A Mystery for the Holidays

If you like cozy mysteries, and you need a break from football this holiday weekend, check out Netflix's funny "A Man on the Inside"

If you've had enough football after the Green Bay Packers play on Thanksgiving evening 💚💛, and enjoy funny mysteries like The Thursday Murder Club, Netflix has a charming show in the cozy genre called A Man on the Inside.

Ted Danson (of Cheers fame) stars Charles as a widower who applies for a job as an amateur sleuth at a senior-care facility in San Francisco. He's bored, grieving, and disconnected from his only daughter, who's worried. Charles becomes a mole in an investigation about a snatched ruby necklace from a resident of Pacific View senior care.

Charles earns the job from the director of a P.I. agency because he can halfway manage technology, a premise seniors understand. There are a few James Bond gadget moments that are delightful.

If you're an author studying plot structure, that's the inciting incident, and the story kicks off (pun intended) from there. The fun and games begin with Charles enjoying his first days at the facility, showing off his skills as a bartender adept at making brandy old-fashioned drinkies—no, pardon me, my Wisconsin is showing—adept at making Manhattans. During his first few days, fun is had by most.

Ginny (Sally Struthers) and Flo (Margaret Avery) are two ladies in the residence who resemble The Odd Couple's giggly Pigeon sisters. The women steal every scene and make viewers believe life in a senior facility with a memory care unit attached is as entertaining as a perpetual pop concert.

The series has eight episodes, with episodes three and six providing pivotal events that affect the story's trajectory. (Sorry, I can't turn off my inner writer; I’m obsessed with plot structure.) Charles is solving a mystery but also repairing his relationship with his daughter, who's mysterious, too. No, ironic. She smartly analyzes the disconnect with her father, but not the one she has with her three children.

It's a problem left unturned—but it wouldn’t be a holiday without unresolved family drama. Here's hoping the series is renewed for another season, and it will be.

The climax occurs early in the last episode. It's a satisfactory payoff in a funny, compassionate series that shows seniors in a poignant, sweet, difficult light. Aging isn't fun, exactly. But Man on the Inside shows it doesn't have to be boring or lonely. The main character's willingness to try something new, test himself, and offer a listening ear to new friends, makes for a delightful show worth a watch. After that Green Bay Packers game, that is.

Happy Netflix, er, Thanksgiving!

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