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CSI:Miami has the franchise brand name -- the original is now television's highest-rated drama -- and two marquee-value top-liners: David Caruso and Kim Delaney.
Sounds like a slam dunk, right? Maybe.
There's also Monday Night Football out there. That attracts the guys. Jordan gets the girls. Will either gender defect to another slick Jerry Bruckheimer Quincy rehash?
Oh, probably. (Although really, few things would be as satisfying as seeing the season's safest, surest bet completely tank, thereby throwing the suits who greenlit it into complete disarray. But we won't be so lucky.)
Caruso stars as the improbably-named Horatio Caine -- Florida's answer to William Petersen's grouchy Gil Grissom.
CSI watchers met Caine last season, in an episode that existed only to set the stage for this clone. Originally Caruso was the solo star of the series, but CBS executives decided he needed a female counterpart and snapped up Delaney, whose Philly had just been axed.
Caruso is just doing a riff of his NYPD Blue character, but that's not a bad thing.
It's the equivalent of a Big Mac: slick packaging, same taste, predictably filling.
Expect CSI: Bakersfield shortly.