Last night marked the much anticipated return of Sarah Michelle Gellar to the CW Network in the suspense thriller series, Ringer.

 

            In the series, Gellar plays Bridget Cafferty, a recovering addict harbored in protective custody as she waits to give testimony in the murder trial of a man accused of killing a stripper. Seizing an improbable chance, Bridget manages to disarm an undercover officer assigned to protect her and escape. By sheer coincidence, Bridget had received a letter from her estranged identical twin sister, Siobhan Martin, inviting her to visit at Siobhan's summer house in the Hamptons while her husband Andrew is away on business.

 

            Bridget takes Shiobhan up on her offer and Shiobhan confides in Bridget that Andrew doesn't know she has a sister, let alone an identical twin sister. Later, while Bridget nods off (but not in a junkie kind of way) on a watercraft idling in an otherwise deserted ocean, Shiobhan apparently commits suicide and Bridget slips on her missing sister's ginormous wedding ring and then slips into her life.

 

            There are a strong set of supporting actors surrounding Gellar. Nestor Carbonell, late of Lost and an amazing guest arc on Psych, acts as Victor Machado, the handler Bridget eludes (but not the ones she put the ninja moves to) and brings real interest to any scene he is in. Ione Grufford, best known for his role as Horatio Hornblower in the series Hornblower, shines as Shiobhan's husband, Andrew; though it is left unexplained whatever drew those two together in the first pace, and Mike Colter makes a strong impression as Bridget's twelve step sponsor, Malcolm. On the other hand, Zoey Deutch, formerly of the Disney Chanel's Suite Life on Deck, misses the mark as Andrew's out-of-control teenage daughter, Juliet, and Kristopher Poloha is just adequate as Shiobhan's lover, Henry, who also happens to be Shiobhan's interior designer/best friend.

 

            The characters of Bridget and Shiobhan are well drawn. Bridget, who has been clean for six months, thinks like an addict and actis impulsively. Shiobhan is more of a cipher. Her perfect outward life is shown not what it seems to be on the surface. In fact it seems as if Shiobhan may have had nefarious reasons for extending an olive branch to her sister as Bridget finds out when she narrowly escapes a hit-man after Shiobhan.

 

            I am a huge fan of the series Buffy the Vampire Slayer and its companion, Angel and I think that made me a little hesitant to watch SMG in another role but I reminded myself that the only reason I started watching Buffy from the beginning was because of SMG's role as Kendall Hart on All My Children and so soldiered on.

 

            There were definite weakness to Ringer. The set-up was telegraphed over megaphone and one has to do some serious suspension of belief to buy into the basic concept of the show. There is talk of a vague "tragedy" involving a boy who seems to have been Shiobhan's son. It would be my guess that Bridget's was watching the boy while under the influence and the boy drowned or something similar. Afterward, Bridget's drug use spiraled out of control, taking her life with it, while Shiobhan became a cold, heartless, narcissist as evidenced by a very beautiful, oversized, black-and-white photograph of Shiobhan's face that dominates the entrance into the Martin's Manhattan apartment; a device used to explain Victor Machado's immediate acceptance of Bridget as Shiobhan, but that's just my guess. In all, I was a bit underwhelmed by the premiere and the premise itself doesn't seem sustainable over the long haul.  Still, I was intrigued enough to be willing to give it another shot. I just won't let myself become too emotionally attached lest it go the way of New Amsterdam.