunate victims.

This was a new wrinkle in CBS procedurals, at least to me: New York as Cabot Cove.

It is possible that Det. Needham's last name was chosen intentionally by the show's writers to indicate that she could benefit from male companionship (as in “need him”). But that would bestow literary tendencies on the part of this writing staff that we do not normally associate with television.

As an aside, it bears mentioning that romantic sparks between Dr. Reinhardt and Det. Needham are not likely to be ignited since he happens to be gay.

The first episode of “Instinct” starts out auspiciously enough with a serial killer dressed in drag injecting a victim to death in a nightclub toilet stall -- like Norman Bates in a bathroom

It is an icky, sickening scene, which belies the lighthearted repartee to come between the professor and the policewoman.

Where the casting of this show is concerned, Cumming is famous and his co-star is unknown (among other things, Cumming hosts “Masterpiece Mystery” on PBS).

She is very competent, while he is a roguish scene-stealer who puts on just the right amount of actor's charm to put his character across.

While a TV critic might tend to focus on the collection of parts from other shows that went into the assembly of this one, viewers are not nearly so persnickety.

CBS quite possibly has another winner on its hands, and its time period following “60 Minutes” on Sunday night cannot hurt either.

“Instinct” premieres Sunday night (March 18) at 8 Eastern on CBS.