There’s something comforting about network procedurals. They’re a staple in the primetime TV line-up, always there when a hankering to watch arises. Available in syndication with episodes that are seemingly always on to enjoy, there are so many from which to choose, from Law & Order to Blue Bloods.
While all the focus is on streaming in 2024, networks like ABC, CBS, NBC, and Fox are still introducing compelling new procedurals, each with their own unique twist. The good news is that for those who have cut the proverbial cord on cable, all these new shows are available on partner streaming services as well. There are five shows introduced in the last few years, a few just recently, that stand out as the best for those who want a quality procedural to dive into.
High Potential (ABC) Has, Well, Potential
High Potential, based on the 2021 French series HPI, has been well-received since it premiered in mid-September 2024. The crime drama stars Kaitlin Olson as Morgan, a single mom who works as a nighttime cleaner in a police department to support her three children. But she also has an incredible IQ of 160, an eidetic memory, and a gifted way of thinking and seeing things. When she happens upon case evidence while cleaning, she can’t help herself and alters the police board to indicate her findings. This gets her into hot water until Selena (Judy Reyes), head of the Major Crimes Division of the LAPD, recognizes Morgan’s potential and offers her a consulting job.
Morgan’s gifts have often caused problems in her life and relationships. This carries over to her new gig as well, as Karadec (Daniel Sunjata), the detective she is sent to work with, is constantly frustrated with having her tag along. But he eventually starts to warm to her when he recognizes that she really does bring value and helps them solve cases. He tries his best to overlook her blatant disregard for legal protocols, rebellious fashion sense, and the constant trouble she causes along the way.
High Potential has all the elements fans love in a procedural: a lead character with a quirky personality and special skills, lots of conflict, and episodic cases that get more outlandish each time. There’s also an overarching story, as is often the case with these types of shows. Morgan’s first husband, Roman, went missing years prior, and she has a gut feeling he didn’t just abandon his family and that something awful happened to him. She pleads with Selena to help investigate as part of her agreement to take the job, and as Selena digs, she begins to find evidence to support Morgan’s theory.
High Potential continues to get better with each passing episode, earning a solid 92% critics score on Rotten Tomatoes and an 82% audience score. From the chemistry among the characters to the strong female lead and the representation of the challenges single working moms face, the show is one of the most delightful new ones on network television.
Stream High Potential on Hulu.
Found's (NBC) Intriguing Twist Grips You From the Start
It seems like every possible twist has been accounted for with network procedurals and done time and time again. But in a sea of remakes, sequels, and spin-offs, Found has managed to carve its own area in the genre. The story centers around Gaby Mosley (Shanola Hampton), a survivor of a long-term kidnapping when she was a teenager. She has used her experience to dedicate her life to helping others, establishing a team of other misfits, each with special skills, to investigate missing persons crimes that law enforcement isn’t dedicating resources to solving. But she has a secret.
Nine months before the beginning of the series, Gaby tracked down her kidnapper, a high school professor named Hugh “Sir” Evans (Mark-Paul Gosselaar) and has been keeping him prisoner in a custom-built cell in her basement. She interacts with him daily and uses him to help analyze her cases and get into the minds of possible perpetrators. No one knows this, however, and the intensity brought to every episode as Gaby tries to keep this illegal secret under wraps is palpable. If the truth were to come out, it would be the end of her.
Now in its second season, Found continues to push the envelope, focusing on cases about marginalized people, from minorities to sex workers and homeless persons. There’s a strong message behind the show as well, about how law enforcement often neglects missing persons victims they may not find worthy of spending time finding.
The ensemble cast is talented, though Hampton steals every scene. Each case is more ridiculously unbelievable than the next, as is the access Gaby manages to get thanks to her detective friend Mark (Brett Dalton). Each character has their own chilling backstory, like Margaret (Kelli Williams), who has developed keen observational and deductive reasoning skills following the obsessions she has developed as a result of the kidnapping of her son years prior. Suspend belief and enjoy every minute of this procedural, which has a decent 70% Rotten Tomatoes score and 66% audience score.
Stream Found on Peacock.
Will Trent (ABC) Is One of the Most Endearing TV Leads
The strange accent aside, Will Trent (Ramon Rodriguez) from Will Trent is one of the most endearing characters on television. The GBI special agent had a rough childhood, growing up an orphan and moving from one abusive orphanage or foster home to another. He finds solace in detective Angela Polaski (Erika Christensen), who went through the foster care system with him, and with whom he shares an on-and-off romantic bond.
Suffering from dyslexia, something he keeps from all but those closest to him, Trent has his quirks. But he is also extremely talented at his job. He can walk onto a crime scene and instantly observe and recreate what happened in his mind. And most of the time, he’s right, much to the chagrin of other detectives like Michael Ormewood (Jake McLaughlin), who become annoyed when he takes over their crime scenes and cases.
The series features a different case in every episode while continuing the main story of Trent trying to figure out more about his life and reconnect with his past. In the first season, he discovers the identity of his biological mother and gets to meet his biological uncle. But there are so many other questions still to be answered.
Already renewed for a third season, Will Trent is a fabulous show with an equally amazing cast that also includes Sonja Sohn (The Wire), Mark-Paul Gosselaar (Found), Greg Germann (Grey’s Anatomy), John Ortiz (Bad Monkey), and LisaGay Hamilton (The Practice). Gina Rodriguez (Jane the Virgin, Not Dead Yet) will join the cast for season three. Fans have spoken loud and clear in agreement that this show is one of the best new network procedurals on television: Will Trent has an 89% Rotten Tomatoes critics score and 84% audience score.
Stream Will Trent on Hulu.
Every Episode of Tracker (CBS) Is Like a Mini Action Movie
Playing a very different role from the one he played in This Is Us, Justin Hartley heads up this action drama about Colter Shaw, a survivalist who has turned the skills his father taught him as a child when they were forced to live off the grid into a fruitful job. He lives in an Airstream and travels across the country taking odd jobs helping families and individuals find missing persons. Together with his small, remote team, they answer the calls, and he swiftly gets to work to find the missing person. He only gets paid when he succeeds.
Each episode of Tracker follows a different case as Colter travels the country doing incredible things like entering a government black site, jumping out of planes into the wilderness, and breaking into all types of facilities. Every case is more dangerous than the last, but apparently, Colter has tremendous fighting skills as well.
With the addition of Jensen Ackles to the cast for the second season, Tracker gets even better. The thematic storyline throughout is that of the one case Colter can’t seem to solve or shake: his father’s death. There are questions and secrets around the work his father was doing, and Colter thinks there’s much more to the story, especially knowing his father was killed by a mysterious person he initially thought was his older brother Russell (Ackles).
Critics are loving Tracker, awarding it an aggregate 89% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Audiences are less generous at 64%, but as far as episodic procedurals go, Tracker is like Reacher for network television, and the show brings the character from Jeffery Deaver’s novel The Never Game to life.
Stream Tracker on Paramount+.
Doctor Odyssey (ABC) Is This Generation’s The Love Boat
Reception hasn’t been as wonderful for Doctor Odyssey as it has been for the other shows. But the Ryan Murphy medical drama is a fun network procedural with a twist that many have likened to The Love Boat. The show is set on the seas where Dr. Max Bankman (Joshua Jackson) has been hired as a luxury cruise ship’s new doctor. As he acclimates to the position, the nurses he’ll be working with, and the ship’s captain, Robert Massey (Don Johnson), he discovers that patient treatment in this setting is much different than anything he has ever experienced before.
Every week, the cruise has a different theme, from Singles Week to post-plastic surgery R&R and Halloween. Of course, each week brings a set of new cases with which to deal as well, including strange injuries and ailments that are supposedly common to those who have worked in the setting for years. Think STDs, people going overboard, and intense iodine poisoning from overeating shrimp.
In every episode, there’s also a new selection of guest stars who play characters boarding the ship, like Shania Twain, Rachel Dratch, Chord Overstreet, Gina Gershon, John Stamos, and Cheyenne Jackson. This adds to the excitement to see who will be in the next episode. The ongoing storyline is that of Max and his romantic interest in nurse Avery Morgan (Phillipa Soo), nurse Tristan Silva’s (Sean Teale) crush on Avery, and Dr. Bankman dealing with his past trauma. He decided to work on the ship because of a brush with death: he was Patient Zero with COVID-19 and is now living to savor every moment.
Doctor Odyssey doesn’t have enough critics ratings to gain a score on Rotten Tomatoes, but audiences only give it a dismal 38%. Nonetheless, the series garnered an impressive 13.6 million viewers for its pilot episode, and the Rotten Tomatoes audience score has been slowly but surely creeping upwards. As far as guilty pleasures go, it's one for the books.
Stream Doctor Odyssey on Hulu.
