FOREVER: Come for Ioan Gruffudd, Stay for the Story (and Ioan Gruffudd)

ABC premieres my favorite new drama of the season tonight, Forever, with a second episode airing tomorrow night in the show’s regular timeslot of Tuesdays at 10/9c. Tonight’s sneak peek gets Castle‘s regular timeslot (that show returns next Monday with a twisty season premiere), and I don’t think that’s a coincidence. With the Nathan Fillion-Stana Katic series heading into its seventh season, the suits at ABC have to be giving some thought to what will take over for the hit once it ends. Forever is poised to do just that.

The new series from Matt Miller (Chuck, Human Target, 666) centers on Dr. Henry Morgan, New York City’s star medical examiner. Henry seems to have a knack for solving the unsolvable when it comes to cause of death, a skill he has honed over the past 200 years after experiencing his own death hundreds of times. You see, Henry is immortal. He doesn’t know why or how, but after being shot aboard a ship two centuries ago, he’s died over and over and over and…well, none of those deaths have stuck. Now he studies death in hopes of discovering the secret to the mystery of his own immortality.

In the first episode, Henry is traveling on the subway when the train he’s on is involved in a horrific crash, killing everyone in his car and injuring countless others. Henry dies, then resurfaces (literally) in the river sans clothing. (This is a theme, by the way. Whenever Henry dies, he “comes to” in water, naked. It’s awkward.) At first the police think the wreck was an accident caused by the driver, but Henry soon discovers that the driver’s death was neither natural nor accidental. Further investigation reveals that this is not the first time the driver was involved in a fatality, either.

Meanwhile, Henry begins receiving messages from a mysterious man who claims that he, too, is immortal and has been watching Henry. With his secret in danger of exposure, it may be time for Henry to go undercover for a while.

Woven into this present-day mystery are flashbacks to WWII when Henry served as a medic for the British army. There he meets a beautiful nurse, Abigail, who we learn is his great lost love. But why was she “lost”? Another mystery!

Ioan Gruffudd stars as Henry, and as a longtime fan, I am delighted to see him in such a promising series. Gruffudd (pronounced “Griffith”) has been on the verge of breaking out for at least 10 years, but while his work in various projects has been good, the projects themselves have not been great (Ringer, Fantastic Four). In Forever, Gruffudd finally has a proper showcase for his brand of broody British drama with a healthy dollop of sardonic wit and boyish charm.

Joining Gruffudd in the series is Judd Hirsch as Abe, Henry’s best (and only) friend. Henry and Abe are very close. So close that until the true nature of their relationship was revealed at the end of the first episode, I had come to a different, erroneous conclusion. And yes, Abe is Henry’s personal taxi driver, in addition to working at the antique store that serves as a front for Henry’s secret cave o’ oddities in his pursuit of knowledge.

Alana De La Garza also stars, playing Detective Jo Martinez, sort of the Beckett to Henry’s Castle or the Booth to his Bones. We’re given a few tantalizing glimpses into her backstory in these first two episodes, laying the foundation for a complex, layered character (I hope) and nixing any romantic vibes between our leads for the time being. Unfortunately those glimpses aren’t quite enough to land Forever on the Nice Girls TV Strong Female Character list just yet, but I see definite potential.

A procedural with some mythology, character building, and a hint of the supernatural, Forever reminds me Castle, Bones, and Sleepy Hollow, while still managing to be something all its own. The first episode premieres tonight at 10/9c on ABC with another new episode airing in the show’s regular timeslot Tuesday at 10/9c.

Now let’s look at pictures of Gruffudd’s amazing hair…