''Terriers'' is an American

crime In ordinary language, a crime is an unlawful act punishable by a State (polity), state or other authority. The term ''crime'' does not, in modern criminal law, have any simple and universally accepted definition,Farmer, Lindsay: "Crime, definit ...

comedy-drama Comedy drama, also known by the portmanteau ''dramedy'', is a genre of dramatic works that combines elements of comedy and drama. The modern, scripted-television examples tend to have more humorous bits than simple comic relief seen in a typical ...

noir

television series A television show – or simply TV show – is any content produced for viewing on a television set which can be broadcast via over-the-air, satellite television, satellite, or cable television, cable, excluding breaking news, television adverti ...

created by

Ted Griffin Ted Griffin (born December 21, 1970) is an American screenwriter whose credits include '' Ravenous'', ''Matchstick Men'', and ''Ocean's Eleven''. Born in Pasadena, California, Griffin graduated from Colgate University in 1993. He was schedule ...

that aired on FX from September 8 to December 1, 2010. The show was canceled by FX on December 6, 2010, after the first season.

Premise

Ex-cop and recovering alcoholic Hank Dolworth (

Donal Logue Donal Francis Logue (born February 27, 1966) is a Canadian actor. He starred in the film '' The Tao of Steve'' and has had roles in the TV series ''Sons of Anarchy'', ''Vikings'', ''Grounded for Life'', ''Copper'', '' Terriers'', and, as Detecti ...

) partners with his best friend, former criminal Britt Pollack (

Michael Raymond-James Michael Raymond-James (born Michael Weverstad; December 24, 1977) is an American actor. He is best known for playing René Lenier in the first season of the HBO series ''True Blood'', Britt Pollack on the FX series ''Terriers'', Neal Cassidy/B ...

), in an unlicensed

private investigation A private investigator (often abbreviated to PI and informally called a private eye), a private detective, or inquiry agent is a person who can be hired by individuals or groups to undertake investigatory law services. Private investigators of ...

business. The series is set in Ocean Beach,

San Diego San Diego ( , ; ) is a city on the Pacific Ocean coast of Southern California located immediately adjacent to the Mexico–United States border. With a 2020 population of 1,386,932, it is the List of United States cities by population, eigh ...

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

, although it is portrayed as a distinct town, with Dolworth having once been a member of the fictional Ocean Beach Police Department.

Cast

Main cast

as Henry "Hank" Dolworth *

as Britt Pollack *

Laura Allen Laura Allen (born March 21, 1974) is an American actress. She starred as Lily Tyler during the first two seasons of the USA Network television series ''The 4400''. Personal life Allen was born in Portland, Oregon, the daughter of Julie and Dav ...

as Katie Nichols, Britt's girlfriend *

Kimberly Quinn Kimberly Quinn (formerly Fortier; ''née'' Solomon; born 1961) is an American journalist, commentator and magazine publisher and writer; latterly the publisher of British conservative news magazine ''The Spectator''. Early life A native of Lo ...

as Gretchen Dolworth, Hank's ex-wife *

Jamie Denbo Jamie Denbo (born July 24, 1973) is an American actress, writer, comedian and half of the comedy duo Ronna and Beverly with Jessica Chaffin. She also co-starred in the FX series ''Terriers'' and appeared in '' Spy'', '' The Heat'' and ''Ghos ...

as Maggie Lefferts, Hank's attorney and part-time employer *

Rockmond Dunbar Rockmond Dunbar (born January 11, 1973) is an American actor, best known for his roles as Baines on the NBC series '' Earth 2'', Kenny Chadway on Showtime family drama ''Soul Food'', and Benjamin Miles "C-Note" Franklin on the Fox crime drama '' ...

Detective A detective is an investigator, usually a member of a law enforcement agency. They often collect information to solve crimes by talking to witnesses and informants, collecting physical evidence, or searching records in databases. This leads th ...

Mark Gustafson, Hank's friend and former partner

Recurring cast

Loren Dean Loren Dean (born July 31, 1969) is an American actor. He has appeared on stage and in feature films. Early life Loren Dean Jovicic was born July 31, 1969, in Las Vegas, Nevada. His parents divorced when he was a small child. His mother won custo ...

as Jason Adler, Gretchen's fiancé *Karina Logue as Stephanie "Steph" Dolworth, Hank's sister (Karina and Donal Logue are real-life siblings as well) *

Alison Elliott Alison Elliott (born May 19, 1970) is an American actress. She was nominated for a Screen Actors Guild Award for the 1997 film '' The Wings of the Dove''. Her other film appearances include ''The Spitfire Grill'' (1996), ''Birth'' (2004), '' The ...

as Laura Ross, a muckraking blogger *

Michael Gaston Michael Gaston is an American film and television actor. He played agent Quinn on the show ''Prison Break'', Gray Anderson on the CBS drama series ''Jericho'', and appeared in the first episode of ''The Sopranos'' as Alex Mahaffey, a compulsive g ...

as Ben Zeitlin, local attorney *

Maximiliano Hernández Maximiliano Hernández (born September 12, 1973) is an American actor. He is best known for portraying Agent Jasper Sitwell in the Marvel Cinematic Universe and FBI Agent Chris Amador in the first season of ''The Americans''. Early life A nati ...

as Ray, Britt's former criminal associate *Daren Scott as Burke (the "man in the tan suit"), Zeitlin's "muscle" *Alex Fernie as Swift, one of the "Squatters" *Alex Berg as Blodgett, one of the "Squatters" *Todd Fasen as Gunt, one of the "Squatters" *Johnny Sneed as Professor Elliot Owen, Katie's college teacher *

Rachel Miner Rachel Anne Miner is an American actress. She first came to prominence for her portrayal of Michelle Bauer on the television soap opera ''Guiding Light'' (1990–95). She made her film debut in Woody Allen's ''Alice'' (1990), and later earned cr ...

as Eleanor Gosney, daughter of Hank's old drinking buddy *Craig Susser as Detective Ronnie Reynolds, Mark's current partner on the force *Stephen Frejek as Officer Robledo, a fellow cop * Zack Silva as Gavin, Katie's college friend * Christopher Cousins as Robert Lindus, local land developer

Reception

On the review aggregation website

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...

, the series holds an approval rating of 93% with an average rating of 6.7 out of 10, based on 27 reviews. The website's critical consensus reads, "Well-acted and quite funny, ''Terriers'' breathes quirky new life into the detective show."

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...

, which uses a weighted average, assigned the series a score of 75 out of 100 based on 24 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews." ''

Time Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, to ...

James Poniewozik James "Jim" Poniewozik (; born July 12, 1968) is an American journalist and television critic. He is the chief TV critic for ''The New York Times''. Earlier in his career, he wrote ''Time'' magazine's ''Tuned In'' column for 16 years. Early life ...

ranked ''Terriers'' at #10 on his top 10 list of television shows in 2010. ''

The Daily Beast ''The Daily Beast'' is an American news website focused on politics, media, and pop culture. It was founded in 2008. It has been characterized as a "high-end tabloid" by Noah Shachtman, the site's editor-in-chief from 2018 to 2021. In a 20 ...

'' Jace Lacob selected the show as part of his top 10 shows of 2010. ''

HitFix HitFix, or HitFix.com, was an entertainment news website that launched in December 2008 specializing in breaking entertainment news, insider information, and reviews and critiques of film, music, and television. In mid-2010 HitFix crossed the 1,00 ...

''s

Alan Sepinwall Alan Sepinwall (born October 19, 1973) is an American television reviewer and writer. He spent 14 years as a columnist with ''The Star-Ledger'' in Newark until leaving the newspaper in 2010 to work for the entertainment news website HitFix. He th ...

ranked ''Terriers'' at #3 on his top 10 list for 2010 as well as #1 on his list of best new shows of 2010. ''

The A.V. Club ''The A.V. Club'' is an American online newspaper and entertainment website featuring reviews, interviews, and other articles that examine films, music, television, books, games, and other elements of pop-culture media. ''The A.V. Club'' was cre ...

'' ranked it as #7 on their list of best shows of 2010.

IGN ''IGN'' (formerly ''Imagine Games Network'') is an American video game and entertainment media website operated by IGN Entertainment Inc., a subsidiary of Ziff Davis, Inc. The company's headquarters is located in San Francisco's SoMa distri ...

's Matt Fowler gave the entire season a "10" and called it a "massively gratifying TV experience like no other." IGN also gave ''Terriers'' their award for "Best New Series of 2010." The series received a nomination for Outstanding New Program by the

Television Critics Association The Television Critics Association (TCA) is a group of approximately 200 United States and Canadian television critics, journalists and columnists who cover television programming for newspapers, magazines and web publications. The TCA accepts app ...

Episodes

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Terriers (Tv Series) 2010s American comedy-drama television series 2010 American television series debuts 2010 American television series endings 2010s American crime drama television series English-language television shows FX Networks original programming Ocean Beach, San Diego Serial drama television series Television shows set in San Diego Television series by 20th Century Fox Television Fictional portrayals of the San Diego Police Department Neo-noir television series