Review: 'Vengeance Unlimited'

Sometimes timing is everything.

Back in the 1980's, the idea of vigilante justice was damn near hip. From feature films like "Sudden Impact" and "Death Wish" to TV shows like "The Equalizer," the idea of taking vengeance on the bad guys seemed logical-- almost righteous.

But things have changed. crime is down nationwide, and even where it's not, it doesn't seem to be such a pressing issue. And in an era where drivers get shot for flipping someone off, the concept of more idiots out there wrecking retribution on citizens they consider evil makes most people downright antsy.

So into this atmosphere comes ABC's newest Thursday night drama "Vengeance Unlimited". It's a show so grim, so humorless and devoid of clarity that it makes last season's "Total Security" seem downright Shakespearean. It's class warfare at its most obvious, and a total waste of bandwidth.

Michael Madsen stars as Mr. Chapel, a man who has apparently appointed himself some sort of one-man retribution squad. Every episode opens with some thwarting of justice by a generally rich, vindictive bastard of a crook. These aren't shades of grey bad guys. These are businessmen who bribe judges, FBI profilers who frame the wrong men, policemen who commit heinous crimes and blame an innocent bystander. Cue Mr. Chapel.

Madsen's approach is simple. He offers the wronged person a deal. He'll correct the injustice, expose the crime, and in return the only thing he asks is that in the future, the person he helps will do him a favor--no questions asked.

Longtime TV viewers may recognize this premise as the same one that was the basis for the 1980's series Stingray. That series starred Nick Mancuso as a mysterious man who helped the disenfranchised, asking only for a favor to be named later.

But while that series was witty and often clever, "Vengeance Unlimited" is devoid of any vestige of intelligence. Madsen plays Mr. Chapel with all of the emotional range of a coma patient. He glowers, he mopes, he growls his way through scenes and his two main expressions are constipated and slightly less constipated. His surly attitude is supposed to be the result of some as-yet-unexplained loss of his family, but considering his noticeable lack of charm, I suspect that if he lost his family, it was due to some self-inflicted effort to get away from his presence.

But even more disastrous than his lack of charm are the scripts. The only hope of making a show like this compelling is to have scripts that are clever--or at least, not moronic. Mr. Chapel is presumably some one-man brain trust, but his ideas for wrecking revenge on the wicked are so hackneyed they would be too silly for even daytime's "Sunset Beach."

After the first episode, he's assisted in his duties by K.C. Griffin (Kathleen York), a paralegal he once helped, and who now assists him in his acts of vengeance. I suspect she's there mostly there to provide some hint of warmth to the plot, but it's never clear why her character is here. Chapel isn't the type of guy anyone would willingly bond with, and despite the producer attempts to give them some sort of bantering relationship, the two demonstrate zip chemistry.

The series is from John McNamara, whose short-lived Fox drama "Profitt" was a brilliantly dark and twisted tale of greed. "Vengeance Unlimited" is just dark and dreary. And entirely without any redeeming value.

Let's face it, it takes a certain type of talent to make vigilantism boring and pointless.

"Vengeance Unlimited" airs on ABC at 8:00pm EST."