All Rise...

Judge David Johnson is very good at sensing lunch.

The Charge

I see…a K!

The Case

Taking a different spin on the police procedural, Sensing Murder dispatches with the CSI-type of forensic investigation and door-to-door canvassing and brings in a pair of female psychics to tackle some of the most gruesome unsolved mysteries. Starring the nation's top investigators (their words) Pam Coronado and Laurie Campbell, the series brings our clairvoyant couple to the cops, who are apparently desperate to shed any new light—ethereal or otherwise—on these hopelessly cold cases. Two discs, eleven episodes:

Disc One
Desperate for Answers
Random Killer
Mountain Murders
Basement Horror
Hunted in the Forest
Missing Teens

Disc Two
Prairie Predator
Video Store Murder
Convent Killer
Parkway Mystery
Dream House Nightmare

Those are some scary titles, huh? Rest assured, the crimes they highlight aren't walks in the park either. So enter Pam and Laurie, brought in to give police a new perspective on the murders and possible give the victims' families "closure." That's cool and these two ladies seem to have the psychic thing down, teasing out details of the victims and the crimes from just holding personal effects—though more than a few of their insights are vague generalizations like, "this murder was especially violent" and "she seems trusting" and "there is some brown in her hair." There's one major problem with the show: according to the disclaimers at the beginning of each episode, their efforts are largely useless. Psychic investigation, we're told, is not scientific and isn't considered evidence and would be inadmissible in court and, even more anti-climactic, no arrests were made and no suspects have been targeted after all is said and done.

That's quite a way to defuse the psychic excitement going in, huh? That doesn't stop Pam and Laurie from giving it their all. Featuring footage of them tapping into the psychic fabric for clues, talking to investigators, interviews with family members of the victims and dramatizations of the crime and even Pam and Laurie's visions (?), Sensing Murder works incredibly hard to make itself relevant. In the end, however, I don't think it is. It's an odd take on the emaciated crime procedural and that's about it.

The DVD is slim, full frame and 2.0 stereo and no extras.

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