Beauty and the Beast: Is the New CW Series Worth Watching?

by Trevor Kimball, October 11, 2012

The CW has given their new Beauty and the Beast TV series a great timeslot, following their most-popular show, The Vampire Diaries. On the negative side, it’s also airing opposite seriously tough competition — Glee, Person of Interest and Grey’s Anatomy. Can it compete? Is it even worth watching?

In this version of the classic tale of Beauty and the Beast, a young girl is saved from being murdered by a mysterious creature/human. Years later, as a homicide detective (Kristin Kreuk), she comes face to face with her mysterious savior (Jay Ryan). He ends up helping her solve crimes while she helps keep his identity a secret. The cast also includes Nina Lisandrello, Brian White, Max Brown, Nicole Gale Anderson, and Austin Basis.

Sound like it’s worth your time? Before you decide, take a look at what some of the critics think:

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: “It’s tough to imagine how anyone could make a more ham-fisted wreck of a remake of 1980s CBS fantasy series Beauty and the Beast than The CW’s effort, debuting on Pittsburgh’s WPCW tonight at 11:30 after the Steelers game… The CW’s Beauty is laughably bad in myriad ways. There’s no sense of star-crossed lovers, just a plasticized romance between a Cover Girl and a glum, anger-prone male model.”

LA Times: “None of the which is even as mildly interesting as it sounds, and, indeed, I grew weary even as I watched, despite Kreuk’s hypnotic eyes, the broody lighting and roiling soundtrack. It is all so dreadfully familiar — the lovely, headstrong and feisty heroine, the nice guy who wants her (in this case, the medical examiner played by Max Brown) and the broken bad boy she loves instead… One can only hope that this marks the last limping leg of the inter-species romance, because in real life, true love should not include a partner whose first instinct is to kill you.”

Boston Globe: “Last season, ABC’s Once Upon a Time and NBC’s Grimm proved that there is an appetite for updated fairy tales. The CW has taken the hint, and contrived this pretty, and pretty empty, series. It’s a market move, nothing more.”

Salt Lake Tribune: “I’m not sure I have the words to describe just how bad The CW’s Beauty and the Beast is. I’ve only been doing this for 22½ years, after all… The first episode of this Beauty and the Beast remake isn’t entirely devoid of entertainment value. But laughing at this show — not with it — wears off before long. Bad is bad, and this is terrible.”

Hollywood Reporter: “Only The CW would take a super hunky dude who would make most women swoon and call him a Beast because he’s got a couple of cuts on his face that, strangely enough, make him magnetically more attractive to other beautiful people. That is either awesome or messed up, or awesomely messed up. Because The CW doesn’t even get it. If the network got it, someone would have said, ‘Hey, guys, this is ridiculous even by our standards. You know that, right?'”

USA Today: “There’s a murder solved in tonight’s opener, but the murderer is so obvious, it’s hardly worth worrying about. Odds are you’ll spend more energy trying to decide whether Kreuk and Ryan are more sinning than sinned against: They’re terrible, but the material may have left them with no other option. Luckily, in this world of 1,000 channels, you have plenty of other options. Exercise one.”

What do you think? Have you seen the new Beauty and the Beast TV series? If so, will you watch again?