Tru Davies is having a bad day.
A recent college graduate, Tru finds out that her hospital internship, which she saw as her ticket to med school, has been eliminated. Instead, she takes the only thing she can find in a related field – working the graveyard shift at the city morgue.
That’s not the best place for Tru to be, for, to make matters worse, she hears dead people.
This is the premise behind the supernatural drama “Tru Calling,” debuting at 8 p.m. Thursday on Fox.
Tru (played by Eliza Dushku, “Buffy the Vampire Slayer”) first manifested this ability 10 years ago, at the funeral of her mother, who was killed by an unknown assailant.
Now, sitting by herself at the morgue in the wee hours of the morning, the voices start again, asking her for help to change the recent past. Then, a la “Groundhog Day,” she wakes up to relive that day, with the track all-star running all over the city to try and prevent that person’s death. At the same time, she tries to keep her drug-addict sister and gambler brother out of trouble. All this makes for a full day.
Initially, Tru isn’t very good at this saving people stuff. Surprisingly, most people don’t warm to her explaining, “You’re going to die tonight,” or accept “Just trust me” as a reason to change their plans.
Most of her friends and relatives view her actions, starting with taking the morgue job, as just being a little odd. Still, that beats being thought of as being insane, as they would if she explained what’s really happening to her.
Although it requires a healthy suspension of disbelief, “Tru Calling” does work, as Tru throws herself headlong into her mission. The show is truly an adrenaline jolt. Who knew that a morgue could be so lively?
Still, opposite “Friends” and “Survivor,” “Tru Calling” doesn’t stand a ghost of a chance in the ratings. Let’s call it another ambitious series that ends up D.O.A.
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