Far be it from me to question a television veteran like Fred Dryer, but you've got to wonder if he isn't somewhat misjudging the current tastes of the American viewing public.
Dryer is under the impression that audiences are crying out for the kind of character-driven, over-the-top cop series he starred in from 1984-91. And we won't have to wait long to find out — the TV movie "Hunter: Return to Justice" airs tonight at 8 on NBC/Ch. 5.
"Police shows today, to me, are all the same, and there's nothing very interesting," Dryer said during a teleconference with TV critics. "And they've all gone toward this microscopic look at crime. I think it's all very dry and a little boring for my taste."
Perhaps so, but "CSI" is currently the No. 1 show on TV and has spawned a hugely successful spinoff, "CSI: Miami." Meanwhile, "Law & Order" continues to be a big hit in its 12th season and has spawned two successful spinoffs, "Special Victims Unit" and "Criminal Intent."
Still, Dryer and his co-star, Stepfanie Kramer, are convinced that viewers are pining to see detectives Rick Hunter and Dee Dee McCall (a k a "the brass cupcake") solving crimes together again.
"The thing that made 'Hunter' different was the chemistry that Fred and I had together onscreen," Kramer said. "That's what compelled people to tune in and watch."
"People want to see those characters. It's that simple. They remember them and they want to see them," Dryer said. "You want to see those two people together in your living room for 45 minutes every Saturday."
Or, they hope, in at least a couple of TV movies — the one that airs tonight and a second (already produced) that will be telecast sometime later this season.
"Return to Justice" sends Hunter to San Diego, where his ex-partner and her fiance — a mayoral candidate — are soon wrapped up in a murder and convoluted plot involving an ex-KGB agent and assorted instances of mayhem. (Yes, they get to pull out their big guns and shoot them.)
Unlike "CSI," the "Hunter" plot takes a back seat to the characters. And, if nothing else, Dryer and Kramer do retain whatever chemistry they had while doing the series.
"It was like getting back on a bicycle," Kramer said. "I know Fred. I know how he works. We just fell right back into it very easily. It was, in some ways, as if no time had passed." (Kramer left the series before its final season amid reports that she couldn't get along with her co-star — reports she disputes. She said she did not appear in a previous revival — a 1995 TV movie titled "The Return of Hunter" — because she was pregnant at the time.)
And "Hunter" is certainly different from most cop shows on the air today — sort of a throwback to the pre-"NYPD Blue," pre-"Hill Street Blues" days when TV cops were bigger than life.
"Hour-format police shows today are very mannered. They're all the same," Dryer said. "They're all the same characters. No one laughs. No one smiles. There doesn't seem to be any sense of any happiness outside of the job descriptions of these characters. And I think that's what's been missing.
"Since 'Hunter' left 11 years ago, Chuck Norris came on and took the 'Hunter' audience on CBS for, like, eight or nine years. And when he left, it's now back to an abyss. The idea was to offer these shows up . . . and to let people know that this show is still viable. We gave them two great movies."
Neither Dryer nor Kramer is interested in reviving "Hunter" as a weekly series, but both are up for more movies.
"I'd very much like to do more movies with Stepfanie," Dryer said.
"Yeah, if we did an arc, that would be great," Kramer said. "If we did a couple of films a year that would really be great."
"I wouldn't mind giving them four movies a year," Dryer said.
E-mail: pierce@desnews.com