An exceptionally talented individual teams up with a justice-hungry law enforcement office to solve unusual cases with their special skill set. You might have heard this one before. It’s a common conceit in crime procedurals, but it’s one that’s served many TV shows well. Coroner is just one of the more recent crime series to employ this strategy, and it pulls it off well enough to please fans of this genre.
Coroner’s unique angle on this formula starts with Dr. Jenny Cooper (Serinda Swan), a former ER doctor turned coroner, tasked with investigating a string of suspicious deaths around town. While Cooper doesn’t have any supernatural cognitive abilities to speak of (aside from a tendency to hallucinate black dogs), her instincts for knowing when a death isn’t quite what it seems verge on abnormal, and help to distract from any disbelief regarding Cooper going so frequently beyond the scope of her job to solve crimes. Talented individual with a unique insight into crimes? Check.
Cooper’s police partner in Coroner is Detective Donovan “Mac” McAvoy (Roger Cross), a jaded senior homicide detective. Detective McAvoy is willing to put his career on the line to support Dr. Cooper and her sometimes outlandish theories, which often pay him back with a case well solved. Justice-hungry law enforcement officer? Check.
Coroner has no shortage of intriguing crimes to chew on. The pilot episode sees Cooper reverse a prognosis that dubbed the deaths of two teenagers a suicide pact based on Romeo and Juliet. Another episode finds Cooper and McAvoy investigating a forest full of dismembered body parts. Unusual cases solved with a special skillset? Check.
Coroner checks plenty of boxes, making it familiar ground for fans of legacy procedurals Bones, Castle, or Harrow. Those who enjoy seeing the likes of Karin Slaughter or Kathy Reichs’ crime novels translated to screen will also find something to love in Coroner, as the series is based on M. R. Hall’s Jenny Cooper novels. The seven books in the Jenny Cooper series give Coroner plenty of material to fill four seasons with, and its popularity eventually bolstered the show’s episode count from eight to twelve episodes per season.
Jenny Cooper is the latest in a long line of complex women leading crime procedurals. As her self-help tapes in the car remind her, Cooper is a “force of nature.” She shares Temperance "Bones" Brennan's fiery temperament and a deep commitment to her role, like Kay Scarpetta. She is also relatably human and has an unequivocally messy personal life that threatens to spill over into her professional life. She is in and out of therapy as she grapples with PTSD following the unexpected death of her husband. This left Cooper a widow and single mother to her teenage son, Ross (Ehren Kassam), and they’re now both in crippling debt thanks to her husband’s gambling habits.
Cooper’s emotions don’t go unnoticed by her colleagues. An episode in which her boss finds her crying in her car is the same episode that sees Cooper slapped by a victim’s mother in the street, and sees her fire her male colleague point-blank for undermining her. She faces prejudices and sexism in the workplace and haunting traumas in her headspace, which ultimately touch on thoughtful conversations about mental health in this field.
All that being said, Coroner isn’t always a retread of the tropes we know and love. While Cooper and Mac share genuine chemistry in their friendship, they don’t fall into the will-they-won’t-they stereotype that commonly attaches itself to the unlikely partners in these crime procedurals. They still manage to balance each other out, with Mac’s cool demeanour and wisecracking jokes offering moments of levity in comparison to Cooper’s impassioned and serious side. That’s also not to say that Coroner doesn’t have its share of romance, as Cooper starts to explore what love looks like in the wake of becoming a widow.
The series has a distinct backdrop, set among the cold urban streets of Toronto, Canada. While M.R. Hall’s novels are definitely British, Coroner manages to feel completely Canadian. Crime procedurals like this one take on so much of their identity from the city they are set in, and in Coroner, Toronto’s social and regional issues are often integral to the crimes, offering a new lens on a city many may not be familiar with.
Coroner keeps viewers on their toes with its unexpected tone, mixing grisly crimes and gritty investigations with procedural elements and surprising moments of comedy. At times, it feels like Coroner is a soap opera version of an American crime procedural, as willing to drop in an offbeat line like “nobody touch the barf,” with an action-packed police chase, or jargon-infused walk and talk.
Nevertheless, with the popularity of highly skilled individual-led crime procedurals still strong, Coroner stands out thanks to its unique perspective on the coroner's role. This show doesn’t try to reinvent the wheel; instead, it takes what works and pairs it with a new setting and some modern conversation points.
All four seasons of Coroner are now streaming at SBS On Demand.
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Coroner
